Ambush.

The caravan was a trap set by the Iron Hoof. There were about a dozen yellow blips on E.F.S. when we entered the ruins of Armistice. I am not sure how, but they managed to avoid being detected as hostile long enough for us to get within range. I was a bit afraid of how they managed to avoid being detected as threats, but that wasn’t what scared me most. They managed to conceal their intentions from Whisper.

“I...I can’t tell what they are thinking,” I recalled the blue colt mentioning to me. “Their thoughts are all jumbling together, I can’t tell what any of them are thinking!” He had a hint of frustration mixed with fear in his tone. “We need to get closer in order for me to hear them clearly. Just act like you are going to trade with them. Or actually trade with them.”

They were smarter than the average raiders the Hoof usually managed to scrounge up. They knew how to avoid being detected as hostile by E.F.S. and how to conceal their thoughts from mind readers. They were also much more well trained, and were better equipped.

“Well well well, what do we have here?” spoke the voice from inside the power armour with the yellow stripe on the shoulder. Another Delta. There were maybe twenty ponies around us, one of which was the Delta, another two were regular rangers, and the rest were raiders that were equipped with better armour and weapons than any raiders we had encountered earlier. The Delta turned to face his allies.“Boys, I think that our waiting has finally paid off.” He turned his head back to us. “It looks like Smile’s personal spy has fallen right into our hooves. Oh, and it seems he has brought his little friends too, the assholes that offed Jackhammer and his crew.” I was a little worried as to how he gained the information. It seemed almost everypony knew about it.

How were we going to handle this? The Delta had what looked like a grenade launcher on his battle saddle, one of the rangers had an anti-machine rifle, and the other just had a minigun. The raiders were mostly equipped with rifles and shotguns, though a few had knives and pistols. They had us outnumbered, outgunned, and out strategized. We were screwed.

“Hey, Sledge,” said one of the rangers to the Delta. “Why did Tin send us after these guys?” I could tell he was a little slow, but his minigun still made him a threat. “Theys just a kid, two bitches, a stable pony, and a big guy.” I was amazed he even knew what a stable was, he didn’t seem very bright.

“Damnit, Molasses, what did I tell you about asking idiotic questions?” replied the leader with annoyance. “The colt can read minds, and those four took out Jackhammer. We can’t have ponies that can take out a Delta wandering around the wasteland. She wants us to take them back to her. She also wants the little guy for some weird experiment of hers.” I could tell he was glaring at the minigun wielding ranger, even though his visor was nearly opaque. “With as few bullet holes as possible,” he added.

I was beginning to think that all Deltas were inherently not very bright. He just gave away his intentions to us. While I didn’t know who Tin was, I knew that if she was a member of the Iron Hoof, she wasn’t a pony I would want to be meeting any time soon.

The Delta glared at Pin and Razor. “Though...I suppose she wouldn’t have a need for the mares,” he chuckled grimly.

Needles’s horn flared with his white aura. Suddenly, a wall of white energy formed between us and the raiders. “Get ready!” he shouted. I pulled out the revolver, while Razor took out the rocket launcher and Can Opener. I briefly wondered why she didn’t name the launcher, but the thought was quickly forced out of my head as Needles freed himself from the wagon and overturned it for cover. Pin caught herself with her wings and ascended into the sky. Whisper just dove out of the cart and disappeared behind some rubble.

I heard the chatter of the minigun as it began firing many rounds into the magical barrier. Then the grenade launcher fired, smashing against the wall and exploding, shattering the protective spell. This was followed by the whoosh of Razor’s own launcher, as a rocket propelled itself towards the crowd of raiders. The resulting explosion helped to even the odds some, but they still outnumbered us by five or so.

I dove into one of the buildings in order to escape the second grenade’s blast. I felt briefly ill as I realized that the building I had entered had once bore a red cross outside it. It was the clinic from the memory I had experienced of Armistice, though now it was mutilated with debris and bloodstains. Once the home of two of my friends, this building now sheltered me from the explosion that erupted on the street I was on not two seconds ago.

“I was really hoping to take you, or at least a few of you, alive. You just had to make things difficult, didn’t you?” called the Delta as he lobbed another grenade at my friends. The blast missed Razor as she dove behind the cart. It had taken a heavy beating from the explosions and the minigun rounds.“Now, I have to deal with Tin’s bitching about why we didn’t bring you back alive.” He fired another grenade, but it missed as well.

A S.A.T.S. guided revolver round pinged off his helmet. I could tell that even though it didn’t pierce his skull, the bullet had still caused him some harm. This at least shifted his attention away from my friends and towards me. He rushed at me. I briefly saw my reflection in his visor.

