I could never have imagined the world was this big… or this beautiful.

Until a few days ago, Blackwash was my world. A small little settlement on top of the tallest mountain in an inhospitable chain of stony monoliths, with nothing but trees and rock below us and blue sky above us. If I perched on the edge of town, I could see for miles, at least until the mountains rose up again and blocked off my view. There was nothing beyond those mountains, the teeth of the world, and Blackwash perched right in the middle of that maw. It was a small, alien world, and it was all I had expected to see for the rest of my life.

But here I was, wandering the valley I never thought I would explore, between settlements I never knew existed. I didn’t see anypony for hours; most of the time, it was just me and the dirt road in the ground going to the east, following the natural path of the valley. Tall, pink prairie grasses lined the road, some bedecked with seed pods on stalks as tall as my shoulders. I walked as far away from them as I could, instead choosing to walk along the bank of the crystal clear river flowing toward me on my right. Those grasses were tall enough and thick enough to hide anything, and I figured I had a much smaller chance of getting jumped from the water than I did from the grass.

But it was beautiful. Insects buzzed in the grass, and I occasionally saw songbirds hovering overhead on their four little wings or darting in and out of the plants as they foraged for food. Fluffy white clouds drifted above the valley, giving me some blessed shade from the blistering blue sun; with my black coat underneath a heavy poncho, I was really beginning to work up a sweat. I found a tree that’d been knocked over by a storm, and I stopped to sit and eat a quick snack from some of the food Hazel had given me. It was a peaceful way to spend half an hour, although this time, I kept one eye open for shrikes looking for a snack of their own. Thankfully I didn’t see any; maybe they didn’t hunt this far from the mountains?

I wasn’t alone the entire trip. Occasionally, I spotted a pony walking the other way, and whenever I did, I’d immediately freeze up and consider fleeing. Most of the time, however, the ponies were unremarkable. Sometimes I’d come across a farmer or somepony who looked like that sort; most of the time we’d pass without a word. Occasionally one would nod at me, or say hello, to which I’d try to smile and respond in kind, just to make myself feel like I wasn’t being conspicuous or suspicious. Some of them squinted at me and my borrowed poncho, and I could feel their eyes searching for a glimpse of my flank through the coarse veil, but I’d hurriedly press on, and nopony tried to stop me.

I was stopped once, however, and it wasn’t by the Crimson. I thought it might have been at first when I saw the troop of ponies walking towards me from about half a mile away, and I immediately froze in the road. I could very plainly see them in this stretch of the valley, which was pretty flat and open, and I knew they sure could see me. I considered bolting; if I ran fast enough, I could disappear into the grass, and with luck they wouldn’t be able to find me. But if it really was the Crimson, then they’d come searching, and even if it wasn’t, who knew who these ponies were going to talk to? I could just be making things worse for myself in the long run. Besides, these guys didn’t look like Crimson, although to be fair, the only comparison I could make was that they weren’t mangy pegasi with dual automatics strapped over their shoulders…

But they were armed, and fairly armored. I only counted seven at first, but I noticed a pair of shadows circling around them—add two pegasi to make nine. They all carried a motley assortment of weapons; I could make out everything from shotguns to assault rifles to heavy machineguns. One of them even had what looked like a musket! Despite the diversity of their weapons, their armor looked somewhat uniform. Old Equestrian military combat gear, reinforced with blocks of wood or sheets of aluminum over the vitals. They must’ve been part of a group or something. At least they weren’t wearing that hide armor that the Crimson pegasi wore.

I realized that the ponies were spread out evenly around a wagon full of… stuff covered by a tarp, pulled by two of their team. Walking behind them was a unicorn wearing expensive clothes (or at least I assumed they were expensive; they looked clean is perhaps what I should say) and sporting well-groomed facial hair. A pair of glasses were perched on his muzzle, and a small pistol was holstered on his left shoulder. Unlike the other eight ponies, he didn’t look like he was much of a fighter.

I can recall this pretty clearly because I had a good chance to look at all of them when we crossed paths, and the two ponies leading the group both pointed their shoulder-mounted weapons at me.

Fuck my ass. I flinched and stepped backwards, seeing the barrels of a pretty large caliber machinegun and a scary looking assault shotgun swiveled my way. I raised a hoof up, trying to ease them off. “Hey, I’m just walking, here,” I said with as much calm as I could muster. “Nopony needs to do anything they’re going to regret later, right?”

In truth, I was fucking terrified. The two big stallions I was talking to (or, I guess, more like at) both glared at me. I had a distinct feeling that they weren’t above killing pretty mares who crossed them along the road. Good thing I’d toggled off the safety on my SMG slung across my back.

Before things could escalate, though, the unicorn with the group came galloping up. “Woah! Hey, hey, easy!” he shouted, charging between us all. “Do we have to point our guns at everypony we meet? I’m sure the lot of you have enough firepower to drop a little mare if she was stupid enough to jump us!”

The other two stallions glared at me a second longer before lowering their weapons. “It’s dangerous in the valley, boss,” said the bigger of the two, an earth pony with dreads whose shoulder alone towered above my horn. “Crimson think caravans are sport. They love hiding in the grass.” He tilted his head towards me. “How do we know she ain’t with them?”

“Because, you idiot,” the unicorn said, slapping his companion. Bodyguard? “She’s a whore on the run!”

I paled and took a step back. Fuck fuck fuck. How did he know? I looked over my shoulder, but my poncho was still covering my brand. I heard something jingle in front of me, and when I looked back, the unicorn was standing within a leg’s reach. He looked apologetic, and shaking his head, he reached for my shoulder. “I’m sorry if my stallions scared you, Miss…?”

