Family.

Volt was the only real family I had. My father died before I was born, and my mother was detached from the both of us. But Dead Volt and I were close brothers. When we were young, I was usually the one who kept him from getting in trouble, even though he was older than me. But Stable life was sometimes difficult when the only one that looked out for me was the one who always came up with insane plans on how to escape.

“Leave him alone!” I shouted at the foals that were kicking the downed Volt. Nightstick was a terrible brat when she was young, and her favorite activity was tormenting us and other ponies. She had a small group of ponies that followed her every move.

“Why don’t you make us?” sneered the filly as she brought her hoof down on my brother’s shoulder.

“Wire...run,” wheezed Volt in between kicks.

I wasn’t very big when I was young, but I was fast. Build up enough speed, and even the lightest colt could knock over a brute like Nightstick. As she went down, the others that were around her looked at me in shock. Nopony had ever been brave enough, or stupid enough in my case, to attack Nightstick. Unfortunately, my blow had just enough power to knock her over, and no more than that. She rose to her hooves almost immediately.

“You little shit!” she shouted as she charged at me. She hit me with full force, knocking me to the ground. She followed up with a powerful kick to my ribs. I felt them crack a little. Her followers joined in on my beating, but I achieved my goal of distracting them from Volt.

He glanced at me with a solemn look and limped away as quick as he could. He was injured, and he was never much of a fighter. I never blamed him for leaving me, as he quickly came back with a few of the security ponies.

Unfortunately, Nightstick’s mother was one of them. I was written up for starting a fight while Nightstick and her gang got off scot free. But I was used to it. I was always blamed for the troubles they caused. Whenever I was in a fight, it was my fault. Whenever one of Volt’s plans ended badly, it was my fault. Whenever something went missing, it was my fault. Okay, that last one was partially true, but I was still tormented by Nightstick and her crew.

Although they did write me up, they at least took me to the clinic. The doctor was kind enough to give me some pain medicine and magically repair as much of the damage he could.

“Wow, I didn’t know you already had your cutie mark yet, Live Wire,” he commented as he realigned one of the broken ribs. After a painful snap echoed from my chest, I glanced at my side. A wrench with some sort of blue shape with a grey trim behind it.

“A wrench?” I questioned.

“Yes, and I think that is a shield behind it. Interesting,” he mused. “What did you do to get it?”

I thought for a minute. It wasn’t there this morning. In fact, I don’t think it was there before I found Nightstick hurting Volt. “No clue,” I declared.

“Well it is an interesting one to say the least. Now, as for your medicine prescription, I will need your mother to fill out...” His rambling faded as the memory faded with it.

The white abyss met me, bringing with it the voice.

“Such an interesting talent,” the voice began. “You are a protector, possibly even a fixer.”

“Yeah right. I wasn’t a protector, I was just a maintenance pony. And I didn’t even fix things!” I argued.

“That was your occupation, not your ability.”

“Well lot of good it does now. I’m dead.”

The voice chuckled in response. “Not dead yet. You have a lot more things to do. Important things.”

“Let me guess, you still want my help for your secret plots? Well forget it. Unless I get answers from somepony, I’m not doing a damn thing for you!” I had had enough of their mental intrusions, their secrecy, and how they showed me memories that weren’t even mine.

The voice was silent for a few minutes. “Alright.” Then the void faded to darkness.

The darkness brought an immense pain with it.

My eyes shot open with the pain. My neck felt like it was still being ripped open, though medicine attempted to numb the pain some. My chest felt like it had been torn open at some point as well. That combined with the general soreness that resulted from the barrage of injuries earlier. End result? I felt like shit.

I looked around. I was in some sort of clinic room, though it didn’t seem like one. It looked more like an abandoned office of sorts. The sickeningly colorful walls confirmed my suspicions that I was in Circus. I lied in a bed that had attempted to have been sanitized at some point. In a corner next to the bed slept a small pegasus.

Pin was soundly asleep. I couldn’t bring myself to wake her up after yesterday’s events. She needed rest, especially after the past few days.

I tried to get out of bed, but that attempt was short lived. The second I put any pressure on my back legs, I went down. “Gah!” I gasped as pain shot up my spine. I fell to the ground, narrowly avoiding bashing my head open on the metal part of the bed.

This series of loud events woke up Pin.

“Are you okay?” she quickly asked as she trotted over to me.

