Ah! Looks like a good place to take a break. Excuse me, citizen, do you serve any non-alcoholic beverages?

The next couple of days were a bit of a blur for me. Admittedly, that probably had a little bit to do with the case of Wild Pegasus that I went through in the course of those two days. At least, Foxglove insisted it had been a ‘case’. I didn’t remember buying more than five or six bottles.

I didn’t leave the garage much during that time either. In fact, except to buy more whiskey and that one trip to see Double Down to get the down payment for the mercenaries, I don’t think that I even went outside. Foxglove made a few comments about my lethargy, I was pretty sure, but I was too out of it most of the time to pay them much mind. As far as I was concerned, there wasn’t much for me to do in New Reino. We had the mercenaries that we needed. Until we got to Shady Saddles, I wasn’t going to be much help doing anything.

So why not spend my down time drunk? At least the black-outs made the time go by faster.

From my perspective, our departure from the bustling city arrived rather quickly. Ramparts and Starlight had seen to our provisions. Foxglove had managed to finish getting everypony’s equipment in fine order, and even managed to fit our some proper barding for all of us. Mine, especially, had needed some significant revisions since her last pass at it.

Gone were my beloved dual submachine guns. I could probably have tracked down some suitable replacements from the various arms merchants in New Reino, but my heart wasn’t in it. While the light pistol caliber rounds had kept the weight of my armament down, their anemic penetrating power would be a lot less effective against the well-armored ponies of Arginine’s stable than they had been against the odd raider or bandit. Only Foxglove’s custom-packed ammunition had kept the weapons relevant since we’d began tackling more robust adversaries, but the bottleneck on her ability to produce the munitions in the quantities that automatic weapons demanded was proving to be a hindrance.

A drawn-out battle meant that I’d need multiple reloads at my disposal, and the hours and materials the unicorn would require in order to fill that order would essentially preclude her from maintaining the equipment for anypony else. As it was, she was essentially taking care of the weapons and barding for a whole squad of ponies. To say nothing of the upkeep that Moonbeam now needed. Her recent upgrades had been anything but ‘factory standard’, and several minor issues had already been addressed by the unicorn where structural support and power demands were concerned.

In the end, I’d been forced to acknowledge that my longtime staples were now part of a bygone era, and it was time to move on. Ramparts had suggested a bump in caliber; something more along the lines of the high-powered rifle that he used. I was reluctant though. Bigger bullets meant more weight, and that meant sacrificing a lot of speed and maneuverability in the air. As an Earth pony, the courser could better shoulder the heavier load, and even power through a couple of tough hits, provided his barding was up to the task. I had neither his bulk or his endurance, however.

Fortunately, Jackboot’s nest-egg wasn’t the only legacy that I’d recently inherited. I’d also come into possession of an heirloom in the form of some weaponized bracers. A weapon that transitioned seamlessly from one that was effective at range to a melee option, they complimented my fighting style almost perfectly. Admittedly, they weren’t the easiest things to aim with any great precision at long distances, but neither had my submachine guns been either.

Not that I minded all that much, my forte was being up close and personal anyway.

Foxglove performed her usual mechanical miracles and proceeded to integrate my bracers into my barding, along with the Gale Force rig. In fact, she’d even managed to give them a slight bump in their lethality, by having them draw from the much more robust spark pack arrays that she’d wired into my flight rig. She’d even rigged them to ride a little higher up on my forelimbs when I didn’t need them. When the time did come to call upon their firepower, all that I needed to do was flick my hooves and they’d extend into place, ready to be unleashed upon the threat.

It remained to be seen what kind of havoc they’d reek when confronted with the ponies from Arginine’s stable, but given what I’d seen them do to rocks and such, I had high expectations.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of this…”

I glanced over to my left. Moonbeam glided along beside me in the skies above Neighvada as the pair of us played vanguard for the rest of own ground-bound party of ponies. There was quite the comically drastic difference between the two of us at a glance. Moonbeam was the better part of four times my size for the one thing, and probably almost ten times my mass with her new upgrades. Even her flying style wasn’t anything like mine, simply because the robopony wasn’t really ‘flying’. I mean, she obvious was flying, but not as a direct result of her wings. She was kept aloft by levitation talismans and propelled exclusively by a pair of large thrusters bolted onto her backside. She basically just had to sit motionless in the air as she was propelled along, while I flapped along briskly beside her.

My lips curled in a smile as I let my gaze pan across the dusty horizon, “I know what you mean. Being up here is like being in a completely different world from the surface. Nothing’s in your way, nopony is going to spring out at you from around the next bend, no monsters are going to jump out of the ground at any moment...it’s the safest, most peaceful, place you can be in the Wasteland.”

Moonbeam craned her head upward, looking towards the distant overcast above, “up to a point,” she noted, “I’m pretty sure that all comes back around full circle once you get high enough.”

I matched her gaze, looking to the thick white border which marked the divide between the Wasteland and the Enclave, a nation of pegasi with technology and weaponry that could give the Steel Rangers a real run for their money. If I’d thought that there was even a chance in Tartarus that they’d have lifted a pinion to help us fight Arginine’s stable, I might have been compelled to risk the wrath of their automated defenses to petition them for aid. As it stood though, I knew full well that they wouldn’t have cared at all what happened to the ponies on the surface. If some accounts were to be believed, they’d actually have been more likely to help the stable ponies wipe us out.

If only so that they’d no longer need to contend with the Rangers for technological supremacy.

Though, I did have to wonder if getting that army of old Ministry of Awesome combat drones operational again might be enough to draw their interest. I felt myself smirk at the thought of the Enclave making an appearance in order to ‘reclaim’ the property that I was sure they’d regard as being lawfully theirs by right of being the successors to Rainbow Dash’s ministry, in much the same vein that the Steel Rangers held claim to the fruits of any Ministry of Wartime Technology labors. Of course, if they indeed waited until all of those drones were functional to make their claim, then I was confident that I’d have a strong case regarding possession being nine tenths of the law…

One war at a time, Windfall…

“Do you know how high up we can actually go before things go bad for us?” the robopony inquired.

“Not really,” I admitted, “I haven’t met anypony who could give me a hard altitude limit. And, frankly, I haven’t been brave enough to conduct any tests.”

The existence of some sort of automated defense network was, by and large, a well-known fact even on the surface; confirmed over and over again by the odd Dashite. I suppose there was a chance that it was all just a lie that they were perpetuating to keep surface ponies from getting curious, but I found it hard to believe that pegasi who had either walked out on the Enclave, or been forcibly exiled by them, would all collectively feel a desire to protect the clouborne nation. The existence of those defenses had been confirmed to me by Jackboot too, who’d gotten his knowledge of them from Hoofington, so this would also have had to have been a conspiracy coordinated across every corner of the Wasteland if it wasn’t true.

Ultimately, it wasn’t worth risking my life, especially since all that I did know about those defenses was that they existed, and that they were supposedly impassable. I didn’t know if there would be a warning shot, or a visible indication that a lethal strike was incoming, or that it would be some sort of attack that could be avoided with some amount of skill. There was every possibility that, should I go too high, that I’d simply just poof out of existence as the result of some magical-based defense mechanism.

There was the slight―very slight―possibility that Moonbeam might be able to bypass those automated defenses by virtue of being a product of the MoA, but that wasn’t a possibility that I was eager to mention, on the off-chance that the robopony got it into her mostly-mechanical brain to test that theory. There were times that I felt like she’d gained a little bit of an inflated ego since getting her new body. She was a lot tougher than any of the rest of us, no doubt about it, but she wasn’t invulnerable.

“I’ve honestly never needed to go much higher than we are right now,” I continued, “not a lot of the monsters in the valley fly; and none of the raiders I’ve met ever have either.”

Moonbeam’s holographic lips creased into a disappointed frown, “you know, I never got to see the sun when I was a foal. Then I woke up in the Wasteland and I find out the pegasi have blocked it from the surface completely,” she glanced briefly my way, “no offense,” I chuckled and nodded, “and now that I have wings and stuff, I still won’t be able to see it; because I’ll get zapped or something if I do.

“That sucks.”

“Aren’t you going to live for, like, hundreds of years or something?” I asked the metal mare, “I doubt even the Enclave can last forever. Someday I bet you’ll be able to see the sun.”

“...I suppose,” she was silent for a long moment after that, then, “that’s really weird to think about: how long I’ll live―how long I have lived. I’ve already outlived everypony who was ever alive when I was born, pretty much―except Mom, I guess. I guess I’ll outlive everypony alive right now too.