I flinched and swiped his hoof away. Shrugging, he merely set it back on the ground. “The name is Denarius, if it matters to you. Not my given name, but it’s the one I use.” He smirked at me, the iron hairs on his silver face betraying a slight hint of pride. “You don’t have anything to worry about me or my bodyguards; I’m simply here to earn a few bullets on the less traveled roads.”

So he was a merchant of some sort. I peered at him sort of sideways, still a little leery of the big group of armed stallions. He seemed to recognize my wariness, and with a gesture of his hoof, his bodyguards dispersed along the road, taking up watchful positions in all directions. I could see two shadows making lazy circles across the grass on one side and the river on the other as his pegasi watched from above. When we finally had some breathing room, I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding and nodded to him. “Nova.”

He smiled at me and nodded. “Pretty name, that,” he said. His hoof reached into the breast pocket of his shirt and produced a little wooden box, out of which his magic pulled what looked like a little brown paper stick. A spark from his horn lit the end, and he stuck it in his mouth. Then, shaking the box, he offered it to me. “Smoke? It isn’t anything from Equus, but I like to save those for special occasions. Besides, I think the Auris stuff’s stronger.”

I held out a hoof and shook my head. Shrugging, he closed the box and stuffed it back in his shirt. “Your loss. Mare like you looks like she could use one. For the nerves.” He took a moment to draw on his cigarette, and the end flared up before he exhaled a cloud of gray smoke. “Can’t have been easy getting away from the Crimson.”

I felt my shoulders tense and I leaned away a little. “How do you know?” I asked, frowning at him.

Denarius casually spat out his cigarette and caught it with his magic before it hit the ground. “You’re a pretty mare wandering the open road by herself with a stolen Crimson gun, a stolen Crimson saddlebag, and a poncho conveniently covering your left flank, despite how hot I know you are with that black coat of yours. You’re either a runaway whore, or you’ve got a death wish, and I can tell from one look at you that the latter isn’t true.” He brought his cigarette back up to his lips for another draw and blew another cloud of smoke into the valley breeze. “Only thing I can’t understand is why you’re going into Crimson territory instead of out of it. Maybe you do have a death wish.”

That was a little unnerving to hear. How many of those farmers or wandering ponies I crossed paths with earlier came to the same conclusion? Gulping, I looked around us, but his bodyguards were still more focused on the valley around us than our conversation. “You’re not going to turn me in, are you?”

Denarius laughed and shook his head. “To the Crimson? No. I’ve seen what mares look like when they’re done with them, when they’re pawned off in Hole to the highest bidder. I wouldn’t want that on any mare. Besides,” he added with a shrug, “doubt they’d pay me anything. All the Crimson are are a bunch of colts who found some toys and think they’re playing soldier. They might be strong, but nopony respects them. The caravans sure don’t.”

“They butchered my town,” I hissed. “Killed my mother and enslaved my friends. Stole what wasn’t bolted down and torched the rest.”

“It sucks,” Denarius said, pretty much succinctly summarizing my thoughts, though with less cursing. “And you’re not the only one who’s looking to make them pay. Not the only one who’s tried, either.”

“So, what?” I asked, shifting my weight onto my right legs and cocking my head at him. “You’re going to try to stop me? I already got enough of that in Northlight.”

To my surprise, Denarius shook his head. “No, ma’am. Not at all. If you think you can kill a few Crimson, then be my guest. The valley will be a better place for it.” His horn briefly lit, and he took his cigarette box out of his breast pocket and passed it to me, pressing it against my chest. When I took it in my hooves, he let go and nodded to me. “Take them. A little charity. Trust me, tobacco’s good for the nerves. You’ll need yours sharp if you want to kill Carrion.”

Then he whistled and pointed down the road, and his bodyguards withdrew to the wagon and began to walk along. Denarius lingered by me for a moment, and I could feel his sharp red eyes peeling me apart in search of the truth inside. After a few seconds, he nodded. “Next time we meet, I hope you feel like telling me your real name, ‘Nova’.”

Winking, the curious merchant turned around and cantered up to his wares, leaving me behind on the road. I stood there, watching him disappear the way I came, for at least five minutes until he finally crested a hill and descended out of sight.

Once he left, I felt a sudden pang of loneliness. He was nice, and I felt a little guilty for lying to him about my name, but I didn’t really know if I could trust him at the time. Tartarus, I still didn’t know if I could trust him. For all I knew he could be going to the nearest Crimson patrol and giving them a lead. But somehow I doubted that. He seemed like an honest stallion; a good stallion. And he’d given me a box of cigarettes for free.

Turning the box over, I took a closer look at it. It was a small wooden box carved from auranoak, a kind of twisting tree with black bark and a red pulp, which gave the box a neat maroon color. There were eight rolled cigarettes inside, and I took one out to give it a sniff. Oh stars… it smelled like pure ass, and not the kind that’s a slur for donkeys. I immediately crinkled my nose and jammed the cancer stick back inside the box. I doubted I was going to get much use out of this if I couldn’t even stand the smell. Maybe I could trade it for some bullets or something, although I had no idea how the different bullets factored into Auris’ money system.

I was just about to toss the cigarette box in one of my saddlebags when I noticed a symbol etched into one of its wooden faces. Squinting, I held it up to get a better look. Carved into the back panel of the box was an etching of a shield with a sword breaking across it. Surrounding that were several stars, all encircled by a laurel wreath. I frowned at the thing, trying to make sense of it. Was this a colonist’s from long ago? The symbol of the Equestrian navy? Some sort of secret order that I was unwittingly stumbling head over hooves into? Or was it simply a crude etching on the back of a cigarette box filled with home-rolled butts?

