Fallout Equestria: Homelands
By Somber
Chapter 20: Connections

“You no good, stupid, piece of crap!” a voice screamed out, echoing wildly over the cherry red of the muddy strip of water that had once, in better days, been a river. Precious perched on the very edge of a broken spur of bridge jutting out over the stinking water. Less than twenty feet separated it from the far side of the span, but it might as well have been twenty miles for their ability to get Whiskey Express across. Precious snatched up stones, furiously throwing them down, one after the last. They didn’t splash so much as slap against the polluted waters with a wet smack before sinking into the muck.

“You know,” Skylord murmured from the shade of the Whiskey Express. “We could just sit and wait. I’m pretty sure eventually she’ll fill the gap with rocks and then we can just roll right over.”

“The noise is making me even thirstier,” Majina whined from under the trailer. “Is it time for our water yet?”

“One more hour,” Charity replied, wilting in the heat, watching Precious fling ever more rubble into the water.

“My teeth hurt,” Scotch muttered. “Why am I so thirsty my teeth hurt? Why is that a thing?” This delay was far from the first. Indeed, it seemed as if the badlands were conspiring against them; they couldn’t travel an hour without finding the road washed out, or a slag heap had collapsed into the roadway, or, increasingly, potholes the size of artillery craters filled with mud and polluted water sitting in the way. That was if they were actually making progress and not getting around by all the twisting dirt roads. She’d hoped that following rail lines would be more reliable, but they ran every which way and were more often than not broken by some crater or wash out.

“If that’s where we are then did we get turned west again? No. That’s south, but where’s the mountain?” Pythia said to herself as she studied the atlas. “You know, it’d be easier to figure this out if I had a drink.”

“One. More. Hour,” Charity repeated. “Drink it now and you’ll be dry for even longer before we can make some more.”

“Are you sure we can’t drink that?” Majina asked, pointing at the vivid red ribbon.

“Not if you don’t mind dying of heavy metal poisoning,” Scotch muttered. “We’ll distill some more tonight when it’s cool.” The Empty had been dry and windy, but it hadn’t had the brutal heat of the badlands. The hills and pits seems to capture the heat and hold it long into the night. The only reliable water they could drink was steam condensed off a pane of glass. It was barely enough to keep them watered after the Whiskey Express took her share. It seemed surreal to be jealous of a steam boiler, but bad water was just as poisonous to a working boiler as it was to a pony.

“Makes me wonder how those settlers made it through here,” Skylord asked, shooting a glance at Pythia.

“They were a lot further west than we were. They skirted between this part and the dragon lands,” the filly replied, still studying the atlas. “We can get south. There’s plenty of futures where we do, even a lot where we’re all alive. I’m just trying to see the choices that get us there safely.” She glowered at the page. “We shouldn’t keep running into rivers like this. They run north to south. We should just cruise right between them down out of the badlands.”

“We’ve been going from one broken bridge to the next,” Skylord mumbled. “Why can’t we just get out of these stupid hills and mines and crap?”

“You want to know?” Pythia lifted the atlas and pointed to a little mark. “That’s Mount Ashra. Three thousand and nine meters tall. Due south of us.”

Scotch blinked and looked south at the broken and jumbled land. “I don’t see it,” she muttered.

“Oh? Well how about the Green Forest of Emerald Delights park, which should be somewhere around here?” Pythia said, jabbing the atlas again then gesturing besides them. Scotch only saw a stack of desiccated stumps.

“I haven’t seen any forests. Just scrub brush,” Majina whined. “Are you saying the atlas is wrong?”

“Not wrong. This came out the fifth year of the war. The mountain and forest are gone,” she said, flipping to the front page and pointing to a glyph. “During the war, this whole area was strip mined, hosed down, blasted, and reprocessed.” She gave a wry little half smile devoid of mirth. “Want some real irony?” She turned and showed them an inset on the page. It showed a broad square of green, with hundreds of blue splotches and lines of lakes and rivers. There were at least twenty glyphs marked ‘shrine’.

“This was a spiritual land?” Scotch asked in shock. They’d been driving through here for almost a month now, zigzagging past the open pits, the rusted mining equipment, the ruined smelters, and the corroded rail cars.

“You didn’t know?” That seemed to surprise Pythia. “I thought it was obvious.” She peered out from the shade of the trailer, then pointed to a pile of white rubble strewn along a hillside about a kilometer away they’d passed an hour ago. “There, I think. Not a lot of marble here. Pretty sure those chunks were… um…” She pored over the atlas. “The Shrine of Ancestral Contemplation.”

“Looks more like the Shrine of Ancestral Constipation,” Skylord sniffed.

“I thought that was slag from a magnesium smelter!” Scotch said, oddly outraged. She’d seen the glyph for magnesium on ruined equipment. ‘Brilliant fire metal’. “How many more have we passed?” She peered around at the waste heaps, as if a dozen more might suddenly pop into view.

“A couple. Most were completely leveled.” Pythia arched a brow. “Why?”

“Well…” Scotch blinked. “They’re important. To the spirits, I mean.”

“If you say so,” Pythia said with a shrug. “If you want, I’ll point out more.” A pensive look emerged on her face. “Anyway, the Empire probably demolished the shrine to get at the ore,” Pythia said as she started awkwardly fanning herself with the book.

“Why on Equus would you build a shine on top of a perfectly good magnesium deposit?” Charity asked, clicking her tongue.

“But that’s the whole point!” Majina countered. “You turn over land to the spirits because it’s valuable, not because it’s worthless. Joko the Digger found a vein of gold on his farm, but rather than dig it up, he dedicated it to a spirit of the earth. Because of that, his whole village prospered.” She narrowed her eyes at Charity’s skeptical glare. “Then, one night, thieves came and stole the gold. The spirit was sickened and the fortunes failed. But the villagers were generous and each brought a gold coin to the shrine so that the spirit was rejuvenated and the village prospered. What does that tell you?”

“That Joko found a way to cash in three times over,” Charity replied. “First by making a shrine everyone depended on, then taking the gold and blaming it on thieves, and then convincing everyone else to pay up. Pretty clever.”

Majina’s mouth worked silently a moment before she shrieked, “No! That is not the moral of the story!”

“Seriously? How do thieves steal a vein of gold, in the ground, with no one getting caught, in one night?” Charity shot back.

Majina bristled a moment. “They were… very good thieves!”

“The point that Majina is failing to make,” Pythia cut in, “is that shrines were located because of their value. Most spirits didn’t contribute to the war, so their shrines were demolished.”

“But why didn’t the tribes try and stop them?” Scotch demanded.

“Gee, I don’t know. Maybe there was a war against the Maiden of the Stars for the survival of the zebra race?” Pythia countered.

“They did object,” Majina interjected. “I mean, the Eschatiks defied the Caesar and were all but branded as traitors. But there’s never been many Eschatiks, ever, while the Imperial Army was strong during the war. And as for the other tribes, what could they do? Follow the Eschatiks?”

“But why didn’t they turn on the Caesar?” Scotch demanded. “These were their spirits, right?”

“Probably because my tribe was the one doing it.” Pythia pointed at the ruins of a train where four stars were arranged in a diamond next to the name ‘Crux Shipping’. “See? That was a company run by the Starkatteri.”

“Your tribe was cursed and evil but the Caesar let you make money?” Charity asked with a skeptical eyebrow arch.

“How much money could you make if you knew the future?” Pythia shot back, silencing the mercenary unicorn. “It was the price for our support. We made him Caesar. He let us get rich. So all of this could be blamed on ‘evil Starkatteri.’ I’m pretty sure that after the war, the Caesar would have just nationalized everything and put our elders to the spear, but fortunately everything blew up, eh?”

“You said the ‘N’ word,” the unicorn said with a shiver, but went on, “I kinda wondered about that. No ‘money’ tribe.”

“The Propoli come close, but even they’re not big on making wealth,” Majina interjected. “They’d rather spend it on building stuff. There was one that made a whole palace out of gold, but it was so unpleasant to live in that he tore it down and gave the lumps of gold to the people.”

“Uh huh. Bet he did his economy wonders with that,” the unicorn countered, not that Majina seemed to follow her point.

They were spared further economic debate by Precious stalking back. Of them all, she was the only one not bothered by the heat. “Did you kill the river?” Pythia asked the snarling dragonfilly.

“I need more rocks,” she growled, walking past them to a pile of scree and collecting a heap. Once they were piled on her back, she returned to the edge of the bridge, hurling them into the water with grunted, semi-intelligible epithets.

“Lay down. You’re just making yourself thirsty,” Scotch said.

Precious glared at them in the shade. “Why are you just sitting there? Why are we just sitting here? We need to get moving or something!”

“We’re baked. You might be heat-proof but we’re not,” Charity said. They’d tried to put a shade on the trailer, but it hadn’t worked well while driving. At the moment, the brown cloth served as passable camouflage, at least. “Soon as we cool off we’ll start moving again.”