The reflection was interrupted by the large, partially mechanical body of Needles as he tackled the Delta. Needles showed his full weight as he managed to knock the Delta to the ground. “You!” Wham. He brought his mechanical hoof down with as much force as he could manage. “Will!” Wham. “Not!” Wham. “Hurt!” Wham. “Him!” Wham. A large dent had formed in the Delta’s helmet, but I could tell from the struggling that he was still alive.

I used my revolver to dispatch two raiders that attempted to attack Needles. He saved me from the ranger, which I don’t understand why, so it was only fair I save him from the raiders. Though I would have saved him either way.

The chatter of the minigun stopped with a familiar cannon-like boom. Molasses fell to the ground in a crumple, his helmet now had a new opening in it, courtesy of Razor. Pin made her presence known as another two raiders fell to the ground, syringes sticking out of them. I had lost track of Whisper in the chaos, but I was sure that he could handle himself.

KRAKOW!

I thought that the final ranger had fallen to the ground with their skull blown open. What had happened was worse. The bloodspray hit me as the large unicorn fell to the ground, the center of his chest had a gaping hole in it. The Delta beneath him had finally given in, and had ceased his existence. Needles laid on top of him, slowly breathing out the last of his life as his blood coated the metal armour.

“NEEDLES!” shouted the three of us in unison.

The rifle wielding ranger stood a distance across from the scene. I charged her, my horn glowing with a grey aura. I let loose a lightning bolt, more powerful than any I had fired before. The armour of the ranger was hit by the spell, full force. The area where it connected became blackened, scorched as the electricity flowed through it into the pony inside. She let out a shout as the bolt seemed to pierce the shell, hitting her as it did so. The dead armour fell to the ground with a dead pony inside. The few remaining raiders witnessed this and fled in fear. My head throbbed from the over exertion, but I rushed to my fallen friend.

“Needles!” I said in disbelief. Surely he could recover from this. He has taken shots to the chest before. He was indestructible, he couldn’t die. Not like this...

“Wire...” he rasped. “Tell Pin...I am sorry...for Armistice.”

“Why?” I asked. “Why did you risk yourself to save me?”

“Because...you are my friend...and Pin would want you to live...” It seemed that everything he had done had been in his sister’s best interest. She was all he had. “You’re...a terrible influence on her,” he added with a groan.

His sister stood over him, trying to inject medicine after medicine into him, hoping that one would manage to save him. The area around the hole trembled some as the tissue tried to reform, but the damage was too extensive to be fixed.

“Just hold on!” she shouted. She glided to the fallen cart that had been the victim of explosions and minigun fire. She flew back to her brother, one of the cases of medical supplies. She tore it open and pulled out a single syringe. One that I had seen earlier.

“Pin...don’t,” he pleaded. “It...isn’t worth it...”

“I’m not going to let you die!” she exclaimed, tears filling her eyes. She plunged the syringe into his side, letting the powerful drug take effect. Hydra. I saw now how potent it was. The wound quickly closed, but I saw the terrifying truth. Needles was right.

He screeched in pain as his skin began to grow over the mechanical leg. Eventually, the appendage tore off, only to be replaced with flesh and blood. He screamed as his chest was tore open once again, this time by his own mechanical organs being forced out.

“Oh goddesses, what have I done?” Pin whispered.

Needles continued screaming until finally another mechanical organ popped out of his chest. His heart. Then his screaming stopped. Forever.

I stood next to the trembling mare in silence. Razor had silently walked over to us. Whisper even appeared as well, his usual scowl had been replaced by a look of horror. Pin began to sob, quietly at first but gaining in intensity.

She had killed her own brother trying to save him.

I spent a few hours digging a grave for Needles. It was a difficult task with the tools we had, but I managed. Razor sat next to Pin, who still had tears trickling from her eyes, rolling down her face and falling to the ground. Whisper was somewhere. I had trouble keeping track of the colt normally, but now I was too focused on my task to think about him. Too focused to think about anything.

Finally, I reached a point at which I deemed the hole in the ground to be sufficient. I gently levitated the corpse of my friend into the ground. I allowed Pin to get a last look of her brother before I began to seal him in the ground. I had finished my task, and the three of us just stood there in disbelief, mourning, and sorrow. I stood in between the two mares, all of us were silent except for the occasional sobs.

Pin finally broke the silence, her voice faltering with every word. “He...he would have...wanted to be buried in Armistice. It was the only place we had good memories of...the last place we were ever really happy.” I felt my own eyes begin to water as well.

This wasn’t fair. They had already taken so much from these two. The Iron Hoof had taken their home, their friends, their family. They had cost Needles his leg, and now his life. Pin had been traumatized and harmed by their actions on multiple occasions, and now she had lost the only family she had left.

