The winding halls seemed to go on and on, forever, but nothing ever felt familiar. Every outlet was a new bed of mayhem. The dead bulging and scraping at the ground. We ran through the tunnels, our clattering hooves keeping time with a ticking clock in our heads. Burning the candle at both ends, we raced down the halls with some distorted sense of hope. The deck was loaded, full to bursting, we were hoping with a little spark we could let it go with a boom.

I knew where to go, or at least I thought did. Shadows and flickering lights dancing on the edges of my vision. Fatigue was biting at my neck. The space beyond seemed to shift and change as it pleased in the penumbra of our vision. Frantically, I checked back, hoping my friends were still there. This bloody night had run a little too long and our breaths were growing heavier by the minute. Twisted shadows of the dead creeped in from the winding claw-like tunnels of the labyrinth, each one a broken dream rising from corpse. An ambition betrayed, every one of 'em. Bulging out of armor, twisting out of control, and evolving with every moment. They were faster, more dexterous, and stronger.

It was an infestation. Every turn, every hall, they were crawling in stagnant pools of blood. We picked up the pace as we rounded the equipment maintenance halls. As the night dragged on, as more ponies died, more of these things showed up. It was a losing battle I wasn't interesting in staying for. We didn't have time to waste on these assholes. This was an accident waiting to happen. Why couldn’t we just cut it quits while we were ahead? Who cared about some stupid artifact? ...but that would just prove Hexerai right.

Against the trembling fear of this deathtrap claiming my friends and myself should any of us slip up, there was one, solitary demon feeding me the strength to keep going... a singular desire rebuffing and echoing violently through my mind, “Prove her wrong”.

“Are we really doing this?” I called out as we passed by the staircase to the upper level. Scapegrace didn't answer. “Hey!” I yelled again, but she didn't even turn to look at me.

“Ha. She ignored you.” Calypto laughed from my back. “Looks like the missy grew a pair. What happened to yours?.”

“Should I make it a point to find out if you are striped on the inside or are you gonna shut up?” I groaned. Calypto smiled as he pointed after Scapegrace as her clacking hooves carried her around the corner. I chased after her at full gallop.

One screw up. That’s all it would take.

“Alright! Hold Up!” I planted my hooves in the ground as I yanked her tail.

Scapegrace skidded to a stop. “Argh! What?!” she snapped with a caustic venom that I wasn't used to.

“I'm calling this one.” I walked up to her as I scanned the halls. I had to keep on guard. This was a window for escape, and it might not be there if something came up from behind. “We're running the clock on that spell, and I don't want to figure out what happens on the other side with those undead dorks. The exit is right there.” As I spoke Scapegrace's eyes avoided mine.

Scapegrace had no color or light emanating from her, just as before. She looked on ahead. She flicked her tail as she took a breath. “You can go. I won't force you to stay with me.”

“What? No! Wait--” With that, she started to gallop down the hall. “Damn it!” I kicked the ground to chase her. “This is not the kind of attitude I need from her right now!” I grumbled to Calypto.

“What can you do? I don't think she wants to listen to you,” he said back as he scratched at his chin.

“Well, listening was what she was so damn good at before,” I cursed. “She's gonna get herself killed.”

“Whatever you do, do it. I'll follow,” Calypto said with a snide grin and small tap of his spurs.

“I should kick you off for that. Passengers don't get to talk about 'following',” I grumbled as I pursued the mare down the corridor. “Scapegrace!” I called out. Fuck. I needed to keep an eye on her. “Don't be brash!” I yelled as I lined up with her.

“What? Does it make you jealous?” Her voice was weak as she spoke. I could barely hear her, but I could tell she was trembling. “Thanks, I needed that. Really, if you can tell me to be careful then anything is possible,” she said as she picked up the speed. Her coat shimmered slightly. She was reworking her own anatomy as she ran.

“What goes around comes around!” Calypto laughed again. “That sting? We call that, Karma. You’re gonna feel that in the next life.”

“I hope your stripes fall off,” I muttered as I chased after the crystal mare. I lost sight her for a moment, then again. I had to pick up speed. “How important is this thing? Is it worth dying?”

“I'm sorry...” Scapegrace yelled out between gasps. “...but, please. Just shut up!”

“If you keep this up, she is going to think you're clingy,” Calypto quipped from his perch.

“The all mares in my life are crazy, but I'm not going to let this one go get herself killed.” As I said it, I stumbled on some uneven flooring and the remains of a dislodged vent that laid scattered across the ground.

“Still clingy...”

“Shut up.”

“You're chasing mares. This should be fun for you.”

“Excuse me, do you want to walk or something?”

I picked myself up and climbed over the vent. “Well, I guess that's one way to look at it,” I muttered as I bounded off. I couldn't see her anymore, but I knew where she was going. There was only one route she could be taking. I just had to get there before something happened.

“Scapegra--” I called out when I turned the corner, only to find her standing in front of a grisly conspiracy of nightmares. She was shaking as she stumbled backwards. I paced up beside her, but when I tried to turn her around, she resisted my hoof. Damn it, why in the hell couldn't she be consistent when I needed her to be? “I don't want to see you get yourself killed. We have to know when to cut our losses.”

“You don't understand. My life isn't important. I don't have a choice,” she said as her coat began to bristle and morph. It seemed to glaze over, forming a tough exterior with rigged crests. Tears gushed down her cheeks as she trembled. She spoke in a weak voice, “I have to...”

She knocked my hoof away as she broke into a gallop. I tried to grab her tail, but she kicked me in the face.

“Nothing else matters! I have to. I [i[need to!” she screamed.

It was like watching her dive right into the jaws of death. There were countless ghasts and they morphed to accept her, with boney blades and claws. She didn't care about dodging, she just charged in.

“You were supposed to be the one with the good ideas!” I charged. She forced my hoof. If I died, that just proved Hexy wrong. It was like a rolling ocean. I had to keep up. Through a road of shattered glasses I charged towards the mare like a lighthouse in the dark. From the shadowy windows the twisting monsters crawled in as I breached the herd. Sharp blades slashed in from where I couldn't see. I reeled my head around the blades as best I could, just trying to make sure it stayed attached to my neck. As the attacks came in I slipped around them and parried them, but every time I lost distance as Scapegrace became harder and harder to see. I needed to take faith in prophecy and keep moving. Things latched on and cut deep. On my hooves, on my stomach, on my neck. I had to keep going. I had some armor, which saved me from being entirely eviscerated. Each step got harder and heavier. The creatures were wrenching me back. Soon I was too entangled to move forward and all I could do was swat at them with my hooves to keep them from crawling all over me.