“Do you think I’ll ever see the end of the Wasteland?”

“I know you will,” I insisted with a smile, “heck, that’s something I intend to live long enough to see.”

Some of that was little more than projected confidence, I suppose, with little to genuinely back it up. On the other hoof, I wasn’t just trying to be optimistic for the sake of it, or to try and make Moonbeam feel better. I wanted to believe that it was the truth; that this hellscape could be ‘fixed’ somehow.

Maybe that was hopelessly naive of me to think that way. After all, the ponies had been suffering in the Wasteland for the better part of two hundred years. What right did a teenaged pegasus have to feel that she could do anything to change that? On the other hoof, I wasn’t alone, was I? I wasn’t even just talking about my friends either. DJ Pon3 made frequent broadcasts about other mares working tirelessly in the rest of the world to try and fix the problems that existed there.

We weren’t the first, of course. I remembered the broadcasts from a decade ago about the ‘Mare-Do-Well’, a former caravan pony who’d tried to take on the slavers of Manehattan, and been slain for her trouble. More recently, the Lone Ranger who’d forsworn his oath to his order and made it his personal mission to slay raiders and monsters. He’d apparently lost his way and become a monster himself that needed to put down. I was sure that other examples from history that I’d never even heard about existed too. Obviously, those efforts hadn’t been successful either, but I was sure that they had existed.

The point was that ponies were trying to fix things, both today and in the past. One day, those efforts would stick. So why couldn’t that day be on the horizon?

“Ponies” Moonbeam announced, drawing me out of my thoughts, “nine o’clock; fifteen kilometers.”

I turned my head in the direction that the alicorn robopony had indicated. It was impossible for me to make out anything at that distance, especially through the dust and haze that covered the surface. My wingmate, however, was not reliant on merely organic eyes, “raiders?” I instinctively glanced in the direction of the rest of our ground-bound party. At that kind of distance, hostile ponies would hardly represent any sort of real threat. They couldn’t have even been aware that our friends were anywhere in the area, and we could easily chose to avoid them if we were so inclined.

“Doubtful,” she responded, “they’ve got wagons with them. Traders, I think.”

“This is a common caravan route,” I noted after a brief consultation with the map on my pipback, “they might even be swinging by Shady Saddles. We could link up with them and travel there together―”

“Additional contacts,” Moonbeam interrupted, her head jerking slightly to the right, “ten o’clock; twelve kilometers. A group of a half dozen. No wagons,” she paused for a moment, “they’re moving pretty fast.”

“Towards the traders, or away from them?”

“Towards,” the robopony confirmed.

“Okay, that sounds like raiders,” I said in a curt tone, already angling in the direction that Moonbeam had indicated, “let’s go check it out,” I brought my pipbuck back up and keyed in the radio to contact Ramparts, “Ramps, it’s Windy. Moonbeam spotted a caravan to the southwest. It looks like raiders are moving in on them. We’re going to go and help. Follow my pipbuck tag and link up with the caravan.”

“Roger that, Windfall. We’re on our way. Stay safe,” the stallion replied.

I closed the channel and kicked on some additional speed, Moonbeam keeping pace easily beside me as we streaked through the skies above Neighvada, “can you make out their weapons yet?”

“Nothing that looks too big,” she informed me, “a couple of rifles. I see spears across some of their backs. Pistols holsters on some flanks; can’t see the guns inside them.”

My lips twisted into a deep frown as I listened to her report. The pistols and rifles were certainly pretty standard fare for just about any group of ponies that you were likely to encounter in the valley. However, spears were another matter. Knives and machetes were the go-to for most gangs and raiders. In fact, there was only one group that I knew of who favored polearms, “can you make out any white markings on their legs?”

Moonbeam was silent for a moment as she scrutinized our targets with her electronically enhanced vision, “no,” she insisted, “I don’t see White Hoof markings on their hides―wait,” another few moments of silence, “but I can make out a brand on the backside of one of them. They are White Hooves.”

I frowned now. Odd that a raiding party like this would be operating without having painted themselves up. I kind of thought that was supposed to be like some sort of taboo or something: to not have their paint on them while they were out in public. True, it hardly helped you ambush your targets when you were wearing something that was so visible and distinctive from such a long way out; but White Hooves weren’t about ‘subtlety’.

At least, that hadn’t been while under the leadership of Whiplash, and her father before her. That family dynasty was over and done with though. Somepony else was surely leading the tribals by now, and there was no telling what sort of changes they might have put in place. We might be seeing a whole new fighting doctrine.

Not that any of that mattered. A brand meant that they were genuine White Hooves, and that meant that they represented a threat to the caravan ponies that they were heading for. Six White Hooves wasn’t a particularly large group, and I’d have thought that a larger force would have been dispatched to take on a caravan like this. It would be a tough fight under normal circumstances. On the other hoof, they’d have the initiative and the element of surprise. That small band of tribals was in a good position to take out half the defenders of those traders before they even knew what hit them.

“Then we’re going to take them out,” I informed Moonbeam, “we hit them hard and fast. Wipe them out before they can react.”

“Okay,” the metal mare nodded.

I flicked out my forelimbs, charging my bracers. The distance closed rapid between the pair of us and our targets. In no time at all, we were close enough that my own eye could make them out clearly. They were running along, their attention focused forward, completely oblivious to either of the flying ponies that were homing in on them. As Moonbeam had indicated: none of them wore the defining white marking of their tribe, but I recognized the slung spears as being distinctly of the White Hoof style.

My eye narrowed slightly as I noted that one of the stallions looked noticeably smaller than the other ponies. He could only barely even be a ‘stallion’, it seemed. Perhaps a pony being brought along on their first raid? I wasn’t positive how early on in their lives the tribal ponies began participating in such things. His youth and inexperience probably explained why he still had his spear slung while they were so close to launching their attack. Though I would have expected one of the other experienced ponies with him to have corrected this oversight.

Though, I now noticed, it didn’t look like many of them were as ready for a fight as they should have been. Were they really that confident in their abilities?

It hardly mattered. They were White Hooves, and they were about to attack a group of innocent traders. I wasn’t going to let that happen.

I cocked back my right forelimb and waited for the distance between us to close.

“...now!”

Glowing orange pellets of destruction began flying from my bracers as I unleashed a torrent of fire upon the White Hooves. A crimson ray of deadly light danced among those orbs, adding its lethal bite to the onslaught. Flashes of light blossomed among the tribal ponies as the once silent valley erupted into a cacophony of explosions and screams. Charging ponies stumbled and fell as they were pelted with debris from the geysers of dirt and rock. My weapons weren’t as accurate at range as Moonbeam’s was, but the mayhem that I wrought was quite spectacular.

A few of my shots did find their mark though, and a mare went sprawling to the ground as a bead of magical energy struck her in her side and exploded. Her charred and mangled corpse tumbled across the path of two others, drawing them up short in their abject surprise. Their stalled gallop was timed just perfectly for Moonbeam’s scarlet beam to do its due diligence and carve them in half.

In just a matter of seconds, only three White Hooves were left, and they were only just now aware that their lives were in peril. An older stallion recovered quickly, bounding back on his many years of experience in combat, and wheeled around in the direction that the attack had come from. A rifle hovered at his side as he doubled back towards the other two survivors of our opening volley: a stunned mare and the much younger stallion who was only just starting to pick himself up off the ground from where he’d stumbled during the eruptions caused by my barrage.

The elder White Hoof interposed himself between them and my assault, his rifle bucking in his telekinetic grasp as he returned fire. I whirled and rolled in an almost lazy loop, keeping myself out from in front of his sporadic rifle fire. His weapon was not designed to track and engage a fast-moving target like me. I unleashed another trio of blasts, surrounding the stallion in renewed eruptions of shattered ground. The White Hoof recoiled and winced away in an effort to shield his eyes from the dust.

There was a flash of scarlet light, and the now-headless corpse slumped to the ground.

Only two more remained. I closed in with a burst from my Gale Force. The younger pony had finally gotten his spear out and ready, gripping it in the crook of one leg. His stance was abysmal though, and it looked like he could barely see anything through the clouds of dust that my energy bolts had been kicking up. He certainly didn’t see my kick coming until it was too late.