I couldn’t be sure, and Denarius was a little too far gone to go and ask him at this point. So, instead, I safely tucked the thing inside one of my saddlebags…

…and continued down the road.

I would like to preface this section by saying that had I known who was following me that night, I wouldn’t have been doing what I was doing. Just so we’re clear. I don’t want you thinking bad of me because of some really unfortunate timing on my part. Though to be fair, I didn’t know he was there, and I didn’t know he could be that quiet…

Ugh. I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s just go back and do this bit in order so I can get to the fun stuff that happened after which is why this really awkward bit has to be included and—

Fucking shrike shit, Ember, get ahold of yourself, girl.

I didn’t see anypony for the rest of the day after I ran across Denarius. I had no idea what was the usual for these roads down on the surface, so I couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or something really bad was brewing around me and my oblivious self. So, as the sun beat on, I started becoming more and more wary of the grasses around me. Hugging the bank of the wide and assuredly deep river, I made my way east as carefully as I could manage, keeping my eyes peeled for Crimson patrols all the while.

Just as the sun was beginning to set, I spotted something unnatural by the side of the road. And by ‘something unnatural’, I mean something built with hooves. Standing just a little ways back from the road, with the prairie grass creeping up all around it, was an old house. I could tell the squat building was a farmhouse, or at least, that’s what it used to be. The paint had all been worn away apart from a few flakes here and there, and mold and woodcutter aphids had done a number on the exterior. The windows had been shattered long ago, and the door apparently decided it wanted to be a welcome mat instead of a door, as it was lying flat on the dilapidated porch, torn off its rusted hinges. Out front, the rusted remains of a tractor were tipped over on the lawn, its fusion engine long since stolen or scrapped and the repulsors it used to hover around were missing.

I would like to take a second to point out that lots of Equestria’s vehicles were using primitive portable fusion drives when the Silence began, and that if a fusion drive ruptures or overheats, it basically explodes with the force of a 500kg bomb. And these things were everywhere across Auris.

Just think about that for a while.

Perhaps somewhat ironically, I wasn’t concerned about that at the moment. It could’ve already been blown up long ago for all I knew; it looked like there was a sizeable divot in the front yard, but that might’ve (almost certainly) been my imagination. I was more concerned about finding a place to lie low for the night and get some sleep somewhere safe. I didn’t know what sort of nocturnal predators hunted the valley, but I wasn’t about to make camp in the middle of the grass and find out for myself.

To that end, the abandoned house was too much to resist. Even still, I kept my distance as I walked a wide circle of the house, trying to get a glimpse of what kind of protection it could offer me, and if there were already any squatters inside. I found some crushed cans and shell casings caked in dirt scattered around the perimeter, but nothing recent. I did find a few .308 rounds lying in a tuft of grass, which I promptly took and shoved into my bullet purse. Hey, you never know when a few spare bucks (or cartridges) will make a difference, right?

Trotting back around the house, I climbed up the creaky, molding stairs and wandered across the fallen door into the interior. While I wouldn’t call the house small, because I lived in a small house for my entire life, and this was definitely larger than my shack in Blackwash, it was certainly… snug. From what I could tell, the ground floor only had three rooms: a living room, a kitchen, and a bedroom. The drywall separating those rooms had collapsed with age, leaving only the supports to hold up the floor above. A small gust tore through the smashed windows as I noted that, making the house creak and moan. I really hoped that those two hundred winter old supports would last.

I decided that if the house did collapse on me while I was sleeping, then it’d probably be better to be on the upper floor. There’d be considerably less rotten wood hitting me in the face, you know? Too bad the stairs were in as bad a shape as the rest of the house. I had to hop over a section that was missing two steps entirely just to go up, and one of the steps was so rotted through that it splintered in two when I tried putting my weight on it. The rest held, however, so that was good.

There was only one room upstairs, and it looked like it doubled as an attic and a spare bedroom of sorts. A lot of debris from things long since decayed were scattered against the walls and across the floor, and I could see the rusted wire cage of a bedframe shoved into the corner. A soggy yellow mattress lied on top of it, and on closer inspection, I could see a few bullet holes, stab marks, and brown splotches covering its surface. Ponies had died on that mattress. I didn’t really feel like tempting fate and joining them by sleeping on it too that night.

Instead, I found an old wardrobe and opened the doors (or tried to; they were so rotted that they just fell off their hinges when my magic grabbed them). There were a few threadbare clothes inside, mostly work clothes to offer some protection from the sun, so I took them all out and threw them into a pile on the floor. I added a few sheets and blankets I could find, and emptying one of my saddlebags, I stuffed it full of cloth and positioned it at one end of the pile of fabric to fashion a pillow. When that was done, I took off my poncho and draped it over everything so I had something clean(er) to sleep on than that mattress. I hated to admit it, but I missed the lumpy thing I used to sleep on back in Blackwash. Even if it did horrible things to my back, at least it was clean. Mostly. As clean as a two hundred winter old mattress can be.

For the moment, though, the sun was just beginning to touch the western horizon, so I had some time before I decided to pass out for the night. Slinging my SMG across my shoulders just in case I happened to need it, I gingerly wandered back down the stairs and began to look through the place, my curiosity getting the better of me. Besides, I was in a house that’d been around since before the Silence; who knew what I would find?

Turns out, a lot of garbage. As I turned over more and more useless shit, I had a distinct feeling that this place had been gutted, then re-gutted, and finally chopped up and combed through by generations of scavengers since society on Auris blew the fuck up. I considered finding a pistol under the couch that was so rusted none of the parts would even move a good find. I was about to give up when, underneath a pile of what once was books, I found a little journal that wasn’t completely trashed by the passage of time.

Prying the caked-on mess of pulp and ink aside, I very, very carefully extracted the journal from its grave. Holding it in my magic, I trotted back to the remains of a couch and sat down on it, although being careful not to lean too far into the mildewy mess. Once I was settled, I began to page through the journal, taking great care not to damage the pages.

For the most part, I didn’t even have to bother with that. Time had stripped pretty much everything of value from the journal’s pages. Instead of clear print and words, I got blue-gray splotches covering most of the pages where sentences would have been. Despite being covered, the water damage must’ve been too much for the journal. Still, I did find one page where I could make some of the words, deep within the journal of itself, where the water didn’t damage it as badly:

…killed today. If Equestria doesn’t send soldiers soon, it won’t be long before… …madness. Tin Kettle said something big was happening on Equus, that’s why they needed all the ships. The MPs in town aren’t saying anything. Tartarus, some of them… joining in. They even… …gangs went out and lynched the sergeant and raped his daughters. Disgusting. Won’t be long before… …to the farm. I have my rifle from the caribou war. They won’t take my family without…

The rest of the journal didn’t hold anything else. That was the last entry. Closing the book, I set it down on a table and stared vacantly out into space, consumed with my own thoughts. Try as I might, I couldn’t really make sense of the farmer’s journal, at least with regards to things I didn’t already know. Something big had happened on Equus, and while that was happening, Auris began to falter and fail. Whatever it was, though, it doesn’t look like Equus ever recovered. They would have sent ships and soldiers if they did.

I didn’t find anything else of value in the house, unless you call spent casings and rot valuable. Plus, it was finally dark outside, and I’d done a lot of walking today; I was tired and ready for bed. Well, nearly. While I wanted to get up early in the morning, I was stressed out, and I didn’t think I was going to be able to sleep well until I’d alleviated at least a little bit of that in the only way I really knew how, besides wasting precious ammunition shooting at targets.

I’m going to stop and say a few things: namely, if you’ve been paying attention, you’ll have noticed I’ve never mentioned any love interests I’ve had. In a town as small as Blackwash, figures somepony would be left out, and though I was far from the only single pony there, all the others were old, young, or very frankly not my type. Also, I was a sexually mature mare with needs like any other mare; only difference is I didn’t have somepony to take care of them for me. Third, for all I knew, I was alone, and there was nopony around for miles.

I think you can piece together what exactly I’m getting at here.

So, imagine my surprise when, in the middle of masturbating in the attic, I hear one of the stairs creak and groan.

I froze as I laid on the pile of fabric I’d made a makeshift mattress out of, legs splayed, the room smelling of my cunt, and with… with…

Okay, listen, I was a bit short on substitutes for cock, alright?

For the record, it’d been cleaned this morning and I’d unloaded the thing before I used it. And no, this isn’t something that happened often. I had a forge I could make my own… tools with back in Blackwash.

Don’t get me started on the time I found Mom’s.

But, point being, I definitely heard the stairs creak while I was in the middle of some much needed personal time. Absolutely fucking panicking, I pulled the barrel of the SMG out from between my legs and tried to hastily jam a magazine into the bottom of it. I was freaking out so much that I didn’t realize I was trying to put the thing in backwards the first few times as I scrambled away, trying to get behind cover. Finally, after realizing what I was doing, I spun the magazine around, slammed it into the receiver, loaded the first round, and toggled the safety off, aiming the weapon square at the staircase.

That’s when I saw a small and very familiar head appear at the top of the stairs.

I blinked once, then hastily put the safety back on and raised the barrel. “Chaff?!” I shouted, stunned, and completely in shock at seeing the colt here. A very bright heat built under my cheeks that was the result of some combination of surprise, anger, and fear. “What in the sh—what in Tartarus are you doing here?!”

Chaff shuffled his hooves like a colt caught stealing from the cookie jar in the ship on the rocket sled to the fucking moon. One of them. Both of them. Didn’t really matter. Point being that he fucked up, and he knew he fucked up, and was probably expecting the spanking of a lifetime.

“You were gonna go fight the Crimson,” the colt said, looking up at me with big puppydog eyes. “You were gonna go to the fort. I wanted to go to the fort! I wanted to see my friends, like Marble, and Leaven! They were taken to the fort last year, and if you were going to find your friends, then I wanted to find mine!”

My eye twitched. Did this colt really follow me all the way from Northlight? Sighing, I shook my head and stood up. “Does your Pop-Pop know you’re out here?”

It was a rhetorical question, and I already knew the answer, but it was something I had to ask. When Chaff bit his lip and shook his head, I patted the floor next to me for him to come over and sit. “Thought so. And you were following me all the way from Northlight? How come I didn’t see you?”

“I was hiding in the grass,” Chaff said, and making me feel a little insecure that a colt apparently didn’t have any qualms with going through the grass but I was too afraid to go near it. “I was gonna sleep outside and wait for you to leave in the morning, because I was afraid if you found me you were gonna send me back, but I heard voices and I was too scared.” He fidgeted, then added, “Then I heard you moaning and I thought something was wrong so I came up to see what was happening…” he paused, then sniffed the air, gagged, and stuck out his tongue. “Why does it smell like fish?”

“It’s nothing!” I shouted, nervously clutching my gun and trying not to smell the barrel. “I was just, uh… eating! Yeah, that’s it! A midnight snack!”

“Oh,” the colt said, then wincing, rubbed his stomach. “Do you have any more? I like fish!”

My face felt like I’d buried it in coals at the forge. Thankfully it was dark, and on top of that, I had a black coat, so Chaff couldn’t see me blush. Shaking my head, I feebly smiled at him. “Nope! All finished!” Well, that wasn’t even true; I really could’ve used a few more minutes before he came dancing up the fucking stairs to finish! Seeing the colt’s frown, though, I hastily dug through my saddlebag and pulled out a stick of some kind of dried plant. “I’ve got some of… this thing, though!”

Chaff’s face lit up, and I tossed the bar to him. He immediately began to devour it like a ravenous black hole, and I felt my heart rate begin to slow down as I watched him. Before I completely lowered my guard, however, I froze, remembering what he’d said before the fish comment. “Wait; you said you heard voices?!”

The colt didn’t have to reply, because as soon as I said that, I heard hooves stomping across the rotten floorboards below us. I froze, eyes wide, and even Chaff stopped chewing on his food to stare at the stairs in terror. Quickly removing the safety on my gun, I quietly stood up and began to sneak towards the staircase on the tips of my hooves while motioning for Chaff to stay put. I braced myself against the wall and peered down the stairs, gun at the ready, while my ears twitched and strained to make out the conversation below.

“You said you heard screaming?” a voice, a stallion’s voice, asked from below.

“Don’t tell me you didn’t hear it!” a mare shot back. “Sounded like a mare. Maybe a fanger found her. Those things are vicious little shits.”

There was a moment of silence as the two shuffled some things around. A third voice joined them with a raspy cough. “Somepony’s been here recently. Books don’t dig themselves out of trash heaps.”

“Slaves have used this place to hide before,” the mare said. “Take a look upstairs. Fan, you keep watch outside. If somepony tries to run, you tackle them.”

“Right.” Hoofsteps marked that stallion’s departure, while more hooves moved towards the staircase. The sodden steps creaked as the other stallion began to climb them, and I heard him curse under his breath. “Fucking old shit. At least there aren’t any spores in the valley.” I heard him jump the gap in the stairs, followed by the groaning of the staircase as it shifted under his weight. I saw Chaff poke his head out from behind an old desk, and I frantically waved my hoof for him to stay down. Thankfully, he listened, and he disappeared right before the stallion got to the top of the stairs.

I immediately recognized the outfit. Old Equestrian combat armor reinforced with the hide of some creature across the vitals. Two submachine guns were mounted to his shoulders, and he also carried what looked like the hilt of a sword across his chest. Red warpaint covered his eyes in a pattern of triangles that extended halfway down his cheeks. His mane was thin and balding, but thick muscles practically bulged from under his armor. I did not want to get into a hooffight with this guy.

Muscles McRoids slowly wandered into the room, his head (and the guns on his shoulders) swiveling back and forth as he looked around. I’d ducked behind the wardrobe as soon as he’d entered the attic, holding my breath and staying out of sight. I watched him through a crack in the wood; he seemed to be taking his time, keeping his guns at the ready as he looked around the furniture. Eventually, he came to a stop in the middle of the room, where I’d still left most of my supplies just sitting in the open. In my defense, I didn’t think I’d have to worry about where I put them when I dumped everything earlier.

“Come out, come out, little birdy,” the stallion sang, poking through some of the broken furniture lying against one of the walls. “I know you’re in here. I already found your shit.” I heard the floor creak, and my heart jumped into my throat as I saw him turn to where Chaff was hiding. A grin spread across his face, and he stomped over to an overturned table. “Hah!” the stallion exclaimed as he leapt around the corner—only for his face to twist in confusion. Frowning, he lowered his weapons and looked around the room, just missing the scurrying shadow of a colt ducking under the mattress behind him.

Kicking the leg of the table in frustration, the stallion turned around, this time walking in my direction. As he walked, he took a deep breath and licked his lips. “Smells like you were having fun, little birdy,” he said, looking left and right as he walked past rows of scattered, broken furniture. “Why don’t you come on out? I can show you a good time. You’ve never seen or tasted anything like I got, heh heh. I might actually split you open, unless you’re deep enough to take it.”

Okay, fucking ew, and also, fucking ew. Seriously, were all Crimson stallions like twelve or something? My thoughts must’ve been echoed by his companion, because just as he set his hoof down next to me, no more than a few inches from where I was hiding, I heard the mare explode in laughter from downstairs. "Are you really that much of a tool, Lead? You’re not gonna lure her out with that little baby bump you call a dick! Fucking quit playing with your food and find the cunt!”

I heard the stallion growl in frustration and angrily stomp past me, allowing me to breathe for the first time in minutes. But I was near the end of the room, and soon enough he’d turn around and see me. I didn’t want to shoot him, because the noise would bring the rest of his friends running, and I didn’t have anything sharp to stab him with. My heart began to thunder as I looked for a solution, my eyes darting across sodden rags, splintery wood, and a section of rusted pipe—

That would do.

Looking back on this now, I can only shake my head and applaud at the wonderful plan my mind crafted that night. Oh, how I’ve grown since then.

This so-called ‘plan’ was simple. As soon as Mr. Muscles (I guess the mare called him Lead?) walked past me, I very carefully stood up and began to creep after him. Right as he ducked his head to go nosing into something, I (figuratively) pounced, widening my stance for power and leverage, and flaring my horn to life.

A funny thing most non-unicorns don’t realize is that magic isn’t quiet. Whenever we use magic, and you see our horns light up, there’s a distinct trilling hum that accompanies it. Most of the time, it’s too quiet to even hear, and most unicorns learn to block it out after hearing it their entire lives, but in the absolute stillness of an attic at dark, it sounds almost deafening.

Which is why as soon as I began to channel my magic, the big earth pony’s head darted up and turned in my direction. Unfortunately for him, I’d already swung the lead pipe straight at his temple, which collided with as much force as I could muster—and considering I used to wield hammers in my telekinesis to shape steel as it came out of the forge, that was no inconsiderable amount.

Unfortunately for me, this guy was an earth pony, and a big one at that. Despite my blow making a solid hit, and despite that causing blood to pool down the side of his face, and despite that causing him to stumble, I might as well have hit him with a fucking spitball for all the good it did. As soon as the pipe clattered to the ground, the stallion was recovering from the blow, and he turned to point murderous eyes right at me, the idiot standing in the open, shocked that her sneak attack didn’t drop her opponent.

Earth ponies are overpowered.

An enormous, terrifying grin spread over the earth pony’s face, and he began to stalk towards me, while I, terrified, stumbled backwards. “Oh, you’re going to regret that,” he purred through restrained fury, and I could see the guns on his shoulders align with my heart. “Say goodnight, bitch.”

Before I could jump out of the way, I saw the ejection ports on his machineguns fly shut as he bit down on the trigger mechanism extending in front of his muzzle. Instead of firing, however, his guns only spit forth a resounding click of hammers striking empty chambers. Bewildered, the earth pony glanced at the guns on his shoulders. The empty guns on his shoulders.

Grinning, I held two drum magazines and two spare bullets in my magic, while pointing my own gun at his face. “Looking for these?”

In case you’re confused, I’ll briefly explain. While my original plan was to drop the stallion with a lead pipe to the temple, I’d also invoked the legendary unicorn power of multitasking to empty his weapons while he was still reeling from the blow as a backup plan. Sleight of hoof is easy when you don’t even have to get near the guy to do it.

Unfortunately, in my naivety, I didn’t capitalize on my advantage, and learned an important lesson when it comes to fighting earth ponies in close quarters: when they’re unarmed, they’re more likely to charge at you than back down, like a cornered animal, even if you have a weapon trained on them. I was standing only a tail length away from this guy, so when he lowered his head and charged, I had no chance of diving out of the way (teleportation would have been nice, but I didn’t learn that until later). Instead, I caught three hundred pounds of pure muscle right to the chest, and was more or less along for the ride at that point.

Which apparently was through all of the still intact furniture in the room. I cried out in pain as tables and chairs broke against my back until I was finally knocked free of the stallion’s charge and sent rolling across the floor like a ragdoll. The world only stopped spinning when I came to a painful stop by smashing my skull against the steel bedframe in the corner of the room (head trauma!). Gasping for breath, I laid there for several seconds as my senses came back to me and I slowly became aware of how much pain I was in. That was when I saw Chaff under the bed, staring at me with wide, terrified eyes.

Teeth grabbed my mane and hauled me away from the bed. Screaming and flailing my limbs, I tried to break free, but against an earth pony, that really wasn’t going to happen. Suddenly, gravity inverted itself, and I saw the door of a dresser come flying towards my face. I didn’t even have a chance to shake off the pain from the first blow before the stallion drove my face into it again. By the time he was finished, my nose had left a red splotch on the door, which had caved and splintered under the force of my head being driven into it, and I felt my stomach drop into my hooves when the stallion hurled me across the room.

The ground drove whatever breath I had left out of my lungs, preventing me from even screaming or crying out in pain. My back hurt and I could feel blood pouring down my muzzle, but I knew that this wasn’t the worst of what was to come. As I heard hooves stomp across the floor, I desperately looked around for something, anything to save my wretched hide. A pale glint of steel caught my attention, and I grabbed my submachine gun with my magic.

And received a kick to the horn for my efforts.

Tonight had started off so great…

When my ears finally stopped ringing and I could see again, I found myself lying on my back, staring up at the stallion, who had sat down and pressed a rag to the gash on his face, along with who I assumed was the mare I’d heard earlier. She was a unicorn like me, though unlike me, she’d completely shaved her mane, letting the war paint that radiated outward in spirals from the base of her horn stand out. She carried an assault rifle in her magic with a wickedly serrated bayonet that I’m sure would leave mortal wounds on any pony she stabbed with it. Like her companion, she wore Crimson armor, and seemed pretty dirty.

She was also like, a two, in all honesty. The crooked gray and yellow teeth really turned me off.

“I’m impressed,” the mare said, lowering her bayonet until I could feel it pricking my throat. “You’ve got some fight in ya.” She smirked at her companion, who sat down against the wall and cursed under his breath as he changed the bloody rag for a clean-ish one. “You let this little runt give you a lickin’?” she asked him.

“She’s a sneaky little bitch,” the stallion grumbled. “Blindsided me with a lead pipe. Idiot.”

“Oh yeah? And how’d that make you feel? I bet ya no mare’s every whipped your ass around before. I’d say she’s got bigger balls than you.”

I really wanted to tell her to stop needling Muscles over there, but I was afraid if I tried to speak, that bayonet would slice right through my throat. I could only look along the floor to make sure that Chaff was still hiding under the bed. So long as they didn’t find him…

The stallion stood up and stomped over to us. “Let me break the bitch.”

Well that didn’t sound pleasant. Amazingly, the mare rolled her eyes and came to my defense. “You don’t have to stick your dick in everything with holes, Lead.”

“I haven’t tried to fuck you, but I can change that.”

“You’re still a stallion, but I can change that.” She ripped a knife out of a pocket on her armor in the blink of an eye and pressed the blade against the stallion’s neck, right where it met his jaw. “I don’t know any spells that can make you into a mare, but my papa used to raise cowigs. I can geld a bull if I have to.”

The earth pony came to a dead stop, and I saw his throat bob as he swallowed hard. Smirking, the mare flicked the knife away from his throat, shaving off several gray hairs as she did so, and pocketed the thing in its sheath. Then, pulling her bayonet away from my throat, she kicked me under my tail, making me cry out and curl in a ball. “Up, bitch. You’re somepony’s property and we’re gonna bring ya back.” When I was too slow to get up, she frowned and drove the tip of her bayonet into my flank, giving me a sharp prick that had me yipping. “Move!”

Not wanting to get kicked or stabbed anymore, and not wanting to linger in the attic in case they found Chaff, I scrambled to my hooves, coughing and licking my lips to get the blood off of them. I more or less tripped and stumbled my way to the stairs while the two Crimson soldiers marched behind me, and I began to descend while leaning hard on the railing for support.

I’ll be honest, I probably should have expected the kick that sent me falling down and through the moldy stairs to the floor below.

I promptly dug myself out of the rubble, feeling a plethora of fresh cuts and bruises decorating my body, as my captors hopped down beside me, laughing the entire time. Before I could suffer any more abuse, I began to trudge to the door, trying to put a little distance between me and their hooves. While I’m sure seeing me in pain amused them, apparently it wasn’t worth the extra effort to trot after me, knowing full well that their third companion was already outside and waiting.

We emerged into the moonlight, and this time I made sure to trot down the steps of the porch well ahead of the two bandits so I wouldn’t suffer a repeat of inside. In the silvery glow of the two moons, I could see their third member, a pegasus, sitting by the road with his back to us. I lingered halfway between him and the house, at least until the mare shoved me along and called out to her friend. “Hey, Fan! We got a live one! Go and get her shit, will ya? Poor little Lead suffered a booboo and can’t carry it,” she said, snickering, while the earth pony rolled his eyes. When a few seconds passed, and Fan didn’t answer, the mare frowned and trotted forward. “What’d you do, fall asleep, asshole? Huffing root or something? If you’re holding out on us, I swear to Celestia—”

She shook the stallion on the shoulder, then jumped and stood stock-still as his head lolled back farther than anypony’s head should naturally go. I couldn’t make it out all that clearly in the dim glow, but there was definitely a visible slash cut completely through his neck, staining his chest and armor with a faint sheen of blood. A half-surprised look was frozen on the pegasus’ face, like he hadn’t even seen his own death coming.

The mare and the earth pony both widened their stances and stood back to back, with the mare throwing me to the ground and pressing a hoof down on my neck to keep me there. I could only tremble and do my best to look around as I laid there with my cheek in the dust, but I couldn’t see anything. I could feel the mare standing on me shaking through her hoof, hear her ragged breathing as she whipped her head back and forth. Growling, she leaned forward, placing more painful weight on my fragile neck, and shouted into the night. “Stop hiding, fucker! When I find you, I’m gonna strangle you with your guts!”

Then I heard a sound I never thought I’d hear out here: giggling. “Oh, you guys are all the same,” said a mare, somewhere… above us? The mare standing on my neck backed off, allowing me to roll onto my back, and stare straight up at a hovering figure dimly illuminated by the moon’s glow. She was a small pegasus, smaller than me, with a pale orange coat mostly covered by a skin-tight gray jumpsuit. On top of that were silver strips of armor covering her chest, shoulders, and portions of her back, along with little metal panels on her legs, and horseshoes spiked for traction on her hooves. A glistening half-helm that covered the top and back of her head had been fashioned to imitate a unicorn’s horn. The crests of her wings were also protected by short, silver rods, and above them, I could see three channels poking beneath the pauldrons of her armor on each side, the boreholes stained black with gunpowder.

She looked dangerous, powerful, elegant, but most importantly, confident and cocky. If she told me she wanted to fuck me I’d have my tail raised in a heartbeat. Don’t judge. You would too.

The mare in the silver armor gave us a teasing grin and shook her head. “Don’t you ground-pounders ever think to look up? A third of us can fly, you know!”

I could already see my captors taking aim. “Piss off, bird fucker!” the unicorn shouted up at her. “You and your kind are done for, you hear me?! It’s only a matter of time before Carrion stomps you cunts out!”

“Yeah… I just had a thought about that, really,” the mare said, crossing her forelegs and smirking down at us (stars how I loved that smirk). “I swear, you guys spend so much time painting your faces with your own shit that you don’t spend a lot of time to look at the big picture. It’s only a matter of time before you lot run out of blood to throw at us. I mean, let’s be real here, every one of us is worth ten of you. If I were you, I’d run away now.”

“Oh yeah? And how about I blow your fucking brains out of your skull like this?!” my captor screamed before firing a volley of shots at the pegasus. At her side, the stallion began shooting as well, unloading a torrent of lead up at the mare. As soon as I heard the crack of their guns, I thought she was a goner for sure.

Instead, the mare was still just hovering there, unfazed. My eyes widened as I saw the air shimmering and warping around her with each blast of the Crimson’s guns. As I watched, little pebbles of lead rained down around her, hitting the earth with little thumps. When both bandits were out of rounds, the flying mare raised her eyebrow and uncrossed her forelegs. “Wow. You guys haven’t fought an actual Sentinel before, have you?” The lights on her armor flickered for a moment, and blades of red energy appeared along the crests of her wings, casting her face in an intimidating crimson glow. An excited grin crept onto her muzzle, and she leaned down at us mid-hover. “Let me give you the one-oh-one.”

Unlike my captor, this mare was at least a nine. And she was hardly more than a few winters older than me at most. I couldn’t think of a better savior.