Suddenly, Calypto threw an ashy-looking sphere down into the crowd. It burst into a choking smoke and a sensation hit me with all the subtle grace of a two-hundred ton freight train. “Ughck! That smell is rank! And it's like it’s coating my mouth and my face and everything.” The disgusting ashen sooty residue clung to everything and lingered in the air. The flesh of the horrors started to wither and writhe in their shells as they withdrew in what almost looked like disgust.

“What the hell did you do, Calypto?” I coughed as I picked myself up through the mass of heavy flesh.

“Incense bomb. It will ward them off.”

“Ullghck! It's like it’s violating my eyes and my nose and my mouth. Bleahhh!” I groaned as I detached the embedded claws as I crawled forward.

“It elevates the spirit and makes us more aware of higher things.”

“Euyaoch, the only... thing this is making me more a-...ware of, is that you just let out the ethereal equivalent of fart.”

“Incense calms the mind and wards off evil.”

“Do I look calm to you?!”

“It suspends their essence and it disperses the coils that anchor spirits of possession.”

“It went in through my lungs straight into my soul. I'm gonna need to wash for days. This stuff better work.”

“Did your tribe's shaman tell you your totem was a vending machine or something, or do you just not know about respect? Trust me. It wards them off.”

I looked around to see all the ghasts curling and falling on top of each other, some clawing at their own skin to try to tear off the terrible odor. Coughing, I picked myself up. I wavered back and forth as it hurt a lot to move. “Scapegrace... did she get through?” My heart dropped as I saw a wet trail of fresh blood leading down the hall.

An echoing crash from behind us showed that the droves of abominations were melding together. It was muscular and downright creepy, and more than that, unlike all the other nightmare golems, it looked pissed. “I'm thinking trust is a bad insurance right about now,” I muttered.

“Damn. Didn't stay in the air long enough...” Calypto grumbled.

I bolted down the room as fast as I could manage. The bulging hulk was staggering as well, having difficulty keeping a straight line as it ricocheted from wall to wall knocking loose pipes and breaking windows and stretchers as it picked up speed. Defying the paralyzing terror at the spectacle of the thing’s lumbering advance, somehow my legs managed to keep putting one hoof in front of the other.

Down the hall was an open door to a lab. I bolted towards it, following the small red splatterings of blood. When we hit the threshold, Calypto dismounted mid-gallop, like some kind of maniac. He was quick to dive on the door control panel. “We have to shut this door,” Calypto called out. As much as he fiddled, the metal partition wouldn’t budge.

The charging mass had turned the corner and barreled toward us when an array of turrets came to life with an arcane hum. A golden emblem of the sun bore into them as the turrets reved. The guns unleashed a barrage of glowing blue blasts that quickly froze giant chunks of the conglomeration of dorks. Again and again it fired until it was frozen solid, forming an impassable wall, barring the pursuit of any other dorks. We were safe it seemed, but we were also trapped.

I didn’t care. I was more interested in the mare who was sprawled out across the ground. I had tried to tell her, and she hadn't listened. Now she was shivering in a pool of her own blood with the logical consequences due. This shouldn't have happened to her. She didn't deserve this.

I hobbled to her side and gingerly lifted her head from the ground and cradled her close. I tried to find words to say, but I had guilt pulsing through my brain. Her timid eyes glanced over towards me as she quivered. “I am never going to run anywhere, ever again, for the rest of my life,” she said in a timid voice. “Running is for ponies who hate themselves....” she muttered.

“You were acting like me out there.” I said as I gripped her shoulders tighter.

“Hmm, so it wasn't just me. I was acting like an idiot.” She faintly chuckled. “I've never internally screamed so much in my entire life. I think my voice is a little hoarse...”

It was hard to figure out how to take that. I perked an eyebrow up as I looked at her.

“... the voice in my head, I mean,” she said with a embarrassed smile. “That was the stupidest thing I think I'dve ever done in my life. I kinda proud of it.”

“Don't be,” I chided.

Scapegrace just stuck her tongue out. I just gripped her tighter. She then spoke up, “I'm surprised you came after me.”

“Of course, I'd come after you.” I gave a tense smile. Was that saying too much? “You're the reasonable one among us. Don't go doing stupid things. That's my thing,” I said in a grave tone.

As I spoke, Scapegrace wiggled just a little bit with a smile. “I am the smart one.” She chuckled to herself.

“Huh?” I furrowed my brow as I noticed the cheery hue return to Scapegrace's coat. Her shivering seemed to stop. I looked her over and noticed that while there was blood on her clothes and coat, I couldn't see any wounds. “What the-- Y-You're not dying, you're totally fine,” I muttered monotonously as my head caught up with reality. My face lit on fire as I gawked at her wide-eyed. “Y-you! I’ve taken a lot of shit tonight, but... that. Don't scare me like that, again!”

Scapegrace flushed a rosy pink. “I patched myself up ‘cause I'm smart,” she said with a coy smile as her eyes flared with a spark of magic. Concerned about her priorities. Scapegrace puffed her cheeks out. “Don't move, this is comfy.”

“We have just over an hour until this place explodes!” I shouted to her as I shook her back and forth, vigorously. The suddenly motion made me wince at my wounds.

Scapegrace picked her head up as soon as I reacted. “Aiya! You need more help than I do!” Her eyes darted back and forth as her usual phrenetic manner began to sink in again. She pointed a hoof towards me, and to herself with the other, “Should we switch?”

“I'm fine.”

“But--”

“I said I'm fine.”

Scapegrace frowned. I looked about the lab room. There were many physical representations of spell arrangements about the room, now scattered in disarray. There were globes and preservative glass chambers everywhere. Weird tablets and daises carved out of stone, metal, and bone were encased in these chambers. Magnifying lenses on slender arms descended from the ceiling. There were circles drawn beneath our hooves, but I couldn't tell a damn what they were meant for. Some unicorn spell definitely, but everything unicorns did had to do with some wishy-washy spell, so that told me fuck all.

Calypto limped in towards Scapegrace. “Got to hoof it to you, you surprised me, kid,” he said as he passed me by. “You finally figured out how to stop wavering and jump in there. Well done.”

Scapegrace grinned as she rose to her hooves. “Thanks.”

“While you were fooling around, I was checking around the room. We have a real problem.” Calypto braced himself against one of the cases on pedestals. “We don't have an escape route,” Calypto said pushing the brim of his hat up, only to reveal a tight glare. “The door on the far side is jammed to all hell. The way we came in is frozen shut.”

“Frozen? How long would it take to thaw?” I asked as I looked back to see the frozen barricade that encased the mob of corpses.

“With ice that thick, it might be hours. We don’t have that kind of time,” Scapegrace worried. A cold blue tone creeped across her face as she pondered useless escape routes. Calypto and I felt the same, though we didn’t say it.

