“So. You're looking for a job. How fortunate, I have one that needs doing.”

“Two more on your left!”

Some day, far in the distant future, I would be able to look back on this day, and perhaps then I would actually understand why I was here. At the moment, I could only think of it as the stupidest decision that I had been a part of in a long while. There wasn't any sort of justifiable reason for us to be here, not to my thinking.

Don't get me wrong, the payout would be spectacular. The client had offered a sum on the order of five thousand caps for the rescue and delivery of the caravan that had been captured. On the face of it, a pony might have been forgiven for being skeptical of such a weighty compensation for a rescue mission. An offer like that could have been thought of as 'too good'. Perhaps even a trap meant to ensnare the foolhardy and greedy.

At this moment, with the odds that we were facing, I might even have been inclined to lean that way as well. Except that I knew better. The payout had been that large, not to entice the overly bold, but to get the attention of larger groups. A band of, say, two dozen mercenaries wouldn't be very motivated to take on jobs that paid out shares that totaled in the dozens of caps for their efforts. But for a few hundred each? Two dozen armed ponies would have had little trouble doing what the three of us were attempting. In all reality, they'd have been long done by now.

The client had tried to explain that same notion to us, but Windfall wasn't having any of it. It wasn't that she was interested in getting rich. Caps and bits didn't hold the same appeal for the pegasus that they did for me, not really. All that the flier had needed to hear was that eight ponies were being held in a bandit stronghold, and that their captors were threatening to turn them over to the White Hooves if a hefty ransom wasn't paid. Killing bad pones, rescuing good ponies, and depriving the White Hooves of slaves. That was a veritable hat trick of what made up the perfect job in Windfall's mind.

So, here we were. Embroiled in a job farther out of our weight class than sanity dictated, with a plan that was possessed of all the tactical brilliance and finesse that I had come to expect from the brash young flier:

Show up and shoot things.

I took Foxglove's warning to heart and dove behind half of an old cart that looked to have been constructed without the intent of fitting it with any sort of wheels. A good number of the conveyances in this old scrapyard looked like they'd never been intended to spend much time on the ground actually. It was labeled as being the 'Las Pegasus Salvage Yard' on my pipbuck. I took that to mean that it had once been associated with a pegasus settlement, and as such I guess their carts and wagons would have been of the flying and not the wheeled variety.

The wreckage didn't offer as much protection as I would have preferred. I was pelted with splinters of debris as lead rounds chewed through the cart around me. Fuck this. I plucked a grenade out of my saddlebag, relieved it of the stem at the top and lobbed it over the cart. The gunfire directed at me stopped abruptly and was replaced by a pair of curses. A few seconds later, a thunderous explosion and a tremor that set my molars wiggling washed over the area. I wasted little time and sprinted around the side of the cart, engaging SATS as the two ponies came into view.

Two rounds pumped into the torso of one of them was all that the pipbuck had the energy to support. Which was acceptable, as I was more than up to the task of putting down the second on my own with manually aimed shots. Their flimsy brahmin-skin barding offered paltry protection against the brutality of Full Stop's powerful cartridges. Blood and viscera splashed across the rusted metal hulks of the old salvage yard as my bullets wrought their terrible destruction upon the raiders' bodies.

Above me, I heard the chattering of twin 10mm submachine guns and the screams of pain that soon followed. Windfall banked low as she strafed a stack of massive wagons which comprised the fortifications that surrounded the base of operations used by the ponies here. A unicorn standing on the top of the uppermost wagon, where he'd been using a sniper rifle to keep Foxglove and I from getting too brave with our advances, toppled limply over the side. He dropped like an old doll, bouncing haphazardly against the exterior of his former stronghold.

Other ponies raked the sky with protesting rounds. At least one or two crimson lances of light sought the flier as well. In response to the barrage of fire, Windfall tucked in her wings and dove for the deck. I lost her momentarily behind some wreckage, but before I could concern myself with whether or not she'd struck the ground, I spotted a blur of white and teal sweeping around stacks of rusting hulks so close to the ground that she may as well have been running on her own legs. Only when she was far beyond the effective range of the raiders' fire did she arc back up into the sky in preparation for another attack.

The sniper was out of action, this would be our best chance to move in on the entrance. I glanced around, seeking out the violet unicorn I knew had to be nearby somewhere. Foxglove was cautiously peeking out from around a pile of corrugated sheet metal, “come on!” I waved and started running towards the towering construction that was our target.

This is so ridiculous.

You're preaching to the choir, I mentally snorted at my sister's observation. The barricaded entrance loomed just ahead. The guards and watches along the exterior of the fortress had been taken care of, but the pipbuck suggested that there were still upwards of a dozen armed ponies waiting for us within. I could also see a small cluster of yellow blips nestled off to the side. The missing caravan that Windfall had volunteered us to find. Hopefully they be somewhere out of the line of fire.

I watched the unicorn mare levitate the improvised breaching charge she'd constructed earlier out of her saddlebag and start affixing it to the gate. Their attention would be rather firmly cemented on us the moment we made our entrance. I plucked a couple more grenades out of my bags.

You never should have agreed to this.

Windfall would have just done it on her own anyway, I pointed out. Not that I imagined for a moment that Whiplash really cared much about the pegasus' well-being. I did though. Which was why'd I'd agreed to follow her on what I privately thought of as a 'fool's errand'. Whether this was Windfall putting me through some sort of test to prove I was determined to be a 'good' pony, or the flier's determination to emulate the feats being performed by the Lone Ranger out in Manehattan, I couldn't be sure. I knew it was stupid and reckless in either case. However, I wasn't exactly the sort of pony that Windfall was going to be listening to any time soon.

So, while I might not be able to talk her out of her insane mission, I could at least be there to keep her alive long enough to come to her senses.

Granted, that did presume that whatever trouble Windfall got us into was something that the three of us could actually hope to overcome. Storming this bandit stronghold in order to rescue a bunch of captured ponies might have been a bit further on the side of 'ambitious' than I was comfortable with. For the moment we were doing well though.

“It's ready,” Foxglove nodded as she completed the setting of the charge.

I reached around and snagged one of the flares from its carrier on the side of my barding and struck it against the ground. It sputtered to life, gushing crimson fire and casting the occasional sparkling flake as two century old fuel burned as best it could. I quickly cast the flare out into the open and then withdrew behind some cover, “do it.”

The violet unicorn tapped a button on the side of the device that she'd built and backed away from it, seeking shelter of her own. I looked about, my attention focused on the amber display that the pipbuck projected across my field of vision. Eventually, I spied the yellow dot moving far too quickly to be a pony running along the ground. While she was not visible with my bare eyes, I recognized the blip that was Windfall reacting to the flare. The blip started arcing around the backside of the cobbled together fortress.

When the charge detonated, there was no concussive explosion; but instead a sound much like a discharge of electricity. A green light of blinding intensity flashed from the direction of the gate. Even though I wasn't directly looking at it, I reflexively closed my eyes and turned my head even more away from its brilliance. This lasted for only a few seconds and then, as suddenly as it had come, the light and noise both ceased. I opened my eyes and glanced questioningly at the unicorn.

She urgently waved at me to get through the gate. Curious, as I had heard nothing that had really sounding like the reinforced metal portal being blasted open, I craned my head around. I blinked in surprise. Where the gate had previously been, was now a rather startling opening in the shape of a circle. A remarkably smooth and perfectly rounded circle. Through that opening, I could see the faces of at least four other ponies that were looking in my direction with expressions that encompassed varying degrees of surprise.

Huh...I guess that was it. As big as the charge had looked, I had really expected something with a more pronounce 'boom'.

Well, it was what it was; and concussive blast or no, the bandit ponies within were still obviously stunned to see me peeking through their barricaded front entrance where a gate had once been. Their surprise wouldn't last forever of course. Time to get to work.

I leaped out into the open now, tossing the grenades held in my mouth up into the air with a sharp flick of my head that ripped the arming stems right off them. Then a deft spin that left my rear exposed for a brief moment as I coiled on my forehooves. My eyes watched the apple-shaped steel orbs descend until I judged the moment to be right. A solid buck with each of my hind legs shot the armed grenades off through the opening at the hesitating bandits beyond. One or two recognized what was happening quickly enough to take appropriate cover, but their companions seemed to not actually notice what I was doing at all. Their minds still trying to ferret out where their gate had wandered off to.

Full Stop was in my mouth before I finished whirling around to face the fortress' interior. Mirrored bursts of smoke and shrapnel greeted my sight, screams of pain and death riding their coattails. Facing directly into a pair of explosions, even ones as moderately far off as those of my grenades, was not the most prudent of courses of action. I knew this well, and my dismissal of the risks earned me several painful cuts as tiny fragments of superheated steel found their marks in my flesh. It was as much as I had anticipated, and I knew that a lethal wound would have been a miracle at such a range. They were injuries I was forced to accept if I was going to truly take full advantage of the momentum our assault was building.

These ponies were no strangers to combat in general. While I doubted they saw many actual assaults on their home from armed ponies, let alone a band as small as ours was, the surprise our audacity had earned us had quickly passed. Once it had, their response had been viscous and determined. It had only abated briefly once more when Windfall fell upon from the skies. Many of the bandits found that their barricades and cover meant to shield them from ground-based attacks offered little shelter from a hail of lead rained down on them from above. Once more their resistance had buckled for a time and allowed us to advance quickly to their gates.

It was not hard for them to mitigate the worst that Windfall could do to them by dedicating a few of their number to directing their attention to the air and warding her off with volume of fire. They didn't have to necessarily kill the pegasus if they could keep her from lining up truly effective strafing runs by denying her huge swaths of the sky with their energy blasts and torrents of bullets.