“Ugh, aside from the severe pain I am in, I’m fine,” I replied as I again attempted to lift myself up.

“Careful, you are still recovering from a major surgery.”

“What?”

“You were shot in the throat during the battle. Raider with a sniper rifle, Razor took care of him though. You were lucky the shot wasn’t a few centimeters to the left, or that would have hit your spine, likely causing permanent damage. Instead, the shot tore through a major vein. You almost bled out. I almost lost you...” she trailed off for a moment, her eyes about to burst with tears. She cleared her throat and resumed. “Doctor Harvest and I were able to stabilize you during surgery, but we discovered tumors growing in your chest. We were able to safely remove them, and it appears that the Hydra had no lasting effects on you.” She wrapped her hooves around me in a hug.

“Ow,” I moaned in pain.

She quickly retracted from the embrace. “Sorry. I’m just glad you’re still here. But you would have been dead if it weren’t for Aurea.”

“Who?”

“The griffin, the one with the golden feathers. She was the one who flew you here.”

“Hmm, I think I remember her from the battle yesterday,” I replied. Pin looked a little uneasy at this information. “What?”

“The battle was three days ago. You were in a comatose state for a while.”

“Three days!” I exclaimed. I had been asleep for three days? It barely even felt like a few hours. I tried to rise up again, but pain prevented me from doing so.

“Your legs were badly damaged as well. The Hydra you took managed to remove a lot of the shrapnel, but the injuries were still severe. They will heal, but you need bed rest. Doctor’s orders.”

“I can’t sit around and do nothing.”

Pin frowned and was silent for a moment. “Fine. I will see if Harvest has a wheelchair or something for you to use.” She left for a few minutes and then came back with a wheelchair and helped me into it.

“Is this a clinic or something?” I asked as I magically pushed the chairs through the halls. A few ponies were wandering through the hallways as well, Laughingstocks from the look of their barding.

“Sort of. This place was a major Ministry of Morale hub during the war. The bottom of the tower had a few medical rooms, one of which is the operation room we first met Harvest in.”

Pin walked slightly ahead of me, leading me through the maze of hallways. A few of the Laughingstocks we passed greeted us with a smile. Some even offered a warm ‘Hello’ to us. I knew I wasn’t the only pony severely injured in the battle, this was made especially clear from the groans of pain arising from a few of the rooms we passed. Eventually, after a brief incident involving an upward staircase, we emerged in the main room of the Laughingstock Tower.

“Wire!” I heard a shout from the upper level of the room. I looked up to see myself staring back at me. Volt quickly rushed down the stairs to greet us, accidentally bumping into a few less than happy Laughingstocks along the way. “It is good to know that you are well, younger sibling. It would be a dreadful outcome if an unfortunate occurrence were to happen to you.” He paused for a second. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Heh, it’s good to see you are okay as well. I saw you during the fight. Good work on the rangers,” I responded.

“Ah, but the merits of my deeds are outshined by the actions of you and your companions, for that is which aided in bringing about the end of the battle so quickly, preventing the loss of many of our own.”

“Do you mean Razor? She was the one who crippled the minotaur.”

“That was but one of the accomplishments of your group. It was you who took out one of the enemy elites that are known as the Deltas, you also bested a few of the more common rangers, along with many combatants that are simply referred to as raiders.” He looked over at Pin. “And your marefriend took out one of the toughest griffins the Iron Hoof had. Except for the metal one of course.”

“How did you know about us?” I asked. Why did information spread so easily around here?

“The young colt that accompanied you in your endeavours on the day of the conflict informed me of your relationship when I presented an inquiry to him as to what occurred during the travel.” He stopped for a second. “Whisper told me.” Great, he is broadcasting my love life to everypony that can hear him. “Though it would have been obvious to those that paid attention to her interactions with you as you slept. Every time I went to see you, she was by your side.”

I looked at the golden eyed mare. She smiled warmly at me and kissed me on the cheek. I smiled and nuzzled her in return.

“I do regret being forced to interrupt such a touching moment between you two, but there are matters which must be addressed when you are able to do so,” interrupted the my doppelganger. “Smile wants to see you later.”

“I kinda just woke up from a coma...”

“He doesn’t mean now, but whenever you can.” He turned to leave, but looked back at us before doing so. “There are other matters that I must deal with now, but this has been a joyous encounter with you, dear sibling.” He ran down one of the carious side hallways of the tower and went out of sight after turning a corner.