No. They needed to pay. I am not going to let these bastards win. I will not let them harm another pony so long as I am able to prevent it. I will take them down myself if I have to. Smile has just gained another ally in his cause, one that is ready and willing to take down the Iron Hoof.

My thoughts were interrupted by the small crying mare. She had wrapped her forelegs around me. I didn’t say anything, but I put my leg around her to comfort her. She continued to cry softly as tears of my own rolled down my cheeks. Razor just sat next to us, her face was stoic, showing no emotion. This wasn’t the first friend she had lost.

Another couple minutes passed before I went to look for Whisper. We may have lost a friend in this fight, but we had completed our mission and needed to bring Whisper back to Circus, safely. I think that we all needed to be in a safe place for a while, somewhere that we would have time to deal with this without being shot at on an hourly schedule.

‘Hey, Whisper! Where are you?’ I shouted in my head. I wasn’t sure if thinking loudly would help or not, but it was worth a try.

Then, I heard the sound of a gunshot. I rushed to the direction it had come from, levitating out my revolver. It had come from one of the destroyed buildings. I entered and found Whisper standing over a dead raider, a gun in one’s mouth and a bullet in the other’s head.

“What...” I stammered out loud.

“I came here to get information, I wasn’t going to leave without getting information. Intimidation is a wonderful means of getting it, even if they don’t say it out loud. Makes them start to think, especially about what they were sent to do.” He holstered his revolver and looked back up at me, his scowl had returned. "Apologies for causing you to worry, the raider simply needed to die.” I suppose when you can read a pony’s mind, it is easy to tell whether they are truly evil or not.

‘What did you find out?’

“Something unsettling. I am not certain, but I know that the Hoof is plotting something big. These rangers and raiders didn’t know much, except that they needed to capture me, and likely needed to kill you as well. But from what I gathered from the other rangers and the griffin, I think that Circus is in danger.”

He walked out of the building, I followed after him. Pin was still sitting next to the makeshift grave. Razor was attempting to fix the cart. I don’t see why, as none of us were strong enough to pull it very far. I walked over to the scarred mare.

“So, what are we going to do?” I asked. She levitated a box from the debris of the cart, then looked up at me.

“What do you mean?” she asked as she pulled more supplies from the ruins.

“I mean, what are we going to do about Pin?”

She frowned at me. “She has been through a lot of trauma today, I think we should just rest here for the night, and decide what to do in the morning.” She turned back to the cart and began trying to attach a wheel, but it was in vain.

I was silent for a few seconds. “Why are you following me?”

She looked back up, a bit surprised at the question. She tried to say something, but she eventually just sighed. “At first, it was just about survival. Two ponies have a better chance at surviving than one. Eventually, I just felt like you were a good pony, and soon you became my friend.” She didn’t say anything for a few seconds. “Whether that is a good or bad thing remains to be seen,” she mumbled under her breath.

“And what about her? Why did they follow me?” I asked, gesturing to the pegasus and the grave.

“Because she loves you, and because her brother would never let her travel the wasteland alone.” She looked at me with a scowl. “Though now that you shot her down, I don’t know why she follows you.” She turned back to her work, though she had made no actual progress in repairing the cart.

That hurt a little. I did feel responsible for the death of Needles. I drove a wedge between the two of them, I was the reason Pin traveled with me. If it hadn’t been for me, they would still be in Circus, safe. I was as much to blame for this tragedy as the Iron Hoof was. But I wasn’t the one that intentionally caused this. They were the monsters that had killed him, they were the ones who side with the raiders. That eased the pain some, but I still felt somewhat responsible.

I entered the clinic. It was as good a place as any to sleep for the night. Razor and Whisper followed me in as well. Pin stayed outside next to the grave. I sighed, and went outside to speak with her. It would be fair for her to stick a syringe in my eye as well. I might not have been the raiders that killed her home, but I was the pony that had killed her brother.

I walked up next to her. She looked up at me with her golden eyes, though they were reddish from all her crying. “Come to put me out of my misery?” she moaned.

“I’m sorry,” was all I said.

“For what? You didn’t do this to him. An Iron Hoof bastard put a bullet in him, but I was the one who killed him!” she screamed in response. “He warned me not to use Hydra on him, several times before. He said it could kill him just as likely as it would save him, and he was right!” Her eyes somehow managed to find more tears to release. “But I thought I could save him, that I might still be able to have something that the Iron Hoof didn’t destroy. But they took everything from me! What do I do now?”

“Make them pay.” Either she would, or I would. This crime would not go unpunished, nor would all the countless other crimes they had committed against innocent ponies.