Now we had breached their sanctuary, and once more our group enjoyed a temporary reprieve from their coordinated defense of their home as they desperately adjusted their positions in search of effective cover and fields of fire. This area could very quickly become a killing field if the bandits were given half a chance. I needed to do everything that I could to deny them that opportunity.

So I charged in.

SATS offered me invaluable moments to appraise the threats around me as I cantered through the interior of the bandits' lair. My grenades had been well placed. Three corpses lay splayed on the ground, their bodies ravaged by supersonic shards of metal and pummeled with a point blank concussive blast that would have ruptured most of their internal organs. I few ponies had escaped the worst of it, but were clearly still disoriented by their proximity to the detonations. Having been present far closer than I would have liked to such explosions in the past, I was well aware of how their senses would have been affected.

The first mare I killed probably hadn't even regained enough of her hearing to register the gunshot that blew out her rib cage. She certainly hadn't heard me running up beside her. The earth pony stallion sitting next to her may not have heard me either, but his partner's blood splashing across his face had certainly alerted him to the nearby danger. Not that he was in much of a position to do anything about it. Clearly, he'd been relying on the mare to cover him while he applied a bandage to a gash on his left leg. His eyes went immediately to his comrade. When he saw that she was certainly dead, the stallion's gaze went to me.

I didn't engage SATS. At this range, it would have been a waste of magical energy that I suspected I'd be calling upon rather shortly. Still, meeting the gaze of the earth pony bandit, time had seemed to slow down considerably. His rifle lay nearby, but he didn't make a move for it. Why bother? He'd be dead in the next second anyway. Instead of offering a token resistance, he spent that last second of his life looking right at me. No fear. Not even any sign of defiance really. Just a sort of...acceptance.

Why so surprised? Whiplash mused, stroking her chin with an idle hoof, you've had that same look before.

The back of the stallion's head opened up and painted the ground with blood and brains as my bullet drilled through his skull; and I was off again running through the stronghold. I glanced at the pipbuck to confirm what I already suspected and cringed as I saw that the revolver was empty. In hindsight, I should have reloaded while Foxglove was planting the charge at the gate, but I hadn't. Maybe I could find some temporary cover and reload, but I'd just be giving these ponies the perfect opportunity to pin me down. I had to stay mobile.

Full Stop was returned to its holster and my 9mm drawn in its place. Less power per bullet, but quite a few rounds before I'd need to reload. I started off by firing a few of them towards a unicorn mare who had finally worked up the courage to survey the aftermath of my entrance. An automatic rifle hovered nearby, gripped in a golden glow. None of my hastily fired shots struck home, but the sparks as the copper-jacketed slugs skipped off her cover sent the mare back behind her barricade. The rifle remained however, and answered my gunfire with a few sprays of its own.

They were not aimed bursts, but there were enough bullets coming at me that she must have figured that she'd get lucky. I declined diving for cover, and instead charged her position. I engaged SATS. As the device was want to do, it defaulted to the nearest threatening pony, which was the bandit unicorn mare huddle behind her cover. Unsurprisingly, the pipbuck indicated that my rounds had exactly zero chance of striking my target. No problem, as she was not what I was interested in shooting. I mentally tabbed to the rifle suspended in the air.

Huh. Fifty-fifty chance. While a remarkable piece of Old World technology, I often found myself unimpressed with my pipbuck's marksmareship. At this range, I could almost certainly hit an object the size of the rifle nine times out of ten at worst. Then again, I had to concede that I was running at a rather brisk pace and more than a little stressed besides. I honestly wouldn't have trusted myself to have perfect accuracy against any target larger than a pony that wasn't within hooves reach. So I queued up three shots to be safe and commanded the pipbuck to execute.

The second round struck home while the first and third went wild. The golden aura enveloping the weapon dissolved and it clattered to the ground. I heard a hushed curse just as I came charging around the corner of the mare's barricade. I was just in time to see her making a break for the other end of the long wall of metal in an effort to escape to safety. My pistol bucked in my mouth as I galloped after her. The first round caught her in the right flank, causing her to stumble slightly. The misstep allowed my second round to sail harmlessly past her, but the third and fourth buried themselves in her left foreleg. The unicorn tumbled rather ungracefully into the dirt with a pained cry.

When I caught up to her, I ended the altercation with another pair to her chest.

I brought the world around me to a halt with SATS once more. Not to engage any specific target, but to have a moment to appraise my surroundings. Five red blips remained. A cluster of nearly half a dozen gold blips lay to my left. Judging by the position of the two singular gold blips, Foxglove was still by the door keeping out of harms way. Windfall was nearly where she needed to be. That was good. My attention was directed to the locations of the remaining hostiles.

Altitude was difficult to gauge with the compass at the bass of my vision, but with SATS actively engaged, I was permitted the chance to cycle through and get a bearing on each individual target. Two of them were on upper levels, looking to be moving to positions where they could get a better angle on the interior of the stronghold. Great. The other three were at ground level with me already. Two were behind cover across the way and one was...

Oh fuck.

My eyes were staring directly at the steel barricade, but I was actually looking at the pony beyond them. The pony which was apparently in the middle of a charge directed right at me. Up and over and gun me down from the direction that I'd least expect it. Bold plan. One that almost certainly would have worked too if I hadn't looked around the way I was.

Your accuracy sucks, but I do love your situational awareness, pipbuck.

I didn't have the energy built up to engage SATS the moment they vaulted over the barricade and gun them down in mid air, but I probably wouldn't need magical assistance now that I knew where they'd be coming from. Instead I disengaged the pipbuck's magical assistance program and fell onto my back, my pistol aimed at the top of my cover.

A dark shape leaped into view and I fired. The slide bounced with the recoil of my shots until locking back after the third. Then my eyes went wide. I'd stuck the pony with all three rounds. Only, it hadn't been a pony at all. It had just been a cloak, which landed next to me in a heap, unimpressed by my gunfire.

There was a flash of movement in the corner of my left eye. Well played, you clever bastard. I spat the empty weapon out of my mouth and rolled up onto my hooves ready to receive my attacker. My eyes widened as I saw the near-blur of red, black, and white charging towards me. Was that a-

I reared up and only just managed to block the kick that was lashed out at me. A strike that was followed up quickly by a second kick as the pony's body twisted in midair. Only, that was wrong, wasn't it? It wasn't a pony that I was fighting, but a zebra! The unexpected nature of the follow-up kick didn't break my block, but it was enough to make me take a step back.

Their 'barding' consisted of crimson robes that were so dark in hue they were nearly brown. Little of their body was actually visible beneath the robes, and even their face was almost entirely obscured by a cowl that was wrapped around their muzzle; but their striped legs and the preposterously straight monochromatic mane were dead giveaways regarding their species.

What was a zebra doing here?!

There wasn't a lot of time for me to process theories of course. My striped attacker had achieved an advantage in the fight by forcing me to give ground early on, and seemed keen to press their attacks. My body was working overtime trying to keep pace with them, and even try to lash out with an attack or two of my own. My parries were marginally successful, but my jabs were swept aside with hardly any effort at all. Then they surprised me even further by rearing up on a single hind leg with their forelegs stretched to either side. I hesitated at the sight. Which was a mistake.

I hardly saw the kick snap out at me, but I most certainly felt its effects. The force of the blow sent me tumbling backwards out from behind the barricade. Great. Not only was I fighting a zebra, but it was one of the ones that knew that weird zebra fighting style I'd heard about. Figured. This was not going to go well for me. By all accounts, only a few ponies could top them in a bare-hoofed brawl.

My ear twitched as I heard the unmistakable sound of a shotgun chamber a round. My head looked out across the stronghold's interior. Oh, right. I was no longer behind cover now. The pair of ponies that had been behind cover earlier were out in the open as well, their weapon's trained on my exposed body.

Then the ground around them seemed to explode in a cascade of dirt and rocks. The ponies themselves looked little better as their bodies opened up from a dozen nearly simultaneous wounds. The chattering of twin submachine guns echoing up above heralded the source of the slaughter as Windfall swooped in low to the ground as a follow-up to her nearly vertical dive just now. She didn't land, but instead worked her way into an upward spiral, offering a parting hail of bullets to one of the ponies on an upper level even as another pony began to blast away at her with lances or furious crimson death. I heard a scream amid the gunshots as Windfall darted out of sight. My pipbuck confirmed that there were only two red blips remaining within its range. A pony on the upper levels, and the zebra facing me.

I took advantage of the reprieve and rolled back onto my feet, facing the zebra. Idly, I sort of wished that they'd been Windfall's target. Armed ponies I could generally handle. Zebras with better hoof-to-hoof combat skills than me? This was going to be a real challenge. Maybe I could keep them occupied long enough for the pegasus to get into position for a second pass.

That being said...

I reached into my saddlebags and withdrew the last of my grenades. Then I saw the zebra charging at me once more. Horseapples! I hopped back, which put me outside of their first strike, but they were quick to follow it up with a flurry of additional jabs and kicks. I was forced to give ground with nearly very blow. A few swipes directed towards my mouth kept me acutely aware of the explosive clutched precariously in my teeth. The last thing I needed was for this zebra to get their hooves on an actual weapon!

Not that it was looking like I was going to have a whole lot of choice at this rate. There was no way that I was going to win in a straight up fight like this on their terms. The zebra was simply too quick. I needed to stop fighting their kind of battle.

This was going to hurt...