Still confined to the wheelchair, which Harvest, who said he had urgent matters to attend to but was glad I was still alive, allowed us to use outside the tower, we visited the tavern that Razor had stayed at while I was asleep; The Drunken Princess. Razor was at the bar, about half a dozen empty bottles surrounded her.

“How can she afford all of that?” I whispered to Pin as I rolled across the tavern to the bar.

“She apparently gets free drinks. Not sure whether it is because she crippled the minotaur and helped win the battle, or because of Martini’s crush on her,” she replied. Razor looked up from her drink and noticed that we had arrived.

“Hey, look who still walks among us!” she slurred. It took her a few seconds to notice the wheelchair. “Or rolls among us I guess.” She turned back to the bar and resumed her drinking.

The mare behind the counter looked at us with a smile. “Here for a drink?” she asked with giggle.

“Not after last time,” I responded. “What happened after I got shot?”

“The griffin and I quickly took you to Harvest and we managed to save you. Circus celebrated their victory, and Razor was paraded around as a hero,” Pin replied. I couldn’t help but chuckle at the thought of Razor in her own parade.

“Any idea where the griffin is?” I asked.

“She’s been in town for a few weeks, been working as a bouncer over at Gates of Tartarus,” chimed in the olive mare as she set another bottle in front of Razor.

“Where?” I asked.

“It’s a bar on the other side of town. It’s more popular with ghouls than it is with the Laughingstocks. Switchblade is the owner, he’s kind of a nasty ghoul. He occasionally sends a few of his goons to cause trouble.”

“Huh, I’ll keep that in mind. You coming Razor?”

“Hubba-wha?” she grumbled in confusion.

“We’re going to go meet the griffin, want to join us?”

“Nah, I’ve been to the Gates before. Booze there sucks!” she slurred in response. “Sides, I ain’t gotta pay here. You two go on, I got my own company here.” Martini grinned in response to this. Okay, better leave before things get awkward.

What Martini neglected to tell us was where the Gates of Tartarus was exactly. We spent the greater part of an hour searching for the place. My horn had given out a short time ago, so Pin happily decided to push the wheelchair around. We finally found the building.

The building looked to be on the brink of collapse. The injuries to the structure looked to be very old, so they weren’t a result of the attack on Circus. A few ghouls and other rough looking individuals loitered around the outside of the tavern. They eyed us suspiciously as we entered the establishment.

The inside had not faired any better than the outside. An entire chunk of one of the walls had caved in. The few shelves that still clung to the walls looked like they couldn’t support the weight of even a single bottle. The bar counter had what looked to be a spear stuck firmly into the wood. Yet despite being in ruins, the tavern held many tables that were packed with ghouls and other ponies.

In one of the corners stood the griffin with the golden feathers. She took notice of our entrance with a slight smile. The ghoul behind the counter took notice of our entrance with a scowl.

“Well, if it isn’t Circus’s resident hero. If you’re looking for a discount, keep looking. You pay the same price everypony else pays,” he grumbled as we drew closer. “I am Switchblade, owner and proprietor of this fine establishment. Ah, who the hell am I kidding, this place is falling to pieces.”

“Why not try to fix it? Or find another building?” I asked.

“Because, dumbass, that costs a lot of caps. I’m barely able to keep this shithole running with so few customers I get. Sure, the ghouls all come here, but there ain’t many ghouls in this damn town. I’m lucky for that battle the other day, else I would have been out of business by now. Ponies got problems, and I got liquor to sell to ‘em... well, liquor and a few other pick me ups. More problems they got, more they drink.”

Switchblade was not the most charming ghoul I have seen. Most of his face was rotted off, his mane had completely fallen out, as had his coat. If it weren’t for the old business suit he was wearing, he would have been completely yellow due to his sickly looking skin, at least the skin that still clung to him. How anypony could be around him for long and not become ill is beyond me.

“I’ll tell ya why my business is doing so poorly. It is because of the damn Drunken Princess. Smile’s own little princess runs the place, and all the Laughingstocks drink there. Laughingstocks outnumber ghouls in this town five to one! How am I supposed to make a living when that bitch just has her daddy send her customers?” Switchblade was getting more and more worked up.

“Sounds like you don’t really like Martini,” I responded.

“It’s because of her that I have to sell this watered down crap.” The look in his eyes turned dark. “Say, would you two be interested in making some quick caps?”

