Now, I'd never been the kind of guy to get drunk. I mean, sure, show me a pony who wouldn't toss off a glass if an opportunity came by? But I'd always been the moderate one, being the top courier of Canterlot and all. A glass of old stuff? 'kay, sure. Two glasses? You bet. A bottle? Now that is when I'd turn down the offer.

But that night was different. Lemme tell you.

So, the old good night was covering the city and the Moon shone brightly in the sky. The scorpions and other scum were just waiting to get a hell of a bite of somepony careless enough to roam around the desert surrounding Canterlot. The radiation level was mild so the streets were filled with all kinds of guys and mares.

Nothing special, all the same. I'd just delivered a package for an old gruff pegasus, who was stupid enough to give me ten bits instead of eight. Or generous; I didn't really care. So, I went back to Canterlot, killing a few giant chickens for dinner on the way through the desert and the first thing I did was to call on this old buddy of mine - Chic Pants. Sure, he was a colt-cuddler, no matter how hard he tried to hide it, but he was a pretty cool guy to hang out with. Besides, he always had a few bits, just in case.

So I came up to Barrack Eight and knocked at the second door; that is, if you count from the left: if you count from the right, it's the whatever-the-number-is. I'd never counted - the barrack was long enough to contain a dozen manticores so what point was there in counting?

"Chic, you gay stallion!" I shouted and banged at the door loud enough for the whole barrack to hear. "Come out; I know you're either doing dope or jerking off to-"

I never finished the sentence, for the door opened and a gloomy unicorn appeared before my eyes. His black mane was tangled; his white fur was dirty and matt. He rubbed his eyes and yawned.

"What kind of ill wind brings you here, you bucking disaster?" he wondered idly and yawned again, covering his mouth with a hoof. "You've woken up the whole barrack - I'm gonna get the hay beaten out of me by the end of the night."

I reached for my saddlebag with a hoof - damn, I envy those unicorns, being able to levitate stuff just like that - and took out a few golden coins.

"That's what brings me here," I replied with a grin, tossing a wink to my sleepy friend.

"Then what are we waiting for?" he shouted and leapt in the air, hitting his head at the cross-beam.

I laughed for a while and we set off to the only place in Canterlot we knew would serve for such underage stallions as we were. Hell, it was pure injustice - I bucking knew that citizens of Manehattan were legal age at twenty-one! Twenty-one - can you believe this?! And we were both twenty-four and still one year till we could get beer and whisky and dope and all the serious shit legally. Canterlot- 'the city of freedom!'

So, we went down the street, trying to avoid getting in trouble - and that task wasn't easy to maintain, 'cause some jerks from the gangs around always searched the streets at night to find some fools to beat up and steal from. We weren't that dumb. Though, if you ask me, Chic had always been the guy to get into all kinds of flank-kicking trouble.

I remember that one time at school when we had a survival class. We went to the desert - not far from the city, just in a gunshot's range - to learn how to make fires and cure radiation and do first aid and kill scorpions and stuff. And guess what? That walking disaster managed to stray from the group and killed a baby manticore. A bucking baby manticore! That fella was bigger than our teacher's plot - and her plot was enormous! Miss Spades almost fainted as she saw Chic, wounded but with a stupid wide grin on his face, dragging a large piece of meat that once had been a baby manticore! We were lucky not to meet its parents, that's for sure! The poor unicorn had to spend the rest of the month in hospital - broken bones and some other stuff with un-memorizable medical terms - but it was worth it, he said.

But I digress. We reached the small wooden building that had once been a barn or something and I knocked at the door - five times, then wait, then six times. There was a soft noise from behind the door and a screechy voice asked,

"What is larger than life?"

I sighed and facehoofed.

"Your mum's flanks," I replied. "Really, Barn, you need to think of a better password."

The door opened and a dirty old earth pony dragged us inside. We didn't hesitate to hug the brown stallion, for he was the one to supply us with booze and dope and whatever a young free-roaming mind could ask for in a mind-breaking post-apocalyptic world where death had become so commonplace that it didn't surprise anypony any more. Besides, he was a cool guy and you know the main rule of the wasteland and all of its cities and towns and villages: if a guy's cool to you and not gonna shoot you or beat you up or rob you or rape you or do some other crazy shit to you - you can think of him as a friend. For the time being, that is.

He led us to the darkest corner of his pub, where the troops - if they would ever visit this place - wouldn't see us and see we're underage and give us nothing but trouble. Don't get me wrong - I like that the troops protect Canterlot from deadlings and manicores and all but sometimes they're just a little bit too righteous, if you get what I mean.

As we passed empty tables and tables occupied with drunk ponies and tables with whorses luring in potential customers, I saw that the usual piano on the scene wasn't there; instead, a female singer with a deep voice entertained the public that night.

"Anything happened to the piano, Barn?" I asked the owner of this wonderful place as we sat down at our usual table.

"Nah," the brown earth pony shrugged and shook his head. "Had to sell it; those bucking gangsters jes' wouldn't calm down. Had to hand 'em my profits." He lowered his head and placed two glasses on the table before us.

I patted him on the shoulder sympathetically, to show that I was on his side. Though, if there was a gun pointed at my head, I would immediately change my point of view. I'm no hero, you see? Just a plain courier, who tries to survive in the meaningless world, getting drunk or high (or both) at each and every opportunity - just to forget about how dark and pointless my existence is.

"Barn, have some serious stuff for us today?" Chic asked, looking around lustfully, his gaze stopping at some stallions' flanks. Though, he knew better than to act: he knew any respectful stallion in Canterlot would seriously kick his flank for being a colt-cuddler, you bet!

The old stallion shook his head.

"Nope, not today. All the stuff taken by them snipers," he said.

"Ah, damn those sons of whorses," my gay buddy swore, not loud, in fear than anypony in the pub could be a supporter of our top squads - the snipers.

Now just a little information for you, just so you understand: the dope they make here in Canterlot not only makes you fly to the sky and ride the rainbow and all that stuff - it also gives you unmatched precision and perfect vision, both during the day and in the night. And since the narcotic effect vanishes after taking a few other pills, you get an eagle's eye without actually any hallucinations and all of that. Of course, you get a terrible headache the next day - that's why Canterlot snipers work shifts.