She looked up at me with her golden eyes again, tears had resumed their torrent. She hugged me again, letting her tears flow into my coat. I didn’t say anything, but wrapped my leg around her to comfort her. We stayed like this for a few minutes. “Come on, it is getting dark.” She seemed to have no will to move on her own, as she just sat there crying. I picked her up and laid her across my back, she had no objections to this action, as she only kept crying while I carried her into the building.

I set her down inside the destroyed clinic next to Razor. Razor looked at me with a sad smile as I had brought her in. I took a spot in the room next to theirs, and drifted off to sleep.

My dreams were plagued by nightmares. I was beginning to miss the memories of other ponies, beginning to miss the voice. The voices in my dreams confused me. This dream terrified me.

Bloodied faces of the ponies I had killed during my time in the wasteland appeared before me, some of which deserved it, but I remembered that some of them did not deserve this fate. One in particular stood out; shotgun pony from the stable. I had taken killed him because I considered him a threat, but he was like the other two security ponies, forced into this position by Sceptre’s influence. The saddest thing was that I knew him my entire life, but I couldn’t even remember his name.

The blood coated ponies scrambled towards me. They swarmed me from all sides. In total, there was likely close to fifty ponies that I had killed. A cacophonic symphony of screeching roared out around me. Their bloodied limbs reached out of me as they surrounded me, I was soon swallowed by the mass of walking corpses. Everything went dark.

I felt myself falling through the darkness. I immediately ceased my descent, a little disoriented, but I was quickly brought back to my senses with a pain in each of my legs, followed by a numbing sensation. I tried to move one, but the pain quickly returned as I did so. I tried to see what had happened, but my neck was pressed to the ground by a cold force. The darkness prevented me from seeing my limbs, from seeing what kept me from moving my head again. And then I felt a pain in my chest.

It felt as if I was being cut open. Then I felt myself being numbed again, only for the numbness to be overpowered by the pain as I felt something being ripped out of my abdomen. I felt my ribs being broke apart, one by one. I found that I was able to scream, but then a voice spoke to me.

“You deserve this,” it said in a familiarly calm but bitter tone. “You broke her heart, and ripped mine out.” I heard the crying of a mare echo around me. I let out a scream as I felt a blade pierce my insides again. “Only fitting that I do the same...” I tried to let out a scream, but all I could manage was a gasp as I felt one of my lungs be tore open. “Was it right for me to die because of you?” The other lung was ripped apart as he spoke. “Was it right for her to endure so much pain because of you?” I felt my heart racing, beating quickly in an attempt to stay alive. Slowly, I felt his magic wrap around it, causing it to strain with each beat. “Goodbye, Live Wire.” With that, Needlepoint ripped out my heart, still beating in vain.

My eyes shot open. I gasped deeply as I woke up, verifying that my lungs were still intact, that my heart was still inside me.

I rose to my hooves. It was still somewhat dark out. I was the first one awake. Razor was asleep in the other room, Pin was curled up next to her. She was shaking in her sleep. I felt a little bad that I had a nightmare about the same pony she is crying over. She let out a few faint sobs, still asleep.

“It isn’t just her brother she is crying about.” I had no idea where he was, but Whisper intruded on my thoughts again. “Some of it is about you.”

‘Yeah, I know I screwed up. She probably hates me now that I got her brother killed. She is likely going to take a syringe to my eye..’ I thought as I sat in the ruined clinic’s main room.

“She wouldn’t do that.” He paused for a moment. “Well, she is unlikely to do that to you.” I rose to my hooves again and started looking for the telepathic colt. I hated speaking to him when I had no idea where he was. It just seemed...off.

“She needs you. She needs somepony to keep her sane, somepony to live for, or else the grief is going to eat away at her until she is nothing. I have witnessed it happen all too often.” The colt knew the thoughts and feelings of those around him, no matter how gruesome the thought or tragic the memory. He heard whenever a pony was suffering, likely felt the pain as well. In the wasteland, everypony suffers...Whisper especially.

I finally found the young colt in what looked like a small office. He had his eyes closed, softly snoring. Was he communicating with me in his sleep? This just brought a new level to the weirdness of his mental intrusions.

‘Are you-’ I began.

“Physically, yes. Mentally, no. My mind is rarely allowed to sleep; the shouts of pain of those around me keep it awake. My life is a living hell, made worse by the sufferings of others. Do you know how many memories I have heard of ponies being tortured? How much pain I feel from the misery another has? Ponies like Smile want to use my power for their own benefit, but it is a curse.”

‘Then why do you do what Smile wants? Why not just leave?’
“Things are never that simple. Few places in the wasteland are as safe as Circus. Besides, Smile is not a bad pony, he is just pressured by being the leader of one of the only groups of ponies with the guts to fight the Iron Hoof.” He sighed in my head. “We have to leave soon. We need to return to Circus as soon as we can. I just know something is going on.”