“What do you mean?” I asked hesitantly.

“Oh, say that Martini were to meet an unfortunate accident that left her unable to continue running the Drunken Princess. The business would be up for sale, allowing a business genius such myself to take over. By monopolizing the bars in Circus, I would be in charge of the town.”

“You’re saying you want us to kill Martini for caps? Are you insane?” Pin seemed to be shocked by this.

“We are not murderers. We wouldn’t kill an innocent pony for caps,” I added.

“Oh, well if the payment is the problem, I can arrange an alternate reward.” He pointed a hoof at Aurea. “I got that griffin on a contract, so she works for me. Those Talon griffins are pretty remarkable, they follow through on their contracts regardless of what they think is right. You deal with my problem, and her contract is yours.”

“You’re not getting it. We aren’t going to kill an innocent pony,” I replied with a hint of growing anger.

“Look kid, I can tell from the hunk of metal on your leg that you’re new to the wasteland, so I’m going to explain something to ya; nopony is innocent in the wasteland.” With that, the unicorn became disinterested with us, instead opting to begin talking to one of the patrons of the bar,

“Unbelievable,” I muttered as I was rolled over to where the golden griffin stood.

“Hey, aren’t you the stable pony I rescued the other day?” she asked as we approached.

“You rescued me twice. Once from a group of raiders during the fight, and then you took me to the Doctor after I was shot. I wanted to thank you for that.”

“Eh, no big deal. All I did was kill some raiders and fly you somewhere. Ain’t like I was the one who cut ya open and did some fancy healing magic. To be honest, I broke one of the rules when I helped in the fight. That asshole Switchblade ordered me to defend the bar, and I broke contract to help the town in the attack. I was lucky the place didn’t burn to the ground, else I’d be in real trouble with the other Talons. Breaking contract isn’t something they condone.”

“Why do you work for him?” I asked.

“He bought my contract off of a caravan. Contract said I would protect and work for the owner of it, which was really dumb of me. The older Talons always warned me to always make a contract with a specific end to it, else I’d get stuck in a situation like this. But I had to be an idiot and not listen to them. So now I am stuck working for that bastard until either he dies, gives away the contract, or decides to end it.” She opened one of the pockets on her armour and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. “Want one?” she asked as she offered the small carton to us.

“Those things will kill you,” Pin said.

“Pff, the wasteland will probably kill me much sooner,” she responded as she lit one of the sticks of death and began to smoke it. “And to top it all off, I gotta do what he says. Switchblade is an evil bastard, and I am lucky that so far he has only had me deal with the drunks and the troublemakers. Won’t be long before he comes and asks me to do his dirty work.”

“Yeah, he already asked us to kill a pony,” mentioned Pin. “I’m pretty sure that he would come to you next.”

“Damnit! Gah, I can’t do anything about it. Talons are bound by contract, whether we want to do what the contract entails or not.”

“Wait, maybe we can talk him out of doing this,” I reasoned.

“Good luck with that. Switchblade is nothing more than a raider in a cheap suit. I’ve heard he’s stole chems from Harvest just to sell to addicts. If it has a chance of making him caps, he will probably do it.”

“Well, what if we got him to give up your contract?” I asked.

“That could work. You two are definitely a better employer than that bastard. I’d tear his throat open if it wasn’t against the contract.”

“Hey!” shouted the wicked ghoul from behind the counter. “I don’t pay you to talk to the customers!”

She exhaled sharply. “See what you can do.”

Pin wheeled me over to the counter. The ghoul took notice of us. “Ah, came back to discuss my offer?” he asked in his raspy ghoul voice.

“Sort of. I wish to obtain the griffin’s contract, without killing Martini,” I replied.

“Now see, that would leave me at an impasse. If you don’t kill the bitch, I would have to have goldie over there do it, and if she doesn’t work for me anymore, how am I supposed to achieve my goal?” Damn, the ghoul was evil and smart.

“Do you really think that you would be able to kill Martini and get away with it? Her father is the head of an organization of bounty hunters and mercenaries, not to mention that he himself is insane. Killing his daughter would not end well for you. “

“Yeah, I thought of that. That is why I tried to hire you two. Ponies who have only been in town for a few days, and who are not known to have socialized with me very much in the past. They’d have a hard time linking it to me.” Damn it.

“So if you failed to recruit us, you would have Aurea, the griffin who is known to work for you, kill her?”