“Oh, sure. Where!? We’ve been stuck here forever! We’re almost out of food. We’re drinking steam, and you’re just… just… sitting there!” Precious fumed a moment. “I’m taking charge!” she bellowed, prowling back towards the tractor with little ammunition pile still perched on her back. “You! Find us a way out of here! And you! Get driving!” she said, pointing a claw at Pythia and Scotch.

“Gosh. Find a way out. What an idea. Why haven’t I been doing that these last three weeks?” Pythia stated flatly, sweat dripping off her chin.

“Lay down. You could do with a break too,” Scotch countered.

Precious froze, claw quivering, before letting out a scream of rage, tossing her rocks in the air in sheer frustration. Then one came down soundly atop her head, making her clutch it with a high pitched hiss. It was everything Scotch could do not to laugh. The heat helped. When the moment passed, the dragonfilly glared at them all silently, gathered up her rocks, walked back to the edge of the bridge, and resumed tossing them into the water with far more sullenness than rage.

“That’s some grade A bruised pride,” Skylord muttered. “I agree with her one hundred percent, by the way. We shouldn’t be sitting here. We should go back to one of those smelters or something. Get out of the heat, at least.”

“There’s bugs, robots, and ghouls in those places. They’re all smart enough to stay out of the sun,” Scotch countered. “Can we just move these rivers?”

“Move the rivers?” Pythia blinked. Her face took on a twisted look of sick humor. “Oh. Oh why didn’t I think of that? That’s what I’m doing wrong! They moved the rivers!”

“Huh?”

“During the war. They didn’t just blow up mountains and level forests. They moved the rivers too! See?” She lifted the atlas again. “They mostly flow south towards the sea. I’m betting they made them flow east to west for drainage. That’s why those settlers went west and we’ve been running into busted bridge after busted bridge! That means this map is totally useless! I’m so stupid!” she laughed, then made a little choked hiccupping sound. “Oh, crap. The heat is turning me into a moron,” she whispered in horror.

“Soooo sorry the heat’s dragging you down to our level,” Skylord deadpanned.

“So we’ve been stuck here for weeks because you thought the rivers went north south when they actually go east and west,” Scotch said, and the navigator nodded.

“Rivers are our biggest blocker. I mean, we can go over or around scree, but I never figured we’d run into so much water where it shouldn’t be,” Pythia murmured. “Worse, since they rerouted them, in two centuries the banks have given way, making all these stupid, backed up lakes.” She closed her eyes. “We should have never gone through this way. I just assumed we could go south because I saw futures where we did.”

“Is she gonna say it?” Majina whispered to Charity.

“An imperio says no,” Charity replied. Pythia’s jaw worked as if she were about to throw up. “Don’t say it,” Charity whispered seductively. “Hold onto your smug superiority.” Majina gave Charity an annoyed, flat glare. “What?”

Pythia shot a dire glare at both of them. Then she said, as if passing a particularly painful bowel movement. “I… I screwed up. I totally screwed up.”

“She actually said it,” Majina marveled as Charity sourly relinquished a gold coin.

“I am so disappointed,” Charity muttered. “Rule number four to becoming a bazillionaire is you never admit you’re wrong. You just make being wrong right.”

“And that’s worked for you?” Skylord asked Charity before going on. “So, now that that revelation is past, how do we get out of here?” Scotch was glad he was still trusting her judgement, even as Charity presented her usual skepticism.

Pythia closed her eyes a moment then grabbed a piece of wood and stepped out into the hot sun. Scotch frowned and followed. The heat was like a hammer, and the humidity from the ponds made it feel like she was wrapped in a great, sticky towel. She walked up to Precious on the edge of the broken bridge, tossing it inside. The stick bobbed for a minute, then started to flow west. She nodded once and returned to the Whiskey Express. At least her actions brought a baffled Precious back to the tractor. “We go east. If we go west, eventually we’ll have to cross whatever all these rivers are draining into. We go east and cross any bridges south we can.” She groaned and covered her face. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it. We could have been in Roam weeks ago!”

“It’s okay. There’s… a lot going on,” Scotch said, the black book sitting like a brick in her saddlebags.

“Wait? What’s going on?” Precious asked.

“Pythia… was wrong,” Charity stated.

“No!”

“Admitted it and everything!”

“No! And I missed it!” Precious groaned. “I would have bet an imperio she’d choke before admitting a mistake.”

Normally, Pythia would just ignore the ribbing, or jibe back. Now the filly was silent, hanging her head as her face twisted in frustration. Scotch derailed this foalish humiliation by asking Skylord. “What kind of danger are we looking at, legion wise, if we go east?”

“East will put us close to the Flame Legion,” Skylord said, then shrugged, “But we’re going to have to deal with them sooner or later.”

“Are they bad?” Scotch asked, and got an annoyed look. “Okay, rephrase. Are they Iron Legion bad, Blood Legion bad, Green Legion bad, or Bone Legion bad?”

“Worse than the Bones. Better than the Bloods,” he answered. “They’re the big legion down here in the south. They’ve got hundreds of little settlements under their hoof and they extort whatever they need from them. All for their ‘fight for Roam’.”

“What’s in Roam?”

“Beats me. We didn’t really deal with each other much. Listening to their stories, the whole city’s a nightmare. There’s a megaspell that’s still burning out of control. Monsters. Ghouls made of ash and fire. Balefire bombs. This great, big, giant… thing. It’s horrible. And the only reason it hasn’t spread is the Flame Legion have some sort of crusade against the damned thing. Propaganda to make them sound like they’re noble and shit. Adolpha said they’re just hypocrites who’ll sacrifice others as cannon fodder long before risking their own. That includes us.”

“So how do we deal with them?” Scotch asked.

“Well, my plan was to shoot them and keep doing it till they stop moving and breathing.”

“That’s a horrible plan!” Majina gasped.

“Yeah. Normally I’d use artillery with anti-personnel shells but I left my howitzer back home.” Skylord stared at her flatly. “We’ll keep doing what we’ve been doing. Run and evade. Worked so far.”

“What about other legions?”

“Golds are down here too. Assholes with expensive toys. They operate out of Bastion, to the west. If this New Empire’s hired them, then they’ll be trouble. If we ever get way out to the east we might run into Thorns, but I wouldn’t worry about them. They’re like the Bones.” He paused, counting on his talons. “I’m missing one.”

“Anything else to worry about? Megaspells. Monsters?”

“One or two megaspells, I think. Like I said, we’re way outside my sphere of knowledge,” he admitted. “Aizen is walking around somewhere down here. If we run into it, we’ll get a thrill for sure, right before it crushes us.”

“Right. The walking mountain… thing…” Scotch felt sick to her stomach just thinking about it. “Bad as a horse made of lightning I guess.”

“On the plus side, no razorgrass down here, so you plant chompers should be able to eat. Lots more settlements down here too, I hear. Not a lot of free towns, but still people.”

Majina’s ear twitched. “Hey, what’s that buzzing?”

“Buzzing?” Scotch frowned.

“I hear it too,” Pythia confirmed.

Charity groaned, covering her sweaty face in her hooves. “Please, no more bugs. I am so sick of bugs.”

“That’s not a bug. I think it’s a motor?” Skylord frowned and peered around.

“I think it’s in the air,” Scotch said, listening to the echoing buzz. Now that she was concentrating on it, she could hear it clearly. High and distant. “Is it a flier?”

“This far from the sea?” Scotch then paused and looked at Skylord. “That flying machine the New Empire had?”

“Or something like it.” He nodded once. “We need to get moving.”

“We need to hole up and build up our assets,” Charity countered. “Fix the drape so they can’t see the tractor.”

Scotch looked at Pythia. The zebra screwed up her face, staring off to the side a moment. Then her yellow eyes glanced from one to the next. , “We need to keep calm and stay put. But it couldn’t hurt to get ready to run.”

Charity glowered at Pythia a moment. “If this was some elaborate way to get a drink early by agreeing with me…” she began, before grabbing a canteen and filling a cup with water, fairly shoving it in Pythia’s face, and then filling five more for the rest of them. “Not like we’re going to get a drink if they blow us up.”

Scotch had to admit it was damned fine water.

The buzzing grew louder. “There,” Majina said, pointing a hoof to the west. The flying machine was a large black blob drifting back and forth. “Think they’re looking for us?” Scotch just watched, lips pressed tightly together. The flying machine didn’t seem to move all that fast, but that was only because it was kilometers away.

“They’re going south,” Pythia said with a sigh. “Probably wondering where we disappeared to.”

“Then let’s get going before they backtrack,” Scotch said as they pulled the dirty reddish brown tarp off the tractor and trailer.

As she stoked the boiler, she heard Precious ask sheepishly, “Hey, Charity. Got any more water? All that rock throwing made me kinda thirsty.”

Charity oversaw Precious, Skylord, and Majina painstakingly purifying the contaminated water. It had been three days since they’d turned east, but the terrain appeared little different. Every night, the blistering temperatures dropped down to a shivering chill, and she would fill a large metal bucket over burning coal, wood scraps, or even Precious’s breath on occasion. The steam would rise and hit a large broken piece of glass held by Skylord, forming droplets that gathered and ran down in rivulets till it collected on the broken point and dribbled into clean bottles. They’d already dropped the glass shard once by accident. Scotch didn’t want to know what they’d do if it shattered.

That left Scotch and Pythia to supervise the shrine’s ruins.

Even half demolished, the site was impressive. Twelve columns once rose in a circle, supporting a dome with an oculus in the center. Beneath the hole sat a dry basin filled with dust and sand. A larger structure sat next to the shrine, but someone had all but levelled it to make a tractor parking lot.

“You know those four probably think we’re doing something lewd,” Scotch said with a smile as she examined the bullet holes in the marble. There’d once been a statue under the arch between each column, but all that remained were broken stumps, smashed torsos, and chipped, bullet-pocked faces. Someone had gone out of their way to pulverize their features

“Probably,” Pythia murmured. “Ready?”

Scotch sighed and relaxed her sight and–

Bodies everywhere.

Some ripped open. Some shot. Some smashed beneath the crushed statuary. The parking lot was a field of broken bone and smashed limbs. Had the shamans been inside when they brought it down? The fine white pillars were slick with black ichor, some of it still undulating in the dust.

Beautiful, whispered many voices in her ears.

“Shut up. You’re an evil book. You don’t get an opinion,” Scotch informed it, getting a worried brow arch from her friend, then sighed. “It’s just like all the others. Like they went out of their way to desecrate it.”

“Damn. I was hoping since there was something still standing…” Pythia muttered. “Well, never mind.”

“This is the third shrine you’ve asked me to check in as many days. What are you trying to find out?”

Pythia raised a hoof and ran it over one of the broken statues. She didn’t answer a moment, and sat there, pensive. Finally, she glanced at Scotch, “I just want to know if my tribe were shits that wrecked all this for fun or just for money.”

“Why?”

Pythia sighed, rolling her eyes a little. “I don’t know, that’s why.” She sat, rubbing her leg as she stared at the ruins. “My tribe is evil. I get that. It’s branded on our faces. I just wonder what kind of evil it is.”

“You’re not evil,” Scotch said levelly, trying to fight down her building worry.

Pythia didn’t answer, simply gazing up at the broken oculus overhead.

We can show you.

“Shut up,” Scotch hissed, clenching her eyes shut.

We can show you what she wishes to know. There is bone here. Memory lives in the bones.

“Book talking?” Pythia asked, mouth twisting down.

“Yeah,” Scotch muttered, cutting off her spirit sight and extracting the black book from her saddlebags. “It’s being stupid. Telling me it can show me what happened here. About how memory lives in bones and garbage like that. As if I’d trust anything it’d show me.” She snorted, lifting the horrid tome with one hoof. “Please. As if.”

“You want to do it.”

Scotch clenched the book between her hooves and took a breath, long and deep enough she almost wanted to give in to a coughing fit, before saying, “So hard it hurts.”

“Well, right now it’s showing me futures where you turn into a super necromancer, kill everyone, and re-animate the whole of Zebrinica as your personal undead zombie army,” Pythia drawled.

“Really?” She blinked and stared at it. “You know, if you showed me stuff like that, it’d at least be more entertaining than my friends as corpses.” She let out a dry chuckle, with strained mirth, then bit her lip. Finally she said, near a whisper, as if confessing to a crime, “I really wanna do it, and I really know it’s wrong.” Somewhere, she was sure, Glory was groaning. Daddy would understand, though.

“Well, that’s the thing. Say you agree once. Probably nothing happens. A few days later you use it again. Next month you use it for more. Eventually, it’s your new best friend.” She jabbed a hoof at the cover. “All the crap it’s making you see? I bet you’d stop seeing it as it got more and more hooks into you. A reward for doing what it wants. But once it has enough hooks in you, you’re Ossius. Bad visions are the least of your problems then.”

Scotch said nothing for a time. Then, almost too quiet to hear even in the desolate silence of the badlands at night, “Would you do it?”

“Of course,” Pythia said with a leer. “Exploiting evil things to get what I want? That’s what the Starkatteri are all about! And it’d be a constant fight with me stringing the book along and the book trying to take those strings and make me its puppet. That’s the kind of dark story that’s defined my tribe for eons.” She tapped the cover with a hoof. “But you aren’t me, and you aren’t Starkatteri. You’re one of those rare people that get to decide what they are. So that book is dangerous. Lots of things are. You decided you’d stop doing what was safe and sane when you took a bath with the spirit of a thousand slain zebras back in Greengap. And it worked. But you have to make sure that it’s you making the decision, and if it blows up in your face, that you accept the fault for it. That’s what being an adult is all about. That’s what being a person is all about.”

Scotch nodded, considering the book. A little niggle of suspicion nagged at her. “So why’re you suddenly okay with me doing it at all? Back in Greengap, you were desperate for me to not do anything shamany.”

“And that worked great.” Pythia shook her head. “The first line of defense is ignorance. If you don’t know about it and reject it, it’s harder for the supernatural to get in. You don’t see them; they don’t see you. Anything you do see is a weird thing you just dismiss and move on. It’s why everyone trotting around isn’t constantly bombarded by dark and dangerous spirits. That ignorance, or innocence if you want to be romantic about it, is something that dark things have to erode before they can really get to you,” she said, poking Scotch in the shoulder with a hoof. “Now, dark things can always eat your face, but there’s not much fundamental difference between that and a raider trying to do the same.”

Scotch frowned, annoyance nibbling at her spine. “So why can you tell me about shaman spirit stuff now?”

Pythia’s eyes popped wide and she blurted, “This is not shaman stuff. This is not spirit stuff. I am not talking about shaman stuff because I am not a shaman!” She rolled her eyes towards the ceiling, then winced, bracing herself. A few seconds later she cracked open a single eye to peek around her and relaxed. Then she caught Scotch staring at her in confusion and coughed. “Anyway. Not shaman stuff. This is dark stuff. I can talk about dark stuff. Dark stuff that isn’t shaman stuff. Heck, even Majina could, if she knew about it.”

“Okay. So why now?”

“Because if you aren’t going to keep ignorant about this stuff, then actually knowing what you’re dealing with is the second line. You don’t have a very forgiving learning curve from ignorant to knowledgeable, either. Because while getting your face eaten by dark things is bad, it’s not the worst that can happen to you.” She leaned towards Scotch, her hood casting her face in shadow so only her luminous yellow eyes were visible. “You can lose your friends. Your memories. Your mind. You can even lose… yourself. Dying is foal’s play compared to that.”

Scotch swallowed hard, remembering how much Blackjack had given up half a world away. “I don’t suppose there is a third line of defense too, is there?” The grin she shot at Pythia melted when she didn’t return it.

Pythia didn’t say anything right away, either. She seemed to think it over, glance at her, and think it some more. “Yeah. There is,” she finally announced. “There’s knowing yourself. Who you are. What you are. What you want. No fear. No doubt. Certainty. That’s the last line. If that line falls, then it’ll get to you. It’ll hurt you just like any spirit would. Maybe you’ll survive. Maybe not. Maybe you’ll be maimed. Maybe you get lucky. But knowing yourself, being true to yourself, is your last fall back. Once you lose that, you lose everything. And Scotch?” She reached out and tapped Scotch in the chest. “You do not know yourself.”

“What?!” Scotch snorted, outraged. “Yes I do.”

“Really?” Pythia asked as she stared into her eyes, her face solemn. “Are you a good person?”

“Of course I am!” Scotch Tape snorted, but when Pythia just continued that stare, she swallowed. “I mean, I think I am! Probably. If you asked people. My friends. I try not to hurt people if I can. That’s good, right?” she asked with a shaky smile, brows knitted. “Do you think I’m good?” Pythia remained silent as her smile melted into a horrified mask. “Crap.”

Pythia gave a slow nod and finally cracked a half smile. “It’s okay. We’re all young. All of us are working stuff out. Lots of people don’t know themselves beyond what they do and what they’re told. Knowing yourself takes work. A lifetime of it. And it’s easy to assume you do.” Her smile disappeared and she pointed a hoof at the book. “But that? That wants to make you exactly like it. You saw it, right? Saw what it really is?” Scotch swallowed and nodded. “Never forget that. Because the second you do. The second you let your guard down, is the second you’re vulnerable. And then–” She smacked her hooves together an inch from Scotch’s muzzle, and the pony yelped as she sprawled back on her back, the book falling in a heap besides her. “It’s got you,” Pythia finished grimly. She stared solemnly down at Scotch for a moment, then grinned. “So! Want to play with some dark magic?”