‘I will go wake up the others.’

I left the room and returned to the two sleeping mares.

“Hey,” I said gently as I poked Razor in the side with my hoof. She proved just as hard to wake up as usual, so I moved to the small mare beside her. I looked at her small frame as she shook with an occasional sob. I poked her even more gently. She stirred a little, and then woke up. “Hey.”

She looked up at me with her golden eyes that had become reddened through the vast amounts of crying she had done. “Hi,” she replied in a meek voice.

“We need to be leaving soon,” I said as I continued trying to wake up Razor. Even when not drunk, she was impossible to wake up. I levitated out a canteen from one of my packs, pouring a bit of water onto her head. She sputtered awake, shouting profanities at me as she did so. I looked over at Pin to see if she had gotten a smile out of it, but she had no reaction to the event.

A few minutes passed, and we were all outside, though we were not ready to leave yet. Pin sat at the patch of dirt with the makeshift grave marker on it. ‘Needlepoint. Brother, hero, friend,’ it displayed. Although it was made only from a few things we scavenged, I think it turned out well. I walked over to her.

“I just don’t want to leave him,” she said as tears streamed down her face again. She didn’t look at me as she spoke. “He was all I had.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to do what you said,” she sniffed. “I’m going to make every last one of those Iron Hoof bastards regret everything they have done to us. They took everything from me, now I have nothing.” She started to cry a little more.

Gah, I couldn’t stand this anymore. “That isn’t true. You still have me.” Her eyes shot up at me as I said those words, a glimmer of happiness shone from the golden orbs. Tears streamed down her face as she hugged me.

I felt bad for her, I really did. At the same time, I admired her. She was able to endure such pain, such loss, and she was still a good pony. Though she did scare me at first, I managed to see beneath the psychotic layer to see that she was a caring pony beneath it.

But I didn't just want to pity her. I didn't want to stay just to stop her spiralling into an ever deeper depression. I wanted to stay because I cared for her, wanted to make her happy; as a friend, and maybe as something more.

At first, I'd been afraid of her... terrified, even. A cold-hearted killer, just itching to use her poisons. But that wasn't really Pin. I'd seen the real Pin; shining through in the markets of Circus, and when she'd confessed her feelings for me. Perhaps I was afraid not of her outer shell, but of confronting my feelings for the real pony within.

I held the small mare in my arms as she hugged me in both happiness and sadness. She was crying still, but at this point, tears in my coat were not a problem.

“You two lovebirds done?” shouted Razor from inside the clinic. “We need to leave is what you’ve been preaching all mornin. If all ya’s going to do is hug each other all morning, I am going back to sleep.”

I released Pin and walked over to the cart. It had been mostly destroyed, but it would still serve well enough to carry medical supplies. We would just have to walk. Walk all the way back to Circus...great.

We should have just left the cart. I didn’t care about all these medical supplies at this point. I had been pulling the cart for several hours, and although it wasn’t weighed down with an unconscious pegasus and an injured cyber-pony like it was last time, it was still exhausting to be pulling this thing.

Pin hovered next to me, her emotional state was somewhere between depressed and joyful, but she had at least stopped crying, which made me a little happy. Razor was grumbling as she walked. I had learned that we had run out of whiskey, though I remembered the one I still had in my pack. Pin likely still had hers as well. Though we both opted to keep this secret from Razor, as I did not want to lug her around for hours because she passed out drunk again. Whisper was walking behind the cart some. I would occasionally let him ride. He was the lightest of all of us, and I could tell that the long walk was tiresome for the young pony.

I continued pulling the cart ahead, but then I started hearing...something. I guess I was bored, so my brain started imagining music to cope. But then it started getting louder. It seemed to be getting closer as well.

“Hear that?” I asked.

Razor raised her ears to the sound. “Yeah, sounds like one of those spritebots that are always wandering around.”

“Wait, I think we might have a way to communicate with Circus.”

I turned to the colt. “How so?” The two mares only looked at me, unaware of the mental conversation.

“Long ago, back before the balefire bombs dropped, Circus used to be a major Ministry of Morale hub. Not so long ago, the Laughingstocks stumbled upon a system inside Circus that could be used to control the spritebots.”

“So? How does that help us?”

“The spritebots are so much more than flying radios. They have built in surveillance systems, communication devices, and even some weapons systems as well. They are the perfect method of watching the entire wasteland with nopony being the wiser, they just assume them to be floating radios.”

“Wow.”

“Yes. Of course, seeing as the network went down when the bombs fell, the Laughingstocks only have control over spritebots within a fairly large area around Circus. It isn’t the entire wasteland, but it suits our needs.”