I huffed and stomped back towards the room. Trapped? No, we weren’t gonna die in here. None of us. I was gonna get everypony out of here. We needed to focus on something else. “What was with those turrets anyway?” I questioned as I furrowed my brow. “They didn’t shoot at us.”

“I suspect the somepony wanted to keep a very specific something out,” Calypto said with a smirk.

“Hexerai,” I snorted.

“Hexawho?” Scapegrace looked at us befuddled.

I scratched the back of my head. I didn’t really want to explain that one right now. I looked around. “Alright, what other escape routes do we have? Vents?” I asked as I scanned ceiling.

“Not a damn one,” Calypto added.

“This is the archaeological storage room. Air flow is tightly controlled sealed as much as possible to prevent oxidation of live artifacts. They probably managed talismans and old relics here in this room.” Scapegrace spoke up.

I tapped a hoof to the ground. “Can't go back the way we came...” I furrowed my brow. “Well, shit.”

“So, we're locked in here?” All strength and spirit dropped from Scapegrace's shoulder. In brief shudders she pouted as hope bled out of her. “I got so close to it! It's not fair!”

“Don't give up just yet!” I assured her. I wasn't going to let despair set in. Hexerai wanted us to panic, we couldn’t afford to lose our calm. “We came here for a reason. Those artifacts are here, right? Well, let’s find 'em!”

I smashed my fridge through a glass display case, sending the shards flying. I blew the glass off of the statuette inside; it was a small draconic looking creature riding atop a cloud with fire pouring out onto the base. It had an ugly-looking head for a dragon, and it didn't seem to know what it wanted to be... as if it wanted to be everything at once. It was ivory and obsidian, but also granite, but when I grabbed it, it didn't seem to weigh a damn thing. I could have sworn I saw it move. Carved runes were etched into it, but it wasn't anything I could read.

“That's pre-Celestian...” Scapegrace muttered.

“Huh.”

“Put that down, you muscle-headed dork...” Scapegrace wrenched the idol from my hooves and placed it back on the pedestal.

“I'm fine. I'm not an idiot.”

“Don't take this the wrong way, but here, you are.”

“I was just looking at it.”

“You were stallion-hoofing it, and it was going to turn you into a cactus...”

“What?!” As I looked at it, it almost looked as if it had been caught in the act of mischief. .

“Head of a horse, body of a dragon, eagle claw, lions paw, That's an idol of Discord, alright. He's one of the oldest figures of recorded history. These things were bad new back in the day. Just carving his image or drawing his picture was said to invite him into your home.” Scapegrace took out tongs and sighed. “Many of them were destroyed a long time ago, for that very reason. It’s really a lovely piece of magical history. I wish I had the time to appreciate it.”

“So is he a bad guy or what?” I asked as I marveled at the thing.

“It's hard to say. He's different. Sometimes he's helped ponies out, other times he just messes with everything that exists, simply because they’re there. He's the Spirit of Chaos. Some ponies in the old times blamed all the world’s problems on him alone.”

Spirit of Chaos, huh? He must have been having a blast since the world fell apart. “Why would anypony keep around a statue that summons a troublemaker like this?”

Scapegrace seemed to get her color back just by talking. I think I distracted her. “There are few reason, really. Inviting Discord was inviting change into your life, so the short answer is, it kept things interesting. Some ponies worshiped him.” Scapegrace pointed her hoof to the carving on the side. “Also, these things were historical recordings of stories and other magical writings.”

“You'd think they'd have something better to write it on,” Calypto cut in as he looked on from the side. Scapegrace had to stop him from trying to poke it with the snake venom horn out of morbid curiosity.

“They were insane, and that's what made it the perfect foundation for the roots of magic as we know it.” Scapegrace perched herself over the figurine protectively. “This is probably here because it has valuable magic inscribed on it.” Scapegrace looked over the hall of objects. “Everything here probably has some magical significance to them that could be incredibly dangerous.”

Scapegrace turned to us glaring, “So don't touch anything!”

Calypto and I looked at each other as we stood frozen, me winding up to smash another case and Calypto opening up his packs ready to swipe. Scapegrace looked at us as if we two were very irresponsible colts on a trip to the marketplace, and she was our caretaker. How were we supposed to control ourselves when she was talking up how useful and amazing these things were? Imagine what any one of these things could be pawned for! Imagine what it would be like if we figured out what they actually did!

Scapegrace growled at us and we dropped our hooves.

“Fine. Well, what if we can use one of these things to get out of here?” I said as I tapped my hoof on the glass encasing some sort of stone tablet.

Scapegrace had already drifted off into investigating the area. “Not everything is going to be helpful for that. It’s a historical preservation wing, not some super weapon storage unit,” she said as she bounced from pedestal to pedestal. “So many different ages... it’s kinda amazing what they had access to. If I lived back then, this would have been my dream.”

“What age do you suppose this one is?” Calypto said as he pointed toward the back. My eyes widened as they followed his hoof to the macabre display of corpses affixed to the wall, bloody, and only barely writhing.

“How did we not see that?” I laughed as I took in the strange mural.

Scapegrace stepped and seemed to examine the corpse. “Well look at that... That's Discord, alright.”

A weird mishmash of reappropriated scrap and body parts helped make the somewhat three dimensional work of art come to life. A horse-headed dragon creature popped out of the wall, and it seemed to trace the edges of the wall as it spectated from above. It seemed to be focused on the bouquet of severed legs that were pushing a grimacing shark-toothed pony up to the sky. The hooves all had shackles on them, as well, while the exalted pony had broken the shackles. There was some creature trying to eat the tail of Discord, it was painted in with blood. Features of the snake-like devourer were depicted in negative and it seemed to burn alive.

There was a lot of craftsmanship.

“Do we have time for this?” I asked Scapegrace as she creeped closer to the image in morbid fascination.

“It depicts the repeat of history. That's Jormungandr and Discord locked in an ouroboros of sorts... and there is some figure being lifted up. A ruler? A liberator? The blood on their face makes me think they aren’t the nice, peaceful sort of leader.” Scapegrace walked along the image. “An ouroboros is a symbol of cycles. Things that repeat. Does that mean this is the raider king being raised up.”

“Are you really trying to find meaning in this?” Calypto growled as he limped across to the mural.

“It's horrifying, but somepony clearly put a lot of...” Scapegrace winced as she walked up to one of the hoof-surfing corpses. The sharp teeth were nailed in. “bleh... love into this.”

“We don't have time for this,” I said as I looked over the artifacts.

“I know we don't have time... it's just...” Scapegrace sighed. “Huh?”

I was too busy to argue. Again and again I circled around. None of them were matching the descriptions of the hammer or the Heart. Was it not here? “I don't see it, help me look. Could you track it down on a computer.”

“It's not going to be on the computer. Starlight was skeptical about being watched. She went to great lengths to make sure the MoM didn't catch her,” Scapegrace said as she continued to look at the murder art on the wall. “Hold up! I think I found something.”