I hear that Manehattan dope gives you unmatched strength or something like that... One way or another, I do it just to get high and forget the hardships of my life, that's all. That's what most ponies do.

"But I have some Scoltish whisky," Barn whispered with a smile as he leaned closer to us, his foul breath making me want to throw up.

"No shit," Chic replied with a look of a pro. "You can't get this stuff unless you have some friends in Las Pegasus," he stated, pressing his hoof against the table firmly, leaving a small, almost unnoticeable mark on it.

"Oh, really?" the bartender cocked his brow. "What would say to this, then?" he asked as he carefully slid a bottle from his saddlebag and put it on the table so that nopony but us three could see it.

I squinted to get a better look. Indeed, this was the best booze one could ever find around the place - the finest Las Pegasus Scoltish whisky, with the brand seal and everything. I felt the urge to try it building inside me. I'd never been a heavy drinker, told you. Just when you see such a treasure you instinctively want to open it, right?

Chic Pants, on the other hoof, was quite a drinker so he momentarily spotted the value of what would soon come into our possession.

"How much?" he asked, carefully investigating the bottle, hopelessly trying to keep a straight face to bargain.

"Five bits for a bottle," Barn stated with a clear intention of keeping to his price.

"Oh, please!" Chic laughed. "Don't make me laugh my flank off. They take four bits for a bottle in Las Peg, and you're trying to make fun of me." He chuckled. "Three bits and we're good."

Barn immediately made a motion to grab the bottle.

"If you don't want to pay, then you don't want to drink, that's what I say," he grunted as he slowly grabbed the bottle and made an impression of putting it into his saddlebag.

Chic stopped him, grabbing his hoof - the one with the bottle in it.

"Come on, man! We're not millionaires, you know that! Four bits and we're good, 'kay? he suggested.

As the two ponies continued to bargain, bring forth all of their skill and ability, my gaze was fixed on the scene. The mare that was singing that night was, to put it simply, the most beautiful pony I'd ever seen in my entire life. She was a young unicorn. Her white coat shone and sparkled in the artificial lights of the pub. Her regal blue mane rested on her shoulders like a princess would rest on her throne. Her singing was divine; by holding that mic in her magical grip and singing into it, she was cleansing the ugly place up inside. If you still don't realise how much I adored her that moment, compare my cheesy metaphors about her to my usual way of speaking. Now you get it that she hit me pretty hard, don'cha?

Two arguing voices reached me, bringing me back to the ugly world from the peaceful heaven the singer had established with her voice and beauty.

"Just how many bottles do you think you need? One, two? Two bottles is ten bits, easy as that!" Barn barked at my unicorn friend. "Don't you be telling me you can't afford 'em!"

"And if we want more than that?" Chic replied excitedly, gesticulating with a hoof wildly.

Barn roared with laughter, dragging attention of a few ponies around us. Though, a few seconds later all of them returned to their miserable deeds.

"Oh, almost had me here, boy!" The old stallion wiped an honest tear from his eye. "Why would you need more?"

"Because we do need more, simply as that," I said, interrupting their discussion. I took twenty-five shiny coins out of my saddlebag - all I had at the moment; all that I would have had for at least a few days, until I got a new order to deliver - and put them on the table, much to the surprise of both the bartender and my black-maned friend.

Chic grabbed me by the chin and turned towards himself.

"Are you crazy?" he whispered into my ear. "That's all the money you've got!"

I shrugged and looked back at the scene. The beautiful unicorn singer smiled and waved at the audience. At that very moment, I felt that she smiled at me, that she waved at me and only me. The question was settled in my head the same very instant.

"Five bottles, please," I addressed Barn, still being held by my now visibly scared buddy.

"You sure, son?" the bartender wondered, looking at me as if I were ill or something. "That's a helluva money you've got here. You have anything left?" he enquired. On one hoof, he was honestly sympathetic, for I could read it in his eyes. Not to brag, but years of crossing the waste ground back and forth had taught me to read ponies like books. I guess that if ponies still got cutie marks after the Cataclysm, mine would be a pair of binoculars or something. 'Cause, in addition to insight, my physical sight was tops as well.

On the other hoof, Barn's eyes shone with greed, and that was more than understandable: the most expensive drink he'd ever got to serve was Manehattan liquor, two bits for bottle. And now he was practically being offered a whole day's pay from one young stallion (who was presumably, to his mind, gone off his wheels or something).

I managed to escape from Chic's grip and tossed Barn a reassuring smile.

"Don't worry, Barn. Take the money and get the stuff. We're good," I assured him as I pushed the bits closer to the edge at which the barkeeper was standing.

Chic Pants swore under his breath and, feeling in his pocket, took out three dusty golden coins and tossed them on the slick surface of the table. One of the coins rolled towards the very edge and I expected it to fall but Barn swiftly stopped its movement by pinning it to the surface with his hoof.

"Thanks, Chic," I said, touched by his generosity. I grabbed three of my own bits from the table and put them into my saddlebag.

"You're ever so welcome, you bucking colt," the white unicorn said, visibly disgruntled. Yet, I knew he felt good inside for lending a helping hoof.

"Well, here you go." Barn took another four bottles of the good substance out of his saddlebag, which, in my view, was simply enormous. Miss Spades' flank was nothing compared to it! The bartender took the bits and slid them into his saddlebag, in a special pocket for money. I immediately wished I could buy such a good, sturdy and convenient saddlebag. The merchants were asking twenty bit for this one model but I knew I could find something like this at a lower price. However, now my dream had to wait, for all my money had just gone to buy us five bottles of whisky.

Barn put the bottles on the table and smiled at us.

"Pleasure doin' business with you. Don't drink your flanks off!" he gave us his usual admonition as he went away to tend to other customers.

And there were few, as far as I could see. At the table to the left of us sat an old pegasus, his mane and tail silver grey by age, his coat grey by nature. He had a patch over his left eye, which meant one of two things: either he had been a professional soldier in the days of his youth or he'd been just a trouble-seeker, of which there were many in the whole Northern desert. Looking at the way he drank his beer - holding the mug slightly leaned outwards so that the foam wouldn't get in the way of the tasty yellow liquid as he drank - I realised that it was a soldier's way to drink. Or a drunkard's. But here, in Canterlot, ponies managed to combine those two occupations perfectly.