“So what do we do?”

“I need you to locate the spritebot, and speak with it. Just say what I tell you to.”

“Fair enough.”

“Mind clueing us in on what the hell you are talking about?” asked Razor.

“Whisper told me that we have a way to communicate with Circus; the spritebot,” I responded.

The spritebot was easy to track down, just follow the accordion heavy song. The machine bore a resemblance to a bloatsprite, although it lacked the tumors and it had metal instead of flesh. It was also much more annoying.

I managed to catch it in my magic although it struggled to fly out. “Ok, what do I do?” I asked the colt. He didn’t say anything in my head, he just took a screwdriver out of his pack and walked to the back of the bot. A few seconds passed as he popped open a panel and began messing with a few wires and various things. I don’t know mechanical parts. I may have been maintenance, but I didn’t know the first thing about maintaining something.

“There,” he said in my head as he walked in front of the machine. “I’’m going to need you to speak for me. Okay? I can’t communicate through these things.”

“Okay.” I was used to relaying his messages anyway.

“Ask for Illex.”

“Hello? Is Illex there?” I hesitantly asked the hunk of metal. I doubted I would receive an answer, but the music suddenly cut out with a crackle.

“Who wants to know?” said a tinny voice through the spritebot.

“My name is Live Wire, I was sent to accompany Whisper on a mission.”

“Ah yeah, you’re that new guy that killed the Delta. What do you want?”

“Tell him that I have gained some information that Circus may be in danger.”

“Whisper says that Circus is in danger.”

“Huh. I’ll be sure to tell Smile you said that. Anything in particular I should warn him about?”

I looked to the small colt for an answer. “An Iron Hoof attack maybe?”

I heard a sigh from the Laughingstock talking through the hovering machine. “Look kid, Circus is built like a fortress. We have survived a lot of attacks from the Iron Hoof. I don’t think we have much to worry about, but I’ll warn Smile regardless.” He then mumbled something quietly, I didn’t hear what it was. “Alright, done wasting my time? I have a lot of more important things to do, and I don’t have the time to be Smile’s secretary.” The voice over the spritebot cut out, quickly being replaced by the annoying music.

“He isn’t that bad when you get to know him. He is usually a lot worse.”

“Hey! Are you two done already?” shouted Razor from beside the cart. “Waiting around is boring!”

Traveling wasn’t much more interesting either. We hadn’t encountered any real threats since Armistice. Only a few lone raiders tried to attack us, and they quickly stopped dead in their tracks, quite literally thanks to Razor’s sniping. But it was getting late again, and I did not want a repeat performance of our encounter with the bloodwings. We were down a friend, and I didn’t want to lose another any time soon.

Luckily, we found a small building that was still in decent shape. It was completely devoid of life, but at least that meant no raiders. I pulled the heavy cart to the building.

This building looked to be some sort of home at one point, though nopony lived here now. It also was picked through very thoroughly, as I was unable to find anything of value.

“Hey,” chimed the pegasus. She seemed to be in better spirits now. She was standing next to me in what looked like an old library of sorts, all the books were either destroyed or taken by scavengers. Razor was searching the kitchen for any hint of alcohol, while Whisper was somewhere. Not that it really mattered where he was, he was still present in my head. “So...” I could tell from the look on her face that she was plotting something. “Earlier today, did you really mean it?”

“Yes,” I answered. Her face instantly lit up as her face turned into a wide grin. I wrapped my foreleg around her in a hug. She buried her head into my neck. “I’m sorry for earlier.”

She sighed. “I thought we covered this, you weren’t responsible for his death.”

“Not that...I’m sorry for turning you down earlier. I just...needed time to think about how I really felt about you.”

“You are so cute when you are awkward and shy,” she giggled as she buried her head in my neck again.

“Bleck,” interrupted Whisper.

‘Shut it,’ I bitterly responded in my head.

“Why is it that the first thing the scavengers go for is the damn whiskey!” shouted Razor from the other room, followed by something falling over with a loud bang. “Ow! Damn fridge!”

Pin sighed and broke from my embrace. “I better go make sure we don’t have to amputate her leg,” she sighed.

“She’s fine,” I replied.

“Should legs bend this way?” Razor shouted from the kitchen. “This is a lot of blood. Can somepony help me? Please?”

Pin grumbled something as she walked out of the room. I heard shouting from the other room, but I didn’t really pay much attention. I was worn out from pulling the cart for hours.

I needed rest, whether it came with nightmares or not.

Strangely, what I found in my sleep was not a nightmare. It was a memory.

My body felt heavy, weighed down by clunky metal armour. My host was an earth pony buck, and was a Steel Ranger.