His head whipped around sharply to the side, the rest of his body spinning a moment later as the blow sent him sprawling. When he landed, he made no move to get back up. My attention turned now to the last remaining threat: a White Hoof mare who was looking at me with terrified eyes. She was trying to backpedal away from me, one hoof curled protectively in front of her chest, over the cloth garments that were slung across her body.

“No! Please! Wait―!”

Unfortunately for her, I had been in motion before she’d even managed to form her words. My forehoof connected solidly with her chest. The bracer affixed to it registered the hit and discharged.

Even as I struck her, I felt that something was off. Not her reaction; I’d seen even the most hardened raider crack in the face of their imminent death. No, what had felt ‘off’ had been the hit. I’d stuck hundreds of ponies in my life. I knew exactly what it felt like to punch and kick ponies in all parts of their bodies. Heads, ribs, guts, limbs; they all felt different, but they were also distinct.

I’d seen where I stuck this mare―squarely in her chest―but it didn’t feel like that's what I had hit. It hadn’t been a solid mass of ribs and cartilage; but, instead, something much softer and more brittle.

The explosion of energy ripped through the mare from one end to the other. It wasn’t visceral or messy though; the detonation was more internal, pulverizing her bones and rupturing her organs. Her body flew back, already completely limp as the strike had caused her heart to pop like balloon. The garment that she was wearing was another matter though. It was thoroughly seared by the strike and fell apart in the air.

That was when I saw it.

That was when I saw that I hadn’t struck one pony, but two.

Weeks.

That was how old the foal must have been; just a matter of weeks. Tiny, delicate, held close to its mother by the cloth swaddle that had kept me from seeing it in the dust and haze and my own bloodlust.

Now, I could only stare at the sight of the tiny broken body. Why? What could possibly have possessed these White Hooves to bring a newborn along on a raid?! I always knew that these tribals were psychotic, but this was on a whole different level! It didn’t make any sense. There was no reason for them to have brought a newborn foal on a raid!

...it...it had been a raid, right?

A gust of air and dust washed over me as Moonbeam’s thrusters lowered her down to the ground beside me, “Windfall…” it was amazing how her mechanical voice synthesizer was able to so realistically mimic a genuinely frightful timbre as the metal mare regarded the same scene that I was looking at, “...what did we just do?”

My hind legs gave out and my armored flank slumped to the ground. My shaking pinions were moving seemingly of their own accord, digging a half-empty bottle of Wild Pegasus out from my saddlebags and bringing it to my lips. A lot of the amber liquid dribbled down my chin as I numbly tried to drink from the shaking bottle, but I got enough of a burning shot down my throat to get my brain working again.

For all of the good it did. I still couldn’t form any words or meaningful thoughts. My mind was simply stuck in an endlessly looping cycle of incredulity as I tried to understand why a foal had been here. It didn’t make any sense! The White Hooves would bring younger ponies along on their raids as a way to initiate them, sure; but even they didn’t bring newborns! Why had this mare brought one along now?!

“Oh, Celestia, this one’s alive!”

I hadn’t even heard her. My attention was still completely locked on the slain infant; its limp, broken, body sprawled out in the desert scrabble, only a few feet away from its mother. Somehow, I did retain enough awareness to vaguely note that the mare I’d killed wasn’t branded. Most of her backside had been obscure earlier by what I recognized had been a papoose for carrying her child. The garment was no longer there now, sundered by my strike, and so her entire backside was laid bare for all to see.

Sans the brand that every bona fide White Hoof would have received early in their life.

A captive most likely. A mare who had been taken some time ago―months, years, a decade, who knew?―and used as a slave by the tribe to perform menial labor and expand their gene pool. Ponies like that weren’t brought along on raids. They were kept safe and secure back in the camps.

This hadn’t been a raid.

And I’d killed two innocent ponies.

“Windfall? Windfall!”

My head snapped listlessly in the direction of the robopony. I noticed that she was cradling something in her forelegs. It took me several inexcusably long seconds to conceive of that ‘thing’ as being the younger stallion I’d knocked aside earlier in the fight. His cheek was split, and his eye was already starting to swell shut from where I’d struck him. The injuries would be painful for a few days, and his lack of consciousness suggested that there was some sort of concussion involved as well, but he’d almost certainly survive and make a complete recovery within a week. Much sooner with the application of healing potions or other medical magicks.

I blinked up at Moonbeam, whose holographic features were doing a superb job of reflecting the exact same feelings of confusion and grief that I was experiencing as well, “he’s alive, Windfall.

“What do we do with him?” Again, it took me some time to recognize that the robopony was doing more than merely asking me a question. My gaze eventually made its way down to were one of her alloyed hooves was indicating his backside.

This pony did have a brand.

Nopony could deny his youth―he was easily several years younger than I was! He might be a White Hoof by birth and by brand, but to suggest that there was any way that a stallion―a colt―as young as he was could have racked up any worthwhile number of raids or slayings was laughable. Chances were much higher that he’d never been out of the camps himself before this ill-fated expedition either.

My gaze wandered from the unconscious colt to the other four ponies. They all at least had brands as well, marking them as genuine White Hooves; but there was more to it than that. There was a...resemblance between them. Muzzle shapes, eye colors, and other little physical quirks that one often found within family units. This had not been some haphazard group of White Hooves.

They’d been a family.

We’d―I’d―just wiped out a family…

...save for one little colt.

“Windfall?” Moonbeam asked her question again, an edge creeping into her voice, “where do we take him?”

It was not lost on me―even in my vacuous state―how the mare had altered the wording of her original question. There was no longer a question in her mind of ‘what’ we were going to do with the colt. Clearly, we were not simply going to leave him here or callously ‘finish’ our job of wiping out the White Hoof ‘raiders’ that we’d so thoroughly slaughtered. Moonbeam had decided that we were going to take him from this place to somewhere he could recover.

What the colt would do after that...once he woke up to a world in which his family no longer existed―struck down in less than a minute by The Wonderbolt as they were merely trying to cross the Neighvada Valley―was anypony’s guess. My mind whipped back to that day in my own life where I’d woken up to the same reality of having just lost everything and everypony I’d ever cared about. How I’d stayed hidden in that barn for days until Jackboot finally found me and gave my life something approaching direction and meaning.

The difference was that I couldn’t do that for this colt, could I? What right did I have to try and help him, after destroying everything that he’d had? Even if―by the grace of Celestia―he was willing to accept that help...would I even be able to bring myself to give it? What I’d just done here…

Maybe there really wasn’t much of a difference between a raider and a hero after all.

“I don’t know,” I somehow managed to sputter out in choppy words, only just trusting myself to be able to speak. Inwardly, I cringed at how hollow I’d sounded, “maybe the caravan…”

Under most circumstances, it wouldn’t be a longshot to think that a group of trading ponies would be willing to entertain a small favor being asked of them by a pony that ‘Miss neighvada’ had been playing up as a protector of ponies in the Valley. Especially when that favor was taking an injured colt to their destination for treatment. The real question was whether those ponies would be able to bring themselves to look past his brand. Shooting White Hooves on sight wasn’t a policy that was exclusive to The Wonderbolt, after all. Even assuming that the ponies in that caravan could look past his brand, that didn’t mean that the ponies of the town they ended up in would be able to.

Seaddle was certainly a no-go. All of the news coming from that region was simply getting worse and worse since Ebony Song had taken over. If we survived the onslaught from Arginine’s stable, it was becoming clear that the former New Lunar Republic was something that I’d have to address sooner rather than later. Shady Saddles didn’t have a particularly ambivalent view of White Hooves either. Their proximity to the tribe’s home turf made them a frequent target for raids and harassment. Everypony who lived in that town had a family member or a close friend who had either been killed or enslaved by the White Hooves. New Reino would hang him on sight too.

There simply weren’t any places that I White Hoof could turn up and be safe in the Neighvada Valley. Not even on the say-so of The Wonderbolt―

Well...maybe there was one place, “McMaren,” I blurted, snapping my gaze back up to the robopony, “can...can you take him to McMaren?” my word carried genuine weight there. White Hoof or no, if I told Homily to look after the colt, the ponies there would.

Especially once they learned why, “tell them what happened,” my words caught in my throat, prompting me to clear it noisily and take a breath, “tell them everything…”

Moonbeam looked between me and the young pony held in her limbs, then she nodded, “alright. I’ll meet you guys in Shady Saddles,” she paused and cast her pink gaze to the other bodies, “what about them?”