At the table in the distance sat a fat blue unicorn, surrounded by a few whorses who were constantly trying to present themselves in a better way. The unicorn was wearing a leather hat; a gun was lying on the table right in front of him. I had a sudden urge to spit in disgust. Don't get me wrong - I'm no saint and I know that in order to survive ponies would do everything. But there was a subconscious grudge against whorses inside my mind. Maybe that was because my mother had been one. Maybe it was because I'd never seen a sight either of her or my father. Growing up at the shelter was a tough experience, believe me. The fat unicorn at the table yawned loudly and poked one of the mares with his horn, making her yelp playfully. I closed my eyes and looked away. Sure, I could have taken my old trusty gun and solved the problem by shooting the shit out of that blue shadow of a pony but I knew better than to jump to conclusions. The hat he was wearing was an expensive one, and the way his hoof lay peacefully next to his gun, not trembling or checking the weapon, indicated that the son of a whorse was a damn good shot.

I focused my eyes on the scene again. The elegant mare on the stage had already finished her swingy tune and was now singing in a voice that opened a whole new meaning of the word deepness to me. It was a ballad in the old language - the one ponies used to speak not only before the Cataclysm but before the Era of the Goddesses even. She closed her eyes and let her beautiful blue mane cover her left eye, making her even more gorgeous than it was possible for a mare to be. Her hoof was moving in the air slowly, as if she were supporting the song with simple gestures. I felt warmness inside and looked at one of the bottles, inspecting it.

Chic patted me on the shoulder patiently. When I turned round, I saw a wide grin plastered upon his face. He winked at me and nudged me playfully, making me rub my shoulder. Just so you know: Chic Pants was all mighty and muscular so he really could deliver pain without even thinking of it. He wasn't a poser, no. He just had to build muscles and all that stuff so that he wouldn't be beaten up to pieces by those who hated colt-cuddlers. And there were many of those in Canterlot. There had always been.

"Come and get her, tiger," he urged with a chuckle. "I see how you look at her." He patted me again, this time more lightly.

I considered shrugging it off, saying 'Don't know what you're talking about' or something of the kind but then realised that it was pointless - throughout the years we'd known each other, Chic'd known me as good as I'd known myself. Maybe even better. Growing up in a shelter was tough, as I'd said, and being a son of a whorse (literally) didn't help at all. Fortunately, there was a guy who wanted to hang out with me not because of pity or selfish intentions but simply 'cause he wanted to. And that guy was Chic Pants.

"Lemme get some nerve at first," I said and opened the bottle. Don't get me wrong - I'm usually open with mares and all but that mare? She was like a goddess of the suburbs so a single look of her made me shy like a foal or even worse.

"I can't see why you shouldn't." My buddy shrugged and poured a full glass for me and half a glass for himself. He'd always tried to get me drunk in such a way and I'd always resisted. I'm not the kind of guy to get drunk, told you.

"Chic," I warned him, tapping my hoof against the surface of the table.

"Just a glass to give you some courage," the white pony assured me seriously. "Cheers!" he said the usual Canterlot toast and knocked back the whole glass.

I pondered for a moment. I thought about how ponies used to say grandiloquent toasts, sitting at long rectangular tables in castles, laughing at refined jokes and sharing exquisite wordplay... I though about how happy ponies used to be. Before the Cataclysm. Long before I was born. Bitterness filled me up inside, flowing in my veins, enveloping my guts, poking at my very heart.

Instead of savouring the delicious (and expensive) substance, as I'd previously planned, I followed the advice of my friend and drank the whole glass in one big gulp. The whisky seemed to have burned my throat. For a moment, I seriously thought I would never be able to speak again. My mouth felt dry, as if a single drop of liquid never touched it. I coughed and felt tears stream from my eyes. In a moment, though, I felt considerably better. The stuff was hard; but it was far beyond tasty. It was the tastiest shit I'd ever drunk, believe me! It woke me up inside and my ears jerked up immediately. I looked at the bottle.

"78% alcohol?!" I screamed, though, only a suppressed hissing came out of my mouth. "Is that old guy trying to bucking end us?"

Chic laughed light-heartedly and patted me on the back, making me cough fervently and finally clear my throat.

"Oh, come on, don't be a weaky-pants!" he reasoned me, smiling widely. Obviously, alcohol had no effect on him whatsoever. I envied him in a way, for this. And also for the fact that he was a bucking unicorn who could make magic shields and levitate things and stuff. Although I found it disturbing to hear his gay insults like 'weaky-pants' and other shit, I knew that my alcohol tolerance was significantly lower than that of his. Higher than that of most ponies but still lower than Chic's. So I didn't swallow the bait.

"That doesn't work on me, Chic." I shook my head and pushed the glass away. I felt a smidgeon of courage building inside me, and a smidge was all I needed to approach the wonderful singing mare.

The white unicorn shrugged and knocked back another glass - a full one this time.

"Anyway you want it, Starry," he said and tilted his head to the side. "Anyway you want it."

Now, didn't I tell you my name? My bad, sorry. Ponies call me Starry, for short, though my full name is Starry Eyes. I know, an idiotic name, right? Especially taking into consideration the fact that I'm by no means idealistic. I'd even go as far as to say that I'm far more of a realist than most ponies, not only being a orphan but also a courier who'd seen things, believe me. And some of them were horrible. For instance, I'd never killed a pony before but I'd seen some of such occasions and they were much more gory and disgusting that one could imagine. I'd seen cannibals eat corpses and foal rapists and mad delinquents... Let's just say, I'd seen things and my name didn't suit the reality. I don't know whether my whorse of a mother was drunk or high or both while she gave me the only present I'd ever received - my name. I knew she had done it - because I was one of the few foals in the shelter who'd been named before they were brought there. The Orphanage Shelter kept record of those.