“Damnit, why did Blueberry order us to this hellhole?” complained one of the rangers to my side.

“Shut it, Custard. You don’t question a Star Paladin’s orders,” I felt my host respond.

There were about five rangers in the group including the pony whose memory I was intruding on. They were packing heavy weaponry. Two had what looked to be more powerful versions of the grenade launcher the Delta from earlier had. Another had an anti machine rifle, while the other had a minigun.

“Ah, kill the act, Mocking Bird,” said another one of the rangers. “Your marefriend just sent us to certain death just because she doesn’t like you.”

“First of all, that would be a direct violation of Ranger code to be in a relationship with a commanding officer. Second, this is not a suicide mission. We were sent to deal with Silver Star’s secession, violently if need be.”

“Yeah, the five of us taking on her entire chapter. No way this will end badly,” snarked another of the rangers.

“Are you questioning a Paladin, Buzzsaw?” my host asked.

“No sir,” he responded with a hint of bitterness.

“Good. Now, the traitors are stationed in Stable 9. We go there, deal with Silver, then we head back for drinks.”

“It is never that simple,” grumbled another ranger as they continued walking in a direction that the E.F.S. in the suit proclaimed to be southeast.

The memory flooded with the white void.

“Alright, what now?” I shouted. I knew the voice was there. It was always there.

“What now? That is for you to decide, Live Wire. What we want will become apparent soon enough, but whether or not you decide to aid us is up to you,” remarked the voice from the endless whiteness.

“Bullshit! You didn’t drive Volt insane and cause him to leave the stable for nothing! What do you want from me?” I had had enough of the cryptic riddles and confusing answers.

“We want your help.”

“Mind elaborating?”

“I do, but I suppose I must tell you what I can. This war that is going on could decide the fate of the wasteland. There are many possible end results, but the most desirable of those is also the most difficult to obtain. Our goal is to influence events so that the desired outcome happens.”

“And just how do you know what you are doing will cause this?”

“We can’t be certain. The future is always changing. We do know that a wasteland under the control of the Iron Hoof is one that nopony desires. So you see? We have similar goals.” I was still not convinced that the voice was as benevolent as it tried to appear, but if it meant bringing down the Iron Hoof, I would at least listen to it.

“I still don’t know who you are, so why should I trust you?”

“We are The New Equestrians. We hope to return the land to its former glory one day.” Using mind control, telepathy, deceit, and betrayal. Yeah, former glory indeed. “You will learn more about us in time, but for now, your efforts are needed elsewhere.”

Darkness.

And then dawn.

I awoke to find that Pin was asleep next to me. What was more of a surprise was to find Razor asleep in the same room, one of her back legs wrapped in bandages. Whisper was somewhere else as usual. The foal had a habit of slipping away unnoticed, though I guess that nopony really notices the silent colt unless they hear him in their head.

I wandered around the small building, looking for nothing in particular, just wanting to kill some time before the others woke up. I entered the kitchen. Razor was right, that was a lot of blood. It had dried in a pool around a toppled over fridge. Sober Razor was more clumsy than Drunken Razor apparently.

I popped open a bottle of Sparkle-Cola and enjoyed the lukewarm carrot-y flavor. It was a couple minutes before Pin woke up. As she walked into the bloodied kitchen, I levitated my last bottle of Sparkle-Cola out of my pack and over to her. The only thing left in my pack that was drinkable was some water, and the bottle of whiskey, which I would gladly put off drinking until I was somewhere where it was relatively safe.

“So how is she doing?” I asked, looking at the large bloodstain on the ground.

“Razor? She’s fine. Probably permanently brain damaged, but that happened well before any of us met her,” she said with a chuckle. It was good to see her laughing again, even if it was at the expense of another. “She banged up her leg pretty bad. Caught her leg under the fridge as it fell, fracturing a bone or two and causing a lot of cuts. She shouldn’t be walking very much, so either we stay her for another day, or you pull her with the cart.” I was fairly certain she wanted the former option rather than the latter, judging by the slight smile on her face.

“As much as I would enjoy staying here for a day, you know that we have to reach Circus as soon as we can.”

She pouted. “Fine,” she grumbled as she went back into the room where Razor was asleep. I knew she was a little upset at my decision, but I didn’t feel safe out in the wasteland. I doubted Circus was very safe, but it was certainly better than wasteland. I heard water splashing, followed by Razor shouting. Pin entered the kitchen a moment later. “Razor is up, now where is Whisper?”

With that, the young colt emerged from the hallway. The kid was sneaky, I had to give him that.

“Gasp! Wheeze! Groan!”

“Whining won’t help you pull any faster, Wire,” retorted Razor from the back of the cart. “Circus is still another day away, so GO!” She jabbed me in the side with the levitating rifle.