He became shocked at this realization. “Shit, I didn’t think of it like that.”

“And would it really be so hard to convince another group of travelers, those who lack our morals, to deal with her?”

“Huh, I guess you’re right.”

“So really, you don’t need her contract. In fact, if you sold it, you would likely have more than enough caps to pay off somepony to get the job done.”

“You make a good point. In fact, you likely saved my ass from getting chopped up by Smile. Tell ya what, thousand caps and she’s yours.”

I couldn’t believe that actually worked. I dug the caps out of the pack that was hanging from the back of the chair and gave them to the psychotic ghoul. In exchange, he gave me a piece of slightly faded paper. It had writing on it that was very hard to read, but there was a signature on the bottom that read ‘Aurea’.

“Hey goldie! Sold this guy your contract, you work for him now,” shouted the ghoul as he greedily scraped caps into a pile.

The griffin’s face became a smile as she glided over to us. “So, that means I no longer work for you, right?”

“Wow this bitch is an idiot. Yes, you no longer work for me.” As he said these words, Aurea grabbed him by his throat and slammed him against the wall. She held him above the ground by his neck.

“Good, that means I can do this,” she said as she pulled out a combat knife from its sheath.

“Gah! You bitch!” the ghoul screeched as the knife was plunged into one of his forelegs, pinning it to the wall. He tried to pull it out with his magic, but Aurea’s grip around his throat tightened.

“Hey Pin,” I whispered. “Do ghouls need to breathe?”

“I’m not sure,” she replied.

I watched as the ghoul’s ichor dripped from the puncture wounds the talons had made. Switchblade tried to shout something, but all he managed to do was choke out coughs and gags. The patrons of the bar all stared at the display, but none were bold enough to interrupt it. Either that or they also hated the evil bartender.

“Now, you are going to leave this town, and never come back. Understood?” The ghoul was unable to speak, so it gave a little nod instead. “Good. I am going to let the Smile know that you were planning to kill his daughter, so if I were you, I would get out of here as fast as I could.” With that, she released her grip on the ghoul, causing him to fall to the ground...or, he would have if his arm wasn’t still pinned to the wall. The force of him dropping caused the blade to tear through part of his arm, but not enough so that he was freed. The griffin then wrapped her claws around the handle of the blade, pulling it out with a quick tug, causing the unicorn ghoul to fall to the ground.

Aurea turned back to us. Her cruel scowl turned to a sincere smile. “Let’s get out of here,” she said as she began to push my chair towards the exit.

We decided to head back to the tower. I still needed to meet with Smile, so I might as well get it over with. The lobby of the tower had a small group of ponies arguing in the center. I only recognized Volt and Illex among them.

“...fix the monitoring system. Without it, we are blind,” argued a Laughingstock pegasus.

“We’re missing a lot of necessary parts, without them, the system can’t withstand controlling the spritebots very far,” responded the alicorn.

“Then get the parts! Surely there is someplace you can gut for the parts,” said another of the Laughingstocks.

“It isn’t that simple. The only place I can think of is the old Robronco factory, but that is deep in Iron Hoof territory.”

“We can’t risk getting attacked like that again, we need eyes across the wasteland. Either fix the spritebots, or find some way for us to have an early warning system!” With that, the small group of Laughingstocks departed, leaving Illex and Volt behind.

“What was that about?” I asked.

“Damn spritebots are messed up. We lost control of them everywhere except the immediate area around Circus. Our control system is badly in need of repairs that we just don’t have the parts for. We don’t even have enough spare ponies to obtain the parts from an old factory to the east,” replied the alicorn.

“Do not worry yourself with this encounter, brother, for this incident will find a way to resolve itself,” said Volt.

“Hey Illex, if you don’t mind me asking, the whole alicorn thing, is that...” I began.

“Yeah, it’s Killing Joke,” he replied grimly. “I used to be part of the Steel Rangers, the real ones, not these traitors. Rangers to the north have been having real problems with alicorns. Unlike the princesses, these alicorns are evil creatures. They serve some goddess or something. Either way, we have been at war with them for a while. A while ago, I was sent along with a small team in order to take out Silver Star’s rebellion before it got too big. Unfortunately, we encountered the mutated Killing Joke in this area. I was the lucky one, as I didn’t die from the transformation. The rest of my team died almost immediately. Unfortunately for me, I could never go home. The rangers would shoot me on sight. So yeah, I lost my friends, family, and my life. I actually tried to return to the north though, but I was ambushed by some of the crazy alicorns. They took interest in me, as I was the first male alicorn they had seen. They took me back to their hive, or whatever it is they call their home. Things weren’t so bad for a few weeks, but the alicorns were less than happy to find out that we were...genetically incompatible. I escaped, and I was found by a few of the Laughingstocks. They told me about Circus, introduced me to Smile, and here I am today. Now, if you are done pestering me about my past, I have important things to do.” With that, he beat his wings and flew to the second level of the tower.