I staggered under the assault and my guard dropped. Seizing upon the opening, the zebra lashed out with a devastating kick. It certainly hurt quite a lot, and the zebra drove it home hard. I noted that I felt part of my rib cage noticeably shift. I'd had broken and cracked ribs before, of course. I'm not saying that I was used to the pain, but it wasn't exactly anything like a surprise either. I grit my teeth against the sudden fiery agony and swept my foreleg—which had been up far too high to block a kick but was in the perfect position for what I intended—down and locked the zebra's leg into the crook of my fetlock. I then spun into the zebra and threw the full weight of my body into a blow which sent the pair of us to the ground.

There was the sound of somepony that wasn't me gasping as we hit the ground and I wasted no time in following up the grapple with a few backwards blows into the zebra's face with my other arm. I managed to get a couple of decent hits in before I felt the much more lithe form beneath me contort themselves into what I would have thought to be some rather impossible shapes and slip out of my grasp. Their departure was followed up by a swift kick to my back which made me grunt. Even the plating of my barding didn't feel like it had done much to soften the hit. I was glad I decided to keep the stolen Republic armor, though it had since acquired a less ostentatious color scheme. I shuddered to think that the strike might have even paralyzed me if I'd been unarmored.

So the tally was at least a cracked rib from the kick earlier, and a bruised vertebrae or two just now. I wasn't positive that I'd come out on top in that exchange just then.

I rolled up onto my hooves once more and squared off against the zebra, ready for their next push. A smirk touched my lips as I finally got a good look at the results of my blows. The zebra was shaking their head, their right eye half-lidded now. I could already see their flesh darkening around it as the bruise set in. While I doubted that it was ultimately as damaging as their blows had been to me, I was prepared to savor that small accomplishment. At the very least, they seemed a lot more hesitant about closing with me. Which was fine, as it gave me time for what I'd planned earlier.

A quick flick of my head sent the grenade still clutched in my teeth into the air, sans stem. I sprung onto my forehooves and held the pose for a brief moment as the explosive charge fell back towards the ground. This would be a trickier shot, so I brought SATS in to help. A single target, and a single grenade, and the pipbuck executed. The steel ball arced high into the air and vanished into the upper levels. Then SATS ended and the zebra was almost right on top of me again.

This time I had a good idea of what I needed to do. Their hoof work was impeccable, I wouldn't deny that. But their grappling ability was a lot rougher. They were clearly used to ponies keeping their distance. That probably meant that they didn't have a whole lot of experience with holds either.

I didn't hop away this time. Instead, I actually leaped towards my zebra attacker. I paid for my audacity with a blow to my jaw, but my tactic was obviously unexpected and the hit had been a glancing one. The zebra balked after the first blow was landed and actually tried to reverse course and back away from me, sensing their danger. It was too late though. My leg was wrapping itself around their neck in preparation to draw them into my grasp and end this fight.

Then their elbow caught me in the face. Something else caught me in the gut immediately after that. It felt like a knee. Then a hoof drilled into my shoulder and I was no longer anywhere near the zebra. I could barely move or even breath. They'd hit me pretty hard in a lot of vulnerable places all at once. It was like they'd...

Horseapples. They'd suckered me.

“Well played,” I gasped as I struggled back onto my hooves. The zebra remained silent, staring me down with their cold gaze. Probably for the best that they weren't the talkative sort. From what I'd heard, zebras weren't great conversationalists anyway. Didn't mean I couldn't chat though. It'd take my mind off the pain somewhat, “but I'm not done yet, asshole,” I drew my knife from its sheath and adopted a defensive stance which was far less steady than I would have liked it to be. My shoulder didn't seem to want to support a lot of my weight at the moment. I didn't have time to inject any Med-X either.

A thunderclap and a scream sounded from above. I quirked an eyebrow and glanced up. Several tendrils of smoke were snaking their way out from beneath the roof of one of the upper levels. No red dot was present on my Eyes Forward Sparkle, “seriously?” I couldn't help but comment with a note of disdain, “that had to have been like a ten second fuse on that fucker. How'd that idiot still get killed by it?” The zebra, though remaining silent, was looking upward with a narrowed gaze that suggested they shared my low opinion of the victim.

“Not exactly recruiting the best and brightest, are you?” now their cold stare was back on me, “it's just you and me now,” my lips tugged in a smile. I was beaten and battered, but this was probably still a fight that was going to end in my favor very soon now.

Then the zebra was charging me again. I steeled myself in preparation to fight them off, but at the last second, my attacker actually jumped over me. I spun around in an effort to keep my knife between us, but before I could complete the maneuver the zebra grabbed my tail with their hooves and heaved. There was a whole new sort of pain and I found myself being thrown, bodily, by my tail. My landing was far from graceful as I rolled head over hooves into a collection of tables and chairs. Glass and ceramics shattered around me as the contents of those tables fell to the floor. I finally came to a stop once I slammed into a line of crates.

Ouch...

A strong odor suggested that much of the wetness I was feeling all over my body was mostly alcohol, and not all blood. However, I was certainly doing some bleeding too. I grit my teeth as I slowly got back up, noting that I no longer had my knife. A yellow blip that I had been watching come up behind the zebra darted behind me and out of sight. I'd heard no sound of gunfire from a familiar pair of weapons, and the reason for that was quite apparent, as the two of us were now underneath a roof. Judging from what I'd been thrown through, I was going to guess a bar of some sort. Even bandits liked to drink, after all.

Windfall could come in and land on her next pass, now that she knew nothing was shooting back at her, but that would take her time that I wasn't sure I had. It was getting a lot harder to stay on my hooves, and I'd so far only managed to give this zebra a black eye. They were tearing me apart.

The zebra closed once more. I brought up a hoof to ward of a high angled kick, but I couldn't deflect it in my battered state. Instead, I just ended up being hit in the face by my own leg and toppled over to the side. I was once more on the ground struggling to get up. A blow to my ribs that I didn't even see coming set me rolling through a table that I'd somehow missed during my initial entrance.

They were toying with me, I realized. I'd killed all their little friends, so they were going to take their time with me. Good. It'd give Windfall time to get into position. All I had to do was buy a little more time. I reached out and started to get back up once again. Beneath my hoof, I felt a slender metal pole. Probably a broken table leg. It'd do as a weapon I guess. I looked towards the zebra, who was preparing to deliver another swift kick to my gut, and engaged SATS. I targeted the zebra's head, grimacing as I noticed I had only the power for the single strike. It was something at least. I acknowledge the attack order and let the pipbuck do the rest.

I lashed out with the pole, mustering as much power as I could. The trajectory was right on the money. Then the zebra brought up an impossibly fast hoof that not only stopped my swing, but somehow managed to harness the momentum of it. I could barely make out what was happening as I found myself swept up in an impromptu spin that ended with myself being held up against the zebra with the pole in her hooves crushing my windpipe. That...had gone poorly.

Horseapples.

My left shoulder was too injured to allow that arm much use, and my right arm alone possessed nowhere near the strength that I required to break free of the zebra's grip. I couldn't even do much to relieve the pressure that was compressing my throat. As I thrashed as best I could and gurgled in a struggle for breath, my soon to be killer still said nothing.

“Hooves off!”

Windfall? No. That hadn't been the voice of the pegasus.

“Foxglove?”

Only, it had really sounded a lot more like, “kkg-ggr?” as the surprised word made an effort to squeeze through my constricted larynx. What the fuck was she thinking?! What the hell did she know about fighting?

Next to nothing I soon discovered as the unicorn leaped bodily onto the back of the zebra. Though, to the unicorn's credit, it was a move that the zebra had obviously not anticipated. After all, only a complete moron would do such a thing in a fight like this. Complete morons we had thus far proven ourselves not to be.

Things change, I guess.

At least the pole was removed from my neck as the zebra released me in order to deal with the new arrival. However much time Foxglove thought she was going to buy me with that move, I think it had to have been more than she actually did. Because it sure wasn't much. I watched with a sympathetic cringe as the zebra deftly removed the violet mare from her back with a quick jab to the unicorn's face and a hardy sweep of the metal pole. Foxglove grunted with the blow and looked to try and wrench the pole away from the zebra. Surprisingly, the zebra seemed to let her have it with little protest, choosing instead to double-buck the unicorn across the bar where she landed in a heap that didn't immediately move.

Whiplash was very slowly clapping for the performance, you tried, she cooed sarcastically.

The mare's got spirit. Fewer brains than I thought, but plenty of spirit.

I felt the presence of another pony nearby. That would be the zebra again. I turned my head, and indeed the robed equine was standing over me, “s'up? You ready to give up yet?” their eyes narrowed dangerously. I started choking once more as a hoof began to apply direct pressure to my throat.

“choking fetish, huh?” I gurgled out, “that's cool...”

I can't decide if you're being brave or trying to get them to kill you quickly, Whiplash said with a wry smile.

Just trying to buy a little time.

For what?

Bottles of Jennyson and Steernov exploded as a burst of gunfire ripped through one of the shelves nearby. The weight on my throat eased considerably as the zebra's attention was drawn away from me, and towards the ivory pegasus and the two smoking barrels strapped to her side. The flier's piercing blue eyes bore deep holes into the zebra standing over me.

“Get away from him.”

The lithe little pegasus was certainly a sight to behold right now. There was fire in those eyes. The zebra didn't move away from me as she had demanded, but instead swooped around and ripped me up off the ground. I soon found myself being used as a living shield between the zebra and Windfall. Great, a stand-off. This could go on for a while.

