Chapter Five: Joining the Children

Our brief encounter with the Brotherhood patrol was friendly, and we had in our possession two pulse grenades. We entered the city soon after, Spike hiding in my backpack rather uncomfortably, with the ponies assuming the behavior of blindly-following companions of mine, as rehearsed. Rainbow and Spike had expressed distaste toward this practice, for the reason that Rainbow disliked being too quiet, and Spike had to curl into a ball to fit in my backpack, which was not comfortable. I had told them not to worry about what I did when we did find the Children of the Cathedral, I had a plan.

My plan consisted of offering to join the Unity, offering the ponies as unique creatures that the master could make use of in his army, and perhaps make more of them. Spike would remain hidden in my backpack until it was safe. The plan wasn't complete; I still needed to find a way to get into the Master's base. Perhaps I could offer myself as a super mutant candidate; my body was almost untouched by radiation, a prime candidate, even better than the master himself had been. It was risky, almost stupidly so, but as I saw it, it was the best idea I could come up with. Getting to the man we were sent to save was going to be another thing altogether, as would be actually getting to the Master through his psychic abilities, guards, and defenses.

Asking around for a while, I found out the nature of this settlement. It was a booming city, with an abundance of security, food, water, and opportunity. New Metropolis had four major factions and a ruling council. Surprisingly organized, I thought. The factions were color-coded, being blue, red, green, and yellow. The Blues were traders, opportunists, scavengers, and everything in-between. The Reds were a questionably-pure, relatively friendly communist micro-nation, that was often at odds with the Blue nation. They had an industrial capacity that was extremely impressive, allowing them to trade manufactured goods for other things. The Greens were mercenaries of all sorts, from loan sharks to full combat units, mercs from the Green faction could be hired for almost any job. The Yellow faction was a strictly agricultural state, which provided a good supply of food, sometimes even a surplus. They were thriving, as food was one of the most valued commodities of the wasteland. The entire city was thriving, each faction was rather well-off, and there was no fighting due to strict mediation by Green forces. The Children's church was actually not very hard to find, located in the center of the Blue area.

"Hello. Is this the Cathedral of the Children of the Cathedral?" I asked the guard, a robed figure who eyed my companions oddly before answering.

"Yes, it is. What is your buisness here?" He asked.

"I wish to join you."

"For what purpose?" He was testing me, and I knew exactly what he wanted to hear.

"To serve our New God, to transcend our ancestors. To spread the Unity." I had difficulty saying this convincingly, but it seemed to convince the man well enough.

"What are these creatures?"

"These creatures are highly valuable, unique, you could say. I wish to bring them before the New God and offer them as tribute. Their value is great, it is of great importance that I present this gift myself."

"I am sure he would be very pleased to accept your... generous offer. Please, come inside."

I cast a slight nod at Twilight, who seemed to understand my plot, as she made evident with a . Rainbow just looked confused, but while I'd expect any other pony to be scared, she only showed confusion. Twilight looked at her and nodded, and she followed her in with me.

The Children's base was quite ornate. The guard led us to a person wearing an ornate purplish robe, obviously of higher rank.

"This young man has an offer for the New God." He told him.

"Does he? What is it?"

"Creatures he claims will serve the Unity well."

"These creatures have surprising intelligence, and this one can fly." I explained.

"How intelligent are they?" The high-ranking man asked.

"Intelligent enough to understand my orders. I'll demonstrate." I pointed to a nearby spot on the floor. "Move."  The two ponies immediately moved to that position, getting the hint.

"Very good. Why would the New God want such creatures?"

"For the army of the Unity, of course. To strike down those that oppose them. The blue one has significant speed. Demonstrate it."

Rainbow took off almost immediately, and flew around the room at great speed.

"Yes. I see. We can arrange these tributes to be sent in the next caravan to our New God's residence."

"I must insist that I come along as well."

"Very well, if you must. We are sending a group of other Children to Him that will leave on the morrow, be ready by noon, and do not be late, and do not do anything foolish in the meantime."

Yes! That was easier than I thought it would be. We left the city shortly after, to explain my plan more thoroughly to the ponies.

****

"So we're going to enter the base, and when we are brought before the Master, we'll destroy him? How will we escape?" Twilight asked. That was the one part of the plan I had not worked out. An idea occurred to me.

"We'll throw our pulse grenades at the Master when you're brought before him, probably taking him out, find the man, who wouldn't be far from the Master, I believe, then we'll go through my trans-dimensional portal to Equestria."

"Are you sure this will work? This Master guy sounds mean." Spike commented.

"I have no idea whether this will work or not. The Master has psychic abilities that might blow our cover."

"Psychic abilities? I thought magic didn't exist in this world." Twilight said.

"I don't think it's magic, it's some sort of mutation from FEV." I explained.

"I can try to dampen it if it happens, but if it's not magical I can't do anything about it."

"Try your best, Twilight."

It was getting late by then, and we promptly decided to go to sleep. Finding no suitable place to do so outside of New Metropolis, it was decided for safety's sake to cross into Equestria to report to the princesses and rest for the night. I set my watch's alarm for ten o'clock in the morning. We didn't want to be late.