“Just get him to McMaren,” I said hoarsely. The robopony hesitated another few seconds, but eventually she was merciful enough to merely nod and flare her alloyed wings. Levitation talismans and thrusters hummed to life, lifting her off the ground in a flurry of dust and grit. Then her engines angled themselves to provide optimal forward movement, and the metal mare jetted off into the eastern horizon.

Leaving me alone among the corpses.

I bowed my head, shaking it fitfully from side to side, “why? Why did you have to be heading towards that caravan?” I spat bitterly at the scattered bodies, “what did you think was going to happen to you, doing something like that?

“Even if I hadn’t been here, those caravan ponies would have gunned you down anyway,” yet, even as the words left me, I could feel how empty they were. Of course that wouldn’t have happened. These ponies would have seen the wagons from miles off and either kept themselves hidden until the coast was clear, or tried to skirt around them specifically to avoid this sort of outcome. From down here, they couldn’t have even known that those other ponies were in the area at all. Visibility for ground-bound ponies was measured in just a hooffull of miles; not the scores that Moonbeam’s augmented vision could pierce.

This wasn’t their fault. It wasn’t even mine or Moonbeam’s. Killing White Hooves wasn’t something that needed pretext in Neighvada. Not any more than killing radscorpions or crazy roboponies. They were a Wasteland hazard, and the fewer of them that existed, the better off every decent pony in the valley would be.

Honestly, it was just the unbranded mare and her foal that were digging at me, realizing that they’d gotten caught up in the crossfire, after a fashion. Had those two not been here, this would have been a completely clean operation with nothing to second-guess.

I felt a cold shiver run down my spine as I felt the hard glare of a pair of emerald eyes that existed only in the recesses of my own mind.

That was when I threw up.

Most of it was the whiskey tat I’d just slugged down, and it burned about as bad on the way back up as it had on the way down. This was followed by about a minute of dry heaving as I tried to spit the rancid taste of bile out of my mouth.

This was a first, I thought to myself bitterly. Both vomiting at the sight of carnage like this, and twisting discomfort in my gut. Presumably my conscience was working overtime in response to what I’d done to the mare and her foal.

I finished spitting the last of the bitter taste out of my mouth and gave a final shake to recompose myself. I turned away from the carnage and hopped into the air, flitting away from the scene, ignoring the pain in my gut. It was more of an annoyance than anything crippling.

Nopony was perfect, and sometimes mistakes were made. That was the nature of the Wasteland. Two ponies who shouldn’t have been here got hurt, and that was tragic; but it wasn’t my fault. To balance out the scales, I was having Moonbeam take that young colt someplace he could be looked after, and perhaps even be taught a better way of living than whatever his guardians in the White hooves had been indoctrinating him with.

That was all that needed to be said on the matter.

I took the bottle back out and downed another swig to replace what I’d just upchucked as I glided in the direction of the caravan that I’d just saved. My stomach didn’t feel particularly receptive though, so I kept the amount down to a couple of cautious sips. Even that small amount was not received well though, and I spent the flight to the caravan with my mind keenly focused on not wasting any further of the precious Wild Pegasus on the ground below.

“And you’re sure there aren’t any more of them in the area?”

The speaker was a mare by the name of, Vardo, the caravan master and part owner of the franchise; which turned out to be a partner in the much larger trading company that was owned by Summer Glade and her husband. News of The Wonderbolt’s involvement in the saving of her life from Lancer mercenaries had spread to pretty much every pony working for them, making me and my distinctive barding a welcome sight. I was sure that, when this mare eventually delivered her report to her superiors, it would only serve to further cement my reputation with their organization.

Lucky me, “there’s nopony else within miles of here,” I assured her and the other merchants in the wagon train, “and we’ll be with you the rest of the way; at least until we reach Shady Saddles.”

“Well, that’s certainly a relief,” the earth pony mare breathed a contented sigh, “seems like the whole valley’s been going to pot these last few months. Knowing we’ve got the best protection a pony could want will go a long way to keeping our nerves from getting too frayed.

“We can arrange for some compensation, I’m sure,” the mare offered, casting her gaze in the direction of the group’s purser, catching a smile and a nod from the unicorn stallion.

“We don’t need any caps,” I assured them, ignoring a frown from Ramparts and the silent reminder of our upcoming expenses. The mercenaries were already covered, and we had enough petty cash for weapons, ammo, and healing potions once we reached Shady Saddles. Frankly, I wasn’t feeling too comfortable with the notion of accepting payment for what I’d just done. Not in the form of caps or bits anyway, “as long as we can mooch some meals off you, that’ll be enough,” then I thought about my rapidly emptying alcohol reserves, “and some Wild Pegasus,” I added.

Vardo grinned, “I don’t see as to how we can refuse an offer like that. In fact,” she covered her mouth and issued a none-too-convincing cough, “some ‘breakage’ is known to happen on long trips like this. I don’t see why a bottle or two of the Special Reserve we’ve got couldn’t be a part of the final tally…” I noticed a matching grin on the purser’s face now as he withdrew a notepad and promptly scribbled something onto it with a pencil.

Now I was smiling along with them, “that sounds like a deal to me!” I extended my hoof and bumped it against the caravan master’s. When I turned around, it was then that I noticed a concerned look on Foxglove’s face. As with Ramparts, I ignored it and simply trotted on past her, content to not comment on whatever had prompted such a look.

Unfortunately, the violet unicorn didn’t seem to be of the same inclination, “don’t you think you’ve had enough to drink for a while? You’re averaging more than a bottle a day―”

“You’re not my mother, and I’ve been drinking since I was twelve,” I snapped briskly at the mechanic, glaring at her, “downing a bottle or two a night has been my routine for years. The last couple of months were just a little...off. A lot was happening.

“Now I’m back in my old grove. So I’m back to drinking like I did then. It’s fine,” and that was all I had to say on the matter.

“Why don’t you see if any of their gear needs a tune-up?” I suggested to Foxglove. Then I turned to the stallions in our party, “you two see how you can help out their watches. Starlight?” the pink unicorn quirked her brow, “you...do whatever it is you do to help,” the mare frowned.

“I’m going back up,” I finished, and leaped back into the air before anypony could make a reply; and that was where I stayed for the majority of our trip into Shady Saddles. I wasn’t in the mood for lectures during the best of times, and was feeling especially unreceptive while nursing an upset stomach. There’d be plenty of time for them to give me an earful when the fate of the Wasteland wasn’t in the balance anyway.

“How’s he doing?”

“Physically? He’ll recover. There won’t even be any scars,” the Neighvada radio personality responded through the crackling speakers of my pipbuck, “but...he’s pretty upset,” she added in subdued tones, “he’s not eating. Barely speaks. He just sort of...lays there. He hasn’t even cried that I know of.”

Not so different from how I’d been in the wake of my own loss as a filly, I noted, “keep trying, Homily. He’ll come out of it, eventually,” I paused for a long moment, debating on whether I even wanted to know the answer to the question hovering on the tip of my tongue, “does he understand why I attacked them?”

There wasn’t a reply for several quite some time, which only served to further ratchet up my anxiety over the answer. Finally, “he thinks it was the Enclave, Windfall. He said it all happened so fast, that all he remembers was flying ponies and a ‘death machine’. We think he means Moonbeam. He was still unconscious when she dropped him off, so he doesn’t even know how he got here.”

I let out the breath that I hadn’t even realized that I was holding in a relieved sigh. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about that colt growing up to resent me. Or, would I? Homily wasn’t exactly in the business of peddling lies or half-truths. Not since Scratch stopped paying her to add in those ‘extra’ advisories during her news broadcasts. If the colt asked her what happened, “...are you going to tell him the truth?”

“Windfall, I barely understand what the truth is! Moonbeam was pretty tight-lipped when she brought him in,” the mare said, sounding more than a little frustrated about being kept in the dark. It wasn’t a position that she was used to being in with me and my companions, “something about a ‘mistake’? What happened, Windfall?”

I felt my expression harden as I issued my stoic reply, “we saw some White Hooves near a caravan,” I told the mare on the other end of my pipbuck, “so I did what The Wonderbolt is expected to do: I took care of them.”

“So then what was the ‘mistake’?” Homily pressed, “because that sounds pretty cut and dry to me.”

I opened my mouth to respond, but then I hesitated. A little orange mare wearing a distinguished hat was glaring at me from deep within the recesses of my mind, “I…” I cleared my throat and took a breath, “I mean we…” I cringed as images of the shattered foal and its mother flashed through my mind, prompting a tear to burn threateningly behind my eye. I rubbed the sensation away and steeled myself, “...we didn’t kill them all, obviously. That was the ‘mistake’,” I finally said, “but I wasn’t comfortable stepping on the throat of a colt while he was unconscious. Sorry about putting him on you like this.”