Windfall frowned, but she kept her guns trained on the pair of us, “it's over,” she informed the zebra, “all your friends are dead,” the pegasus didn't make a move to get any closer to myself or my zebra captor. She didn't need to. There was nowhere for the striped equine to escape to with the pegasus blocking the way to the courtyard and the gate beyond, “let him go, and you can walk out of here.”

Awe, listen to her, bargaining for your life. It's sweet.

“Ponies with silver,” for such a powerful zebra, her—as the soft soprano was indeed that of a mare—voice was eerily sweet, “poisoning their honeyed words, would promise the world.”

“What?” the confused question was echoed by me and Windfall both.

The frown on Windfall's face deepened noticeably, “don't make me kill you,” she growled.

“Gone goes temptation,” the mare cooed with a sinister smile, “with the carrot cast aside, she presents the stick.”

“Oh, for Celestia's sake,” I croaked, “what does that even mean?” I guessed from the fact that I was still being held tight that the zebra wasn't exactly agreeing to Windfall's demands. This couldn't possibly go on forever of course. The zebra had to know that. She could plainly see that she was surrounded and outgunned; so what was she holding out for?

“I'm offering you a way out,” the pegasus stressed, “if you refuse, I won't be responsible for the consequences.”

“Promise of freedom; reprisals offered in kind; words in arid winds.”

The zebra thinks that Windfall's just bluffing, I realized. There might even be something to that. Held the way that I was, the pegasus didn't have a very clear shot at the striped mare. If she used armor piercing rounds, they'd go through me and strike the zebra as well. I doubted that the pegasus would be quite so determined to get the zebra that she'd be willing to kill me in the process. The two of us might not be on the greatest of terms, I know, but I don't think we were quite right there at this moment. A week ago, maybe.

Are you so sure? Whiplash whispered in my head, how many raiders have you seen Windfall spare?

Yeah, she was pretty ruthless. I'd taught her not to let ponies linger around who could prove a threat to you later. Still, she'd never been willing to harm an innocent in order to get at a target.

So you're an innocent now?

Well...I mean...

Horseapples.

I could almost see the debate going on behind Windfall's eyes. She didn't want to let this zebra live, but at the same time she wasn't willing to put both of us down just to get at her. I saw her mouth playing with the firing mechanism on her battle-saddle as she mulled over her options. Finally, she seemed to make a decision.

“What do you want?” the pegasus sounded defeated as she resigned herself to negotiating with her adversary.

“A swift exodus; worryless provisioning,” there was a noticeable tightening of her arm around my throat that made me gag slightly, “token of safety.”

Awesome. She wanted a hostage to make sure that Windfall would be on her best behavior. The problem with that was...there was no end game as far as I was concerned. The zebra had to know that, right? Especially with me in tow, she would never be able to outrun Windfall and Foxglove. When they caught up, we'd just go through this whole thing all over again until the zebra either got to where she wanted to go, or she felt that the pegasus had overstepped one two many times and killed me in reprisal.

Either way, it didn't end well for me. Whether this mare was on her way back to zebra lands or some other group of bandits, I suffer more or less a similar fate. I wasn't going to let that happen, thank you very much. I'd already been a prisoner this month, and had little interest in reliving the experience. So, since I had very little to lose, it seemed like a good time time to do something stupid and hope that it worked out for the best. All that I had to do was give Windfall a clear shot at the zebra, not escape and subdue her entirely. I hurt in a lot of places, but I could probably manage that little thing.

“Head's up!”

You have got to be fucking shitting me, I mentally groaned. What the fuck was Foxglove thinking?!

The zebra and I both looked over as the unicorn mare charged us. The pole was hovering at her side, wrapped in her magic's emerald glow. I foresaw this working about as well as it had the last time she had come at the zebra. Especially since this time she wasn't in anywhere near a position to surprise the striped mare the way that she had before. In anticipation of a repeated failure, I cringed as I saw the unicorn swing the metal pole and the zebra throw up a deft hoof to deflect the blow.

Then I saw the pole pass right through the upraised hoof as though it wasn't even there. No...it was more than that, I soon realized as the striped hoof and fetlock detached themselves from the rest of the zebra's leg and fall to the ground. Blood streamed from the newly formed stump, gushing up like a rhythmic geyser.

That...it...how?

The zebra was just as stunned as I was by the realization that their hoof was no longer a part of their body. Her other arm went limp around my neck, letting me fall to the bloody floor in a grunting heap. Her eyes stared numbly at the severed limb. Then, after several seconds, she finally screamed and doubled over in an effort to staunch the flow of blood with her other hoof.

They didn't even seem to register that they had discarded their cover. I noticed though, and I hugged the ground as a stream of bullets streaked above me and shredded the robed zebra. Upwards of two dozen rounds ripped through the air and rendered the zebra into a bloody mess. The corpse crumpled to the floor next to me.

Silence hung over the bar. The pegasus release the mouthpiece of her battle saddle and stepped over to inspect her work. She stared down at the broken body, “all you had to do was walk away,” she murmured to herself. I looked up and saw the icy glint in her blue eyes. Her gaze shifted to me a moment later, but they softened only slightly, “are you okay?”

I nodded. I was many things, but the traditional definition of 'okay' was not among them. I was alive perhaps, but far from 'okay'. Broken ribs, a shoulder that felt dislocated, a sore back, and most of me was probably just a giant bruise despite the barding that I was wearing. The zebra hadn't been pulling her punches in that fight. Still, nothing that was wrong with me could be fixed by the pegasus, so there wasn't much sense in telling her about it.

“Alright,” she said softly and turned away. She glanced at Foxglove, offering a brief smile, “nice work. I'm going to go free the prisoner. See what you can do for Jackboot,” she flicked her head in my direction.

“No problem,” the unicorn nodded. She watched the pegasus flutter away and then approached me.

The pole still hovered at her side, and I looked at it warily for a moment before looking back at the zebra mare. Specifically, her stump of a leg. The cut was perfect. I'd seen a lot of Lancet's work over the years during my visits to Seaddle. He knew his way around the surgical table, and I'd seen first hoof the sorts of cuts that a scalpel could make as they effortlessly parted flesh. This looked like one of those surgical knives had completely bisected flesh, sinew, and bone like they were so much warm cram.

“Are you really alright?”

The tone of her voice suggested that the unicorn was dubious of the assurance that I'd given to Windfall earlier. That was probably fair. The pegasus wouldn't have been in a position to clearly see that beating that I'd taken in the exchange. Foxglove, on the other hoof, had been right at ground level and would have had a good view of everything from the open gate. Heck, with some of the blows, she'd probably been close enough to hear my bones snapping.

At the moment though, I was far more interested in the pole havering at her side than answering the unicorn's question. Now that I had a few spare moments to look at it up close, I realized that it wasn't exactly what I had thought it was when I'd first picked it up. That was no broken table leg, but some sort of specialized equipment or something. One end of it was tapered into a little nozzle, while the other end ballooned out slightly at the bottom. Honestly, it sort of resembled a pool cue, but I knew it wasn't one of those either. Though, if pool cues could sever limbs like that, they would have made more sense to me as being the weapon of choice for certain groups of raiders out east.

“What is that thing?” I asked, feeling a little nervous at having it so close by.

“Hm? Oh,” Foxglove brought the pole around in between us, which I instinctively flinched away from in case it happened to touch me, “it's an eldrich lance,” she answered with an amused smile at my reaction, “nothing to be afraid of. They're perfectly safe if you know how to work 'em.”

“And you do?” I quirked a skeptical eyebrow. The mare barely knew how to handle a pistol.

“Sure! I used these things all the time in the stable,” her telekinetic field set the metallic pole twirling in the air, “ain't no better way of turning large pieces of broken equipment into manageable bits than an e-lance!” I watched in stunned silence as the pole darted over to a nearby table and promptly diced it into sixteen nearly identical squares. She set the lance down next to her and smiled broadly down at me, “fabricator pony, remember?”

“Yeah, right,” my gaze lingered on the table. Somehow, I had felt a little better about having the unicorn around before I knew she was capable of dicing ponies into little bits with a flick of her horn. On the bright side, I guess she could start pulling a lot more weight in fights now though.

I tried to get back on my feet, but found myself grunting a lot louder than I had intended. A bottle of purple liquid and a syringe floated into my field of view and hung their for a moment. I nodded and opened my mouth. Foxglove obligingly helped me drink the healing potion while simultaneously jabbing the Med-X into my shoulder. Between the two, I felt a lot of my more pressing pains fade away into merely dull aches, but I could sense that I was once more going to be stiff for a good while. I was getting too old for this shit.

“Thanks, by the way,” I mumbled once I was back on all four hooves.

The unicorn acquired a broad smile, “at this rate, you'll be owing me,” she chimed in an amused tone. Then her attention went back to her magically powered lance as she twirled it lazily in the air. Her expression faltered subtly as she watched the device turn. I recognized that tiny mote of regret in her eyes. I'd seen it in my own reflection a time or two when I'd thought of the White Hooves long ago. That lance would likely forever be a reminder of what she had once had when she'd live in her stable.

Her face retained the smile, subdued though it was, as she threaded the lance through the straps of her saddlebags and finally released it from her magical grip. She looked over at the zebra, and her smile waned a little more. The unicorn mare studied the corpse for a while before finally speaking, “it felt different this time.”

“What did?” I asked, following her gaze.

“Killing,” was the purple mare's reply, “Tommyknocker was the first pony I'd ever killed, and doing it had felt,” she shrugged as she struggled to come up with the right word to describe the sensation, “cathartic? No, that wasn't it. But I felt like so much of the stress I'd been carrying inside me had been washed away. The source of so much pain and misery in my life was gone.

