The sun had set and we weren’t quite back to New Appleloosa.

“So do you guys just want to set up a camp here and stay out for the night?” I was a slight bit tired and extremely confused. After going into that weird world I was questioning everything I knew.

“I suppose we could. Did you bring anything to keep warm?” I was starting to reconsider who was in charge of this group Silver had really taken charge when it came to our operations.

“I brought a few blankets and some stuff to build a fire. That should be enough to survive the night even if it is a little cold.” I pulled out a few sleeping bags and some wood.

“Well I would like to stay out and watch the stars for a while.” Onyx looked up as he talked.

I looked to the sky. The stars were out and shining down upon us. I had been out of the stable for around one month and not once had I just sat down and stared at the sky. The sight was breathtaking. I just sat and stared out into the universe thinking how beautiful it was.

“Are you going to give us the stuff to set up a camp or not?” I levitated the stuff to Silver and continued to stare at the stars. “Thanks. Do you guys mind helping me set up camp so we don’t freeze to death? Midnight is a little out of commission at the moment.” Silver started the fire with his wing.

Camp was set up around me and all the while I just stared at the stars. A thought came to me. I knew that other creatures existed in the universe and some of them could come to this world if they wanted to. Any species that could travel between worlds had the technology to take over our post apocalyptic society. Fear controlled my mind and my body froze. Harmony had seen this happen and trotted over to me.

“Hey Midnight you need to snap out of it.” She laid a hoof on my shoulder. “What is it that’s got you frozen?” She dragged me to my hooves.

I snapped out of it. “Just had a disturbing thought about the universe we live in.”

“Aliens?” This question was simple yet terrifying.

“Yeah.” I kept my eyes to the stars.

“Don’t worry even if they could travel here we don’t have anything they want. We can’t leave this planet. Therefore if they can get here through space we have nothing they want. Do you feel better now?” She kissed my forehead.

Truthfully I didn’t feel too much better about this but I pretended I did. “Yeah.” I yawned. “Let’s go to bed. I’m kind of tired.” I trotted over to the blanket Harmony had set down near the campfire for us.

It was really warm next to the fire and I wasn’t sure I would need this blanket to keep warm. Harmony crawled underneath the blanket and beckoned me to do the same. I crawled under and was happy that the fire was there.

“The ground is freezing. The campfire makes it mostly better though.” I shivered a bit.

“Not to mention you’ve got me to cuddle up to.” Harmony wrapped herself around me.

“Oh so it’s me who cuddles up to you. I thought it was the other way around.” I stayed curled up next to her.

“Usually is but I figure I can repay the favor today.” She nuzzled my neck.

“Seriously did we not talk about this today?” Onyx was on the other side of the fire.

“We did Onyx but I told you to shut up. I’m going to show my love for this mare whenever I want.” I opened my eyes and returned to star gazing.

He tossed a rock in my general direction. “Just go to bed.”

“Fine.” I stayed up for about another hour staring into the sky. I then drifted off to sleep.

We were back to New Appleloosa in an hour or so after we woke up. We made our way to Spitfire’s office.

“I expected you all to be back last night. What kept you?” Spitfire had two hooves up on her desk.

“We decided to camp outside of town and watch the stars.” Nopony had been answering so I decided to answer.

“You sat outside and watched the stars. You realize you could have been killed right?” Spitfire dropped her hooves back to the floor.

“I suppose we probably could have been but I’m pretty sure Silver didn’t sleep last night.” I tossed a glance his way.

“Well Silver were you watching over them?” Spitfire was right up in his face.

“Yes I was. I don’t have an easy time sleeping in places I don’t know. I can sleep there if I really try but usually I just stay up and watch out for anything that might be trying to kill me.” He pushed her away.

“You are all lucky that Silver was there to watch over you. Anything could have been out there just waiting to pounce on you. Anyways I have tasked strike teams to pick up the slack since you all haven’t been attacking the camps surrounding us. We do have a few camps we want you to take down.” She stopped.

“We’re listening.” I was more sarcastic than I had wanted to be.

“I was just realizing that Silver hasn’t replaced his throwing knives yet. You might need a few of those to survive these camps we want you to take on. They are somewhat similar to that last camp you secured. A few of them are more well defended so you might need some heavier weapons.” She spun back towards her desk.

I presented the .50 caliber I had bought. “I think I’ve got big guns covered.” I was really cocky about that statement.

“That might work to take down the heavily armored guards. How many bullets do you have for it?” Spitfire glanced back at me.

I counted in my head. “I have five shots for it.”

“Well don’t miss if you have that few. Hold on.” She turned around and pulled a painting down to reveal a safe. She pulled out a few boxes of bullets and a revolver. “Here's a box of bullets for that .50 you’ve got there.” She hoofed me over the box.