“What a grouch,” mumbled Aurea. Volt took notice of her.

“Ah, it seems that my brother has come across another companion. Allow me to introduce myself, I am Dead Volt, brother of Live Wire.”

Aurea took a second to eye Volt, then looked at me. “So what, you two twins or something?”

“Oh here we go,” mumbled Pin.

“Nope, Killing Joke made me look like him.” I was glad that Volt had given the less eloquent version. “Also makes me talk funny sometimes.”

“At least you don’t talk weird all the time like your brother,” the griffin chuckled. Hey!

“I need to see Smile, is he busy?” I asked , quickly changing the topic.

“I believe that our leader is not currently occupied with any other task. You may convene with him.” He stopped for a second. “I gotta go help Illex with the monitoring system, catch ya later.” He ran up the staircase and went in the direction that the alicorn had went.

The elevator was a little bit crowded. Aurea was much larger than a pony, though she claimed she was a bit small for a griffin, and the wheelchair wasn’t helping with the limited amount of space.

“You should be healed enough to walk in a day or two,” Pin mentioned after I had complained about being confined to the chair.

Ding. The elevator reached Smile’s floor. We exited the metal box and walked to the door, or at least Pin and Aurea did, I was wheeled along by the griffin. The room that led to Smile’s room hadn’t changed since my last visit, except for the desk. Sitting behind it was a figure wrapped in gauze, wearing goggles similar to mine, a heavy duster, and a hat.

“Hello, Ghost,” I greeted.

She looked up from some papers that were on the desk. “Oh, hello Wire. Are these your friends?” she responded.

“Yeah, this is Pin,” I said as I nudged my head to the side that Pin was standing next to.

“Hello,” Pin replied as she was introduced.

“And this is Aurea,” I said, gesturing to the griffin behind my chair.

“Hey,” she responded.

“It is nice to meet you. You’re all here to see Smile, right?” Ghost asked.

“Yeah, he wanted to see me.”

“Fair enough. But I must warn you, he has been a little on edge since the attack,” she said as the door opened with her invisible magic. “Just go on in.”

The room was a lot like I had remembered it, except there were streaks of red along the walls that were freshly painted. The floor still had areas of dried blood, though I did notice a few new ones. The amount of party decorations in the room had increased some.

“Ah, if it isn’t Wire and his friends,” Smile chuckled. The paint that had once adorned his coat had faded, revealing the originally white coat. His mane also lacked the paint it once had, showing that it was also white. His mismatched eyes seemed to stare at the three of us, while his grin continued even while he spoke. “I’m so happy you finally decided to visit me. I wanted to personally thank you for your help in the battle.” The eyelid on his red eye lowered a little. “Err, where is the cut up one?” His smile didn’t change as he asked the question.

“She is still at the Drunken Princess...with your daughter,” Pin replied a bit nervously.

To this, Smile just laughed, though it had a sense of sincerity to it. “Ah yes, Martini told me that she was interested in somepony new. Just didn’t think it would be one of your friends, Wire.”

“Excuse me, Smile, but on the subject of your daughter, there is something you must know,” began Aurea. “You see, the ghoul I was employed by, Switchblade over at The Gates of Tartarus, he tried to hire these two to kill her.” Smile almost frowned at this information. I think he actually tried to frown, but was unable to. “When that failed, he was going to have me do it. I was lucky that Wire bought my contract off of him before he did so.”

“I see,” Smile replied with a laugh that he tried to hold back. “And did you deal with the ghoul?”

“I stuck a knife through his arm and told him to never come back here,” she responded grimly.

Smile burst out laughing at this. “Heh, I must say I admire your gusto. Do not worry, I will have that bad pony dealt with,” he replied with a chuckle. “Oh, that reminds me.” He opened one of the drawers of the desk, and pulled out a small bag with his teeth. He tossed it over to me. I leapt back a little, as I wasn’t sure what it was. Smile laughed at this. “Don’t worry, it’s just your payment for helping Whisper, and a little bit extra for helping stop the Iron Hoof’s attack.”