“I was relieved, that's it. But this time...”

“You didn't know this zebra,” I said, venturing into her little bout of introspection. I knew a few things about how killing could make a pony feel, “you didn't kill her because it was personal. She was just a threat, so she had to go. Like killing a bloatsprite. It's how it felt, isn't it? Like you killed a bloatsprite, or radroach, or some other vermin.”

“I...guess,” the unicorn sounded very uncomfortable at the prospect that I was correct. She looked up at me, “is that what it feels like for you and Windfall when you shoot a raider?”

“Yup.”

A slight hesitation, “what about when you were a White Hoof? You said you'd killed foals...”

There was a brief flash of a broken colt laying on the floor or a dark room, but I savagely ripped the scene from my thoughts, “don't let yourself get too focused on how it makes you feel,” I suggested coolly, “sentiment like that might make you hesitate. Then you're dead.”

“Right,” the unicorn nodded. She swallowed, and then her wan little smile was back, “let's go meet back up with Windfall.”

The pegasus had been busy while Foxglove and I were occupied. She'd freed the prisoners and was currently helping them gather together weapons and supplies for the trip. I could see that a few of them would be sloing us down a good bit as the limped about. Medical attention must not have been a high priority for their captors. It wouldn't surprise me if a few of them weren't a little weak from malnourishment either. A thought that was confirmed when the white pegasus and a yellow earth pony mare standing beside her noticed our approach.

“Homily,” the flier began by way of introduction, “these are Foxglove and Jackboot. Guys, this is, Homily. She'd the leader of the expedition.”

I inclined my head towards the yellow mare and then hesitated as my mind got around the processing Windfall's words, “expedition? I thought we were rescuing a caravan?”

My mind went back over the conversation that the three of us had had with the pony that had described the job to us. I was certain that he had described the group of ponies as the members of a convoy that had been ambushed on their route and captured.

“So did I,” Windfall confirmed with a wry smile, “we were just talking about that, actually,” she held the other mare's attention, “would you mind starting again from the top?”

“Of course,” Homily's voice was a fair bit deeper than I'd have expected, and a little scratchy as well; though I suspected that a good bit of that could be attributed to a low intake of water over the last few days. A theory reinforced by her taking frequent sips from a bottle of Sparkle-Cola she'd recently acquired.

She cleared her throat and began her explanation, “we're not traders,” she corrected, “we're on a mission to the nearby McMaren Calvary Base south of here.”

“Weapon salvage?” I guessed. Few other reasons to go to a military base, after all.

The earth pony surprised me by shaking her head, “not salvage, and not weapons. There's an old Ministry of Image facility on the base. Propaganda station during the war, complete with radio tower and everything you'd need to make regular broadcasts. We want to get it up and running again.”

“Why?” I felt compelled to ask, “there's already DJ Pony and the NLR Broadcasts. How many radio stations does the Wasteland need?”

“When's the last time DJ Pony mentioned anything that was happening in Neighvada?” Homily asked wryly, “and all Princess Luna does is talk about how the NLR is holding its own against the Steel Rangers. There's never any actual news that matters to the ponies here. We're looking to fix that.”

“What if the radio tower's broken?” I asked, “figure somepony else would have started doing just what you're aiming to if it worked at all.”

“Everypony here is an expert in electronics, magical circuitry, and telecommunications,” the mare informed us, “it doesn't matter how broken it is, we can get it back up and running eventually.”

Windfall chimed in now, “all you have are technical experts? Isn't anypony here a fighter?”

The yellow earth pony mare's expression darkened, “we had bodyguards,” she confirmed, but said no more on the matter.

The pegasus cringed momentarily, and then flashed a reassuring smile at the other mare, “well, you some more now. We'll get you to that tower safe and sound.”

“I appreciate that,” Homily forced a little smile as well, sharing it with all three of us, “you're all doing a good thing for Neighvada.

“If you'll excuse me,” she continued, “I should make sure everypony else is getting everything they need,” she nodded at each of us and then trotted off towards her comrades.

“I don't like it,” was the first thing out of my mouth the moment the mare was out of earshot. The comment earned me a couple of dubious looks from the others.

“She showed me a map, the tower isn't much farther away,” Windfall assure us, “we'll be there by tomorrow evening at the latest.”

“That's not it,” I shook my head, “a group of experts like she was talking about, plus guards? That isn't cheap. It isn't just a bunch of ponies that got together, threw their money together, and hiked off into the Wasteland either, like most expeditions I've heard about. Somepony back in New Reino is financing them, and cares enough that they put out a contract to rescue them and keep going. Somepony that isn't shy about throwing around thousands of caps to get it done, too.”

“Maybe it was a bounty put up by their families?” Foxglove suggested.

“It wasn't any family we spoke to to get this job,” I pointed out.

“Why does it matter?” Windfall demanded, sounding slightly irritated, “these ponies needed our help, and they're going to get it,” she bore into my eyes with her own sapphire stare, “that's the end of the discussion. Got it?” I grimaced at the glare from the young flier, but I eventually nodded, “good.”

She turned away and headed off the aid in helping the others get equipped, “you two should scavenge what you can too. We're leaving in an hour.”

“I still don't like it,” I grumbled quietly so that only Foxglove could hear me.

“Homily seems like a good pony to me,” the unicorn said.

“It ain't Homily that concerns me,” I admitted, “it's her benefactor that throws good caps after bad like that.”

“It's a worthy cause though,” said Foxglove, “setting up someplace to let ponies know what's happening in Neighvada? It's a good idea.”

“But who's paying for it, and what's their angle?”

“Not everypony has an 'angle', Jackboot,” the unicorn shook her head as she offered a smirk, “there are good ponies in the world who just want to do good things because it'll make the Wasteland a better place. Like the Lone Ranger, or DJ Pony.”

Maybe. I wasn't convinced about that though. It was easy for DJ Pony to be altruistic, he had comfortable and secure patronage in the form of Tenpony Tower. He didn't have to eke out some sort of living out in the Wastes. With nothing better to do with his time, why not turn himself into a celebrity known the Wasteland over? A pony who had everything might as well get their ego stroked by their fans every chance they got.

The Lone Ranger wasn't much better in my take either. A Steel Ranger that felt like his friends weren't killing enough ponies and so took it upon himself to go out on his own to blow as many ponies to pieces as he could with enough firepower to level a small town? That hardly had 'hero' written all over it in my view. Like I'd told Windfall more than a few times growing up: 'heroic' ponies were just mass murderers who had chosen 'acceptable targets'. They were still just going out looking to hunt down other ponies and kill them because they wanted to.

You know who else had done that? Me. As a White Hoof. So where were my throngs of ponies celebrating my heroics? Oh, right; the ponies I'd hurt had been 'good' ponies.

“We'll see.”

Eleven. That was how many ponies in Homily's expedition had survived long enough to be rescued out of the original twenty-seven that had set out from New Reino. Most of those lost had been killed during the ambush that they'd fallen prey to. Four others had died of their wounds later while in captivity. With a casualty list like that, any pony could have been easily forgiven for wanting to abandon their mission and simply go back home. A couple of the survivors wanted to do just that, as a matter of fact. But the yellow earth pony mare that was leading them seemed to be very good at her job. All it had taken was a couple of private conversations with those ponies, and they soon been willing to see the mission through to its conclusion.

She was one determined pony, that Homily. It didn't even look like she was the least bit dissuaded by the disclosure that the three of us was all of the protection that their group would have until they reached New Reino. I'd reminded all of them that our small band wouldn't just be able to hang around the old military base indefinitely when we finally arrived; raising the question about what they'd do for security once they'd gotten there. Foxglove, the ever helpful technical wizard that she was, assured Homily that if there were sufficient supplies in the local armory, she could assemble suitable automated defenses to keep out the more common wandering threats in the Wasteland.

Its not that I was eager to get back to civilization, though I certainly was that. With all the little aches and pains that were plaguing me, I was looking forward to investing a portion of our payout into some quality medical care. Windfall's overconfidence was starting to concern me. I'd known that she respected idols like the Mare-Do-Well and the Lone Ranger. Larger than life ponies that were reportedly accomplishing monumental feats. The young flier seemed desperate to measure up to their successes, and that was what was leading her to take on such assignments as assaulting a bandit stronghold with just three ponies.

If she took on one of these tasks and failed—no, when she failed—the emotional blow would be...bad. Assuming that any of us survived the incident to begin with. Windfall's needed to start tempering her expectations. Not that it looked like she would be doing that any time soon. Not so long as we kept succeeding. I felt that the more impressive victories that were accrued, the greater the shock when one of her endeavors failed spectacularly.

That was why I'd suggested we hedge our bets and go home. Homily could gather a larger escort and try again, rather than pushing our luck the way that we were.

“When word gets out what happened to us the first time, who'd be stupid enough to sign up for a second attempt?” the yellow mare had pointed out when I'd posed the suggestion. It had been hard to fault her there. Only the stupid and desperate would have agreed after hearing about the disaster that the survivors had barely survived. A protective for of stupid and desperate ponies wouldn't be much of a protective force at all.

So now the fourteen of us walked across the Wasteland, heading further south. Well, thirteen of us were actually walking, Windfall was in the air, acting as our scout. Homily and I walked at the head of the column. Foxglove was moving between others in the line, chatting and exchanging technical knowledge. At the moment, she was debating with an argile earth pony stallion whether capacitors that used topaz gems as their cores were better than those that used peridot. It was a discussion that had both of them fully consumed, and had recently brought in a third pony who was extolling the virtues of citrine cored capacitors.