A subdued snort of disgust made my ear twitch, even though the sound had not had a corporeal source. I no longer felt those emerald eyes glaring at me though. Others were, though.

“I see,” I wasn’t convinced that she did, but Homily didn’t seem inclined to press me on the issue if she had one with my story, “I’m actually glad to hear you’re not that kind of mare. I know what kind of history you have with the White Hooves.

“This was good of you to do, Windfall. We’ll take good care of him, I promise. You just focus on saving the valley, okay?”

“Yeah, okay. I can do that,” if I rehearsed that a few more times, I might even be able to say it in a way that sounded remotely confident, “I’ll let you know the moment we have our first sighting, alright?”

“Alright. Stay safe; all of you.”

“We’ll try. Windfall, out,” I cut the connection. A bottle of spicy Special Reserve was out, uncorked, and to my lips before the pipbuck’s communications feature was even disengaged. A full third of the contents were gone before I let it part from me was a quiet gasp. I winced, clutching at my stomach only moments later as I felt my gut tie itself into a knot. The nausea was back too, but I managed to keep everything inside this time, if only barely. For the next couple of minutes, I merely sat atop the roof of Sandy’s bar and focused on breathing until the sensation passed.

So now I was lying to Homily. Neat. Some ‘hero’ I was, huh? Murdering unarmed mares and their newborn foals and then lying about it to somepony who trusted and looked up to me.

I winced again, but not at the thoughts; rather the now piercing pain that I was feeling in my stomach. Part of me was actually starting to feel a little concerned now. This was some pretty acute feeling indigestion considering that I hadn’t eaten all that much besides Cram and Wild Pegasus. Yeah, that might not sound exactly like the diet of champions, but it was the menu that I’d been accustomed to for years without ever having this sort of issue.

Briefly, I entertained the issue of downing a healing potion and being done with it, but I ultimately decided against it. We’d likely be needing all of the little purple vials that we could get our hooves on in a few days, I shouldn’t waste one on what could turn out to be just a little heartburn or something. The local clinic was bound to have something more appropriate on hoof, so I alit from the roof and glided my way in that direction.

I’d been a regular at the Shady Saddles Clinic during my upbringing. This town had been a frequent stop along the route that Jackboot had taken me on over the years and not all of our endeavors went without some sort of hitch. I was rarely the actual patient in question, but I’d always accompanied the older stallion when he’d come by to get treatments for the injuries he’d sustained. So, the regular staff pretty much knew me on sight, and I knew them all by name.

However, I was caught quite by surprise to discover an additional familiar face within the small-town clinic, “Doctor Lancet?” I blurted out loud when I saw the black unicorn stallion conferring with another patient in the modest office, “what are you doing down here?”

The older physician glanced up at me briefly, but only held up a patient hoof as he finished his already ongoing conversation with his patient. I blushed awkwardly and remained off to the side, not having intended to interrupt the doctor during his job. So I waiting off to the side, my hoof idly massaging my still aching tummy.

Finally, Lancet completed his talk and dismissed his previous patient, and turned to regard me with a patient expression, “Miss Windfall. it has been some time, hasn’t it?

“As to what I’m doing in Shady Saddles, well, there has been some...administrative woes, shall we say, in Seaddle,” he fixed me with a knowing look, eliciting another awkward blush from myself, “I thought it prudent to relocate my practice. So, now I work here with Doctor Phleb. He’s currently out making some rounds in the robust little ‘tent city’ that has so recently sprung up within the town limits.

“Which I understand is also your doing, correct?”

“Uh, yeah, something like that,” I admitted, rubbing the back of my head as I smirked at the physician, “they’ll only be here for another day or two. Then we’ll be heading out to go and deal with some bad ponies.”

“Woe be unto the ponies who prompted the Wonderbolt to enlist an army to deal with them,” Lancet allowed himself a dry chuckle before adopting a more serious expression, “if you’re here to try and purchase more of the clinic’s supply, we’ve already sold all that we can possibly spare. I explained to that courser friend of yours that it’s not a matter of caps or bits. Phled and I simply refuse to risk having nothing left to use to treat the ponies of Shady Saddles, regardless of the results of your campaign―”

“No no no, it’s nothing like that,” I hurriedly explained, “I just wanted to see if you had anything for an upset stomach, that’s all.”

“Oh,” he seemed almost surprised by the mundane request, which I guess was a little understandable, considering what most of my visits with him had typically involved, “well, that I can help you with,” he turned and began heading towards a cabinet in the back of the office, “can you give me some details about your stomach issue? What kind of discomfort you’re feeling, where exactly it’s located, that sort of thing?”

“I started getting some pretty sharp pains in my gut a couple days ago while on the way here. They won’t go away.”

Lancet hesitated and looked back in my direction, his expression slightly more concerned, “you’ve been experiencing sharp pains for the past few days?”

“Off and on,” I said, feeling a little more self-conscious as a result of his reaction to being told about a little stomach bug.

The Doctor studied me a little more intently with his eyes, “have you eaten anything out of the ordinary recently?”

“No, just the usual: Cram, Fancy Buck Cakes, whiskey. Same as everypony else.”

“How have your stools been? Runny? Have you gone at all?”

I frowned, “you mean my shits? They’re about the same, I guess. Why?”

“Hmm,” he frowned pensively, “it’s unusual to experience significant intestinal discomfort without anything manifesting during a bowel movement,” he tapped his chin, “when were you last in heat?”

My cheeks burned at the question, “what’s that have to do with anything?!”

“Maybe nothing, maybe everything,” Lancet explained, “there are several uterine issues that can be mistaken for stomach trouble; even if you aren’t sexually active, which I assume is still the case since your last visit?”

“Yeah,” I blurted immediately, feeling decidedly a lot more uncomfortable about this visit. Then I was forced to grunt and sigh, “I mean...kind of,” my cheeks felt like they were about to catch on fire, “I’ve only done it two times, and the first time was really quick, so it probably doesn’t count.”

The stallion’s expression was slightly more amused at that last remark, but his features swiftly morphed into a more professional mask as he continued, “I see,” he then moved towards a different cabinet and opened it up, “and I presume that both encounters were indeed after you last assured me you were celibate?” I nodded. Lancet retrieved a needle and syringe floating in his telekinetic grip, “in that case, I’d like to run one test before proceeding…”

I fidgeted with my hooves in the examination room that Doctor Lancet had told me to wait in while he ran his ‘test’ for whatever it was that he was expecting to find. More frustrating than the waiting had been the fact that the unicorn had refused to give me anything at all to deal with my abdominal discomfort. He’d also asked that I refrain from eating or drinking anything until he came back.

My ears twitched and my eyes went to the door just moments before it opened and admitted the older stallion into the cozy little room. Instantly, I felt myself go on guard as I saw his expression. There was...something behind his eyes that I’d never seen on Lancet’s face before. Almost like a...remorse, of some sort. He sat down in front of me on his haunches, a sheet of paper held firm in his magic as he looked his gaze onto me.

“Miss Windfall, I have the results back from the blood test,” his tone was flat and condid, raising my hackles in response, “and I’m just going to come right to the point: you’re pregnant...barely.”

I had once been hit by a gargantuan hell hound so hard that the resulting impact had slammed me into a wall with enough force to very nearly pulverize my spine and leave me paralyzed from the neck down…

...but this news hit me harder than I’d ever been struck before, “I’m sorry, what.”

“It’s definitive,” he repeated, his words still cool and reserved, “you are quite pregnant; but the hormone levels that I found in your blood indicate that you may not be for much longer,” he took a deep breath, “Windfall, your body is in the early stages of a miscarriage.”

I forced myself to remove the hoof that had, at some point, wandered over to hover across my belly during the news. My brain was still trying to process receiving the initial news when the gravity of those last words struck home, “I―how? What’s wrong?” then the wider implications hit, “how can I even be pregnant at all?! I’ve only done it twice!

“None of RG’s...whatever, even made it in me the second time! I can’t be pregnant, so why would I be miscarrying?!”

Lancet let out a long sigh, “if you and your partner were together while you were heat, then all that it would have taken was the one encounter, but ultimately I can’t comment on how you became pregnant. That’s between you and the stallion in question.