“Why not just tell me not to do it if it’s so dangerous?” Scotch asked as she picked herself up.

“Gee, I wonder...” Pythia remarked, rolling her eyes a little before jabbing a hoof at her. “Telling you not to do something is a guarantee that you’ll do it. Or at least think about it, which is almost as bad. And if I told you no, I bet my hooves that book would start playing the ‘Woooo, what is she hiding? Wooo, what is she keeping from meeeee?!’ game,” she said, eyes wide and waving her hooves before her as she spoke in a spooky voice. Scotch couldn’t help but giggle and Pythia snorted. “Anyway, you’ll do what you do. If it’s playing with dark stuff, I’ll try and help you not to get burned too bad. And if you decide not to, then cool. Not everyone has to play on the dark side.”

Scotch stared at the tome. I can show you everything.

Scotch put it away. “Let me try and do it right first,” she said, giving Pythia a half smile of her own. Pythia nodded and Scotch thought. Her spirit sight wasn’t much help here. The only spirits were utterly unresponsive black lumps. Whether it was some sort of lethargy born of a lack of energy or the black corruption of their nature, they didn’t react.

The stupid book, Shamanism for Idiots, said being a shaman was all about connections. She stared at the rubble. “Memory is in the bone,” she murmured walking from the ruins out into the switching yard. “Memory is in the bone…” she repeated. The book had told her that, but there was an echo of truth to it as well. She stared at her hoof and slowly dragged her foot through the packed gravel, stirring up dust. “Bones… stones… bones… stones…” she repeated, trying to put the two together. If only she was a unicorn and not a stupid ea– She froze. Earth.

“Stones are the bones of the earth. Memory is in the bone,” she murmured, then immediately dug into her saddlebags and pulled out the Propoli mask with its wrench. Better than a meal on her face… right? Except it felt… wrong. Tools were used to break the earth. To take things from it. A tool mask wouldn’t be suitable, would it? She stared at it a minute, and then put it away.

“Do you have any water?” Scotch asked, licking her lips.

“Yeah,” Pythia murmured, reaching into her saddlebags and extracting half a bottle of distilled water. “Thirsty? I don’t blame you.”

“I’m parched,” Scotch said, her lips and tongue dry.

Then she poured it on the ground.

Had Charity been present, Scotch was certain she’d be throttling Scotch right now. But as the water spilled into the earth, the black globs roused. They moved like tar, not acting just yet, but watching. They made their temples there because it was precious. Majina’s words. Water was precious to her right now, and she’d just given it to the earth. Water plus dirt equaled mud. Mud plus face equaled mask. Pythia watched her silently, her own face impassive but with the tiniest smile.

The ground seemed to hum as if it’d just been electrically charged. It wasn’t enough to have the mud mask though. She needed something. Something to focus it. Something to address. She scanned the train yard, then spotted it.

A rock.

It really wasn’t all that different from the crushed rock around her, save that it was bigger, rounder. About the size of her head. She heaved it up and carried it over to the middle of the yard. Then she took what little mud remained and put two daubs on it, and smeared a horizontal line beneath it. A face. She knelt before it and closed her eyes, the mud cooling on her skin. Then she opened them again.

The rock stared back at her. The mud daub eyes had become sunken holes, the mouth a crevice. A faint golden light seemed to emanate from it as she watched it. “H-hello,” Scotch said, falteringly, as the stone face stared up at her.

It simply gave her a little nod. Well, it was earth. Dirt. Stone. Rock. Whatever. None of that bespoke anything ‘talky’ to her. “I am Scotch Tape. My friend here has a question about this place. I was hoping you could help her,” she said. The rock arched a stony brow, then looked at Pythia and immediately scowled. “She’s not a bad Starkatteri! She just wants to know if her tribe… she wants to know what happened here. To the shrine.”

“You’re going to get us stuck here for a thousand years if this place has been here that long,” Pythia warned.

“Oh. Right!” Scotch blinked. ‘What happened here’ could mean ‘everything’. “Show us everything involving her and her tribe and the destruction of this shrine.”

The rock closed its eyes and she fought not to lick her dry lips. Then it opened its flat mouth. “A price.”

“A price?” Scotch repeated, and glanced at Pythia who immediately shook her head.

“I’m not carrying that thing around for eternity or whatever a rock could want, thank you very much,” Pythia said as she crossed her hooves.

Scotch considered. “How about if we take you somewhere new?” Scotch asked with a bright smile. “Rocks must not get around. When was the last time you took a nice trip?”

“Two hundred thousand years ago, when the great ice tore me from my mountain and pushed me here. Oh, and there was being split and broken up for gravel. That was interesting too,” the stone said in a deadpan that would do Skylord proud.

“I’ll find you somewhere nice. Perhaps a field, or maybe beneath a tree. People who pass by will see you there and go ‘what a strange rock. I wonder how it got there.’ and you’ll be a wonder.” Scotch actually couldn’t guarantee that last bit, but it sounded good.

The rock screwed up its simple face. “Mmm… or be split by tree roots or buried in the soil, or used to prop up a broken wagon. Still, it will not be here. That is different. Rocks take time becoming different, you know. Abrupt change is not in our nature.” Finally it gave a little roll that might have been a nod. “Very well. I will show you what I happened here, and you will take me somewhere new.”

Scotch stretched out a hoof, “Agreed!” The rock arched a stony brow, as it lacked any limbs to extend, so she had to shuffle forward a touch it.

Then the earth started shaking. Scotch staggered on her hooves, and Pythia fell completely as the pulverized stone lifted up into a low ridge. It took her a moment to realize that it was the foundation of a large rectangular building. Round pillars popped up like mushrooms in clumps of four around their hooves, rising no higher than knee height. The topography altered as well, the flat sinking and rising, creating a winding path before the building. Three more round structures popped out on each corner, and Scotch identified them as cardinal points.

“What is this? What did you do?” Pythia gasped.

“You didn’t see it coming?”

“I told you, all I’m seeing in the future is stupid death. Like, tripping and breaking your neck death. It’s annoying.” Pythia huffed, then thrust a hoof dramatically at Scotch. “Now this! What did you do?”

“I don’t know!” Scotch replied, gesturing at the little knee high walls and knobs that surrounded them.

“This is why you shouldn’t be a shaman!” she said as dodged the little pillars popping out of the ground.

“You were telling me I should try to use the dumb book!”

“Dark magic is easy to deal with. It’s handling poison. I don’t know what this is!”

“What I saw,” Rocky answered.

Scotch thought about that a moment. How did things look like from the perspective of the ground itself? The ground could only ‘see’ things in contact with it. It didn’t have eyes after all. “I think those are the foundations of the building. Those are legs. Those must be... trees?” she said as she gestured to large, single disks.

Pythia took a deep breath, stepping aside as the various leg pillars dropped into the earth, and rose again. “Okay... so that must be walking...” She glanced at Rocky then at Scotch. “You understand I’m going to be self-conscious about everything I do while in contact with dirt from now on, right?”

“Wise,” Rocky rumbled.

“Wait? Did you hear them too?” Scotch asked.

“You asked me to show, not tell,” Rocky rumbled.

Urrgh. “Fine. So we have a bunch of zebra walking around,” Scotch said as she watched the little pillars popping up around their knees. “No. Not walking. Running. Chaotic... but they’re not running away.”

Pythia studied the patterns. “Preparation, maybe?” she asked, standing on one of the foundation walls to avoid footsteps from poking her.

Suddenly the legs rushed out the building and assembled themselves into two rows. From behind them, two columns of footsteps approached. “They’re receiving visitors,” she said as she stared. “Can you make them more distinct?” she asked Rocky.

“No,” the rock replied.

“This is why I hate dirt spirits so much,” Pythia muttered.

“Hey, watch it. Rocky’s helping. Not his fault I wasn’t specific in my request,” Scotch huffed. “Why don’t you ask the stars?”

“Not a shaman,” she repeated, eyes flat.

Scotch rolled hers. "That's getting really old, Pythia."

“Watch,” Rocky rumbled.

The zebra standing before the temple suddenly bent knee, and heads appeared in the dirt. Then the rocks rose from the earth, but rather than stop at knees, they continued to rise, piling up until they formed a large stallion. “Whoa!” Scotch asked. “Why can we see all of him?”

“I show what I saw,” Rocky answered.

“Who is he?” Scotch asked as he approached the temple. The rocks fit together perfectly, outlining every muscle and sinew.

“Not a Starkatteri,” Pythia murmured. “No way we get bowed to like that.”

Other zebras were fully formed too. One on the huge one’s left appeared to be a mare, only the stones shimmered with heat and were blackened with soot. On the opposite side of the huge zebra was a smaller stallion, but only just. A fourth one appeared to be like gravel mixed with hot tar. His rocks jutted from his hide in a quill like pointiness. “Why do the rocks see these four and just the hoofprints of everyone else?” Pythia asked as she walked around the three. She looked over at Rocky. “Let me guess: you just do.”

“Yes,” Rocky replied, getting a snort from Pythia. “They are as she is,” he added, getting a look of surprise as Pythia saw Rocky look at Scotch.

“You mean they’re spirit touched too?” Scotch asked.

It gave a noncommittal grunt, “One speaks for fire, but is also touched as well.”

More spirit touched people. Now Scotch was definitely glad that she’d done this. Had being spirit touched made them more visible to the earth? Now she really wished she had sound. The mouth moved, but the voices were all drawn out and distorted. She tried to record them, in the hopes that somehow she’d hear what they were saying.

“What’s going on?” Pythia asked, watching the soldiers’ footsteps spread out around the shrine. “Oh no!” she muttered.

The spikey stallion disappeared, flashing into the ground only to pop up at the door to the temple. Instantly the profiles of zebras appeared in the dirt as the spikey stallion moved like an avalanche through them. Some tried to flee, but were shoved back by the soldiers. Scotch ducked for cover as the stone zebra ran through some of the rail cars, knocking them aside as if they were nothing. She glanced at Rocky with new respect.

Then smoking pile of rock approached the shrine and swept their hoof before it. The stone foundation instantly blackened too, shimmering in the heat like an oven. The large one in charge said something, then turned on heel. The spikey stallion and smoldering zebra followed him, as did the hoofprint soldiers. All that remained behind were the profiles of zebras where they had fallen.

“So the Starkatteri didn’t do this,” Pythia muttered. “I mean... I just thought that we did everything bad,” she said as they looked at the train yard. “I guess all this got built... after?” The shrine’s foundations and the bodies sunk back into the ground.

Scotch trotted up to her and put a hoof around her shoulders. “See? Your tribe isn’t the baddest of the bad.” Then she regarded the now empty flat before them. The ‘rearrangement’ had left the tracks and cars even more scattered about. “Do you think that was the Caesar? That huge stallion?”

“Maybe,” Pythia replied with a twist of her lips. “But why would the Caesar personally want to burn this place down? Didn’t he have better things to do with his time?”

“Well, either way, I’m thirsty. Let’s get back and–” Scotch said as she turned to the little shrine she’d made for Rocky.

One stone zebra remained. The oozy, tarry one stood right behind her... not where she’d last left it too. “Uh... Rocky? What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” it replied.

“Crap,” Scotch said as she backed away from it. The gravel peeled wide in a grin, exposing tar stained equine teeth within. “Crap!” she shouted as she whirled to run to Rocky.

It rose out of the ground before her as if it were emerging from a pool of water. “You!” it rumbled like a rock crusher. “You! You! You!” it repeated, advancing on her slowly step by step. “You taunt me! Torment me! Ridicule me with your every breath!”

“What the hay are you talking about?”

“Oh yes. First you were going to Iron Town. But you weren’t going to Irontown. Then on the Old Road to Bastion. Very clever. Running to your enemies for help! But now here you are. Taunting me with your location, again!”

Pythia, quietly, heaved Rocky on her back and ran in the direction of the Whiskey Express. The gravel golem turned, oily tar dripping around one empty eye socket. “I should crush your friend while you watch!”

Oh, that wasn’t happening! She grabbed a chunk of rebar in her mouth and swung it for all she was worth against the creature’s back legs. Scotch was fairly sure she broke a tooth as the bar vibrated right out of her mouth, but it had the desired effect. The golem returned its attention to her. “You’re right. You need to die!”

“Who the hay are you?” If she could get it talking, maybe she could buy time. Even learn something. The golem tilted a head and thrust a hoof into the ground. A moment later, an impact against her sternum sent her flying into the hair, landing with a thud on the roof of an old flatcar, coughing and clutching her chest.

“Who am I? I am annoyed. I am vexed! I tire of hunting for you. You keep changing course on me, Scotch! Why don’t you just stay put and die?” the golem screamed, stomping two hooves into earth. The impact against the underside of the flatcar lifted it up, rolling her right off the ground. She scrambled to her hooves, bobbling away, glad that Pythia had thought to grab Rocky. At the very least she’d probably move him somewhere new, even if that somewhere was the bottom of a river.

Right now she had to run, but running was the last thing she was up to. Between that blow to her chest and her censured lungs, she could barely breathe. She clambered onto flatcars, trying to keep ahead of the golem as it knocked over train cars behind her. Every breath crackled as she coughed. As strong and tough as it was, though, the golem wasn’t particularly fast, shuffling its feet along the ground and pausing to knock over impediments in its way. It must have required some connection to the earth, so Scotch located the biggest hunk of metal she could find. The locomotive wasn’t much more than a knob of rust, but it was heavy. Scotch clambered on top of the firebox and collapsed, coughing and struggling for breath. She felt like an iron band was tightening around her barrel.

The golem shuffled up, tearing up track as it moved, and slammed the locomotive hard enough to make it sway and dent the boiler, but not knock it over. “What is...your name?” Scotch asked between wheezing gasps. Oh this was going to be a bad attack. She needed her lungwort tea. If she could get it talking, she could wait for Pythia.

“You don’t know? You keep touching me and you don’t know? Are you saying all of this is all... an accident?” the golem rumbled, its oozing eye sockets narrowing. They widened in realization. “You don’t know!” Stony hooves smashed into the train over and over again as the golem’s mouth opened wide, revealing the skull within. “Oh how rich! The irony!”

“Look, I don’t know who you are. And unless you tell me how to make you stop attacking me, I don’t care,” she wheezed, splaying her limbs wide to keep from being tossed off as the Golem prowled around the train. “Go away.”

“Oh no. It’s taking all my effort to keep this connection at this distance, but now that I have you here, I am going to kill you once and for all. It’s no less than you deserve, for what you did.”

“Oh, for the love of...” Scotch muttered, rolling her eyes in annoyance. “I never did anything to you! To this New Empire. To Riptide. To anypony! What is your flipping problem?” Her outrage was halted by another fit of hacking.

“You should have died on the moon with all the rest! They die. The Maiden returns alone. The Maiden slays the Eater of Souls, and he takes her with him. But you– You! Came! Back!” the monster screamed, thrashing the side of the firebox.

“Maiden. You mean Blackjack?” Scotch frowned. She didn’t like thinking about the moon. She made herself not think about it. Her daddy died there. Rampage was stuck there. That was all she needed to remember. Everything else, especially on the trip back, she didn’t want to remember. It’d happened and she’d put it all behind her, like a bad dream that she’d never quite shake. “Blackjack’s gone. If she did something to you, blame her!”

The golem stopped thrashing. Instead, it just glared at her. “You must die. Your every step undoes more and more of my hard work. For the sake of the world, you must perish!”

“Well, not dying no matter how convenient it would be for you, and you can’t come up here.” She rolled onto her back, coughing as she did, to stare at the luminous moon, and rubbed her aching chest, wheezing. “So go away.”

“Oh, I’m not done yet,” the golem rumbled, plunging its hooves into the ground beside the locomotive. Suddenly the metal started to vibrate and Scotch jerked up in alarm. The compact rock was uncompacting, roiling like an angry sea as it piled up and was pushed aside. Slowly the rear of the locomotive began to sink, creeping centimeter by centimeter into the flat. Eruptions of rock tossed stones aside as the golem brought her to it. “I don’t care if using this much energy puts me out for weeks. I have you now. I finally have you, and this time I’m going to kill you!”

And seeing herself sinking towards the golem, she had a hard time disagreeing.

Then a pockety-wheeze filled the air as the Whiskey Express raced into view around a row of boxcars. Majina held a lantern aloft on a pole, waving it and screaming “Here! Come get us, monster!”

“Shall I kill your friends in your stead? You really are like Blackjack,” the golem taunted as it stepped out of the roiled earth and in front of the tractor. Precious tried to speed past, but it almost negligently reached out with a hoof and hooked the back of the trailer. The whole tractor skidded to a stop.

Then Pythia rose in the back and brought Rocky down on its hoof. The stones of the limb popped and turned to sand, and the bones and ichor stretched, and then the tarry strands snapped, leaving a bony stump. “We’ll come around!” Charity shouted as they pulled around in front of the locomotive.

The golem was waiting for them. It’d sunk down into the ripped open ground and popped up in front of the tractor. Precious swerved just in time to miss it, pulling across the switching yard and fishtailing wildly. She managed to avoid smashing into an overturned flatcar but smashed a rusty utility shed to pieces. Then the golem plunged its hooves into the ground and once more the earth began to churn and pop as more and more of the locomotive sank backwards into the earth. Scotch was forced to clamber up onto the front of the train rather than on top to keep away from the roiling ground. Her burning chest had abated a bit, but not enough for her to go swimming through churning rock!