Homily was glancing over her shoulder at the heated conversation, her lips cocked in a tired smile. Then somepony threw the prospect of garnets into the mix and all tartarus broke loose. The yellow mare simply shook her head and returned her attention to the trail ahead, “I haven't seen them this happy in a long time.”

I glanced momentarily back at the jabbering ponies as well, “I think Foxglove's just thrilled to finally have ponies to talk to that understand all of that stuff.”

“Not a technical sort, huh?”

“Not hardly,” I snorted, “I can get a terminal to do what I want it to sometimes, but that's about it.”

“Same here,” the mare admitted.

“I thought you said that you were all a bunch of experts?”

“They're the experts,” the yellow earth pony nodded her head back towards the rest of the group, “I'm just the stubborn mare with crazy ideas who brought them all together.”

“So you're the one funding all of this?”

“Not really, no,” she admitted, “somepony else fronted the money. It was the strangest thing,” Homily went on as her mind worked to recall the string of events that had led her to this moment, “I knew about McMaren, and the Ministry of Image station there; and I was trying to put together a small team to go and see if it still worked. I wasn't having a lot of success though.

“Then, out of the blue, this brown earth pony walks up and says he knows somepony that will hire all the help I'd need and pay for our supplies. How could I say 'no'?”

“Because it's obviously too good to be true?” I posed, “they must have wanted something out of the deal. What was it?”

“An inside track,” the yellow mare smirked, “and the occasional..special broadcast,” the second part of the deal, Homily seemed much less happy about.

“He want's you to lie to your listeners.”

The mare cringed painfully, but was quick to defend herself, “he just wants me to slip in an exaggerated story or two. Nothing that would affect the average pony living in Neighvada; I made him swear that much before I agreed to this. Still, right now there isn't anything resembling a reliable news service in the valley. I figured that this had to be better than nothing,” there was an edge in her voice that suggested she was subtly asking me for a tacit confirmation of the justification that she'd come up with.

I'm sure a truly altruistic pony would have insisted that compromising her integrity like that would only serve to undermine her completely legitimate reports. If ponies didn't know what they could trust, then why trust anything at all? Of course, altruistic I wasn't; and I had my own issues with trust as it was. Besides, having a source of news about what was going on in Neighvada would have tremendous advantages for ponies like the three of us. Just as long as we also knew what was fact and what was fiction.

There wasn't much I could do to fault her benefactor though. Control what ponies know, and you could come close to actually controlling the ponies themselves. A few scenarios filtered into my mind where this could be well worth the investment I'd seen put into the expedition: such as setting up a way-station along a rarely used trade route and then broadcasting that the normal routes had seen a sharp increase in raider activity. Suddenly, your little pit stop is swarmed with caravans topping off their food and water while paying the properly inflated prices.

Nopony got hurt, not really; but whoever knew what the news was going to be ahead of time, and which stories were the bogus ones could make a small fortune in a very short amount of town. If whoever it was that had set this up was going to be in on the inside track, I wanted to be right there with them for all of the effort our small group was putting into making sure the enterprise actually succeeded. They owed me that much, I figured. Plus, it'd keep us from wasting a lot of time chasing down bad leads. I was sure that Windfall would appreciate that.

“As long as nopony's getting hurt, I can't see how it's a bad thing,” I provided by way of an answer to Homily, “you're just trying to do the best you can for the valley.”

The yellow mare seemed to relax a little, grateful for having her justifications vindicated. After all, I was just another good pony trying to do the right thing by helping other ponies in trouble. I was a perfectly reliable source for knowing what was and what wasn't an end that was justified by any means. We were alike.

Personally, I think you'd get on better with the pony that paid for all this, Whiplash remarked casually.

They were a pony that I was going to make it a point to meet when we got back to New Reino, there was no doubt about that. Both to make sure that I was getting in on the ground floor of their little media scheme, and to see what other work they had that might satisfy Windfall's little pseudo-quest without putting us all through the sort of risk we'd just managed to survive earlier.

A brief message flashed across my vision in the upper left corner. I faltered slightly in my steps, which drew the attention of Homily and a couple others nearby.

“Are you okay?”

“I'm fine,” I murmured as I sat down and quickly examined the fetlock-mounted device. My right hoof tapped at the buttons and carefully adjusted a dial. At the end, I tapped a button that enabled the pipbuck to play its audio feed aloud for the others to hear. The rest of our column gathered around to listen to what the pre-war contraption had just started to pick up.

“-weapons to protect you! If you can hear this message, we can provide you with protection. Equestria has not fallen! I say again: Equestria has not fallen!” there was a pregnant pause filled with static, then, “this is Colonel Bivouac at the McMaren Calvalry Base, broadcasting in the clear to anypony out there! We have food, clean water, medicine, and weapons to protect you! If you can hear this message, we can provide you with protection. Equestria has not fallen! I say again: Equestria has not fallen!”

The message continued to repeat on a loop. The ponies gathered around listened in awe to the scratchy voice of the disembodied mare whose message was being transmitted across the Wasteland. I noticed a second message that only I could see tick down and swapped the screen over to see the map. Only a dozen miles further south, a new location had been marked on the map. It was the base.

“It looks like we'll be there in a few hours,” I jerked slightly as Windfall's voice drifted over my shoulder. The pegasus had apparently noted us all huddle up and flitted over to see what had gotten our attention. The ivory flier ceased hovering and flung herself high up into the air, coming to a halt a few hundred yards above. I watched her hang there in the air for a few seconds before she floated back down to the rest of us, “I can see the tower from here. It looks pretty intact.”

“Intact and still working,” Homily affirmed with a relieved grin plastered across her face, “Celectia bless those ancestors of ours, they knew how to build things that last!”

Another member of her group, a unicorn stallion was peering at the map and rubbing his chin, “the signal's got to be really weak if we're only picking this up now,” he observed, “that tower's supposed to have been able to reach all the way to Roam.”

“Could just be a power issue,” another pony offered, “maybe a transformer went down. Signal strength is an easy fix as long as everything's working alright.”

“Well that message suggests it is,” the yellow mare pointed at my pipbuck her face still one glorious smile, “which is more than I could have hoped for.”

Foxglove peeked up into the sky, “we can be there before dark,” she noted.

“So what are we waiting for?!” Homily was off at a trot before the words were out of her mouth. The others of her group followed, though most didn't seem to mirror her level of enthusiasm. Hard to fault them for that, as there were still a few of them who were recovering from injuries and malnutrition. Windfall easily overtook the earthbound mare and resumed her post as the group's scout. I chose to hang back this time and cover our rear. Foxglove did the same.

“Mind if I take a look at that signal?” the unicorn mare asked.

I hesitated, but only for a brief moment before extending my arm. She was not only far more technically knowledgeable than anypony I knew, but she had been a stable pony on top of it. There was probably a lot that she could learn from my pipbuck about the transmission that I'd never even think to look for. So I sat in a slightly awkward pose while the mare manipulated the little device's controls and stared at the screen.

My eyes were on her face, carefully watching her expression as she parsed through her findings. I noticed her brows begin to knit themselves together in mild confusion as she studied the pipbuck, “what'd you find?”

“A few things,” she replied, sounding as though she was still trying to come up with explanations to her discoveries, “first, that broadcast isn't being sent over the radio, it's a general transmission to pipbucks. Which let me learn something else: the date the transmission started.

“This signal's only a couple decades old, not centuries.”

The two of us looked at each other for a long moment as I processed that information, “we're walking into a trap?”

The mare shrugged, but her features suggested that her own thoughts had been leaning that way, “I mean, the message is coming from McMaren, and there is a perfectly innocent explanation for those things.”

“Such as?”

“Maybe their radio did die, and so they patched a pipbuck into the transmitter to keep it broadcasting. Of course, that means that-”

“Somepony's still there,” I finished for the mare, my lips creasing in a frown as I pondered that realization.

“Or at least there was somepony there twenty years ago,” Foxglove corrected, “it doesn't mean it's a trap.”

“A group of ponies living in the Wasteland broadcasting a signal for anypony that gets close can hear, and nopony else has ever heard about this place?” I said, not hiding the suspicion in my voice, “there's only one way somepony who wants to be found can still be a secret like that.”

Foxglove nodded, “nopony ever leaves to tell anypony about it.”

“Exactly.”

“Do we warn the others?” her tone suggested there was little doubt in her mind that we should.

“Get word to Windfall that there might be bandits there,” I decided, “she can fly ahead and get a good look at things before we get there,” the unicorn nodded and galloped towards the head of the column of quickly moving ponies.

It wasn't a hour before Windfall called for us all to gather up. She had just returned from her reconnaissance flight to the base and was ready to share her findings, “the base is occupied,” she informed us, “ponies dressed in green uniforms. Most of them are armed.”

The expedition ponies reacted negatively to the news, Homily most of all, “more bandits?” she looked between the three of us, “do you think you can take them all out?” her voice was hopeful, but there was doubt plainly visible in her eyes.

“I...don't know if they're bandits,” Windfall admitted, and then elaborated, “they were...organized. Like, really organized. It was like watching NLR guards on patrol,” the flier hesitated a moment, chewing on her lower lip, “I...think they were soldiers. Equestrian soldiers.

Foxglove blinked, “you're not serious,” the mare sputtered, “there can't possibly still be Great War soldiers around anymore!”

“I don't know,” Windfall admitted, “but they even had the flag flying in the middle of the base!”