Calypto and I rushed over to her. “Look here.” She pointed to a spot where the blood from the grisly artpiece had dripped down against the wall, finding its way into the crevasses that broke up its surface. It was subtle, but there was some kind of divot disrupting the flow of the blood. It was uneven.

“What exactly is it?” I raised an eyebrow. There were strange shapes and designs all over the painted part of the wall, plain to see now that I was close. “A hatch?”

“It's a spell matrix,” Scapegrace said as she dipped a hoof in the blood and spread it along the wall. “I think the whole room is one.”

As I looked back, the room felt so much bigger than it ever should have.

“Tell us what to do,” Calypto said.

Scapegrace followed the wall, tracing the design with her hoof. We called out to her, but I don't think she could contain herself. She was in her own world. She ran along the floor and morphed her hoof into a pointed blade on it. She hooked it under a latch and flipped it aside.

The walls sparked as magic exhaust emptied from the circle on the floor. My field of view stretched and wavered, giving me a strong vertigo before it tremulously firmed itself as the illusion was peeled away. An ornate altar now peered over the rest of the artifacts. Beside me there had appeared the skeleton of a pony in a pink suit as bright as day. There were three or four more of the skeletons. Scientists, inspectors...it was hard to tell, but I could guess based on the remains of their clothing and on the notion that they probably hadn’t allowed just anyone inside back in the facility’s heyday. It reeked of death and secrets, the nasty sorts of things the old world wanted to hide away.

“Bingo!” Scapegrace grinned as she walked around.

“Was that just sitting there, smack dab in the middle of the room, and we didn't see it?” I asked as we converged at the center of room.

“An illusion and a talisman network for diverting attention,” Scapegrace explained as she climbed up the steps to inspect the twisting spires on the sides of the alter. It had a little rock garden of talismans on the side. She walked towards the steps of the altar when Calypto stopped her.

“Ten Thousand caps says it’s trapped,” he called as he circled around the alter.

Scapegrace grimaced. “I'm not taking that bet.”

“Smart mare.” Calypto grinned.

Concentrating on my senses, I could feel he was right. It’s hard to say why I did, but it was my earth pony intuition. The Mint-als had made me more perceptive than I usually was. “I'm feeling a pressure plate on the inside of the container. I can't really tell for sure, but if you open it, it’s gonna do something fun... I don't know, probably kill ya.”

Scapegrace flipped through the pages of Glimmer’s diary, her eyes darting between paragraphs in a frenzy. “Yeah...mmhmm... Aha!” Scapegrace put a hoof down with excitement on the page and grinned. She began walking around the pedestal, aligning the pieces of the statuettes. “And that...should...” she muttered, and a trapdoor sprung open. The three of us stopped to look at each other, before carefully leaning in. Within was a chest... it had a similar design to the fridge that I carried with me.

Suddenly, the room quaked. A long fissure ripped across the ceiling of the room. “What the hell--” I hesitated as I felt a vindictive atmosphere ooze through the crack. “Scapegrace! We need to--”

A quick and violent cataclysm tore the ceiling asunder. The broken chunks of steel and concrete crashed to the ground, crushing the many of the artifacts beneath. High-pitched arcane howls and blinding bursts of light erupted as the broken artifacts set off a chain reaction, throwing the room into total chaos. Smoke and dust from the debris choked the room. I couldn't see anypony, but I could taste a viscous hatred flooding in. It coated the air and left us sputtering. Damn it. I barely missed getting crushed as I was flung off my hooves, but my head was ringing. Before I could call out for my friends, my body silenced itself instinctively.

“Finally... it’s here. Everything, it all comes down to this!” a cackling voice cut through the billowing dust cloud. Her voice was different now. It carried a bitter gravel, no doubt a sign of the wasteland. She cleared the air with a flap of her broad wings, revealing the distorted white flesh of the alicorn.

“Calico...” I muttered as I ducked behind a fallen pillar. Damn it, why did she have to show up? It was fine, she didn't know we were here... not yet. We could lay low... We wouldn't win a fight. Not here. Not now. Forget Hexerai... we could call this a loss and get away with our lives.

That was what we should have done... but my heart dropped as I saw Calico marching towards Scapegrace.

Damn it, girl! Hide! That was what she was good at, why wasn't she?

“Out of my way!” Calico growled.

As if she didn't hear, Scapegrace trembled as her hooves traced the frame of the box. Scapegrace produced her ring of lock picks and flipped to the most twisted ones among them.

“I have a short fuse, whelp. Do you want to die?” Calico barked.

“Do you want this open?” Scapegrace muttered in brittle defiance as her eyes soaked in the details of the lock. The alicorn tensed as a haze grew around her horn. A tight, certain kill strike, judging by the look in her eyes. “It’s trapped, and you'd break the lock. The runes are designed to reduce a unicorn down to a singularity.”

Calico faltered.

“That's what I thought,” Scapegrace sighed as she fumbled with the lock picks feeling around. Removing the picks, she grit her teeth and molded a new bone slowly... not into a lock pick... but a key. “I've been looking for this for too damn long. I can't lose it to you. I don't care what you do with anything else, but I need the Heart.”

The box, made of foreign clockwork structures reeking of skeptic paranoia, howled as it gaped open, gasping for its first breaths of air in over a century. Inside, there were several talon-like vices, pinning two artifacts into place. Calico seemed to gawk at the twisted bone scepter within, like it whisked away her mind and left her body chasing after. It was a hammer, with a strange equine skull, linked to distorted shaft of various bones of different creatures, all fused together by some color-stealing ichor.

The other item was a large gemstone, almost as big as a pony's head. It was heart-shaped, but looking worse for wear. Chipped and fragmented; divots and holes dotted the surface. Scapegrace basked in the sickly green glow of the crystal heart. So this was the thing that made her act like a madmare.

Calico's eyes gleamed red as she shoved Scapegrace aside. “You're a talented one. Very servile, as a crystal pony would be. I guess I owe you a debt.” Calico floated up the hammer in a cloud of magic dust, twirling it around as it consumed her focus.

Scapegrace picked herself off the ground, barely fazed. Nothing seemed to matter to her now... now that the Heart was right in front of her. She reached a hoof out to grab it, but the Heart slipped away in Calico's spell. Scapegrace paled as she looked up at Calico.

“This has a name...” Calico hummed. The word meandered through the air with sinister venom, “Yes... Crystal Heart... I remember. Treasure of the crystal ponies, but perhaps it's more of a curse... I couldn't give up something that draws such memory from me... maybe I should keep it.” The false princess pondered. “Hmm, I do owe you a favor.” The alicorn's face plunged into a nightmarish grin that made me bolt into action, even before the glow... even before the words: “I'll kill you quickly.”