I decided to muster some more resolution before coming up to the mare of my dreams - I was sure of that - but her final song came to an end and she began to descend the few stairs that connected the divine scene, which she'd graced with her presence, and the dirty floor of the pub, which she was about to cleanse with her divine white hooves.

After receiving a mild nudge from Chic Pants, which I almost hadn't noticed, I rose from my place and closed the distance between me and the goddess of the scene. She looked at me. Her beautiful blue eyes which suited her mane and tail perfectly seemed to have reached my very soul, if I ever had one. I bowed my head slightly, making her chuckle. Her laughter was divine, just as her voice, and the way she closed her mouth with a hoof made me melt. I smirked uneasily in embarrassment, realising that my manners were far from graceful.

"Madam," I began, stopping next to the mare and bowing my head clumsily again. "Your singing was magnificent. I feel like it gave birth to something new inside me - something deep and bright. Something that tells me this world is not completely hopeless."

I was telling the truth: I really felt, at that exact moment, that there was something bright and clean left in this world of darkness, filth and sorrow - and I felt that because of her singing.

"In my view," I continued, "your song in the Old Equestrian was simply the best. You managed to transmit the hopes and longings of the old world to us, ponies of the wasteland. Would you mind telling me what the song was about?" I enquired, looking at her expectantly, worshipping her very existence.

Suddenly, the mare shrugged.

"Don't really know. I've no idea - I just learned the sounds," she said and spit on the dirty floor, breaking my harmonious impression of her into pieces. Sure, she talked to me... And her voice was as beautiful as ever... But that was not what I was expecting. No, not in the slightest.

"I... I wanted..." I mumbled, feeling my plan falling through slowly, as if I were falling through a thin cover of ice on a lake. "I wanted to suggest that you sit at our table and have a drink or two with my friend and me..." I said insecurely, not sure what to expect.

"Are you trying to pick me up?" she asked, cocking a brow, moving closer to me.

"What?..." I felt an urge to protest immediately - who did she think I was?

"'Cause you'd better be," she said with a sly grin, touching my leg with her tail accidentally (or maybe on purpose).

"What?.." I repeated dumbly, trying to comprehend what was happening around me.

"My fares are five bits per hour, if that interests you," she whispered in my ear, finally closing the distance.

I looked around hopelessly, fixing my gaze on the table where Chic was finishing the first bottle all by himself. Upon seeing my turning towards him, he levitated his glass in the air, making a silent toast.

"How can you..." I backed down, "How can you, of all mares, with such beauty and voice - how can you sell your body to anypony?!" I yelled in despair, maybe too loudly, for I had attracted attention of the fat blue unicorn at the adjacent table, who frowned and looked at me attentively and disapprovingly.

"Everypony needs bits, honey," the singer cooed and planted a small kiss on my cheek that made me blush. "So, you're buying me or not? I can't wait all night till you make up your mind," she said, pouting her lips in fake offence.

I felt anger building inside me, filling all of my limbs and organs, becoming my blood, oxygen and everything I needed to survive. I'm still not sure what caused that sudden outburst: maybe it was my, how Chic would put it, 'easy-to-burst' personality; maybe it was the whisky; maybe both. One way or another, I pushed the mare away from me, staggering back in disgust. She fell on the dirty floor, her pristine coat turning filthy.

"You! A whorse!" I yelled, commanding attention of the whole pub. "You're just like all mares - a bucking whorse, ready to fuck with whoever wants it!" I was shouting insults, not taking into consideration the changing surroundings. And I should have, for the fat unicorn stood up from his table, his whorses running away instantly, and took his gun. Chic, seeing this, dropped his glass on the floor and ran towards me. The glass broke into tiny pieces, breaking the tension.

"Kid, what do you think you're doing?" the blue unicorn hissed, pointing his gun at my face, which was still burning with anger. "This is one of my girls, kid, and you don't get away with offending her," he said calmly, his magical field holding the weapon tightly, playing with the trigger by almost pulling it but then releasing it, as if nothing had ever happened.

"Whoa whoa whoa!" I heard Chic shout as he took his place between me and the pander. "Calm down, calm down!" He waved his hooves in the air pacificatorily.

I wanted to say a couple of words to the fat bastard or maybe get my faithful gun from the saddlebag and make a couple of holes in his head - what was the difference between shooting a pony and a creature of the desert, anyway? - but my gay friend had already begun taking his conciliatory measures.

"Here," the white unicorn said as he handed two golden coins to the pander, who lowered his gun after taking the money. "Just imagine that we'd picked her for ten minutes and got a bit... active, all right?" he continued with a smile and a nervous wink. When my buddy helped the singer stand up, the blue unicorn finally put his gun into his saddlebag and motioned for his whorses to follow.

"We're gettin' outta here, girls," he said through gritted teeth and left the pub, the mares following him obediently, falling in line, as if they were on a leash.

As silence established itself in the pub again, ponies returned to their drinking and chatter, facing away from us. I exhaled and shook my head. Chic patted me on the back.

"Shit happens, Starry," he tried to calm me down. "Shit always happens round here, for some reason..." he concluded, looking away, lost in thought.

"She turned out to be a whorse, Chic. Just like my mother," I said solemnly, following my friend's gaze. However, I couldn't see anything but a dirty wall with a dusty dart board on it, which obviously hadn't been touched for years. Maybe Chic Pants could see something else. Maybe he could see through these walls, through the desert, through the despair and pain of our generation...

"I owe you," I said and took out two bits from my saddlebag. "Here." I gave them to Chic, who hesitated a bit.

"You'll have only one left," he said, with uncertainty in his voice.

I silently took the bits from him and put them into his saddlebag with a look that allowed no discussion.

"Come on," he said with a sigh and motioned for me to follow. I hung my head low and followed the unicorn towards the table. Chic opened the second bottle of whisky and poured a glass to himself.

"Want some?" he asked carefully, knowing both my attitude towards heavy drinking and my current state.

I opened my mouth to decline but suddenly Barn appeared before us. He had just cleaned the shards of the broken glass from the floor and was now standing in front of us with a look on his face that said 'Kids, I know you're short on bits but you'll have to pay.'

Raising his hoof to stop the bartender from speaking the obvious, Chic felt in his saddlebag to get a bit to pay for the glass. Yet, I forestalled him and handed a golden coin to the barkeeper.

"Here you are, Barn," I said in a dark tone that made the bartender consider going away at once. "Sorry for the inconvenience."

"You're an idiot, you know that?" Chic Pants told me as Barn vanished as quickly as he had appeared. "It was your last bit, you dumb-flank," he said, forgetting all about my mental state and stuff.

I, on the other hoof, just let out a sombre chuckle. You know, there are times when you are broken; when your entire world is broken into pieces; when you don't know what to live for; when you know you can't get better. It is at such times when you try to make yourself only worse, in a desperate attempt to find out how broken you have to be to finally feel all right.

Now I was run out of money, my only hopes for a speck of brightness in the dark future falling down into the eternal abyss of reality.

What was I to do?

What would have you done in my place?

"Chic, pour me a glass," I said.

The sunlight penetrated my eyelids, making it impossible to sleep. I opened my eyes but had to close them the next instant, for I found myself staring directly at the Sun. I couldn't fully realise how it was possible for me to wake up under direct sunlight when I should've been sleeping in my cosy bed at home. By the way, I had my own house, a small one but a house nevertheless. Of course, I used to live in a barrack, like most of the youngsters in town but I soon had enough bits to buy a house. I remember the occasion very well.

I had been asked to deliver a message to the Southern Desert, Ponyville, to be exact. The way there had been quite unpleasant, 'cause not only the desert creatures tried to beat the living shit out of me but also ponies. If my memory serves me right, it had been the first time I encountered them. By them, I mean the Southern Gangsters. Some ponies say they are raiders, soulless marauders who torture and kill ponies for their own amusement. It seems that I had been privileged, for the three gangsters that I'd encountered had been merciful enough to accept my bribery, which consisted of all the money I had had with me at the moment and my weapon - a revolver pistol. They had simply taken my possessions and kicked me for a while till I fell unconscious. It hadn't been a fresh experience - I had been beaten up before, and even harder than that one time. Being an orphan and a son of a whorse in addition didn't help me get along with peers, that's for sure. But eventually, I had reached Ponyville, which I had thought was rather impossible in my current condition.

But I had survived. I had delivered the package. As far as I remember, inside it was a simple note asking somepony out for dinner. What a good way to ask out somepony! One way or another, I had been paid a hundred bits. A hundred shiny golden coins that, added to my savings, had been able to provide me with my own house.

Finally coming to an understanding that I wasn't home, I rolled over to the left and opened my eyes so that I wouldn't see the Sun. However, I saw something much more interesting. A large scorpion was standing next to me, his tail raised, his sting ready to pierce through my face.

No matter how hungover I was, my reflexes took over my mind. I quickly rolled to the right a few times so that the beast wouldn't reach me and jumped to my hooves instinctively. The creature tried to sting me at that exact moment. Praising my luck, I turned my head to get my gun from the saddlebag when I realised that I had no saddlebag attached to my body nor did I have a weapon. Casting a couple of worried glances around, I managed to see three things.

To begin with, I was in the middle of the desert, in the unknown part of the wasteland. It wasn't very troubling, 'cause I could manage to get out of craziest situations (as well as places), being an experienced courier and all.

Moreover, there wasn't a single sight either of my saddlebag or my gun. That point troubled me slightly more. I had all of my supplies - including food and water, which are essential for survival, by the way - as well as my trusty weapon and ammo in my saddlebag. It was like a survival kit for me and now it was gone. I lamented about how I should have listened to Chic Pants and bought an utility suit to keep some of my stuff in my pockets. Alas, I hadn't listened to him and now I really felt sorry about it.

What was really troubling me, at the moment, however - the point that should go under the 'last but not least' label - was the simple fact that a giant scorpion was going to kill (and possible eat) me and I had no way to kill the bucking monster in advance.

Oh, well. Shit. All those thoughts rushed through my head in a matter of a few seconds, as the scorpion made its way towards me, regaining his offensive stance. Now, I may not be a coward, but I'm not the bravest pony. So I considered the only option that was open to me at the moment.

Run.

And so I ran away, galloped across the scorched land covered by hottest sand. Fortunately enough, my hooves were sturdy, hardened during all those years of roaming the desert. The corns covering the bottoms of my hooves made good horseshoes, I thought for some reason. Unfortunately for me, though, the creature of the desert was just as sturdy. The scorpion chased me all the way, closing the distance.

It took me a while (and a few miles) to realise that the beast was faster than me. The distance was closing inexorably and I was getting tired, in addition to the terrible hungover. On a side note, that feeling was completely new for me. Not the fatigue; the hungover, I mean. I told you I wasn't the kind of guy to get drunk, right? Right. So this could be qualified as my first official hungover. I would've thrown a party to celebrate this memorable occasion, if it weren't for the fact that I had no bits. And I would also be stung to death in a few seconds.

My grim stream of consciousness was silenced by a sound of a gunshot. I stopped dead in my tracks and fell to the ground - another reflex of mine: the chance to get hit by a bullet is significantly lower if you're lying on the ground. I looked at the scorpion. It was dead. A perfect headshot. That meant that its killer was a professional marksman, no less. You see, it's nearly impossible to find a scorpion's head, not to mention hit it. Not to mention hit it from the distance.

"Hey, you all right?" I heard a voice from above. To me it seemed like the voice of one of the Goddesses that had come to rescue me.

I raised my head to see two earth ponies standing before me, inspecting me carefully. They were both stallions, both black, both of the same muscular complexion. The one on the left was silver-maned, with a strange glittering. He was holding a small pistol in his teeth. I marvelled at how he managed to shoot in such a manner. Usually, earth ponies' guns were strapped to their bodies so that they would only have to pull the string connected to the trigger. I, for one, had a gun of unusual nature as well. Mine was crafted in such a way that the handle wrapped the hoof and the trigger was located on the inside part of the strap. It took a while to get used to it but now I had the perquisite of sudden approach to the enemy: I didn't have to take out my gun and strap it around the body. However, such a model was gradually getting more and more popular: that fat blue unicorn in the pub had had one of those.

The stallion on the right was completely bald. It was strange to see a hairless pony, mostly because I hadn't seen one before. However, judging from his dusty dark green tail, I assumed that his mane had been dark green too (if it had ever been there, that is). He looked at me with concern. He was wearing an old-fashioned rifle that was strapped to his right foreleg. Smoke that was still coming from the barrel of his weapon indicated that it was he who had saved me from inevitable death.

"You all right, kid?" the bald earth pony repeated, bending so that he was able to look into my eyes. "Can you get up on your own?" he asked sympathetically.

Blushing in embarrassment, I rose to my hooves to show that I was quite able.

"Thank you," I said, addressing both ponies but paying more attention to my saviour, who shrugged with a smile. Only now did I notice that his mouth was disfigured, turning his smile into an ugly grin. I tried not to concentrate on that minor detail.

"You're welcome, kid," he replied, taking my hoof into his and shaking it. The hoofshake was too hard for my liking but I suppressed the pain and smiled in return.

"We earth ponies have to help each other, right?" the other stallion said, seriously, without a hint of a smile. It sounded more like a question so I found nothing better than to answer.

"Yeah... I guess," I replied, measuring the ponies. They were much taller than me and wider as well. One of their biceps was larger than my head. I gulped, although I had a feeling that those weren't enemies to me.

Yet, their question perplexed me greatly. You see, in Canterlot we had never paid any attention to races. Earth ponies, pegasi, unicorns - all the same shit. All live the same, die the same. There was no difference. So now, upon hearing the stallion's words, I pondered for a moment. Tales of merciless nationalists were not uncommon among ponies of Canterlot but I had thought them to be nothing but tales - stories, fruits of ponies' imagination.

"For a moment I thought you were a unicorn," the bald pony said with a chuckle. "The scorpion's sting was right next to your forehead," he explained. "I actually tried to kill you next. Fortunately, I saw that you were a fellow earth pony!" he concluded, nodding his head as if her were agreeing with himself.

I gulped and felt a shiver run down my spine. And if you hadn't seen it?! I wanted to ask but kept that mouth of mine shut. So the tales were true, after all! Now I just had to find a way to escape those psychopaths, find a weapon, find out where the buck I was and go home. Easy, right? Except for stages first to last.

"It's time to go to the camp," the silver-maned pony said after he looked at the Sun. Again I wondered what kind of insane training they had undertaken so that they were able to look at the midday (presumably) Sun without actually getting hurt or even squinting their eyes.

The bald black stallion nodded as I rubbed the back of my head.

"Yeah... That kinda brings up a question: where are we?" I wondered, trying not to offend those ponies or make a laughing stock out of myself. To my relief, the earth ponies seemed neither offended nor in the mood for making fun of me.

"The Eastern Desert, kid," the silver-maned stallion replied.

The Eastern Bucking Desert? I screamed inside my head but was experienced enough not to let out a single yelp and keep a straight face.

The news was shocking. No, it was more than shocking. It was disastrous. The Eastern Desert - the place where all the thugs and thieves laid their camps; the place where the most dangerous monsters roamed free; the place where the level of radiation was the highest one could ever imagine. The place I'd never been to and had never expected to pay a visit. No orders ever came to deliver here; and that was somewhat justified, if the talk was true. Well, now I knew at least one part of the rumours was true - there really were nationalists here and for the first time in my life I felt glad to be an earth pony and not a unicorn. I wouldn't have envied Chic Pants if he were in my place... 'The foul wind always blows from the East,' they had always said.

I felt a sudden urge in my teeth to clench in fear but managed to hold it at bay. I only gulped, shivering slightly.

"Is there any way to get to Canterlot from here?" I wondered, already knowing the answer.

The bald pony chuckled and shook his head.

"Not in your condition, kid," he said. "The North is miles and miles away from here. You'd better come with us," he suggested. "Can you fight?" he asked, inspecting me from top to bottom.

I didn't like where this was going, no, not in the slightest. For a moment, I wanted to say, "Thank you and goodnight", and turn round, and gallop away, but I understood that I had no other choice at the moment.

"I'm not a soldier..." I began carefully, trying to figure out the ponies' reaction, which was hidden behind the steel walls of their bland, expressionless faces. "But I'm a courier so I can handle a small gun and I know a few survival techniques," I concluded, thinking to myself, Somehow those techniques didn't help you to get away from a bucking scorpion!

The earth ponies exchanged glances and then nodded in unison.

"We're taking you aboard," the bald stallion said, while I tried to maintain a grateful expression of somepony who was glad he was worthy of such a privilege.

I let out a fake smile and sighed inside my head.

The ponies turned round and started to walk. I followed them, with no other options left for me.

As we trotted across the desert, I tried to look around at first, but, seeing nothing new but only old good stones, sand and dust, decided to delve into the nooks of my mind.

The question of how I had got here still remained open. I didn't remember what had happened the previous day... Night. The previous night. I only remembered drinking much more than I should have. But how did I end up here - that point was missing for me. I mentally accused myself of being a dumb bucking drunkard (although it was my first time heavy drinking) and thought about that singer mare in the pub. About how my last hope in ponykind popped like a toy balloon, leaving nothing behind but soft air. No, not even air - helium, a substance lighter than air, something that vanishes the instant it is released.

There was some self-abasement in my thoughts, that's for sure. I thought about how miserable I was. I thought about how miserable the whole world around me was. I blamed myself for everything, even for the Cataclysm. I abused myself with all the swear words I could find in my vocabulary. I wanted to kill myself but then I realised I even didn't have anything to kill myself with. I wanted to lie in the desert and let some mutated creatures come and kill me - maybe even devour me; I didn't care.

But I dragged my hooves mechanically, my head hung low, my thoughts away from reality. Then I started to blame Chic for not protecting me from whatever it had been that had sent me here. For a moment, I even thought that it had been him who had done it. Then I blamed the old barkeeper for selling me the whisky. I blamed the fat unicorn in the bar for taking my money. I blamed the beautiful singer for returning the faith in ponykind to me and then taking it back again. I blamed these two earth ponies for saving me and not letting me simply die, as I, it seemed to me at that moment, deserved. I blamed all ponykind for being greedy, and evil, and sinister, for bringing forth the Cataclysm, for destroying the beautiful land ponies once called Equestria.

And I felt better. I honestly felt better. Maybe when you can't feel worse, you start to feel better? I rose my head and inhaled the rough air of the desert. My head still ached; though, it appeared to me, no longer from the hungover but from the increased level of the radiation that I wasn't used to. The two ponies, my bald saviour and his silver-maned companion both walked in silence, thinking about something.

Suddenly, I heard a gunshot in the distance. My ears immediately jerked up. The black earth ponies located the source of the sound at once and began galloping in the opposite direction, silently motioning for me to follow, trying to keep as quiet as possible. There were no more gunshots or other sounds but we still kept on galloping.

Despite all the pain, I was quite enduring (all good couriers are) and even managed to outrun my fellow companions. We were running towards a sand hill and I reached the top faster than them. I turned my head to see where they were and didn't notice that I bumped into something warm and fuzzy. My head straightened and I looked ahead in fear, jumping back instinctively. I expected to see a lion or even a manticore but it was nothing but a pony. Two ponies, to be exact.

Why do they patrol in pairs here in the Eastern Desert? a thought appeared in my head. We, Northerners, travelled in groups of three and more ponies - apart from the couriers, of course, who were loners. Like me.

"Oh, look at what we've got here," one of the strangers, a mint unicorn, said, levitating a pistol and pointing it at my muzzle. "An Earth Brother, no less," he hissed. "Don't you think we're lucky, Lars?" he cast a glance towards his partner, a pegasus, who had just begun taking his own weapon from his saddlebag.

Yet, that fleeting moment was more than enough for me to remember my infamous survival skills and grab the pistol from the unicorn's grip, taking him by surprise. As I did so, I quickly stepped aside in process, so that an occasional bullet wouldn't hit me. And I was lucky to do so, for the bullet came. At the moment of my claiming the weapon, the trigger was pulled accidentally. I didn't want to think about who had pressed it: it was either the previous owner of the gun, the unicorn, or me. The fact was that the bullet hit the silver-maned pony, who had just ascended the hill. The bullet made his head explode and shower the bald pony, who'd just appeared on the spot himself, with fountains of blood. I grabbed the gun tightly in my mouth and aimed at the pegasus, who had just attached his own weapon to himself. I pulled the trigger with my teeth and missed, 'cause you know, I wasn't used to shooting with my mouth. But while my precision failed me, my luck didn't. I missed the pegasus but managed to hit the unicorn. The bullet pierced through his chest, leaving strangely beautiful patterns of blood on his mint coat.

The pegasus pulled the trigger. I screamed, still somehow not dropping the gun, and fell to the ground. Fortunately for me, the bullet was meant not for me but for my bald saviour, who staggered a bit, managed to get a hold of his own weapon but fell on the ground eventually, lump and breathless. Now the pegasus was aiming at me. My courier's reflexes didn't fail me: I aimed a little more to the left than my target was and pulled the trigger. The bullet served by me for the pegasus found its place in his mouth, shattering the pony's teeth and thus preventing him from firing back. I ran towards the enemy and fired my gun, I fired away, I fired again, until there was no ammunition left.

I looked at what I had done. Before me lay a pile of blood and meat that only slightly resembled a pony. I reacted as anypony would have reacted in my place, I think. I threw up.

I looked around. I was alone in the middle of an unfamiliar desert, with a gun but with no ammo, with no food or water. I suddenly realised how much I wanted to drink at that moment.

And I had just killed not only one, but two ponies. My first kill was a double one. Or maybe I had killed three of them. Still, I decided that the death of the black lavender-maned stallion had better remain a mystery.

I looked around again. The Sun was slowly coming down, which meant that the night waited for me ahead.

Shit.

I wasn't sure of anything at that moment. All of my values had been shifted, muddled, replaced wholesale.

I was sure only of one thing.

Shit just got real.

Author's note.

I have a few things to say.

First and foremost: wow. That's the longest chapter I've ever written (over nine thousaaaand words!). I'm not sure how I managed to do it but still I hope it was enjoyable to read.

Next, I would really like to see some feedback. It took me a lot of effort to write this, both mental and physical. I'm not complaining, I'm just pointing out that it's not that hard to rate the story and write a comment. Please, do so.

Next, some essential information. This is not a Fallout crossover so there will be no zombie ponies, level ups, ghouls, pip bucks and other stuff like that. Sorry.

Last but not least, I do not promote and/or advocate the behaviour presented by the characters of this story. On the contrary, I highly oppose heavy drinking and drug use. I also do not support smoking in any ways. *Takes a puff of his cigarette*. Ahh, that's better. But seriously, think about your health, 'kay?

As I've already said, I am eagerly, I repeat, eagerly awaiting your feedback.

Peace.

The Sun was inevitably crawling and sliding and galloping towards the horizon as if it had a date or an important appointment there. The desert heat was maliciously draining the last bits of water left in my body. I was thirsty. I was dying of thirst. I wanted to drink. I wanted to drink even more than I wanted to live, it seemed to me. If you're giving me life without water, better not to give me a life at all!

I cursed the Sun and the desert and the sand and myself and continued dragging my hooves pointlessly in no particular direction. My new saddlebag (thank you, dead ponies!) was heavy, for I had stuffed it with weapons. I wished I could stuff them with ammo, though, 'cause most of the guns I had stolen were just that - guns. Only one of them, the one I'd taken from my bald saviour, had enough ammunition for five shots. I prayed to Celestia that five would be enough.

Strangely enough, stealing from the dead wasn't bugging me half as much as I'd thought it would. I think my mind had established some kind of a protective barrier to keep me from contemplating it. Like it had established a barrier to protect me from thinking about my mother, or father, or even touch the subject of family. I'm not complaining, no! I'd never been jealous when I saw ponies with families and shit; just... It would have been nice to actually see my mother and ask that whorse why she had decided to give birth to me, throwing me open-hoofedly into a brave new world where danger, death, misery and sorrow were my constant companions. I don't think that she would answer. I'm quite sure she had been drunk when she had fucked the stallion that was my father and didn't remember a single thing. No, that didn't bug me at all. What did bug me, however, was the fact that I had just killed a couple of ponies.

I stopped to think about my inner phrasing. A couple of ponies. Did I really think that? It sounded like blasphemy - as if I were saying 'a couple of bits for that shit' or something like that. Images of those dead ponies occupied my mind. I felt an urge to throw up again, remembering the ugly, jelly-like remains of the pegasus I'd killed. The thing was, I didn't have anything left in my stomach. I hadn't eaten for the whole day and I could swear that in a few hours I would be chewing on sand.

It was getting significantly darker. The sunset was nigh, and I just had to shrug off the moral side of my idle speculations and step up to reality once more. I looked around hopelessly, trying to make out even a slightest hint of a shelter - a camp, a cave, anything! But my perfect eyesight told me that it was just sand and sand and sand for miles around.

I recalled our survival lessons at school, namely, the one at which we were taught how to survive in the middle of the desert. I would have called that lesson 'How to survive in the desert if you have water, food and something to build a shelter of'. Miss Spades had told us that "it is easy to make a shelter. First, take a piece of canvas and a few large sticks...". Stupid whorse. Needless to say, I had no sticks or canvas or any possible shit to use in building at least some weak sort of a shelter. I had learned my own lessons during all the time I'd spent travelling back and forth the Northern and Southern deserts, the main one being, If you have a gun and know how to use it, you can get anything. Unfortunately, that only applied to inhabited deserts, and the Eastern Desert by no means looked as one.

While I'd been born in the Northern Desert (at least that's what I'd been told), the Southern Desert was basically my favourite. Compared to the sagacious emptiness of the North, the South breathed with hospitality; though, that hospitality could be deadly sometimes. I would always call on a few merchants and listen to what rumours bums had to share, given the chance there were orders to deliver something to or across the Southern Desert. One could find all kinds of ponies in the South - raiders, gangsters and thugs on one hoof and other couriers, monks and merchants on the other. However, I wasn't sure any more which of them were 'on one hoof' and which of them were 'on the other hoof'. Did killing several ponies make me one of them, the ones who would kill and still for fun and profit? I surely gained no profit and got no fun from doing what I had done but I had stolen and I had killed nevertheless. Given the circumstances, I was able to somewhat justify my actions but I decided not to. Theft was theft, and murder was murder. And I was a part of it now.

Compared to the Eastern Desert, which was now covered by the silent night, my homeland - the relatively empty Northern Desert - seemed to me a crowded circus, stuffed with all kinds of ponies, animals and stuff. It was so quiet that the very atmosphere made no sound. Not a single vernal breeze, not a single ill wind roaming across. My ears were constantly reeling, much like locators, to adjust to the silence; yet, they could not. My head ached more and more, for, I estimated, the radiation level here was at least twice as high as in the Northern Desert and three times as high as it was in the South. I was thirsty. I was so thirsty that saliva wasn't produced by my mouth any more. My tongue was dry and my stomach ached of emptiness. Believe me or not but I would've been happy to see any creature around - a scorpion, a lion, a manticore, it didn't matter. I wanted meat. And I wanted it at once. For a second, I wondered if pony meat was actually tasty but then shrugged the thought away - cannibalism never had a place in my mind, and I wanted for it to remain unchanged.

I felt fatigue fall over me, making my head heavy and my sight grow dim, filling my limbs with lead or some other heavy shit so that it took me a damn amount of effort just to keep going, not to mention actually look where I was going. I resolved not to back down. If I fell down now, I would never get up. Knowing the desert very well, I could assume that, although there were no creatures in sight now, monsters would come. At midnight; at dawn; no matter when, they would come. And I would have no power even to rise to my hooves, not to mention kill them. I checked the straps on my right foreleg: they were pressed tightly against flesh, a bit too tightly for my liking, but now I praised the leather, 'cause the pain kept me going. It reminded me I was still alive. I wasn't used to wearing guns such as that one: I just had looked at how my bald saviour (may his soul rest in peace, if peace is what he wanted; a point that I doubt) had strapped the gun to his foreleg and had copied him. The rifle was big, old and rusty but at least I had ammunition to support that piece of steel. If it wasn't tin, that is; judging by the softness of the barrel, I came under the expression that it was a mixture of tin, lead and steel, and steel wasn't the main ingredient.

Now, most of the guns produced in the wasteland were made by the Spherical Industries, SI for short, a mysterious company that was said to create both the finest weapons and cheap guns for amateurs. Nopony knew where they were located, where their factories were (if there were any) and who worked there. They sold their weapons through merchants who, as it was clear, had no intention of talking about it. Not that it interested me; they sold good stuff - I bought it, easy as that. I had a SI gun, too, back there in Canterlot. I missed it at the moment, for the rifle was heavy and very uncomfortable to wear. I looked at its barrel: not a single seal, either of SI or some other company. This confirmed my suspicions of its being home-made. I made a mental note to pay more attention to it while shooting, 'cause those home-made guns had a tendency to melt into shit occasionally.

Suddenly, I saw a light. It shone like a beacon of warning, bringing about hope, joy - and distrust. I didn't know whether I could trust it; the light could have been a friendly fire made by some neutral tramp, who pledged allegiance to none of the alliances, supported none of the numerous gangs that, for some reason, existed in the wasteland. Or it could have been a fire on which cannibals roasted some pony meat, which they'd bought still alive from the slavers or had caught themselves. All of a sudden, a thought about possible tastiness of pony meat rushed through my head, leaving a weak trail that made my body shiver and my stomach grumble.

I gasped at my own thoughts and lifted my forehoof to slap myself on the cheek. No matter how hungry I was, cannibalism would never be an option! Not my glass of whiskey, never had been, never would be. No such shit in my lifetime. I slapped the cheek quite hard, gathering all of my weak might.

That was a grave mistake: while my thoughts cleansed and my head became somewhat lighter, all the power that was left in my body left it in an instant and, staggering and failing to maintain balance, I fell on the warm sand, passing out.

I was standing in a big long hall that stretched itself for miles and miles, as it seemed to me. