What draws us together? What is it that is so hardwired into us that we seek out others to be near, to confide in, to spend time with? For many I would guess it is to feed the constant hunger that loneliness grows, filling the endless void of silence with brief moments of laughter or even crying. Ponies can't sit still. They can't give in, even when they look to have lost it all. It is just one of our special talents that we are all born with. To get back to those moments where we had a home, had loved ones and even had lives that didn't involve bullets.

I never had those memories to look forward to reuniting with. I never had a home, never really had a true family and I never had a moment in my memory without a gun near by. How does somepony like me try and find the light at the end of the tunnel? So many talk about the old days, before the war, but they all just seem so content with living their lives the way they are. Few want to change it and even fewer seem to be holding on to that dream of what once was, residing themselves to the muck and mire of today.

Like every other tale this Wasteland has spun, if you are to read my words, you would do well to know who I am and how I came to be. I'm Joey, weird name, I know. Lets gloss over that for now, there will be plenty of time for that later. Yes, I have feathers, again, not important for now but I imagine that you can guess what kind of life that might lead to out here. Born to the Wasteland as its fallen foal from the sky, lost to this world and so many others thanks to my extra ability to fly. I'm not wanted, but I and begrudgingly accepted thanks to those I travel with.

I never knew my parents, never had the chance. I never knew family apart from the traders I worked with. Even from a young age I was trained in the ways of 'not dying' by a grizzly middle aged buck who I worked for. It was as close to a family as I had ever known, but even with this one glimmer of hope to many, there was still something missing. I never spoke up about it, not with what all was wrong with this world, residing to keep my thoughts to myself and my nose to my job.

But with everything that happens in life, things change. Sometimes fast, leaving the world a smoldering crater of what glory it once was. Sometimes slow, like the healing of said crater. I'm a firm believer that everything has a beginning and a end, logically. One day I was born, I had a mother and I had a father... But that ended long before I had the chance to even remember it. I was found by a trader and trained up to work for him, but one day I have no doubt that experience will end as well. But the constant wondering and pain of rejection and lack of something so natural as parents would forever eat at me, until my end came. Temporary as it was, for me it was eternal.

As far as I could remember, I was born alone and I would die alone. Heavy stuff for a buck the ripe age of 14, I know. Anything beyond that was merely a dream, something I could only hope for and wish on falling stars. Everypony else would get the chance to have somewhat of a life, friendship or even a special somepony. For me, I would have to resort to day dreams and sometimes even nightmares to find that sort of comfort. All because I had wings... I honestly would not be shocked if one day a shrink told me that my fear of hights was from the rejection they caused.

It should come as no surprise that I enjoy tracking. Tracking Ponies, raiders, slavers, animals... my colleges that call themselves my 'brother and sister'... I even tracked another trader for five days so we could find a new town to sell our wears to. I enjoy the solitude. Not because I wanted a quiet place to cry, I only did that when it rained. But because it gave me the chance to think, to dream to myself of what it would be like had I not been cast out to the world. When I was a good mile ahead of the caravan, I was was in my element, I was alone.

Would I always be this way? What were my parents really like? What did they look like? Would I ever get the chance to have a special somepony of my own? Would a slaver catch me today? What would happen if I just... ran away. Topics to some but for me, they were titles to stories in my head. Stories with no end in site, no chance of coming to true outside of my own head. I had dreams, dreams I couldn't explain. I was often haunted by images of Zebras, Slavers and the Pegasi that had abandoned this land long ago. I even had a dream I had a mare friend... sorta. I never told anypony about it, how could I give the type of mare she was.

No. I couldn't, I'm judged enough. No, I'm Just Joey. The cold nopony wanted, the one they threw away to the Wasteland to live out what few days he might have on his own. I am alone in this world, I will probably die alone at this pace. The pain of that knife has long since dulled and failed to draw blood at this point. I just had to keep my head down and keep working, try and not get shot and wait for the day that the Waste bites me.

But, everything changes. Sometimes without warning and sometimes by our own hoof. The universe provides, it just takes a little time to get around to everypony. For me on the other hoof... I feel like it had forgotten me... Or so I had thought. One thing is for sure, when that time did come for me, it was beyond my wildest dreams.