“All that I can tell you is that you are pregnant, Windfall; but not for much longer,” he paused, “unless you wish to be.”

“What?”

“As I said: you’re hormone levels indicate that your body is in the early stages of a miscarriage,” Lancet repeated, “with a combination of potions and some spells, it is possible that your pregnancy can be saved.

“Otherwise, I do have something that I can give you to...expedite the process and remove the discomfort that you’re feeling.”

“You can save it?” I noticed that my hoof was back again, resting gently over my abdomen. I didn’t remove it this time, though my head was still racing with a myriad of thoughts as I tried to wrap my brain around the whole concept of being pregnant.

I mean, having a foal or two had always been a foregone conclusion in my head. Raising a family was something that I was going to do someday. However, I hadn’t meant for ‘someday’ to be quite so near in the future. I mean, I was about to lead an army into battle within the week! I couldn’t do that pregnant! Could I? There wasn’t even any telling if this would be a proverbial ‘killing blow’ to Arginine’s stable, even if it was all successful. Who knew how many of their roving ‘specimen’ teams that they had out and about. They’d have to be tracked down and dealt with.

To say nothing of what was almost certainly an army of those genetically engineered ponies that was currently moving through White Hoof territory. I hadn’t wanted to acknowledge that as a serious possibility, but ‘political instability’ didn’t account for why so many groups of White Hooves would be heading out of the Neighvada Valley. On the other hoof, it all made a lot more sense if they were all refugees fleeing from a systematic extermination of their whole tribe.

I was the last pony that was going to shed a tear over their slaughter, no matter what group was doing it. As far as I was concerned, they deserved to by struck down, to the lasted painted stallion or mare. However, that meant that there was currently a group out there that was large enough to perform the eradication of a group that was as large and powerful as the White Hooves. Even without Whiplash keeping them all unified, they wouldn’t have been pushovers, and an external threat would have curbed whatever infighting they might have experienced and unified them again rather quickly. Tracking down and destroying such a force could take a lot of time.

Time that I couldn’t afford to spend pregnant!

...and yet…

“Windfall?” Lancet asked again, peering at me with a slightly concerned expression, “did you hear me?”

“Huh-what?”

“We need to make a decision, and quickly: do you want to save the pregnancy, or not?”

“I…” I hesitated. Which was ridiculous. After all, there wasn’t really an actual ‘decision’ to make here, was there? I couldn’t lead this campaign and have a foal at the same time. There’d be plenty of time to find a stallion and settle down later, when the world wasn’t under threat from genocidal freaks. I’d be able to pop out as many foals as I want then with no issues whatsoever.

Logically, the only acceptable course of action was to help my body do what it was already apparently doing on its own anyway, and move on to more important concerns. Any other decision would just be stupid.

“I…”

“...am such an idiot,” I bemoaned for about the twentieth time since leaving Doctor Lancet. I reached up and flicked the tiny glowing pendant hanging from around my neck. According to the black unicorn, it had a very similar function to a regeneration talisman, though its magic was far less robust and powerful. It might help me heal cuts and stuff slightly faster than normal, but its primary focus was to keep the fetus viable for the next few weeks while I finished taking the course of hormone pills that he’d provided to me.

In two weeks, I was supposed to come back and see him again for another round of blood tests to see how everything was coming along and if the treatments were indeed working.

That was the stupidest part about this whole thing, honestly. Even if I did everything that Lancet told me to do, there was every possibility that I’d miscarry anyway! I could very well be doing all of this for nothing. According to the physician, it all came down to what had triggered my body’s reaction in the first place. If it was something that my body had detected that was biologically wrong with the fetus, then no amount of magic or pills was going to do anything to help.

However, he’d noted that an overabundance of physical activity, excessive drinking, and being under a lot of stress could also serve as triggers for a self-terminating pregnancy. With my luck, I was probably sitting right at a trifecta of all three, considering how the last few weeks of my life had been going. If that was really the case, then the treatment plan that Lancet had given me would keep things running smoothly until I was in a better place, both emotionally and physiologically.

None of that changed that fact that this was all still likely very stupid of me. I shuddered to think of what Foxglove’s opinion would be. Though, that was a conversation I was completely content to put off for a while. Preferably until my inbound colt or filly was all grown up with a family of their own. At around that time I’d be open to being berated by the violet unicorn mechanic.

However, there was at least one conversation―with one specific stallion―that I almost definitely should have.

Not that I was expecting anything from him. After all, Arginine’s and my ‘relationship’ was still in the midsts of a rough patch. I think that I’d mostly managed to forgive him in my head, but things were still pretty complicated where my emotions were concerned―I bet the fluctuating hormones from these pills would be a big help there!―and so we hadn’t really had a chance to speak and iron things out since New Reino.

...well, okay, so that wasn’t necessarily true. There’d been plenty of chances. I’d just been too stubborn and drunk to want to make use of any of them.

This was hardly the ideal way to try and reconnect with him. I wasn’t even sure just what kind of response I would want from Arginine. It didn’t even really matter, since I’d already made my―very stupid―decision. I just...wanted him to know, was all. He sort of deserved to know, right? Since he was the father and all?

Would a stallion like him even care?

“Well, isn’t this jus’ the smallest durn Wasteland in the world!”

My head whipped up at the vaguely familiar voice. Standing before me was a unicorn that I’d met only once before, but the circumstances surrounding that meeting had certainly made it memorable, “...Marl?”

“Well, now I feel all abashed an’ such,” the mare laughed, “ta think that the Wonderbolt remembers the name of lil’ ol’ me! How’s tricks? Not that it’s much of a secret what the Wonderbolt gets up to around these parts,” she added with a wink.

“Yeah, I guess not. And it’s hard to forget ponies like you and your crew,” I said, finding myself able to muster a warm smile for the mare, “your sapphires really came through for me.”

“Glad to hear it! It was definitely the least that we could do for you and yours.”

“What brings you to Shady Saddles anyway? Selling gemstones?”

“Pretty much,” she nodded, her hazel eyes glittering, “word got around that the Hecate Band was down here, and they’re always willing to pay top bit for high-end stones.”

“Oh? Why’s that?”

“Their leader, Keri, a big zebra with a funny way of talkin’, uses them to make talismans and such. But, like, super zebra voodoo talismans, you know?”

It was reassuring to hear that at least one of the mercenary groups seemed to be taking my warnings about the threat that Arginine’s stable posed seriously and gathering together the resources that they needed to fight them, “zebra voodoo talismans, huh? How are they different from the ones that ponies make?”

“Oh, I’ve heard that zebras can do all sorts of things with their magic,” the unicorn mare informed me, “summon monsters from Tartarus, make dead bodies move on their own, enthrall ponies to make them their slaves, all sorts of dark stuff like that.”

My eyes widened, “really? Zebras can do stuff like that? But they don’t even have horns! How can they do magic like that? I didn’t even think that unicorns could do magic like that!”

“Unicorns can’t,” Marl insisted, “not that I’ve ever heard of, at any rate; but zebra magic ain’t really ‘magic’ like that. I heard that they get their powers by making deals with demons from another realm or some such,” she leaned in really close, “they sell their souls, some say, to get all sorts of powers. I even heard that, when they die, they become those same demons too and help other zebras.”

“That...sounds pretty dark…”

“Well, that’s zebras for you,” Marl shrugged, straightening back up again, “there was a reason that ponies fought their empire until the whole world was destroyed, after all.”

“Right, yeah, I guess.”

“You alright, girly?” Marl inquired, peering at me with a slightly concerned expression, “you seem a little out of sorts.”

I blinked at the mare blankly before I finally processed what she’d said and gave myself a little shake to wake myself up, “yeah, no, I’m fine. Sorry. I’m just...you know, under a lot of pressure right now,” I put on a wry smile, “sort of planning a war and all that.”

“Ha! That does sound a might stressful, I’ll grant ya!” the mare laughed, “in that case, I’m heading over to the local drinking establishment for some ‘stress relief’; care to join me?”

“Well, I kind of looking for somepony, and I don’t know where they are at the moment, so―”

“So why not start at the tavern? If the pony you’re looking for isn’t there, then maybe there’s a least a pony there what’s caught sight of them, right?”