I levitated the bad in front of me and untied it. Inside must have been well over a thousand caps. “Wow, thank you,” I replied as I tied the bag closed and put it in my pack.

“Now, there are a few things I wish to discuss with you,” he said in attempt to be serious, though his constant laughing and unending grin didn’t help. “Have you decided if you are going to join us.”

“Yes. The Iron Hoof needs to be stopped,” I answered.

“I would like to join as well,” added Pin. I looked over to her. “Those bastards have taken almost everything from me. They almost did take everything from me,” she added as she glanced at the gauze wrapped around my neck.

“Ah, the more the merrier,” Smile laughed. He then looked at Aurea. “Well?”

“What?” she asked.

“I assumed that you were here to join as well. Both of your friends did.”

“Look, I’m already a Talon. I don’t think that they would be happy about me leaving for another group,” she replied in a gruff tone. She paused for a second. “Although, this guy holds my contract, so I guess that means I will have to help him kill those Iron Hoof bastards.”

“Splendid, splendid, splendid!” he chanted. “I will have to let all the Laughingstocks know that we have new members!” I think that he was actually happy right now, not just wearing the facade of happiness. He stopped his cheering for a moment. “Oh, but I suppose that you will need to rest a few more days before you can do anything. I will have Martini set you up with rooms at the Drunken Princess, free of charge. I’ll see about getting you a room in the tower soon.”

“Thank you,” I replied.

“Ah, it’s nothing really. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have other matters to attend to,” he chuckled.

Aurea turned my chair around and wheeled me to the door, Pin walked beside me. Ghost opened the door and greeted us. We left the room and she entered. The door shut behind her as we entered the elevator.

Ding.

The elevator door opened to the main room of the tower. A few Laughingstocks were moving about. I realised that all of these ponies were now my allies. I barely even knew any of them, and those that I did know I didn’t know very much about them aside from their name and their ability. Then again, I was never very good at getting to know other ponies. I lived my entire life in Stable Seven, yet I barely knew anything about the ponies I worked and lived with. This was actually the first time I had real friends: Pin, Razor, Whisper, maybe even Aurea, and Needles, even though he died because of me.

I quickly pushed that sad memory out of my mind, replacing it with a question the thought had created.

“Where is Whisper?” I asked.

“No clue,” responded Pin. “I lost track of him after the battle. I sort of left him with Razor when we took you to Doctor Harvest.” She stopped for a second, a look of shock was on her face. “I don’t think that was a wise decision.” I couldn’t help but chuckle a little at that, Pin did as well. Aurea just looked at us, a little bit confused.

“Well, he knows this town better than any of us, I guess,” I said. “He is a Laughingstock, and has been in this town longer than any of us. I’m sure he is okay.”

“About time you noticed I was gone,” came the foal’s voice in my head.

‘To be fair, you do disappear a lot,’ I replied mentally.

“Fair enough. I see you have made another ally.”

‘Aurea? Yeah, I guess so.’

“You attract the strangest females, don’t you?” he laughed in my mind. “Well, at least this one isn’t as psychotic.”

‘Where are you?’

“I’m in the tower. I actually have a some things to do right now, I will join you later at the Drunken Princess.” With that, the voice in my head ceased.

“Yo, Wire, You okay?” asked the griffin as she wheeled my chair outside the tower. “You haven’t said anything and were just staring off in space.”

“Oh, sorry. I was talking with Whisper.” Her silence indicated that she wasn’t aware of his abilities. “Whisper can talk to certain ponies mentally. He can also read the minds of anypony around him, probably even griffins.”

“Right, right,” she replied. I then heard her whisper to Pin. “You think he might be a bit brain damaged?”

“Oh, I think he was brain damaged long before I met him, though he is telling the truth about Whisper. He’s one of the Laughingstocks with strange powers.”

“Hey!” I interjected. She giggled and kissed me on the cheek.

We arrived at the Drunken Princess a few minutes later, during which time Pin and Aurea decided to continue making fun of me. We entered the bar and found a few patrons other than Razor drinking. Some of them looked like Laughingstocks, others looked like civilians. Razor was also at the bar, passed out drunk.

“Did she finally die from alcohol poisoning?” Pin asked. The mare behind the bar responded by poking the passed out Razor in the side with an empty bottle. Razor responded by grumbling something incomprehensible, but remained unconscious.

“Hmm, not yet,” declared Martini. Only then did she realize I was being wheeled around by the gold feathered griffin. “Hey, aren’t you one of Switchblade’s goons? You better not be here to cause trouble.” This might be the first time I have seen the olive mare angry.

“Calm down, I work for this guy now. I stopped working for that ghoul as soon Wire bought my contract from him, even gave the bastard a knife to the leg as a parting gift,” Aurea proclaimed. “He wanted you dead so I made sure he understood that it wouldn’t end well for him.”

“Oh, well then thank you,” she chimed. It seemed the fact that Switchblade tried to have her killed was completely ignored by her. “I got the message from my dad, I’m supposed to get rooms for you four. I suppose you two would want a separate room?” she asked with a smile as she looked at me and Pin. I felt my face become red.

“Yes,” Pin answered with a smile of her own. My face only became redder.

“Good, because I only have two spare rooms left. You two take the one on the left, griffin here takes the right,” she declared with another smile.

“What about Razor?” I asked.

“Oh, don’t worry about her, she’ll be fine,” she answered with a laugh.

It was then that I encountered my greatest challenge during my time in the wasteland; stairs. My horn fizzled out when I tried to lift my chair up them.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Aurea grumbled as she lifted me out of the chair with one arm and lifted the chair with the other. She flew up to the top of the stairs and set me back in the chair. “This is the mighty stallion who took down two Deltas?”

“Thank you,” I mumbled in return. I really hoped I would be able to walk again soon...I really hoped I would be able to walk again. Pin said the damage wasn’t too severe, but she seemed worried when she told me this.

I continued to dwell on this as Pin wheeled me into the room.

My dreams were uninterrupted by the memories of others, nor were they nightmares. The dreams I had were rather lackluster, but were interrupted nonetheless. It wasn’t even the voice that stopped the dreams. No, it was something a bit more violent and almost as irritating; somepony hitting me repeatedly in the head.

My eyes opened. Razor was standing next to my bed, poking my head painfully with one of her hooves. This was likely revenge for all the times I had woken her up.

“Get up, dumbass,” she grumbled, clearly suffering from a hangover that left her a bit angry.

“Gah, what? Is Circus on fire? Is the tavern burning to the ground?” I grumbled groggily. “Why did you wake me up?

“There’s a hot mare at the bar who wants to speak with you,” she responded.

“About what?”

“I don’t know. I tried talking with her, but she only seemed interested in speaking with you.” She turned and walked towards the door. “Lucky bastard,” I heard her mutter under her breath.

I looked around the room for a second. It was the same one I had stayed in before we left for Armistice. Pin had already woken up and was elsewhere. I decided to try to stand. The pain in my legs was still present, but I should be fine as long as I didn’t stay on them for too long.

I limped out into the hallway and down the stairs. I found out I was not as healed as I thought I was, and I tripped down the last step, landing at the bottom with a painful thud.

“Ow!” I grumbled. I rose myself up to see Pin standing next to me. I felt a small bit of pain in my side as she plunged a syringe into my side. The pain in my legs and the pain from the landing subsided.

“There, you okay now?” she asked gently.

“Better.”

At the bar sat a pony wearing a cloak of sorts. It concealed her mostly, although the hood was down, revealing her red mane. Her coat was pure white. She was a unicorn. At first, she didn’t seem to notice me, but when I limped over to the bar and took a seat next to her, she looked at me. Her eyes were a silvery grey. Razor was right, she was pretty, but I loved Pin.

“Are you the one who wanted to see me?” I asked her.

I did not expect her response to be what it was. I knew that she was the one who asked for me, as she was the only new pony in the bar. But it was her voice that was unexpected.

“Hello, Live Wire,” she said. “I thought it was about time we met, face to face.”

Her voice was the voice from my dreams.
=====================================================================

Footnote: Level Up.
New Perk: Element of Loyalty- When you drop below half health, your allies are able to withstand a lot more damage.
You are now an official member of the Laughingstocks, congratulations!

(I would like to thank Kkat for writing Fallout Equestria, one of the best stories I have read, and I would like to thank Somber for writing Project Horizons, another great tale. I would also like to thank Melon Hunter for reviewing the chapter and submitting suggestions.)