Her wings blurred like fire, and while the two Crimson were reloading, she’d already darted behind us. “Spread out!” Bayonets screamed, waving for Lead to put some distance between us. I began to scramble, but apparently I wasn’t allowed to move, because she stomped hard on my cunt to immobilize me, sending crippling pain through my abdomen. At least I wasn’t planning on having foals any time soon…

The Sentinel soared through the sky, the energy laser things on her wings casting her in a deathly glow as she wheeled about. The two bandits took shots at her, but whatever… forcefield or something her armor provided continued to deflect their bullets. Then, with a flourish of her wings, the lithe mare suddenly changed directions and dive-bombed Lead. The stallion dived to the ground, and her energy blades left a red afterglow in her wake as she passed, but by the confident grin on her face, I had no doubt that she could’ve adjusted to cut him in two if she really wanted. Rising back into the air, she continued to circle and dart about, swooping low over the mare or the stallion as she pleased, invincible to their fire.

I was speechless. She was… she was playing with them! If Sentinels were bulletproof and this well-equipped, I couldn’t understand how they were supposedly losing horribly to the Crimson. Slamming her hooves into the ground, the Sentinel grinned at them and cocked her head. “You’re not going to get through my shielding with such low caliber rounds,” she said, shaking her head. “You either need a hunting rifle, shotgun, or other powerful weapon, which I see neither of you have, or enough small arms fire to saturate the thing, which between the two of you, you don’t have. So, that just leaves one option left for you two,” she said, stalking forward. She threw her head from side to side, and I could hear her cracking the vertebrae in her neck. Her wings flexed, and she stopped about twenty feet away from Lead. “Who wants to dance?”

Apparently Lead wanted to, because the hulking brute all but hurled himself at the Sentinel in a mad fury. I could still feel the bruises to my ribcage where he’d plowed into me earlier, and even though this mare had armor, she was smaller than me. It almost didn’t seem fair to watch this little pony try to take on this goliath.

But I needn’t have worried. Spreading her wings, the Sentinel effortlessly dodged around, under, and between Lead’s frenzied attacks. Several times, she spun past an attack to bring an energized wing up to the stallion’s neck before pulling away at the last second. She was having fun, and there was nothing anypony could do to stop her.

At least until the mare standing next to me picked up a few large rocks in her telekinesis and flung them at the Sentinel. To my surprise, they passed right through her forcefield and struck the Sentinel in the back of the head, causing her to stumble right into the swinging hoof of Lead. I gasped as the pegasus reared back from the blow and rubbed her muzzle, quickly darting out of range of Lead’s attacks. That was when I saw the amused smile fade from her face. “Alright. You want to play for keeps? We can do that.”

Snapping her wings open, the Sentinel streaked toward Lead. In response, the stallion bit down on the hilt on his chest and produced an energy saber of his own, maybe realizing just how absolutely fucked he was. And by absolutely fucked, I mean absolutely fucked. The Sentinel came in swinging so fast that Lead could barely block or deflect the swings of her wings, much less parry them. The stallion backpedaled faster and faster, until one of his hooves slipped out from under him, throwing off his block by just enough for the mare to slip through. In a spinning waltz of bladed wings, she entered the fray.

The first spin lopped off Lead’s foreleg.

The second spin cut clean through the armor across his chest.

The third spin lopped off his other foreleg.

The fourth spin slashed his neck wide open, spilling blood that sizzled and crackled along her energized wings.

The whole thing didn’t last even a single second. A dying gasp was all Lead’s body made as it fell to the ground with a dull thump. The Sentinel stood over it for a moment, as if making sure he was really dead, before abruptly spinning in place with a flourish of her wings. She lowered her head towards me and the other mare and leered out from under her helmet. “Surrender and I’ll let you live. But I’ll be really disappointed if you do, so please, try me.”

Just when I thought it was over, telekinesis grabbed me by the mane and hauled me onto my hooves. I struggled against the mare’s grip, at least until I felt cold steel pressed against my neck. “You move and she fucking dies!” the last Crimson soldier screamed at the Sentinel. Hooves wrapped around my shoulders and neck, dragging me backwards as the mare backpedaled. “You hear me? Stay right the fuck where you are!”

The Sentinel just sighed and rolled her eyes. “Ugh, you take all the fun out of everything,” she said, almost complaining. To my horror, she sat down and powered off her energy lances. Crossing her forelegs, she calmly called into the night, “Sig, you wanna get this one?”

“Who the fuck are you talking to?!” the mare screamed, pressing the knife closer to my throat, and starting to cut through my skin. “Huh?! Answer me, you dumb bitch!”

“What, just because I can singlehoofedly whoop all your asses on patrol doesn’t mean I travel alone.” Then, smirking she pointed over our shoulders. “Might want to look behind you.”

“I’m not gonna fall for that, you cu—!” I assume that her last word was going to be ‘cunt’, but before she could finish it, something heavy knocked us over and she screamed. Loudly. I began to clamber to my hooves until her body slammed into the ground next to me, twitching, and missing its fucking throat. Blood pooled and gurgled in the massive hole in her neck as she very quickly and feebly died next to me. Gulping, I turned around. And screamed.

Some sort of monster I’d never seen before stood behind me. Half feline and half avian, it wore similar silver armor to the Sentinel mare that’d cut down Lead, including the metal rods that produced the energy blades on its wings. Lethally sharp talons supported the front half of its body while strong, leonine paws held up the rear. Dusty brown feathers covered its neck and face, turning into a pointy crest at the back of its head, and gradually thinning out until a yellow beak emerged; at least, I assumed it was yellow, because it was currently covered in scarlet gore. If it had two more eyes and two more wings, it would’ve almost looked like a small shrike.

Then it grinned at me. “You alright?”

My response was to faint and slam my face into the ground.