That wasn’t the worst idea that I’d heard recently. While Arginine certainly wasn’t the kind to hang out at a bar and drink, a massive gray stallion with two horns popping out of his forehead wasn’t an easy sight to forget. Sandy or somepony else there very well might have seen him recently and be able to point me in the right direction to start my search, “sure thing. Let’s go…”

I trotted down the road at Marl’s side as the mare went on about how she and her family hunted gems, along with a questionably interesting explanation about the best soil consistencies for natural gem formation and the techniques that were used to dig for them, “after all, it’s not like you can just scratch at the ground and uncover a pile of sparkling gemstones!” the mare cackled, “maybe in the old days, if the stories are true,” she sounded dubious, “but certainly not anymore. These days, you have to dig for them, and I mean really dig.

“But our clan’s been tunneling for centuries, and we’ve gotten it down to a science. Heck, diggin’s practically an instinct for us Tarts; dating all the way back to our so-many-greats grandmother Lemon or Lime or Citron whoever,” she paused, tapping her chin in thought before finally shrugging, “eh, it was one of them fruits anyway, I think.”

I was about to point out that something probably couldn’t be both a science and an instinct at the same time when I realized that we’d arrived at the front door of Sandy’s tavern. Marl had apparently already vanished from my side and I spied her on the other side of the overcrowded dining area chatting away with a few other faces that I recognized from our rescue a few months ago.

While not every pony that the New Reino mercenary companies had promised us had made their way to Shady Saddles quite yet, it was pretty obvious wherever you looked in the small town that this place was a lot more populated than it usually was. Two hundred-odd ponies increased the settlement’s population by nearly a full quarter. Seeing the serving ponies, along with Sandy herself, now dashing between tables that had become ‘standing room only’ as they tried to keep up with their clientele, I idly wondered if I should have sent word ahead to Ramparts’ sister…

“Hey, Windy! Be with you in a sec!” the dusty-colored mare blurted as she zipped by, balancing a half dozen drinks and plates on her backside. She was out of sight before I could utter a word in reply. Patiently, I set myself by the door and waited. Several minutes later, the very out of breath mare approached me, smiling tiredly, “sorry about the wait,” she gestured to the packed room, “but, as you can see…”

“Yeah, sorry about that―”

“Sorry?! Are you kidding?” the mare laughed, “I’ve made more money tonight than I made all of last month! This is great!”

“Oh...well then...glad to help? Hey, have you seen Arginine around here? Big gray unicorn stallion with two horns? Always looks like he’s shitting out a cactus?”

Sandy sniggered, “can’t say that I’ve seen anypony like that, no; but I’ll keep an eye out. Can I get you anything? I have plenty of Wild Pegasus to go around if you want your usual?”

“Yeah, that sounds―wait, no!” I winced, idly putting a hoof to my stomach. Alcohol was one of those things that Lancet had been very clear about me staying away from during the pregnancy. He’d also cautioned me about drinking even after I’d given birth, since it would be bad for the foal while it was nursing, “Uh, a bottle of...um…” I drew a blank, “what do ponies drink that’s not whiskey?”

Sandy quirked an eyebrow, “expanding your palate, eh? Well, I’ve got some vodka, gin, a little rum―”

“No, I mean drinks with no alcohol at all.”

“Oh. You mean a Sparkle Cola?” the mare glanced at me, skeptically.

“Yeah, that’s right! One of those please.”

“Really? No booze?”

I frowned, mostly at myself for having managed to garner a reputation with this mare for being such a lush, “no thank you; just the cola.”

“Suit yourself,” she shrugged, “I’ll have a bottle sent right out,” the tavern owner said, and then she vanished into the crowd. A few minutes later, another of Sandy’s servers walked past me and delivered my bottle. I paid her, and then slipped back outside into the slightly quieter night in front of the bar so that I could drink in relative peace.

Finding Arginine here had been a long shot, so I wasn’t surprised about being no closer to locating him. On the bright side, I was left with plenty of time to look.

Just like in New Reino, there wasn’t all that much that I was responsible for handling at the moment. Ramparts was meeting with the mercenary commanders to hash out the details of our campaign. Foxglove was collecting supplies and servicing the group’s equipment. Starlight had locked herself away for the evening to look over her grimoires for any spells that might prove particularly useful in the coming days. Moonbeam had chosen to linger in McMaren for the evening at the request of some of Homily’s engineers. Apparently they wanted her help with testing the connections that they were setting up with the hangar beneath the landfill.

Meanwhile, I was left to...just sort of wait around. I wasn’t a tactician like Ramparts was, so I wouldn’t be a lot of help in their planning meeting. My lack of engineering expertise would be more likely to slow Foxglove down than provide her with any meaningful assistance. I couldn’t read any sort of magic at all. Outside of combat, I was really pretty much...useless.

I cast a scathing glance back at my cutie mark.

A fat load of help that thing was. I’d just slaughtered a whole family, save for a single young colt, because all I knew how to do was kill.

The bottle was uncorked and to my lips with hardly any thought given to the matter before I even remembered that I wasn’t holding a bottle whiskey. I just about choked when I tasted half-flat carrot soda instead of liquor. I wiped my mouth and glared at the offending bottle for several seconds before finally letting out a defeated sigh and sipping at what was left of its contents.

Being pregnant was going to suck…

I didn’t even have the luxury of escaping my self-destructive ruminating by getting too drunk to think straight anymore!

Fortunately for me, before my head could drag me too far back down the whole ‘all you’re good for is killing ponies’ rigamarole that I’d become used to of late, somepony came by to pull me right back out of it.

“There you are, I’ve been looking for you.”

My head whipped around at the sound of the deep voice. I breathed an exasperated sigh as I saw the familiar looming grey bulk of Arginine, “small Wasteland; I’ve been looking for you too. There’s some, uh,” I cleared my throat, which had suddenly gone dry despite the recent Sparkle Cola that I’d drunk, “things that I need to talk about with you.”

“Indeed?” the tall unicorn stallion asked. He motioned with his head, “then perhaps you could do so while we walk? There is someplace that we need to be.”

An annoyed grunt escaped my lips, “if I’d known that waging a war would require so many briefings and so much planning, I wouldn’t have stormed your stable myself,” Arginine didn’t respond to my little vent, and the two of us simply began to make our way down one of the town’s dimming streets as night began to go into full swing.

“Look, RG,” I began, a frown creasing my lips, “first, I want to apologize for New Reino―the way I acted. It was...well, I know that it wasn’t like you were trying to hurt me. You were trying really hard to do something nice for me, and I should have remembered that you don’t know how ponies on the surface do things.

“We needed money, and you went out and got a job that made a lot of caps. I needed some cheering up, and you took me out for what was genuinely a really fun night,” my expression shifted into a slight smile as I recalled the evening’s events. My cheeks burned with a slight blush as well as I remembered how it ended; which also prompted my hoof to briefly reach up and brush against the talisman around my neck. Time to stop beating around the bush, Windfall.

I took a deep breath.

However, before I could speak, Arginine interjected, “Your apology is appreciated. I would also like to comment, as well,” the words I’d been preparing stalled in my throat as the stallion went on, “I have noticed that, since the last night we interacted, several of you self-destructive habits have returned. You have begun drinking to excess, and have become more withdrawn from the others.”

“Yeah, I know; but I promise that I―”

“Those habits further escalated in the wake of the incident during our trip to Shady Saddles,” the stallion cast an aside glance my direction, “the ‘White Hoof’ attack?”

My mouth snapped shut and I felt a cold shiver run through my spine. Partly due to the reminder of the costly mistake that I’d made, but also because of the tone that Arginine had used to frame his question. In my head, I was furiously going through every word that Moonbeam and I had exchanged with anypony on the matter to see if there was a way that the details could have reached him. Frankly, there shouldn’t have been anypony outside of myself and a few of the ponies in McMaren who should have known that the White Hooves I’d butchered weren’t strictly ‘raiders’.

Moonbeam might have said something to her mother somehow, I supposed. I couldn’t think of any way that the two of them could have been in contact, but the unicorn mare was certainly the most likely candidate for the cybernetic alicorn to talk to about that subject. From there, it was possible that Starlight Glimmer might have said something to Arginine, or at least said it to somepony else where he could have overheard them…

Though, I felt like if any of my companions knew that I’d murdered a mother and her newborn foal, I’d have gotten an earful from at least Foxglove about it by now.

My left wing briefly moved from where it was folded at my side, a pinion brushing against my underside at the thought of the newborn. I felt my throat grow too tight to speak. The other day, I’d ended the life of a mother and her foal, and here I was trying so desperately to keep from losing mine...I wasn’t quite so certain anymore that I’d had to the right to ask for Doctor Lancet’s help. That impending miscarriage could very well have been the Wasteland serving up some very fitting justice for my actions.