There was only one thing she could think to do. She dug out the black book. “How you I defeat it?” she asked, and then opened the page.

A blank page.

She turned to another and another, all blank. “Oh, come on! You really want that thing to get you? Or Pythia. You know she’s smarter than me! She’ll know all your tricks before you do them. Now help me! I won’t threaten to pee on you again. Or wipe my butt with your pages. Or use you to start a fire.” Nothing. “Please!”

What would a super evil book want? Not money. It would want promises. Promises for her to do things for it. To do things to her friends. And then she’d either have to do bad things, or break those promises, which would lead to censure. Either she’d end up broken in body, or possessed like Ossius.

Like Ossius...

She’d beaten the book and severed its connection to Ossius. This thing had talked about her making a connection to it. If she beat the book with a spirit, maybe she could beat this thing the same way. But she didn’t have a spirit, and given what looking at the book with her spirit sight did, she didn’t dare look for– “Oh, I’m such an idiot!” she said as she stood. The Whiskey Express was pocketying closer, but there was a big gap between her and them. “Pythia!” she yelled, waving a hoof at her friends. “I need Rocky!”

Majina drove the Whiskey Express back on the opposite side of the locomotive. Precious clutched Rocky in her claws as Majina came to a halt, tongue hanging out the side of her mouth. Then, with a great over-head heave, she winged the bowling ball sized rock straight at Scotch. This is a bad idea, she realized as she spread her hooves wide and caught the stone with her chest. The blow knocked the wind right out of her, and it was all she could do to not drop him or fall off herself.

“Booyah! Three points!” Precious said. “Go run over that rock, ‘Jina!”

“I’m telling you. Two grenades! Get it to eat them! No more monster!” Skylord shouted back as they drove off.

Scotch could only wheeze a moment as she looked down into the face. “It’s... bad.” Rocky looked back. “That’s not how rock should be, is it?” Rocky continued to stare back at her. “Please, stop it.”

Rocky closed his eyes and the front of the locomotive disappeared. Immediately the vibrating and humming stones rushed up around her hooves. Scotch curled up, clutching Rocky close to her chest as the sand, gravel, and roadbed rose around her. “Yes!” the golem hissed in delight. “And once you’re gone, I’ll make a snack of your little friend there.”

The earth crawled over her shoulders. “Please,” she begged. “Stop it.”

Then the ground closed over her head. Grit scratched at her clenched eyes. All she could do was hold her breath and hope as the weight pressed in on all sides.

Then she heard, almost begrudgingly, “Fine.”

And the vibration increased.

It increased, growing and growing as something deep moved, shifted, and released. She could feel the waves passing through her as the ground shook. Suddenly the earth pulled apart, the ground and grit tumbling off her as the foundations pulled apart in a crevasse. She found herself sitting atop a vertical locomotive that swayed wildly. On one side of the crevasse sat her friends, watching with their mouths agape, and on the other stood the golem, its mouth hanging open.

The shaking stilled, rocks and pebbles clattering down into the rent that now crossed the entire switching yard. Scotch shook herself, snorting and coughing out grit that she carefully didn’t inhale. Then she looked down at the golem. It recovered from its shock. “Well. That was futi–”

A massive block of stone crushed it flat.

The remains of the oculus slowly crumbled, tumbling down like the rest of the ruin into the crevasse, burying the golem beneath the solid stone pillars. One struck the uplifted locomotive, which groaned and leaned over. It’s fall was slowed by the rear, still stuck in the ground, and fell on the side adjacent to her friends. Scotch rolled off the front of the tractor before her friends. She coughed dust at them, then offered a feeble, “Ta-dah.”

A week later and they seemed no more out of the Badlands than before. Though they hadn’t been stopped by any more rivers and lakes, the topography became steeper and more treacherous. Whole mountains appeared scraped in half, the exposed rock streaked yellow and red in oxides. They’d encountered warehouses filled with massive piles of rusted metal. Glyphs on tags marked them for manufacturing centers that likely no longer existed. Fire resistant shoes and coats hung on pegs and in bins, while lunch pails resided in refrigerators. What had happened to the occupants? Had they all died from an attack? Evacuated without taking their personal possessions with them? Scotch ran her hoof over the pails as if touching their owners through an expanse of two centuries.

Of course, her friends were more interested in looting them for drinks. Fortunately, amid petrified sandwiches and stale bags of dried vegetables they found cans of ‘Spirit Leaf Green Tea’. While warm, they were still potable after a good shake or two. The minor traces of radiation were concerning, but no worse than a bottle of Sparkle-Cola. They rested in the relative shade of the warehouse interior, parked amid the scattered rod stock.

“Is it just me, or is this the exact same font as Sparkle-Cola?” Charity asked as she narrowed her gaze at the bottle.

“You’re crazy. That would mean ponies selling things to zebras in the middle of the war. Who’d be that hard up for coin?” Skylord countered.

Scotch gave the pair a tired smile. “If half of what Blackjack’s told me is true, I wouldn’t be surprised.” Scotch sipped at her bottle. It’d been more than a year. Maybe she was crazy, but the ‘tea’ really did taste an awful lot like Sparkle-Cola.

“Hey, think there’s any radio out here?” Majina asked as she practiced her balance on a scrap metal beam. Scotch had to admit, walking on hind legs on a metal rail was quite the feat. Majina even did a forward roll onto her forehooves before coming back up on her hind legs. Scotch couldn’t help but clap her hooves for her.

“Maybe. Be nice if we could pick up news from Roam. Even a little music would be nice,” Pythia responded between updating the atlas with the winding route they’d taken. After her mistake, the filly wasn’t taking any chances with getting lost again.

Scotch turned on her radio and started searching, turning the knob and watching the numbers whirl. Suddenly sound waves began to ripple as a strange series of blips and scratches filled the air. “What kind of music is that?” Skylord asked.

“It’s an encrypted frequency,” Scotch said as she turned her eyes out the large door to the warehouse. “Think it’s the people hunting me?”

“Hunting us,” Pythia corrected. “And wouldn’t surprise me.”

Scotch resumed twisting the knob. They picked up what sounded like two scavengers warning each other about Fire Legion patrols before cutting off. Another channel that was deep brass and drums. Not bad, but the static ruined the melody. She was just about to turn it off when her PipBuck jumped to a frequency and stuck. She frowned as she twisted the knob. Was it broken? A few thumps didn’t fix it. Suddenly rapid music of guitars and drums erupted from the speaker so abruptly that she reflexively turned it down a moment before it picked back up. There was some sort of rattling noise and a mare singing in a dialect of Zebra that Scotch could barely follow.

I woke up in my summer home, right outside the city of Roam
It was fine, I’m telling you, till my life threw a horse shoe!
Caesar says and zebras do!
Gotta go fight with zebra fu!
Nevermind, I prefer fondue.
Caesar says and zebras do!

A horn sounded one day when we were all going out to play.
Caesar said jump into the fray then he turned and ran away!
I don’t know why we’re in this stew!
Caesar says and zebras do!
I feel like I’m gonna spew!
Caesar says and zebras do.

Here we stand on the battle line waiting for the killin’ time!
Caesar says with no reason or rhyme everything’s gonna be just fine!
Caesar says and the zebras do!
Take our guns and go pew pew!
Have to fight till this war is through!
Caesar says and zebras do!
Even if he’s full of poo!
Caesar says and zebras do!

The fast paced song and then the gruff voice of Dr. Z emerged from her PipBuck, “I’m on? Oh! Okay.” A clearing throat. “Ohhhh yeah. Caesar says and zebras do. Glad we’re done with that shit. Well. Suppose you can probably swap in general but it just doesn’t roll off the tongue.”

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d heard him, and smiled as she listened. “Anyway,” he went on, “since we’re on the subject of generals. Turns out that the Green Menace herself killed General Ossius in the Big Empty–”

A choking sound rose over the steam engine, and Scotch realized it was from herself. Green Menace? Blackjack got called Security. Littlepip got called Lightbringer. Why’d she have to be the ‘Green Menace’?

“Bone Legion’s generalship passed to one Lieutenant Marrow. I know, not the one most of us would have expected, but they’re the Bones. But it looks like she’s taking the legion in a whole new direction. That’s right. It seems like the legion’s actually doing some work for once. So if you’re looking to get north or south, and you don’t want to deal with Bastion’s shit... and let’s be honest, ain’t nobody got enough deal for that much shit... then you can pay your way across the Empty and even pick up some salt for your trouble.”

“Heh! Free advertising!” Charity cackled, rubbing her hooves together.

“But it looks like the Boney Lonelies aren’t the only ones in a shake-up. Sanguinus’s gone all in against the Irons. You know, I used to joke that the Bloods had more soldiers than bullets, but it looks like the Red Reaper is trying to prove me right. My heart goes out to all you poor bastards in the north who are getting pulled into this. But guess what hasn’t changed! No no, guess! That’s right. Rice River’s still divided with two armies just glaring at each other. Either these armies need to get off the pot and do something or they need to get their asses south to Irontown!”

Scotch glanced over at Skylord, who stared out at the wasteland without comment.

“But hey, are you an up and coming wanna be warlord? Do you want to command thousands of drug addicts looking for their next fix? Well then send your resume to the Thorn Legion! They’ve got an army just sitting around with nothing to do right in the middle of Sand Legion territory. It seems their officers have got a nasty case of lead poisoning. That’s right. Everyone who’s in charge seems to be getting a bullet through the noggin. But if you think you’re up to the job, contact the Thorn Legion right away. And invest in a really thick helmet.”

“It doesn’t sound the same,” Scotch muttered. Maybe it’d been so long since the last time she’d seen Doctor Z, but the tone was off. “How does he even broadcast all the way out here, in the middle of nowhere? Even DJ Pon3 had needed the broadcast towers of the MASEBS. So how did Doctor Z reach out in the middle of the Badlands with barely a scratch to his voice? “Is it the same person?”

“Probably not. Doctor Z pops up every now and then, but then someone else comes along. How he knows what he knows is a mystery, Green Menace,” Majina said with a giggle.

“Why am I the Green Menace?” Scotch asked as Doctor Z broke into some haranguing news about the local ‘politicians’ in Freetown that made little sense to her. “Call me...” she paused and then said dramatically, “The Lone Wanderer!”

“You’re not Lone. We’re not wandering, we’re lost. And you’re green. And think about everything you come across. I bet this New Empire thinks you’re a menace,” Majina offered.

“I should have the right to pick my own nickname,” Scotch pouted.

“So I’ve had listeners wondering–just who is the Green Menace? How a pony from Equestria winds up causing so much mayhem? How she leads an assault on Carnico’s production facility? How she evades the deadliest pirate in the ocean? How she makes a mockery of those suits in Bastion?” Doctor Z went on in full deep drama mode.

“Wait? Bastion? I’ve never even been to Bastion!” Scotch blurted. “He’s making shit up about me!” Definitely not the Doctor Z she remembered!

“Hush! I wanna hear this!” Majina countered with a grin.

“Deep in the heart of Equestria was a military facility known as Stable 99. It’s a well-established fact that the Stables were really just secret government test beds for radical, illegal, morally depraved studies to further the war effort. Well, we’ve come to learn that Stable 99 was the home for a special military project: EC-1101. Cybernetic war machines. That right! The merging of flesh and metal. One of their experiments, code named Blackjack, escaped the confines of the base, slaying thousands with poison gas and balefire bombs, before ultimately perishing at the hooves of the Glorious Legate Vitiosus in the pony lands.

“But what few realize is that not just the weapon escaped. That’s right, folks. I have incontrovertible documents that the Green Menace is actually the mad Equestrian scientist behind the creation of the Blackjack weapon! She looks like a filly due to botched experimentation, but she’s more than two hundred years old. And now she’s prowling the Badlands as she seeks with her mercenary army of ponies, zebras, griffons, and dragon pony hybrids to seek out new test subjects! What dire magical spells is their unicorn mage concocting at this very moment?! What depravities is her zebra shaman, a Starkatteri agent of the foes beyond, plotting as we speak?! Right now, her dragonpony minion pilots them through the Badlands on their steam tractor of death, prowling for victims for her mad experim–”

A loud bang cut his tirade short. “What the hay is wrong with you! I’m broadcasting here! Green light!”

“What are you thinking? ‘Green Menace?’”

“That’s what it says on the screen!”

“She’s the ‘Wandering Pony,’ dipshit. Is his mic cut?”

“It says ‘Green Menace.’ Right there! Didn’t you write it?”

“Cut his mic! Go to music!” a stallion bellowed.

“Hey! I don’t interrupt you when it’s your turn!” the first broadcaster blurted.

“Is it off?” the second stallion asked and a moment later blurted. “You idiot! She’s less than five kilometers away! The old Stallion’s been watching her all month. We’re supposed to be broadcasting out of a remote. Who scheduled a local broadcast with her so close!? Find out who scripted that so I can take their stripes and wait till she leaves!” A moment later. “Why is that mic light on? Pull the plug! Pull it–” And the broadcast went dead. A sporty jingle started to play.

“Problems in Z TV land,” Skylord chuckled.

“Stop! Stop!” Scotch shouted to Precious. The Whiskey Express skidded to a halt. Scotch scampered out and climbed up the highest pile of scree. Being in the Badlands was a lucky bet, but how could they know that it was Precious driving? Inside five kilometers? She scanned the debris around them. Something was off. She glanced at Rocky in the trailer and tried to relax, breathing deeply. That broadcast had been way too weird to just be a coincidence. She shifted her gaze again, this time a little more wary for black gooey things that might want to kill her.

The terrain was just as spiritually devoid as before. With the exception of the Whiskey Express and Rocky she couldn’t see anything odd. Black gunk of corrupted spirits. She glanced at her PipBuck and then reached into her saddle bags. Now was definitely the time for Xeres’s mask. She pulled it over her face and looked again. “Spirit of electrons... where are you?” she whispered.

“Did she say ‘Spirit of erections?’ Really?” Precious asked, getting three sharp ‘shhs!’ and one chuckle.

A golden equine face on the screen of her PipBuck, fuzzy and indistinct, gave her a little wink. She stared at a tiny golden filament that seemed to flow into the device on her hoof. Carefully she reached out with her other hoof and caught the gossamer like thread. Instantly her ears filled with a staticky buzz.

“–kay? What’s she doing now?” a stallion asked.

“I got no idea. They stopped soon as we finished translating and now she just standing there with a shaman mask on. Does she think she’s a shaman? Can ponies do that?” Scotch slowly turned her head, listening to the electric buzz grow and fall as if adjusting antennas. “Now she’s doing something with her head. Her friends are just watching her.” A long pause. “Think we wake up the old stallion?”

“I don’t know. That was a hell of a glitch. It hasn’t done that in months. What’s she doing now?”

“She’s just sitting there. Now she’s pointing out her hoof computer and waving it around. Wait. Now she’s pointing it at us.” A moment and then the stallion muttered in a horrified voice, “Wait. Can she hear us?”

“She can’t hear us.”

“I swear she can hear us.” A long, horrified silence began.

“She can’t hear us. We’re not broadcasting,” the first muttered, his voice dropping.

“She can fucking hear us.”

“Shut up. Just shut up. There’s no way she can hear us. All the mics are off.” Another pause with low breathing, then, “Right?”

The other didn’t answer. “Pony... stomp twice if you can hear us,” the zebra whispered.

Scotched raised her hoof up and brought it down twice. Fillyish screams burst from the far side of the connection.

Opening her eyes, she stared at a rocky hill barely hid behind a ridge of scree whose top had been sliced right off. A lone radio antenna poked out into the sky, the rust red blending in with all the other scrap metal and rust red hills. “Gotcha.”

“Oh shit,” the stallion muttered.

Scotch walked back to the Whiskey Express and her baffled friends and explained what she’d heard. They pulled on to a narrow road that twisted up towards the flat topped mountain. With sheer sides it seemed impassable. “Rocky? Is there a tunnel?” she asked the stone. It simply nodded, but that was good enough for her. They left the trailer/tractor and fanned out, and Scotch knew something was up.

There were yellow bars on her PipBuck.

“Listen up!” Scotch bellowed. “I am Scotch Tape, and I want to have a word with whoever’s in charge of broadcasting!” She walked around the cliff with Rocky on her back, in case the spirit decided to be a little more forthcoming. “Now you can try and keep me out, but I think you know that I get into all kinds of stuff other people don’t want me to. So open the door and wake up the old stallion, because the Green Menace has arrived!”

She listened to her voice echo off the stones. “Wow,” Precious muttered. “That was actually kinda badass.”

“I am sick of things jerking me around,” Scotch replied. “Now open up!”

There was a pop and grind, and a section of the wall slowly recessed into the rock face. A moment later a grizzled old stallion whose stripes had faded to white stepped into view. He glittered with all sorts of zebra data gadgets and disks hanging off his bony hide. A mask with a television screen covering his eyes completed the ensemble. The screen flashed and a zebra with blue stripes appeared. “Heyyy-ey- ey- ey!” it stuttered. “We meet again my fine fair-air-air-air fill–” A buzz and the blue zebra disappeared.

“Doctor Z, I presume?” Scotch replied.

The old zebra pulled off the mask. He had a worn, wrinkly visage. “Doctor Xandros really, but Z rhymes better,” he said as four more stallions and mares emerged from the tunnel. Only one of them was armed with a rifle. Doctor Xandros chewed some gum thoughtfully. “So you’re her. The cursed pony. And of course you show up right on my doorstep. ‘Cause the spirits just have to be royal dicks sometimes.” He turned and jerked his head. “What do you want?”

“Mad scientist? Botched experiment? Army of ponies and griffons and... Who named me the Green Menace? Seriously? How about ‘The Traveller’? or ‘The Ambassador of Friendship’? Seriously!” Scotch spluttered. Doctor Xandros just stared at her thoughtfully. “Are you going to answer? Let us in?”

“Not sure. You might not like the name, but I’ve kept track of you since you arrived in Rice River. You fixed a Carnico Talisman, invoked a Carnie ceremony, evaded the Blood Legion twice, and killed the leader of the Bone Legion. Forgive me if I’m scared to fucking death of you. In fact, I’d be tickled pink if you turned around, got back in your tractor, and got on your way. I can’t help but think that just talking to you is going to get us all killed. Or worse.”

Scotch considered. “Maybe it’s a good reason the spirits brought us together?”

He snorted. “Things the spirits think are good ain’t things most of us think of as good.”

“Sir. The longer we all just stand here, the more chance we have of getting spotted,” one of the younger stallions said. She recognized him as the ‘Green Menace’ speaker. He seemed to be avoiding meeting her eyes.

Doctor Xandros snorted again, twisting his lips sourly. Finally he threw his hooves into the air. “Fine! Just... fine! Try not to get your curse all over everything. Knowing how bad you’re touched, I knew it was a matter of time. I should just make things simple and die right now and spare myself the horribly ironic death of giving you the time of day.” He pursed his lips and scowled. Then the mask he’d set aside let out a squeal of electronic feedback that had them all press hooves to ears. Doctor Xandros grit his teeth as he endured it for half a minute, then shouted, “Okay! Fine! Fine! You win, Z! You win!” The feedback cut out immediately. Giving Scotch a sour look, he shoved the mask back on his head, the apparel slightly askew. “Come on. Get inside. I can’t wait for our sudden and tragic slaughter by your enemies.” Then he turned and marched back through the hole.

“He’s got Propoli stripes, but he talks like a Zencori,” Majina commented. His followers went through, and then the Whiskey Express followed after.

They passed a pair of hydraulic lifts that managed the door, and then began to spiral down into the earth. Scotch began wincing as the Whiskey Express’s brakes began to grind. Definitely needed to give him some good and tender maintenance. Overhead, periodically hanging lights illuminated the rough-hewn walls. Then they reached the largest door that Scotch had ever seen. It dwarfed even the Stable-Tec portals, hanging like an immense slab of steel on a pivot larger than the steam tractor. On its front was a single four pointed star with eight rays extending out from all directions.

“It’s a Star Legion base,” Skylord breathed.

“You got a whole legion?” Charity asked Pythia, earning a flat glare of annoyance.

“Who are they? Is this going to be trouble?” Scotch asked.

“Hardly. Star Legion are deader than the Bones. They used to have balefire bombs coming out their asses, but that was generations ago. The other legions stomped them into the dirt hard; the last time Irons and Bloods worked together on anything. You have to work to find Star Legion now,” he said as they drove through the portal into a parking area with two other Propoli style steam wagons.

“We got a tip and moved in,” Doctor Xandros said as he pointed at an empty bay. “Luckily, most of the Stars here died of some disease ages back.”

“Disease?” Scotch felt a fear twist in her guts. “What kind of disease?”

“Don’t know. Wasn’t really interested in biology,” the old zebra said. “Was more focused on getting the reactor and hydroponics going.” Scotch remained stuck on the Whiskey Express. “We burned all the bodies,” he added, noting her consternation.

She swallowed and pulled herself from the seat. It hadn’t been an easy month when Blackjack left. How the Overmare got sick. Then the security ponies locked up Gin Rummy and freed the Overmare. Then one by one, others were getting sick too. Finally Rivets had isolated people in the supply and maintenance sections, certain that eventually they’d get hungry and give in.

Instead, they’d started eating ponies.

“You okay?” Precious asked, giving Scotch’s flank a nudge with her own. Scotch jerked at the contact.

“Come on. I’ll give you the tour. Then we’ll figure out how to get you the hell out of here without your curse wiping us all out,” Doctor Xandros said, walking away through a passage. Scotch steeled herself and followed. Solid concrete walls surrounded them, their surface glossy in that ‘reinforced, industrial hardness’ quality. Only every third light in the roof was lit, making the passage barely navigable.

“What was this place?” Majina asked, looking at the stenciling on the walls. “Balefire bomb silo?”

“Nope. Good guess. This is the Star Legion’s southern balefire control center, or SLSBCC. ‘Southern Star’ for short. Powered by a special reactor, fortified against most conceivable pony megaspells, and fitted with both reinforced land line connections and broadcasting capability,” He said as he walked along. “No balefire bombs anymore, though.”

They entered a massive domed chamber with an aperture thicker than Scotch was tall. The doors had recessed into the walls of a shaft rising up above them. Filling the dome was a multitude of dishes and broadcast equipment, the bowls pointing up towards the sky. The entire air hummed ever so slightly and she could taste the ozone on her tongue. “This is our local broadcast. Reaches everywhere from Roam to Bastion, but we’re wired into more than two dozen camouflaged broadcast locations.”

“Like the MASEBS?” Scotch said, then elaborated, “That’s the Ministry of Arcane Science–”

“Emergency Broadcast System. Yeah, we know about it,” Doctor Xandros said. “Pretty sure this was a rip-off of the same idea, only ours was solely for the military, and solely under the control of the Star Legion. When the other legions decided not to put up with the Star Legion’s demands, they shut all these down. We’ve been working for twenty years to reconnect as much as we can. Maybe even patch into the pony network, it they’re compatible.”

“You’ve been sitting on the greatest military asset of the Empire and using it to host a television and radio show?” Skylord demanded.

“Gee, you’re right. Maybe we should give it to the Blood Legion and make them really capable of coordinating their attacks. Or I bet the Gold Legion would pay us a ton for it,” he replied sarcastically. “You’re not the only legion that’d want to get their claws on this place.”

“Point taken,” Skylord grudgingly admitted.

“Plus, if Bastion knew this facility existed, they’d be all over the Badlands like ants looking for it. We keep them confused by broadcasting from different locations. I think the current theory is that we’ve got an airship.” He poked the mask’s monitor. “Unfortunately I think someone wanted to meet you.”

The staticky stallion’s head flickered into view, blew a raspberry, and disappeared in a crackle.

“Who... what is he?” Precious asked, her eyes narrowed in unease as she pulled her head back.

“The burden of my life,” Doctor Xandros said as he led them to a pair of heavy doors. ‘Launch Command’ was stenciled on them, and they hissed open.

Within lay a temple to data. Scotch couldn’t begin to count the number of monitors covering the walls, demonstrating strolling lines of numbers and glyphs in an endless rain of green digits and symbols. Video images came to life, played a few seconds of video clips, and then winked out only to be replaced again. Maps with icons and slowly moving glyphs dominated some of the steadier images. All around the cavernous space, a dozen zebras trotted around taking notes or studying screens. The three biggest screens were all several times larger than her!

Someone had set out fake electrical candles, and she counted no less than three shrines with terminal components laid out before them. A carving of a dead chicken swayed over a bank of processors. Posters with messages like ‘Garbage in, garbage out’ lined the parts of walls not showing screen, wire, or processor. The sweltering heat was barely undercut by tubes of coolant gurgling around the immense chamber.

And in the middle stood a blue monolith. A great tube filled with fluid that immediately made Scotch’s neck itch. Countless wires and cables, some as big as her hoof, snaked out and into the machinery. “May I introduce you,” the old zebra said with a note of finality, “to Doctor Xiegfried, member of the Terrific Twelve.”

Instantly, every monitor in the room became part of a mosaic that projected an immense, glowing zebra face. The condensation on the tube evaporated with a hiss of released coolant, and within was a desiccated equine form. The gray and white hide was pierced by hundreds, if not thousands, of wires and leads that studded the form almost like a coat of insulated strands. At the top was a skull frozen in a permanent scream, a mane of connections sprouting from the split open skull.

The eyes twitched to stare at Scotch, and the immense computer display looked down at her like a colossal blue glowing god.

Scotch took one long look, and her eyes rolled back as darkness claimed her.

Author's Notes:

Well, six months, but I've had longer delays. Finally just bit the bullet and put it out. Hope it's okay.

Big thanks to Kkat for creating Foe, and huge thanks to Bronode, Icyshake, heartshine, and Rachel. Hopefully the next chapter will be out sooner...

Should say more, but I'm about to pass out.