All of us were silent for a moment. Most residents of the Wasteland knew what the ancient national flag of our pre-war ancestors looked like. It served as a backdrop on many of the faded propaganda posters scattered throughout old ruins. Just one more relic of a world long gone. I'd certainly never heard of anypony flying those colors as a banner though. It was hard to conceive of any group that would still be embracing a culture like that after two centuries. Who would even still feel that sort of connection to a heritage that they never knew?

Unless...they did know about that heritage, I realized. Not every pony had hid in a stable when the megaspells and balefire bombs burned the world. The White Hooves had been one such group of dubiously fortunate survivors. Could there have been another? A group of soldiers at a remote outpost that hadn't made the list of primary targets for the zebra missiles?

“It might make sense,” Homily said, breaking the silence, “it's not impossible that the ponies there survived the war.”

“But that was two hundred years ago,” Foxglove pointed out.

“Maybe they're ghouls,” she shrugged, “maybe they're descendants. The point is that we might be able to work with them. Offer to fix their transmitter if they'll let us use it to make our broadcasts. They might not even know about all the other places in the Wasteland! We can really help these ponies!”

If they want to be helped, I mentally noted. I shared a brief look with Foxglove. The unicorn didn't look much more convinced than I was, but neither of us had any real sort of evidence that anything nefarious was going on. Having Windfall confirm that there were ponies living there, but that those ponies gave every indication of being relics of a bygone age didn't give us anything more to work with in developing our theories about why this settlement was unknown to the wider Wasteland.

Somepony would think that the cultural descendants of Old World ponies would be all about doing everything they could to rebuild Equestria to the way it had once been. On the other hoof, how many ponies in the Wasteland were really interested in that sort of thing? You had little bastions of civilization like Tenpony, Flank, and Seaddle, sure; but it's not like any of them were interested in banning together into anything remotely resembling a nation. Every group was just out for themselves, and nearly every time two or more groups met, it was on the field of battle and not in conference rooms to draft treaties and alliances.

Maybe the ponies here had tried once upon a time to pick up all the pieces left behind by their fallen princesses, and gave up when the impossibility of the task at hoof became too obvious to ignore. Now they just sat back in their little refuge and minded their own damn business to keep off the radar of the more hostile groups out there. Meanwhile, they advertised their services as a sanctuary to anypony who wandered by. As far out of the way as these ponies were, the only ones who were likely to come out this way were the desperate. Ponies who would jump at the notion of being accepted into a well-equipped group and probably given little thought to leaving anyway.

Whatever the case, Homily's mission was clear and hadn't really changed as a result of this new information. There was a working radio tower at McMaren, and she intended to get her hooves on it. Our mission was to keep her and her team alive long enough to do just that.

And if it did turn out that these uniformed ponies were on the up and up, then all the better for us. They'd have all sorts of weapons and gear that we could trade for.

I peered through the binoculars at the distant gate. There was a creamy colored unicorn mare leaning against a shack made of corrugated steel sheets just beyond it. I watched as the mare issued a bored yawn and brushed aside a few strands of pink hair that had escaped from beneath her helmet. I suppressed a reflexive yawn of my own and continued scanning the rest of the fence line.

The 'patrols' weren't doing a whole lot of active 'patrolling', I noted. Mostly it was just pairs of ponies standing around chatting with one another. Their uniforms weren't all identical, and had all seen a lot of wear and tear. The similarity of style was unmistakeable though. The affiliation was also quite clear. Those uniforms bore an uncanny resemblance to that worn by the long dead soldiers depicted in so many of the old recruitment posters in the Wasteland. Whether these ponies were genuinely part of some remnant of the defunct nation of old, or just clinging to some past ideal, I couldn't say.

I was forced to admit, however, that nothing about what I saw was screaming 'trap'.

From all appearances, it was a functional cavalry base. It also clearly possessed the large radio tower that Homily had hoped to find here as well. Judging by the size of it, I could understand why some of the ponies earlier had been underwhelmed by the range of its signal. The thing had to be nearly a thousand feet tall, at least! I had to admit though, that it didn't look to be in the greatest shape, and there were a few sections that boasted makeshift repairs.

I finally lowered my binoculars.

“So, what do you think?” Foxglove asked from nearby. Beyond her were the others, eagerly waiting for my appraisal. Windfall was on the ground as well, keeping out of sight with the rest of us until the decision had been made about how to proceed.

“It looks legit,” I admitted, noting that I sounded a little surprised myself. I had firmly expected to find what was clearly some sort of raider camp. Nothing about this suggested any such thing. Their uniforms, while tattered, looked to have been maintained as well as could be expected. The buildings looked to have seen regular repair, and the grounds themselves were rather well kept. It was all quite orderly, and what somepony would expect to find when looking at a military base. If these ponies weren't who they were claiming to be, then they were certainly as close as anypony could come.

The violet unicorn nodded and looked back at Windfall, “we should still be cautious,” she shifted her gaze briefly to the other ponies in the expedition, “seeing this many ponies heading their way might make them nervous. We should keep our weapons in their holsters.”

Windfall nodded, “you're probably right,” the flier looked to Homily, “you take the lead. This whole thing is your show after all.”

The yellow earth pony mare nodded, “right. Thank you,” she looked at all three of us in turn, “all of you. We wouldn't have made it this far without you.”

“Let's hold off on the thanks until we make contact,” I suggested with a wry smile, “there's still know way to know if they'll agree to your offer. This trip might still have all been for nothing.”

“I really hope not,” Homily sighed, but she did seem to temper her expectations a little at my warning, “but there's only one way to find out,” she motioned for the rest of her troupe to follow, “let's go and make our introductions.”

Homily led the way to the entrance of the Old World base, with Foxglove and I at her flanks. The rest of the expedition formed a gaggle behind us, while Windfall hovered close by. It wasn't long before we could see noticeable activity beyond the chain link fence. Ponies who had been keeping watch at other points along the perimeter were cautiously converging on the entrance.

It wasn't long before we'd advanced close enough for my pipbuck to note the ponies on my Eyes Forward Sparkle. Which caused a slight misstep when I first saw it. Normally, the pipbuck was rather clear about how it classified other ponies. Threats were red, and everything else was yellow. These ponies were yellow...most of the time. It was like their blips were...flickering? I'd seen the occasional blip swap over from one color to another when a pony's disposition changed during the course of an interaction, but this wasn't anything like that. The change was sporadic and rapid. It lingered on yellow most of the time, but would randomly blink red for fractions of a second.

I'd never seen it do that before. I wasn't even sure what to make of it. That didnt stop the little hairs on the back of my neck from bristling though.

By the time we arrived, there were close to a dozen ponies arrayed on the other side of the gate to meet us.

They remained silent as we approached, and I gratefully noted than none of them drew their weapons. A green mare with a close-cropped scarlet mane stood at the head of the uniformed group of ponies. Her topaz eyes watched us carefully as we drew near the gate. Our little entourage drew up just short of the gate before Homily cleared her throat and initiated the dialogue.

“Hi, um,” her voice cracked slightly, prompting her to clear her throat a second time as she tried again. If she was trying to suppress her embarrassed little blush, the mare was failing spectacularly, “we heard your broadcast,” she began again, her tone growing with more confidence as she spoke, “and we want to see if we can help each other.”

The green mare nodded, her expression still stern, “I'm Colonel Bivouac, and I'm willing to hear out your offer, Miss...?”

“Oh! Wow,” the yellow mare's blush intensified along with her embarrassment, “sorry. My name's Homily.”

“It's good to meet you,” the faintest glimmer of a smile peeked out from the corner of the colonel's lips as she nodded, “and what sort of help are you offering?”

“Well,” the yellow mare began nervously—this was the mare who wanted to speak to thousands of ponies? “we heard your broadcast, and we couldn't help but note how weak it is. We're all experienced technicians,” she gestured back at the rest of her group, “and we're pretty sure we can get everything working like new again if you'll let us.”

“That's awfully generous of you,” Bivouac nodded, “is this a free service you're offering?” Looking for the angle. I could appreciate this mare's mindset.

“Kind of,” Homily explained, “we're actually hoping that you'll let us use it. You see, my group is looking to set up a regular news broadcast to keep ponies in the Neighvada valley informed of what's going on. So, the deal is: we'll fix your equipment, if you'll let us use it. We can even help you get your own message out to more of the Wasteland!”

The colonel blinked at the offer. She looked to the side at another of the ponies with her, and the two of them exchange a few brief words that I couldn't make out. When the two were done, Bivouac looked back at Homily and nodded, “that...actually sounds like a very reasonable offer.

“I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to have to add a few additional conditions,” she went on, “we don't usually get such large groups of ponies arriving all at once, you understand.

“First, none of you will be allowed anywhere without at least two of my own ponies with you at all times,” she began, “this is for your safety as well as ours. The base is very old, and there are some places that aren't safe because of that; the magazines, armory, that sort of thing. Second, while I won't ask you to surrender all of your weapons, I would appreciate it if you at least kept them unloaded,” she must have noted the uneasy looks on mine and Windfall's faces, because she followed this demand up with an explanation, “once again, that's in the interests of everypony's safety. Even my own soldiers only have their firearms loaded while on guard duty,” a few of the ponies with her nodded in confirmation.

“If any of you are ever found to be on your own, or have a loaded weapon, you'll be asked to leave,” the colonel concluded, “is that acceptable?”

Homily wasted little time in voicing her assent, and quickly demonstrated her good faith by ejecting the magazine from her pistol and cocking back the slide to expel the chambered round. Her fellows followed suit, if not as gingerly. Windfall and I hesitated the longest. If things went wrong, I could probably load my 9mm pistol quick enough, but Full Stop wouldn't be an option until I got somewhere where I could put the rounds into the revolver. The pegasus would be in a similar boat. Thanks in part to Foxglove's alterations, loading the weapon could be a cumbersome affair. The trade off was that she rarely found herself needed to reload in anything short of a protracted fight.

Still, I'd have my knife and my hooves. I also noted that Foxglove hadn't so much as nudged her eldrich lance. Nor had any of the colonel's ponies made any indication that they thought of the metal pole as anything other than a simple staff. It would count us a lot if things went south. So, I proceeded to disarm.

Once the McMaren ponies were satisfied, they opened the gate, “welcome to McMaren Calvary Base,” Bivouac greeted with a broad smile, “the last bastion of Equestria.”

She looked over her should and barked a hasty order, “Sergeant Cypher!”

A mottled gray stallion snapped to attention, “ma'am!”

“Grab somepony and escort Miss Homily here and anypony she wants to take with her to inspect the radio room,” Bivouac returned her attention to the yellow mare, “I figure you'll want to get a look at what you're getting yourselves into before you get to work. Anypony else is welcome to go either with Lieutenant Abatis to the mess, or follow me to the barracks. I think we can find a few spare bunks for you.”

Food was tempting, but after the trek we'd just been on, I was a lot more interested in the bed. I was still a little sore from the fight in the salvage yard, and the hike hadn't done me a whole lot of favors. Homily and a couple other ponies headed off in the direction of the tower, while most of the others seemed quite eager to get a hot meal. Hard to blame them. Windfall, Foxglove, and I looked to be the only ones eager for a bed. Made sense. Of all the other ponies, we were the ones who had been eating regularly for the last few weeks.

“Still waiting for the other horseshoe to drop?”

I glanced over at the unicorn mare with a wry smile, “I don't even know anymore,” my eyes wandered over to Colonel Bivouac. Her blip was still yellow...most of the time. I'd ask Foxglove about it later when we were alone.

The scarlet maned commander brought us to a building that was in better condition than most. Inside was a long hallway with over a dozen doors on each side, “officer's quarters,” the colonel informed us, “not a lot of us left these days, so there are plenty of vacancies. If the door's open, the room's open. Latrines are in the middle—and yes,we do have hot water,” she added with the flash of a grin, “make yourselves at home. If you need anything, there'll be somepony right outside. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to check with Miss Homily and see what she thinks she can do for us.”

“Thanks for the hospitality,” Foxglove bowed her head slightly, “it's pretty rare to meet ponies like y'all out here.”

“More's the shame,” Bivouac mirrored the bow before leaving.

I peered through the nearest open doorways. Inside I saw a room that looked lived in at first glance. The night stand next to the bed had a few nick-knacks on it, and there was a fade Wonderbolts poster on the wall. However, the thick layer of dust on everything suggested that nopony had actually slept in this room for a long time. I stepped inside for a closer look.

The bed was nestled into one corner, and across the room from it was a desk and chair. I saw a couple of old books stacked on the desk. A few tomes that looked to have been part of a series dealing with a pegasus in a rather outrageous looking hat, at least one manual about military history, and even a book whose title suggested it dealt with zebra history. 'Know thy enemy,' I guess. A plague denoting some sort of award hung above the desk.

“I'm going to got see if the shower works,” Foxglove announced. I glanced out the door and saw that she had claimed the room across from mine and had wasted little time in stowing away all of her gear. The mare moved quick. A quick peek out into the hall revealed that Windfall had staked her claim in the room next to Foxglove's. I watched as the flier stifled a yawn and closed the door behind her.

I withdrew back into my own temporary quarters and closed the door. The room wasn't luxurious, but it was certainly comfortable enough. The bed had to be as old as anything that you were going to find in a stable, but its springs still seemed to possess some tension. I shucked my barding and saddlebags and crawled stiffly onto the mattress, sighing as I let myself relax for the first time in weeks. The flickering of the blips on my EFS still nagged at the back of my mind, but it was something that I could ask Foxglove about when she was done with her shower.

From all appearances, there wasn't anything sinister going on here. If these pones had wanted us dead, they'd had plenty of opportunities to do it up to this point, what with us all split up like we were. My eye twitched slightly. Actually, yeah, right about now would be the perfect time to take us all down. A few of use at the radio tower, a few more in the mess hall, and the three of use in these rooms; all without loaded weapons. A shiver started crawling up my spine as I considered how vulnerable we all were at this very moment.

Apparently I was far enough on edge that the soft knock at my door nearly sent me diving for my knife. Fortunately, I managed to draw myself up short, and only nearly fall off the bed. Ponies coming in here to kill me probably wouldn't have politely knocked first.

“Yeah?”

The door cracked open and a puple head with a pair of green eyes poke in. I relaxed visibly at the sight of Foxglove, “can I come in?”

I motioned for her to come all the way into the room, shaking my head at my own nervousness, “sure, what's up? I thought you wanted a shower?”

The mare cracked a smile, “shower can wait,” she closed the door behind her and walked over to the edge of the bed. I watched her curiously as she then proceeded to crawl up onto the bed and lie down next to me.

“Um...what are you doing?”

Foxglove shrugged and rolled onto her side, “nothing,” she said, a playful little glint in her eyes. She reached out with one of her forehooves and started to slowly trace it along my shoulder, “you're really tense,” she noted, “you should really relax.”

“Uh...” I didn't really have a coherent response for what was happening at this precise moment. Curiously enough, Whiplash seemed just as dumbfounded as I was. A fact for which I was pretty grateful. My brain was having enough trouble to process what was happening without also trying to deal with any snark from that yellow specter.

The unicorn mare put her hoof on my lips, “shush,” she said softly, “let's see if I can't get you to relax a little,” then she leaned her head in close and started nibbling at my neck.

Huh. I must have been more tired than I thought. Since, obviously, I had already fallen dead asleep and was currently having one of the most vivid dreams that I could ever recall having in my life. That was the only thought that served to explain what was going on right now. This had to be a dream. I was simply fantasizing about Foxglove nibbling on my neck...and now lapping daintily at my chest. It was all in my head. Her hoof was on my crotch, but this event was all in my head.

It was the only explanation.

That being the only possibility, and knowing that this was just a harmless dream; I foresaw no reason not to indulge. After all, what the Foxglove in the real world didn't know I did to her in my dreams, wouldn't come back to bite my in the ass.

I reached out and placed my hoof under Foxglove's chin, lifting the mare's head up nearer to mine. Without a word, I engaged her in an embrace that would certainly have betrayed my eagerness if this had been real. I'd been without for fucking years! Fantasy or not, it felt real enough and I was more than willing to settle for getting laid in a dream. What a dream it was too! I swore that I could actually taste her. It was like...well, actually, I couldn't place what it was like. I'd kissed a lot of mares in my life, but this was...very different.

When we separated for breath, I pulled back a little and looked at the mare. There was an eagerness in her eyes that actually put me off a little. It almost seemed like she was just as desperate for this as I was. Which, I guess made a lot of sense if this was my fantasy version of the unicorn mare. The violet unicorn latched herself onto my neck, her nips far more aggressive than they had been before. I could also feel her moving her body in closer to mine.

Wow. This mare knew what she was about! Even Saffron had never been this aggressive. Which was fine with me, in all frankness. I was still pretty tired, so if Foxglove wanted to do all the work, I wasn't going to stop her. Then my thoughts were interrupted as she left my neck and found my mouth again. She wrapped her legs around me and rolled me over on top of her. It was at about this moment that I discovered I was developing a strong inclination towards aggressive mares.

There was the sound of shattering glass nearby, but a brief glance confirmed that it was only a picture of Colonel Bivouac and a stallion I didn't recognize falling to the floor from where it had been sitting on the nightstand. I went back down for another kiss, offering my own nibbles on the unicorn's neck; relishing the groans they elicited.

Wait.

My head shot back up, and I quickly peered over the edge of the bed at the picture on the floor. Foxglove seemed mostly oblivious to my actions, as she leaned up and started licking my chest; which I only half-noticed. My attention was becoming more and more focused on the picture on the floor.

There was a green mare with orange eyes, and though the scarlet mane was long and braided in the photo and not short like that of the mare I'd seen only minutes ago; it was clearly the same pony. She was wearing a blue sundress, and clinging tightly to a broad-shouldered orange pegasus stallion wearing a Wonderbolt uniform. In the background was a banner that read, 'Best Young Fliers Competition 1012'.

It was only then that I noticed that Foxglove was looking at me with a rather annoyed expression, “are you fucking serious right now?” she frowned, “I'm throwing myself at you, and you're looking at some old picture?” Her eyes glanced downward briefly, “you obviously aren't gay, so what gives?”

“But it's the-”

There was a sudden pounding at the door that would have made me jump if Foxglove hadn't had a rather tight hold on me. Before I could even consider who might be calling on me right now, I received an answer that promptly threw my whole worldview for a loop.

“Jackboot, are you in there?!”

The voice coming from the other side of the closed door was, impossibly, Foxglove's.

My eyes went from the purple unicorn laying beneath me to the door, and then back again in utter confusion. A dumbfoundedness that was only further compounded by the look of annoyance on the mare's face. It was as though she was not actually surprised to hear her own voice coming from the door, but was rather merely perturbed by what it signaled.

Foxglove sighed, “well...shit.”

Footnote:...

Thank you so much for reading! As always, a thumbs up and comment are always greatly appreciated

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