“And what about that revolver?” I slid the bullets into my saddlebag after loading the magazine.

“That revolver is a special weapon. It shoots magically enhanced bullets. It was one of the only things that I was able to bring with me here from the other world.” She hoofed me the gun.

“You’re letting me have this?” I held the gun in front of me.

“You’re going to have to work for it but after a while yeah I’ll let you have the gun. For now you’ve got about fifteen shots for that .50 and two cylinders worth for that revolver. Use them only when you need to do so. Ammo for those things costs a fortune.” She shut the safe and put the painting back up.

“That’s an understatement. Is that all?” I slid the revolver into a holster.

“Yes. Dismissed.” Spitfire waved us off.

Silver saluted her and I had a strange feeling like I should as well. I didn’t and we walked out of the office. I looked at my pipbuck map. To see the camps she had marked.

“Well it looks like we have four more camps to take over.” I flipped over to a note on my pipbuck. “She wants this done by the end of the week.” I put my leg back down.

“She wants us to have all of these secured in two days?” Silver was really pissed.

“Silver. I have something for you.” Spitfire had opened the door again.

“What is it Spitfire?” Silver looked at her.

“A few blades for your wing. I did say you would need them to survive. Almost forget them.” She hoofed him a package.

He took out a couple of the feather like blades. “These look like the ones I usually make. How did you make these?” He slid the blades into spots in his wing.

“One of the blades struck a wall and didn’t disintegrate. So I had the best smiths in town reverse engineer that blade so they could make more. Cost me a fortune to get those made so don’t use them up too quickly.” She stood waiting.

“Understood. Any other mission objective I should be aware of?” Silver put his wing back down.

“Nothing else soldier. Dismissed.” They both saluted.

I waited until Spitfire had left before asking my question. “Do you always have to salute her? She seems to be just a normal mare here in this world.” We continued downstairs.

“Even if we are in this world and not the world I was trained in I’m still a soldier and she is my superior officer. I have to salute her. It’s been hardwired into my brain to do so.” Silver rolled his shoulders.

I nodded and we walked outside. I checked the map on my pipbuck to see where the camps she wanted us to take out were. They were out farther than the other camps were but they covered easily twice the area.

“Do you think an aerial attack would work?” I had stopped when I saw Silver standing in front of me staring into the distance. “Silver are you there?” I shook him a few times.

“I’m here. What did you need?” Silver was distracted by something.

“Do you think we’ll be able to attack these next camps from the air?” I stepped away from him.

“They might have some anti-air capabilities but if they don’t an aerial assault would be best. Have a sniper cover from a distance while the others sneak in and kill off those they can before everything goes to shit.” He stopped. “But that’s just speculation. I have to see the camp first before I decided the plan of attack.”

“We should get going if we want to reach one of these camps before noon. Unless you’ve got a quicker way to get us there.” I started towards the gate.

“Why don’t you just teleport us there?” Silver brought his eyes back down to look at us.

“Well Silver.” I hesitated and started whispering. “I’m not that good with magic.” I looked down to the ground.

“What was that I didn’t quite hear you?” Silver put a hoof to his ear.

“I said I’m not great with magic. I haven’t had time to practice new magic since I left the stable and inside they don’t teach you much magic. I learned levitation and a translation spell that’s it.” I kept my eyes pinned to the ground.

“What species’ language did you learn to translate?” Silver seemed genuinely curios.

“It should work for talking with most sentient species. Any that have a language that is vocal I should be able to translate back to equestrian. The translations might be crude but they usually convey enough meaning that you should be able to understand.” I finally brought my eyes to meet his.

“Well that could be useful one day. I think they have a couple of chariots here that we can use.” He yelled to Spitfire. “Hey Spitfire do you have a few chariots we could use?”

Spitfire called back. “Yeah. They are on the roof so you pegasi will need to get them. Have the others meet you outside the gates. It’s easier to land out there and not hit something.”

“Thanks.” No further response came from Spitfire. “Now then we have transportation so that should speed this up a bit. Let’s go.”

And we were off.

We had been looking the first camp over for an hour or so.

“So you think that you can fly over the camp without being shredded to bits?” I was setting my rifle up.

Silver had been studying the camp intensely. “I might be able to make one pass over the camp before they start to shoot at me. If you cover the other four while I make my pass over they might not notice them getting close to the wall. You’ll just have to pick off those trying to use those turrets.” Silver pointed to a myriad of turrets along the walls.

“And you’re telling me this is one of the less fortified camps.” I counter five or more turrets.

“Yeah this is the camp that is the least fortified. The last one we need to take out has turrets twice that size and more ponies guarding the walls.” Silver put his hoof back down and looked over his weapons.

“And you know this how?” I levitated my .44 down next to my rifle.