“In any case,” the stallion went on, as though he were oblivious to the clouded state of my expression, “it has also been my observation that there has been a gradual shift in the load being undertaken by this group. You have begun to rely more upon Miss Foxglove and Mister Ramparts to organize this campaign. Am I correct?”

I blinked, caught off guard by the question that felt so removed from the topic of my recent uptake in drinking, “I mean, I guess so. They seem to know what they’re doing. Ramparts knows military stuff, and Foxglove knew New Reino better than anypony else but me. It’s not like I could really hope to pull all of this off on my own, right?” I scoffed at the notion, all joking earlier to the side.

Honestly, I’d never had to to anything on my own. Not really. Jackboot had been there with me just about every step of the way until his death. Even after that, Foxglove had been by my side to lean on. Without somepony there to help out, I very much doubted that I’d have made it as far as I had; in life, or in this quest to stop Arginine’s stable.

“Indeed,” the taller stallion nodded, “though, this raise a few concerns.”

“Concerns?” my features scrunched up in confusion, “what could there possibly be to be ‘concerned’ about? Are you saying there’s somepony with us that you don’t trust?” that would certainly be quite the hypocritical opinion to hold, considering that his was the loyalty that should be the most questionable in all of this.

“It is not a question of ‘trust’, no,” Arginine assured me, “but there does yet remain some lingering...doubts regarding their competency. Up to this point, the ponies from my stable that we have faced have not been true reflections of the quality of pony that we will be facing in the near future.”

“What do you mean?”

“Our mission is, and has forever been known, to be an undertaking that is accomplished in various stages. Each stage would similarly rely most heavily of specific qualities from the ponies involved,” the stallion explained patiently, “and so those qualities were specifically expressed in the strains assigned to those tasks.

“For example: I am a Lambda Strain. Our genome was designed to favor high intelligence, but with a distinct lack of empathy and emotional reservations about our tasks. The latter traits are not something that is intended to be introduced into the eventual Omega Strain that our stable designs when settlement of the Wasteland is to begin.

“Now, while we do possess the greater mass, heartier health, and superior strength that is inherent to all strains in our stable at the moment, those traits are further enhanced in our Kappa Strains. It is those strains that will spearhead the extermination of all other ponies in the Wasteland. Ponies who, in a word, make me and all the others you’ve encountered up to this point look: ‘weak’.

I certainly didn’t like the sound of that, “wait, are you telling me that your stable has, like, special soldier ponies who are designed to be as good at fighting as you are at thinking?”

“That’s a fair summary, yes.”

Well...horseapples.

“Now, while that is true, I have faith in your personal abilities. I have, on multiple occasions, witnessed you best numerous members of my own strain while significantly outnumbered. While I would not hesitate to admit that any singular Kappa could easily best a Lambda like myself in combat, I do have doubts that one Kappa could do so while confronted with three or four of my strain.

“You have faced off against much greater odds and emerged victorious in the past. So I am confident that you would prove a match for a Kappa when the inevitable confrontation occurs.”

“Oh. Well, thanks, RG. That actually means a lot,” and I certainly couldn’t help but feel flattered by the praise, which was not something that Arginine seemed to so readily provide, even to me. Though, that little bit of elation was very much overshadowed by the disconcerting knowledge that he’d just provided as well. His stable had ponies in it that were even bigger and stronger than him? I was not looking forward to fighting off an army of uber-RGs…

“You told the others this, right?”

“I have,” the stallion nodded, “though I must acknowledge my own lack of in-depth knowledge on the subject of the Kappa’s specific capabilities. I was never involved in the design process in my stable. My knowledge is largely hyperbolic and anecdotal. The others were grateful for the warning, but it is hard to know how effective any of their precautions might be.

“Indeed, the more I think on it, the less assured of a victory for the ponies of the Wasteland I am.”

Well, that wasn’t what I needed to here from Arginine, of all ponies, “that’s not very optimistic,” I murmured.

“It is not a question of optimism,” he replied, “it is a question of capability,” he drew to a halt and gestured at a small building to our right. I glanced about, taking note of where we are, but not immediately recognizing anything. We were in a section of the town that didn’t seem to see a lot of traffic, and I couldn’t immediately think of anything of note that was supposed to be around here.

Though, I suppose that space in a town like this would be at a premium with the sudden influx of a few hundred additional ponies. The various mercenary leaders probably couldn’t afford to be very picky about where they held there little planning meetings and whatnot. So I went ahead and slipped inside what could only generously be described at a ‘shack’.

As it turned out, the exterior had actually served as a pretty good indicator for what was inside: it was a shack alright. Specifically one that somepony was using to store a lot of their old junk; and not even particularly valuable looking junk at that. I turned around and glanced at Arginine in confusion, “what’s going on? Where is everypony?”

Arginine shrugged, “I presume they are at a planning meeting. I honestly don’t know,” he brushed past me and walked over to one of the shelves that was choked with odds and ends. When he turned around, he was levitating a small case in his amber magic.

“So...what are we doing here?” I felt the fur along the nape of my neck start to stiffen as I became more unsettled. If Arginine was anything like a normal stallion, I’d have thought that he was trying to get the two of us alone to fool around or something, but that was about as far from the kind of pony that Arginine was as anypony could get, the events in New Reino notwithstanding.

The unicorn opened up the case and removed a small cylinder from inside. It looked very much like any of the syringes of Med-X that a pony might find in an old first aid container around some ruins. I opened my mouth to question what he was doing with it, but before I could get a word out, the hypodermic darted in an instant into the side of my neck. It happened so quickly that I didn’t even feel the bite of the needle as it entered.

By the time I finally reacted, Arginine’s magic had already withdrawn the now empty syringe and placed it back in the case, “ow! Hey, what gives?!” I reached up and began to massage the point on my neck that had been injected, “what was in that...thing…?”

As I spoke, I heard my words begin to sound deeper and further away. My vision was also starting to tunnel slightly. My hind legs grew weak, and I stumbled slightly in an effort to maintain my footing. All the while, Arginine simply stood in front of me, a patient expression on his face, “it was a sedative. A potent one. In a few moments, you will lose consciousness.”

“Wh...Wh…” my mouth was being quite uncooperative, as were my legs. Despite my best efforts, my haunches had already collapsed down to my knees. Vainly, I spread my wings and tried to fly away, but even my drug-addled brain could tell that their movements were far too slow and sporadic to actually create any amount of flight. All I was doing was fanning the dust off the shelves, “why?” I finally managed, though it took a frankly stupendous amount of concentration and effort.

“Because I am unconvinced that the ponies that you’ve recruited are capable of victory,” the stallion said in his usual unconcerned tone, “and my goal is, and has always been, to ensure that only the best ponies in this fight emerge victorious,” he paused and cocked his head to the side.

I heard it finally too, though it was a distant and dull thing to my dwindling hearing: an alarm. The town’s raid alert siren; typically employed whenever a group like the White Hooves or some other large band of raiders were attacking the town. Even in my drugged state, I knew full well that it couldn’t be White Hooves that were attacking at this moment.

The lines on Arginine’s face tightened in, what was for him, mild annoyance, “I suppose there is a fine line between ‘prompt’ and ‘inconveniently early’,” the stallion droned, “this will make getting out of the town unnoticed significantly more difficult than I had planned for.”

I found it difficult to sympathize with him, even as I could no longer keep myself upright. My body slumped slowly to the ground. I strained to keep seeing and hearing, but it was getting so much harder to do so. It was like everything around me suddenly felt like it was all a part of dream that I was having. There were words coming from my pipbuck that could have belonged to Ramparts. He sounded like he was trying to tell me something important. But I couldn’t bring myself to acknowledge them, let alone respond.

Somepony was doing something to my pipbuck, and then the words went away. I recognized Arginine’s scent. Then I felt his warm body beneath mine. It was nice and reminded me of all of the great sensations that I’d felt the last time I’d experienced it this close. A part of my mind was wondering if I wasn’t supposed to hate that scent right now. I wasn’t sure. I just felt really tired. I was sure that something important was going on, but I just couldn’t bring myself to care. Besides, I had great ponies with me. They’d take care of any problems.

I just wanted to sleep...

Foot Note: ...

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

I've set up a Cover Art Fund if you're interested and have any bits lying around! You can see what I'M capable of, heh; professional assistance is clearly needed here!