“Calico!” I charged in without any plan. Plan didn't matter. I just needed to create a diversion. I aimed to tackle through her, but I met a thick invisible barrier. “Hey, Bit--” I didn't even finish taunting before her telekinetic talons wrapped around my neck. I coughed as I fought the grip, watching Calico's visage roast in fury. “Remember m--” The alicorn smashed me against the ground in short-fused anger. I only clung to consciousness enough to register my reflexes, whirling my hooves to break fall.

“You idiotic roach!” Calico growled. She was possessed in a way that made me feel important. Such terrifying yet fulfilling anger... Good. Scapegrace could get out, or so I thought. The Crystal Heart was still tight in the monster's grip. For Scapegrace, there was no escape. “You don't learn lessons, do you?” Calico burst out. “Well, I do... and that's the difference.”

I spat at her eye, vainly. With her shield up, it only reached halfway. She flung me down, again, but I could feel the direction she was throwing me in. I caught myself on my hooves to spite her. Anger made her uncontrollable, but fairly straightforward. Somehow, with just the angle of my resistance, I managed to trick her into throwing me into Scapegrace.

Scapegrace groaned as I blindsided her like a bighorner. I grit my teeth and scowled at the mare. “Get out.”

Scapegrace gave a rebellious grimace.

Damn it.

Calico rose above on a pile of rubble and slashed out with an ethereal blade without hesitation. I couldn't block the entire strike with my shield, as it lapsed across both Scapegrace and I.

Wait! Maybe we could get through this. Scapegrace could absorb magic. That was right.

“Did you get tha-- holy pastel hell...” I trailed off to see Scapegrace shivering in pain, her face and neck carved up with splintering cracks along her coat, blood seeping through the crevasses.

“Too much... can't handle that much.” Scapegrace coughed. Her coat flickered with a faint, sporadic glow as she tried to repair herself.

Calico grabbed both of us and lifted us off the ground by our necks, letting our hooves kick vainly.

The bloodlust in her eyes made me call out. “Leave her out of this! This is between you and--”

“I don't care. You die.” Calico summoned up a small lightning-coiled spear as she grinned.

Suddenly, the spine-raising sound of heavy revolver fire shattered the moment of deathly silence. As if haunted by ghosts, Calico screamed, rebuffing her shield with a wave of force. In the storm of her fear, she cast everything out to the corners of the room: Scapegrace, myself, even the Malleus and the Heart. Alright, Calypto! Calico remained in the center bracing on all fours, gasping for air in a state of panic. She remembered the sounds of the gun. The feeling of bullets piercing flesh resounding in an echo brought with it a resurfacing sense of fear and weakness.

The alicorn shuddered as she spun around, scanning through the thin veil of dust that was kicked up from the impulse of the shield. She cackled as her shield shined a bold red. “Hahahaha, you should have killed me when you had the chance. Where are you?” Calico laughed again as a hunting thrill took over. Bullets ripped out of the cloud, driving the alicorn to tense up, even as the bullets ricocheted harmlessly away. Glancing side to side, she peered into the haze. “There... you've given yourself away... This shield won't break. I learned from last time.”

Calico lashed out with exploding spears of light that kicked up more dust. I had put my goggles on, and put my bandana up to my mouth. One coughing fit would quickly get us added to the macabre wall at the back. I lost track of Gracie, as she continued to chase after that damn heart.

I couldn't worry about that, Calico was closing on Calypto... and he couldn't run. I did the only thing that I could.

I whistled.

When she ignored me, I tossed a rock.

Calico turned about and blindly struck through the dust, with about as much success as you would imagine. Fuck.. now what?

I started to crawl through the cloud to escape, but I slipped and knocked a block of concrete over. The alicorn struck again, this time even closer.

I dove for cover.

“I'll find you.”

Just as she was getting close, Calypto whistled from across the room.

She turned around and launched a chunk of concrete at the wall, knocking up another billowing plume of concrete dust. Every furious move she made clouded up the room, making it easier and easier to blend in.

Bingo!

I pursed my lips and gave my best bloodwing mating call.

It drove Calico nuts. Even so, she caught herself expending too much energy.

“Moooooo~ don't cha know!”

I almost died as Calypto gave what might have been the best or the worst brahmin impression I had ever heard.

But Calico didn't strike... She listened. She flapped her wings and funneled the dust up and above, clearing the room.

A bolt sent Calypto flying back against the wall, his hat clattering to the side as he wailed in agony.

The zebra grimaced, falling down to his side as he gripped his stomach with one hoof and pointed his revolver with the other.

Nestled between an overturned computer and a shattered hieroglyphic tablet, was the Witch's Hammer. Racing over, I snatched it up. Actually grabbing onto it felt disgusting. It felt invasive. It felt cruel. Still, I needed to have it to get her attention. Hopefully, it wouldn't make my legs go numb. “Hey, Sparky!” I yelled out as I threw a rock at Sparky (Calico).

The pebble rebounded, pitifully, against the side of the alicorn’s shield. Calico glared at me.

“Look at what I found just lying around!” I said as wiggled the hammer in the most profane method I could manage.

Three small star bursts ripped craters in the ground around me, overturning the mound of debris I was standing on. I tripped and rolled down the backside of the hill. When I collected myself, I was bloody and my head was ringing.

“Where are your words now?” Calico said as she cast a spell that enveloped my body in a green light. I felt my strength drain from my body. My coat started to wrinkle and my hair started to grey.

I'd never seen anything like this before. I was growing old...

Another red arcane burst sent me rolling back as I groaned, enfeebled by unnatural age. Suddenly, my shoulder began to throb. My skin was pulled tight and it felt like my bones were filled with magma. A malformed head started growing out of my shoulder. It started back at me with the same confusion as myself.

“Come on, where did all your enthusiasm go?” Calico lifted me up with her magic and she scowled. “Lie to me!” She howled as she javelined a spear through my second head.

It splattered blood and brains across the ground and the shocks reeled throughout my body as I flew back to the wall. It came in paralyzing waves that left me shuddering. I could barely breathe. Damn it, this sealed it for me. I wanted to die before I turned fifty. It was hard to think... hard to remember, and all of me was breaking down. Calico took her time strolling over.

Scapegrace groaned as she turned away from the Crystal Heart. She brandished her stolen tommy gun and sprayed bullets harmlessly against Calico's shield until the gun clicked empty. Scapegrace started to tear up. Calico shot a sanguine ray at her, and she began to shrink in size. The regression sent Scapegrace wailing and shivering.

I couldn't keel over and die, not now... Not after ten years ago. I could hardly remember what it was, but even in this cronish state, the body remembered its grudges. I pushed through the pain. I through open my fridge and grabbed one of the three Balefire eggs I had remaining. I called out “Calypto!” as I hurled the egg as hard as I could.

Calypto grinned as Linux's green glow coursed through his stripes and up his body, fixating on the eyes. Zeroing in on the lone egg, the zebra lined up his revolver as he laid on the ground. With locked jaw growl, Calypto's bullet sliced through the air toward the balefire egg...

But it didn't make it...

Calico swiftly extended her shield out to deflect the incoming fire. My heart dropped as I watched the alicorn sweep up the egg with a whirl of her horn. She cannoned the explosive right back towards Calypto, detonating it against the wall just above the zebra.

“No! Calypto!?” I called out. “Calypto!”

There was no response.

It was happening. Hexerai was right. I was watching my friends die. I'll survive but I will abandon them...

What absolute filth.

What was that voice?

I am you and you are me... or at least you were when you were great... What happened to your spine? Don't forget, old wreck, we're the ones who never bow.

I found the voice sickeningly comforting. I didn't have the time or strength to question it, I just needed it to give me strength. I needed some way to deal with this, but we were out of time. What could I do? I had to do something.

When given shackles, we strangle the slaver. Just as we used to.

Even as cryptic as it was, I understood exactly what needed to be done. My quivering hooves grabbed hold of a balefire egg.

“You're a pathetic rat,” Calico said as she stopped in front of me.

“Stay the hell back!” I growled.

“Your bag of tricks has been exhausted. Try to use that bomb on me. It won't work. It won't break through the door. There is no escape,” Calico said.

“This bomb isn't for you.” I dropped the egg to the ground and clapped my metal horseshoe to it. Gripping the Malleus Maleficarum in my hooves, I held the hammer head flush against the twisted ovaloid. “It's for me.”

“What?!”

Hexerai said that I would survive this evening, so let's put that little prophesy to the test.

The plan was simple: if Calico listened to my deal, I could bargain her away and save my friends. If she tries anything funny, I blow myself up. If I died, that would be the worst, but I'd have the peace of mind that Hexerai was full of shit. If she was right, I could save my friends. Screw saving the world, I wanted to protect those two ponies.

“I can't hurt you with this bomb, I know that much... but perhaps I could destroy this precious artifact.”

Calico faltered as she leaned in. The artificial alicorn took one step and I swung the hammer back, ready to strike. “You're a lunatic.” Calico's brow furrowed.

“I'm a business pony,” I grunted in a gravelly, old voice. “Let's make a deal. It's really simple for you, and I think you'll like it a lot.”

“Why should I listen to you?” The alicorn was perplexed. This time I really wasn't a threat to her.

“Because I'm gonna give you everything you want.” I tried to grin, but the fatigue was making it difficult. “I will give you the hammer, no funny business, if you heal my friends and leave us alone.”

Calico's horn began to glow, but as I vigorously swung back the hammer, the shimmering light dispersed.

“You're right, Calico. I'm a rat!” I growled as I spit on the ground. “I've got nothing, but the corner. My desperate tricks are all I have. So, please. Do whatever the hell you like.”

Calico stared at me as she measured the depth of my resolves. It was a heavy silence, but eventually she backed down. “Alright, it is a deal.” Calico reached out a hoof.

I readied the hammer to strike. “Heal them first, bitch. I know you can, you sadistic cunt.”

Calico flapped her wings in indignant frustration, but ultimately, she complied. With a ray of light, one by one she repaired the injuries. My skin became more elastic and stretched back into position, and my muscle and joints fortified to their usual vigor. Scapegrace aged back into usual size, she even fixed her shattered skin. Calypto rose up and was able to walk on all four legs.

Somehow, it managed to work out.

Calico turned to me. “Now, the hammer.”

For once in my life, I didn't really have any trick up my sleeve. It was funny how if a scoundrel was forced to use up their bag of tricks, when everything else is gone, all that is left is an honest pony. I felt weak. I felt vulnerable... but I had no choice. “Alright. Fine.”

It was the moment when I tossed the hammer that it clicked in my head... the reason I felt so off. I lacked leverage. Calico's face dove into a nefarious glee as she took hold of the artifact. Her horn cast the room in a deep red light.

Scapegrace was the one to scream first as fissures of blood cut down her face and neck as the cracks returned on her face. She began to shrink, faster than before, reverting to her previous state.

Calypto fell down to the ground as his leg snapped like a twig. From within his gritting teeth, his body heaved up fountains of blood.

I stared daggers at Calico as my body aged and withered, giving her my thousand years of hatred. “You lying bitch….”

Calico reeled back onto her hind legs as she fell into laughter. “What was the phrase you use?” She pondered as she put a hoof to her chin. “Ah yes... Welcome to the wasteland.”

I had nothing left. I took one of the balefire eggs and charged at the false goddess... but my body was too weak to carry on.

Suddenly, a little rock bounced off of Calico's shield. It was a tiny foal, Scapegrace. She was holding back tears with a stern glare in her eyes. “Meanie!”

Calico grunted. “So you will be the first to die,” Calico said as she spread her wing out wide, casting a shadow over the foal.

Scapegrace sniffled as she wiped away her tears, and grabbed another rock.

Calico scoffed. “Yes, try to strike me down with that. I will wait.”

The bluish magenta foal threw the stone and it hit the shield with an earsplitting “ZZZZrGRNPROING”

The alicorn was knocked off of her hooves as her shield dented from the impact. The walls shook as a heavy pounding force slammed chunk after chunk out of the wall.

Calico got up to see a purple earth pony with countless scars all over his body, with a club over one shoulder, and a long gemstone-infused rifled mounted on a battle saddle hanging over the other. Behind him was a motley crew of raiders.

“CALICO!!” Killjoy roared as he fired round after round from the high-tech Gestalt rifle. Flanked on either side of his rambunctious charge was Midnyte and Marina, all unified in their intentions.

“That isn't even my name...” Calico picked her self off the ground and stretched her wing to the side as magic surged from her eyes and horn. The amulet on her neck seemed to grin.. “To think, you're still alive. I'll have to correct that.”

“I'm gonna rip every limb from your body.”

“Fool. You can't win.” The alicorn fortified her shield as she focused her coalescing spelldust into two blades of blinding arcane energy. The blades arced in from either sides.

“This is for my leg.” Walls of chains appeared out of nowhere, criss-crossing over each other, weaving into a solid, reinforced barrier. I noticed the mare three legged mare beside Tough Cookie, her eyes flooded with light as her horn erupted in intense green fire. If Calypto was alive, he might be regretting it about now. The chains were able to slow the blades down, but their sheer power wasn't enough to keep them at bay.

However, Killjoy didn't seem to be afraid. He stopped his charge just before Calico. One of his comrades kicked a strange bundled mass into his hooves. As the chaotic, air-eviscerating blades of light swung in towards Killjoy, he cast off the cover on the bizarre package and raised it up to Calico's eyes.

It was a severed head. Mutating and distorting into the nightmares we had seen all night. It locked eyes with the alicorn before she could even understand what was going on.

Orange glowing veins lit up across Calico's face, legs, and back, just before they erupted into geysers of blood.

“AAHHGHHHGGHHGHGHYEEEEOOOOW!”

Calico screamed in terror for the second time in her life. She writhed as pain crawled all over her body. Screams replaced themselves with hysterical laughter, as she began trying to patch herself with medicinal spells. “You... ignorant... whelps!! I'll slaughter all of you.”

Marina hunkered down to restrain the insurmountable kickback from her unrelenting firepower, not letting up with the attacks from her revolving miniguns. “Bitch, you gonna get the thorns!” came her battlecry, barely heard through the roar of gunfire

Calico wrenched her body back as she rebuffed her shields. Letting her power surge, she gathered it in her horn. A specter of a serpent formed from Calico's amassed energies.

Killjoy stuck his hoof through the ring at the end of his stone club. He galloped forward as Calico and her serpent cast down a wave of spellfire. With the strength of the whirling earth, the scarred raider spun his heavy club over his head, catching the spellfire along its stony exterior.

Dashing through the conflagration, he whipped the whirling club in a big wind-up, the spellfire clinging to the outline of the weapon as Killjoy arched the strike counterclockwise. For a moment, I saw him coated in a brilliant iridescent aura.

The burning club crashed through Calico's shield and followed through, from low to high, crushing any conceptions of pride or strength in Calico along with bone and tissue. Like a shooting star, the alicorn streaked across the room, colliding with the mural wall. The figure of Discord appeared to be laughing at her.

Calico's head clapped the wall as she crashed. Arcane voltage spiked through her horn, which was now splintered down the center.

As the fissure drove down the horn, I could feel my strength return to me and my skin smooth out. It seemed that the spells were breaking down. Even the ball of fire splitting the sky seemed to evaporate. All that was left was the moon.

The alicorn stumbled on crumbling legs, struggling to balance as her split skull oozed.

Killjoy stepped forward bearing his club along his shoulder.

The alicorn scrambled across the floor, tripping over her own hooves and wings. “No,no,no,no,no. Back...baaacck!” Calico spat, struggling to even form words.

Killjoy glared down at the pathetic excuse for an evolved lifeform. With roiling contempt he backed Calico into a corner. “Don't fuck with my friends.”

Calico panicked, taking to her wings. Killjoy swung for Calico, but a renegade bolt from her shattered horn jerked Calico out of the way of the strike. Feathers scattered through the air as she grasped for higher altitudes even if she lacked the control to not crash into the wall while she did so. It was enough for her to escape out the top while Marina took potshots at the struggling alicorn.

The monster was gone, and I was alive, but it was hard to imagine how. I took a breath and fell to my back as I saw Tough Cookie stepping forward towards me.

“I already know what you're going to say...” I interjected before the raider could form words.

Killjoy looked displeased that Calico got away, but his ire softened as he looked back over the room. Somewhere in his head between surveying the room and taking stock of damages, he found the time to respond to me. “Really?”

I pulled my cheeks down with my hooves, giving myself the killjoy-esque rings under my eyes to give a proper impression. “We aren't friends. Ha!” I picked myself up as I looked away. “You don't need to tell me. I'm not gonna look for friendship in the reflection of revenge.” A grim thought raised my hair on edge as I looked back to my friends... to Calypto... to Scapegrace. “If you’re still looking to kill me, I'd be happy to give you the opportunity, but before you do... could you do me one last favor and help save my friends?”

Killjoy cocked his head to the side as a long smile stretched across his face, but from that a soft laughter poured out of him. “Hahaha, I was going to ask if you are okay...”

What? I balked as my head tried to understand what was going on. “Wait, what do you mean, am I okay?””

“Guess you don't know half as much about the world as you think you do.” Killjoy pulled a strangely shaped multitool out from a bag. With a turn of a dial and the click of a grip, he was shining a little light in my eyes.

“Ack! What the--”

Killjoy held my eye open as he muttered. “Heh... glad you haven't taken anything else since those mint-als...” He shut off the light and tapped my stomach. I nearly had the wind knocked out of me. “Say ‘Aahhhh.’”

“ungg~” I stuck my tongue out at him. My mouth suddenly opened wider as he dug the edges of his hooves into my temples slightly. “Ahhhhhhhhhh!”

Looking me over, he grinned. “Your skull is cracked, you’re sleep deprived, you have quite a few mutations, and I'm seeing a few fractures that I can't remember if I caused... but your body is recovering quickly. Looks like the wasteland’s smiling on you.”

I was healing faster? Something told me that tree had something to do with it. Was it destiny? Whatever it was, it could wait. “Thanks, Doc...” My eyes caught sight of Midnyte hobbling on three legs towards Calypto.

The zebra clung to life with thick, bloody breaths. Trembling in a pool of his own blood, the crusader raised his revolver on an unsteady hoof, but it didn't stop Midnyte from laying by his side.

Killjoy saw this and stepped forward pushing me out of the way.

“Damn it, Killjoy. If you kill him, I will make your life hell.”

“Midnyte told me all about you,” Killjoy said as he stood over Calypto. “Normally, I'd crush a violent bastard like you, because you make me afraid for the ones I love... but I heard you spared my one of my closest friends.” Killjoy threw his bag down next to Calypto. “So, shoot me all you want. I'm saving your damn life, bud.”

My eyes widened at that moment as I saw the face of Killjoy fade away behind smile Tough Cookie. What a big damn softy...

Tough Cookie muttered as he began treating individual wounds with all manner of strange tools. He removed several pieces of shrapnel, pinning blood flow with heavy hooves when a procedure called for it, and with magical serums, he reformed the broken flesh and even bone. It was like watching a miracle worker.

Rendered speechless, it was easy for me hear the shrill cries of Scapegrace from behind a pile of debris/over in the corner of the demolished room. I nearly burst out laughing: she was rolling around on the ground, awkwardly trapped in her own clothing.

“ahhn~ Help meeee!” Scapegrace groaned.

“Sure thing!” I said as I leapt over to her. I reached over to loosen her jacket and shirt, but she rolled away like a caterpillar. “Hey, I'm trying to help.”

Scapegrace's hues didn't change... or maybe they couldn't, all cracked as they were. She writhed as she tried to crawl away.

“I'm trying to help.”

Scapegrace calmed for a moment as I helped unzip and unbutton her clothes, but I could feel her anxiety beneath the surface. I was a weak pony. As I pulled open her shirt to let her free her folded elbows from her sleeves, I snuck a glimpse of her bare skin beneath. Cracked as it was, it was more than I ever deserved, and I felt the sins of the world weigh down on me... but somewhere in those guilty wanderings, I saw a faint patch of dark festering skin, with the color in the middle of it hinging on obsidian. Not like a bleeding wound or a burn, it looked a disease or a tumor, but as soon as it appeared it was shuffled away. “Hey, is something--”

Scapegrace shied away as she tucked her hooves through her sleeves. “It's nothing. I can handle everything from here.”

A raider from before, the one that kicked the head to Killjoy, approached us. He was young and had a PipBuck, one of those old Stable devices, on his leg. He had the number “7” painted on the back of his armor in white paint. “Coach told me to give you this,” the stallion said as he hoofed over a health potion to Scapegrace.

Scapegrace drank a little bit, letting her coat reform. After the initial regeneration, her fur shimmered as she began healing on her own. “Here, I only need a little.”

The raiderball lunatic looked at the potion and winced. “Gross. Hope you don't backwash.” Despite the reaction, it didn't stop him from putting the potion back in the bag. “Whatever.”

Scapegrace stumbled away without me being able to catch her. As she scoured the debris for the Crystal Heart, I decided to join her to find the Maleficarum. It had taken a few minutes, but by the time we collected both, Calypto was stumbling around as he collected what was probably the most important artifact in the room, in his eyes. His hat.

“I'd tell you to go easy on your injuries, but I get the feeling you wouldn't know how,” Killjoy said as he pulled aside his mask and tools and put them inside a bag emblazoned with three stylized skeleton butterflies.

Calypto just turned away from the raider.

“Glad to see you're up on all fours,” I said as I galloped over to Calypto. “Maybe now you can stop bumming me for rides. The hitchhiking thing gotta stop...”

Calypto glared at me with chilling eyes. Something was eating at him inside, stealing away the humor I was used to. He wrapped his hooves in my duster and pulled me close. “Tumbleweed.”

“Yes, mi amigo, my business buddy, ol' pal, ol' friend?”

Calypto's eyes squinted. “Why is there a raider with a pristine m72 MAS Gestalt Rifle?”

Looking at the rifle on Marina's back, I stroked the scruff of my chin. “Oh yeah, back before the necrodoodle sacrifice thing, there were a bunch of Unity alicorns flying around. They had some seriously spiffy tech.”

I flinched when I glanced back to Calypto as he swelled with anger. He huffed and puffed as his bloodshot eyes shuddered with rage. “THERE WAS A STATE OF THE ART M72 JUST LYING AROUND AND YOU DIDN'T EVEN THINK TO TELL ME ABOUT IT?”

I shrugged as I dodged his optic fury. “Oops?”

“We are not friends anymore.” Calypto dropped me to the ground and stormed off in a stampede of jingling spurs.

I caught a breath as I saw the some of the raiders moving blocks of debris, piling them up to form a stairway to the rooftop. Marina was keeping watch on the second floor while Midnyte magically bound and fused stones together. While I watched,Tough Cookie approached me with a weary smile. “So that's your friend.”

“He's fine. He'll be back.”

“You two seem close. What your history?”

“Yeah, we go way back to yesterday at alcoholic tea time.” I smiled as I flicked a hoof, pointing back and forth between Calypto and I. Killjoy shot me a confused look. “That bastard owes me twelve bits,” I said, glancing snidely away from the zebra as I shook my hoof.

Wide-eyed, Killjoy tensed in bewilderment. “No kidding.”

I didn’t really expect him to understand. Afterall, it was something I didn’t entirely understand myself, but Calypto and I were buds, and I knew I just didn’t want to let a friend like that go… not in the tumultuous wastes. It was only a short time, but we clicked.

“Thanks for everything. I owe you one,” I said as combed my brain for the exact thing that I owed him. It was something, and I owed it to him, but what the hell was it?

“Friends don't owe me anything.” Tough Cookie grinned.

While we talked the jingle train worked its way back to us. The zebra sighed, but didn't speak.

“You don't need to thank me. I was paying back a debt of gratitude. Anypony who saves my friends has a place at my dinner table.”

“You didn't have to...” Calypto muttered.

“I wanted to,” Killjoy replied.

“This doesn't mean I'll turn a blind eye to what you are and who you hurt... but thank you.”

Killjoy sighed. “Can we please stop with all the thanking and debt junk? It’s giving me a headache. Do we need to call a meeting or some crap?”

My hoof shot up as my memory caught up to me. “Well, it’s fine if there are no debts, but as you are a freakish horse of medical wizardry, I might have something you might be interested in,” I said as I trotted back to my fridge.

“Oh my gosh, am I speaking a different language? Stop thanking me. I keep explaining it, over and over. This is such a nightmare. What part do you not...” Killjoy trailed off as he saw me pull the severed leg out of the refrigerator. “Is that...?”

The room shook with a thundering crash of a massive chunk of concrete falling from Midnyte's grip as her jaw dropped down two floors.

I cradled the leg in my hooves, much like a cat, stroking it a little bit. “I figured you might be interested in this, but hey, if you don't feel like I owe you anything, maybe I'll keep it.”

Killjoy nearly tackled me to the ground. “Your spine will make accordion noises!” the raider growled.

“You are a very persuasive pony, you know that?” I laughed as I passed him the leg.

That whole gang of raiders seemed to light up with enthusiasm at it. A bunch of ponies cheering and celebrating over a severed leg... somepony might look at something like this and say, “This! This is what raiders look like,” but no, this wasn't anything like raiders. This was friendship. That what friendship looked like. They were genuinely relieved that they might return their friends leg. The wasteland was a crazy place, but seeing that, that might have been the craziest thing of all.

As they cheered on, I put my hoof down. “Hey, listen up!” I shouted. “Closing time, everypony. This place is gonna blow up, end-of-days style. We’ve got to get out of here.”

I looked at Scapegrace and Calypto, and they nodded back to me.

“You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here.”

We got all rounded up and started climbing the paths Midnyte and the rest of the raiders had built. Climbing towards the bright red moon. An eerie laughter echoed through my mind for a moment. I took one look back to the room we should have died in... to the wall with the grizzly mural.

But it wasn't there...

Author's Notes:

Alright, I was a little bit late on presenting this chapter, but there has been a lot of things going on. Joker's Wild is going to be closing down, and that really puts a damper on things. The next two sections will be the last, but these characters are going to be returning in a new story. I've wanted to do original work for a while, and I've found that the FOE community just isn't the sort of place that works best for this tale. I know people wanted to see this epic reach its fruition, but I'd rather give this one up to tell a story I can keep with me for years and years.

Anyway, thank you so much for reading this far into the story, the next two sections will be even more exciting than this one. Its got a really intense climax that will handle things in its own, Joker's Wild way. You won't be disappointed.