“I’ve had a few ponies scout them out for us. They have been giving me good information. Now are we ready to do this?” Silver levitated a revolver back into his saddlebags.

I flicked on my microphone. “Harmony can you hear me?”

She nodded before turning on her own microphone. “Loud and clear.”

Aurora flicked into reality. “Now remember you two this drains the power from your suits. Use too much of that power too quickly and you’ll be reduced to a crawl when trying to move.”

I turned off my microphone. “Yeah Aurora we know. We just need these to communicate when absolutely necessary.” I laid down next to my rifle.

“Good because I run off of this suit of yours. I need enough power to keep some of these systems running.” I was a bit surprised by that but wasn’t able to protest as she slipped away from reality.

“Let’s do this. We have three more camps better armed than this one to take out after all.” Silver was hovering in the air.

“Alright. Everypony get to work.” I pulled my rifle to my shoulder.

Silver made his pass over the camp.

Silver’s POV

The camp was a hundred feet or so below me. I channeled my inner rage and threw a few fireballs down at the camp. I dived down towards the ground and prepared to throw one of my knives.

A few ponies were pointing and shouting. I caught the last little bit as I got close to the camp. “Shoot that bastard down.”

I tossed a blade at the mare who had just been talking. She saw the blade coming a second before it her square between her eyes. She burst into flame and fell to the ground. She had been dead before the fire overtook.

“You’re going to regret that you piece of shit.” A stallion had jumped onto a large turret and was spinning it up.

I had a few seconds before that gun tore me to shreds. I channeled my mana and ripped his skull out. I faltered in the air for a second before regaining my strength.

A group of ponies were charging me. I hurled myself into the air as I hurled a fireball to the ground. The fire splashed against the ground and scattered to the ponies who had been charging me. Most got away without a singed hair. The unlucky few who had been next to the explosion were engulfed in fire.

“Holy shit. Don’t just stand there put them out.” A stallion galloped forward.

I was still not used to the sound ponies made when they were being burned alive. I had burnt so many ponies to death over the years that I had learned to ignore it, but every time I burned somepony I heard their screams as they tried in vain to put themselves out.

I knew that if all this did one day become a society where nopony had to kill anypony I would need some serious counselling to get over this.

I didn’t have time to think as somepony else was spinning up the turret. I was sure we’d get paid extra if that thing stayed intact. As a last attempt to kill the gunner without hurting the turret I pulled out the one gun I had. The 9mm was nothing to admire but it got the job done. A few shots later and the turret had only been hit once. I really needed to train with guns if I survived this.

I shot off into the distance avoiding gunfire as I flew. A few bullets grazed me but I continued flying ignoring the pain. I stopped just outside the wall and dropped to the ground.

Midnight’s POV

The turret had whirred to life a few times and I saw Silver disappear. I was almost certain that he had gotten hit a few times. I was worried but I knew he would survive. During his distraction the rest of the group had gotten up to the wall. They were all huddled close together.

I flicked on my mic. “Hey Harmony what’s going on?”

It was a few seconds before she responded. “We are preparing to breach the wall. I swear if we didn’t regulate Demo he would probably just blow this place up.” I heard a small thud in the background.

“Planting the charge now. Prepare to enter the camp.” Demo stepped away from the wall.

I watched as a small portion of the wall exploded sending debris into the camp. From my spot on the ground I could see over the wall a little bit. I started taking shots at ponies inside the camp. I couldn’t take out more than a few before nopony else entered my sights. I stood up and started galloping towards the camp.

The hole in the wall was just large enough for a fully grown stallion to walk through. Demo had a way with explosives that literally blew the minds of ponies. I trotted through the opening.

My friends were ducked behind cover a few yards into the camp. A few of the raiders caught on to my presence. I started firing taking a few of them down before I was forced behind cover.

“Well that wasn’t the heroic rescue I was hoping for.” Onyx was reloading his pistol.

“Shut up Onyx. I’m here now and we need to get out of this before they kill us or worse.” I peeked over the wall. A few bullets whizzed by and I ducked back down. “Any Ideas?”

“Take this.” Demo tossed me a metallic thing.

“What is this?” I rotated the strange device around.

“That is a grenade. It is an explosive device.” Demo took ahold of his gun and took a few potshots.

“Ok. Cool. But how do I use it?” I was still rotating the grenade around.

Onyx rolled his eyes. “You pull the pin and throw the rest of it towards the enemy. Now could you please kill them before they kill us?” Onyx took a few potshots of his own.

I pulled the pin and tossed the grenade over my hiding place. A few seconds later it exploded sending shrapnel everywhere.

A few bits and pieces of ponies flew over the wall and landed in front of me. I was slightly sick at the thought of what might lay beyond this wall. Onyx was saying something but I couldn’t really hear him. The blast had deafened me for a few seconds. My hearing started to come back to me.