“Ow!” I yelped. “Stop it!”

Razor began chuckling to herself. Even with an injured leg, she was still a deadly shot, which she proved when a group of raiders decided that we were an easy target. She dropped three of them with only three shots, and Pin dealt with the other two. I was unable to help them due to being strapped into the harness for the cart.

Several hours passed, raiders attacked, raiders got killed, and I pulled the cart the entire time.

“Can...we please...stop now?” I panted. Pin fluttered next to me, a look of concern on her face. Whisper was walking next to the cart. Razor was happily working her way through the bottle of whiskey she snatched from Pin’s pack when she wasn’t looking.

“Nope,” chimed Razor as she resumed drinking merrily.

“Yes,” said Pin. “Circus won’t be destroyed if we don’t return there immediately. I don’t see what the rush is.”

“Yeah, yeah. Go make out with your buckfriend, I am going to take a nap. Wake me when we get attacked,” yawned Razor. Pin blushed at the statement, and I could feel my face turn a little red as well. “Ah, not even going to dispute it this time? Thought it might be true.”

“We...well we...uhm.” I was at a loss for words.

“Heh, just glad to see you two are happy,” Razor concluded as she fell asleep.

I rested for about an hour, speaking with Pin about various things such as Stable life and her life in the wasteland. Another few hours of traveling, and then it began to get dark.

“We should be at Circus tomorrow,” declared Pin as we entered a building for the night. Razor had woken up a little bit ago, amazingly it was all on her own. The building was another house, thoroughly looted just like the other one. Razor even lamented the lack of alcohol, even though she just had a bottle a few hours ago.

I was tired, but I didn’t want to sleep. I knew that I would either be plagued by nightmares or I would be visited by the strange voice. That reminded me of something.

“Either of you ever heard of something called ‘The New Equestrians’?” I asked. The mares looked at me with confusion, answering my question.

“No, what are they?” asked Pin.

“No idea, but they are the ones that caused Volt to leave the Stable.” I explained to them about the voices in my sleep, and how they drove Volt to do what he did. Razor just chalked it up to ‘freaky powers’ while Pin thought I had gone crazy. “And they said they were called The New Equestrians.”

“Well they sound like bad news to me,” Pin replied. “They may oppose the Hoof, but I think they are plotting something bigger. And messing with your head like that, unforgivable.”

“They are a faction of powerful magic users,” said Whisper in my head. “I don’t know much about them, but I managed to gather some info from Volt and other ponies they influenced. From what little I know, they seem to have mastered a form of telepathy, one more powerful and better refined than mine. Very secretive bunch as well, they do not make their presence known but to a few ponies, and even then they limit what they tell them. I have to agree with your marefriend, they are up to something.”

“Well that is reassuring,” I lamented. I then relayed Whisper’s message to the two mares.

“Wow, you know they must be secretive when the mind reader doesn’t know much about them,” chuckled Razor. “Look, just tell these psychic ponies to piss off. Don’t get involved in whatever scheme they have.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “They screwed up my life by killing my stable and throwing me into the wasteland, and now they expect me to help them?” I looked over at Pin, who had a small frown on her face. “Well, some things are better now.” She smiled again. I sighed a little in relief. “I am going to sleep. Razor, you got first watch?”

“Fine,” she grumbled.

I collapsed on an old mattress in the ancient bedroom.

My sleep was dreamless. I suppose it was better than intruding on the memories of another pony and arguing with the voice, and it was certainly better than having more nightmares.

I woke up while it was still dark. Pin was asleep next to me. Razor had passed out in the main room. I found Whisper sleeping underneath a table in the kitchen. I waited about an hour before Whisper and Pin woke up. We decided that it was too much effort to wake up Razor, so I just levitated her onto the cart.

We would be reaching Circus today, so I didn’t want to waste any time. We set off for our destination.

“Shit...” Razor gasped as we watched the horrifying spectacle from a distance.

Pillars of smoke were rising from the once sickeningly joyful settlement. What looked to be over one hundred ponies were fighting around the city. From the distance, I could still make out the metal armour of a few steel rangers, what looked to be almost twenty of them. In the sky above, a few flying combatants from either side engaged the others in strife. Some of them were pegasi, but I noticed a few of them were griffins, or at least they resembled the pictures of griffins I had seen in the Stable.

The Iron Hoof was throwing everything it could at Circus, and it looked like it was working.
=====================================================================

Footnote: Level Up.
New Perk: Tough Hide (level 1)- The brutal experiences of the Equestrian Wasteland have toughened you. You gain +3 Damage Threshold for each level of this perk you take.

(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, and helping me make the emotional segments understandable.)