“Equestria to Midnight. Are you there?” Onyx waved his hoof at me.

I turned to him. “I’m here just trying to imagine what the other side of this cover looks like.” I sat there waiting for the ringing to subside.

“Not pretty but you got the job done. I would have had Demo use those but he just won’t touch the things after his last experience with them.” Onyx peeked over the cover.

“Understandable. I don’t like them since they deafen me.” I put a hoof to my left ear.

“Yeah they do have that effect like all other explosives. Now we need to get moving before they swarm us again.” A fireball struck one of the buildings behind me.

“Well sounds like Silver is going to need some help.” I gestured with my head. “Let’s go our friend needs us.” I rolled out from behind cover.

After I stopped rolling I was staring down a stallion clad in a suit of power armor. He had no guns on his side so I thought I was safe. He lifted up one of his hooves and slammed it into my chest. I have no idea how far back I flew but after he hit me I was airborne for at least two seconds. I skidded to a stop outside of the wall.

Aurora’s voice filled my head. “Administering health potion. Hang in there.” The world started to come back into focus.

“What the buck just happened to me?” I had a large pain in my chest.

“That stallion has a power hoof.” Aurora pulled up a hologram database of weapons.

“What is that?” I pushed myself onto my hooves.

Aurora rummaged through the database before stopping on a weapon. “It’s a gauntlet strapped onto a pony's leg that can be used to administer damaging often lethal hits with very little sound.” I tried walking. “Stop. You need to wait a few seconds for the healing potion to have full effect. You’re lucky that blow would have killed you had you not been wearing this armor.”

I waited a few seconds and trotted forward as fast as I could. One of my guns had fallen out of my saddlebags while I was in the air. It was the revolver Spitfire had given me. I picked it up and spun the cylinder.

“Midnight are you ok?” Harmony’s voice swam in my head.

“I’m fine Harmony I just got the wind knocked out of me.” I slowed down for a few steps.

Harmony’s voice came into full focus. “Good. Can you hurry back and take care of this guy. He has almost killed me twice now.” Her voice disappeared.

In that moment my speed tripled and I galloped through the hole and at the stallion in armor. I was almost up to him as he almost landed a punch on Onyx. I jumped into the air and landed on his back.

“What the buck?” He spun his head towards me.

“Remember me you bastard.” I pulled the trigger firing a bullet into his skull. He froze for a second before falling to the ground.

“Don’t get up or I will kill you slowly.” I stood up and kicked his corpse. I looked down to his power hoof. “And I’m taking this.” I pulled the device of his leg and inspected it. I slipped it onto my front right hoof.

“Stealing from the dead huh?” Silver had landed beside me.

I spun around a threw my front right hoof at him. The power hoof activated and unleashed a devastating hit upon a shield that stood in my way. “Don’t sneak up on me damnit.” I pulled my hoof back.

“Sorry I was just making sure you were all okay. Nice piece of equipment you’ve got there.” He gestured at the power hoof.

“Do you have a problem with stealing from the dead?” I put my hoof on the ground.

“No I figured you might have a problem with it. Maybe you do but you were just forgetting about because somepony threatened Harmony.” Silver looked back to one of his wings.

I hadn’t stolen anything from those who I had killed until now. The more I thought about it the more I was disgusted by what I had just done. I was okay with killing to protect my friends but I wasn’t sure whether or not to steal from the dead.

“I.” I stopped. “I don’t know.” I looked at the dead stallion. “I haven’t ever really thought about stealing things from those I killed. Something inside me snapped after I heard Harmony say he almost killed her.”

Silver put his left wing over me. A soft clank happened as he did so. “I know how you feel. I had to decide about that a few years back. I have come to terms with it. Sometimes you have to take things from those who you’ve killed just to survive. It shouldn’t be easy to make your choice about whether or not to take that stallions stuff.” Silver lifted his wing off of me.

I thought for a few minutes on my dillema. If I take from those who I’ve killed doesn’t that make me just as bad as they were? Am I willing to descend to being nothing better than a monster. I was about to throw the power hoof away before another thought crossed my mind. What if I need it to protect my friends?

“I’ve made my choice.” I slipped the power hoof off and deposited it into my saddlebags.

“You made the right decision.” Silver laid a hoof on my shoulder.

“I’m not sure about that.” I put a hoof up to brush his off.

“You made the right decision.” Silver put his hoof back on the ground.

“How do you know?” I stared at my hooves.

“Because you took it just in case you need to defend your friends.” Silver stepped away.

I didn’t respond further. I trotted over to Harmony. She had overheard everything and hugged me. A single tear rolled down my face. I knew that I had made the right decision.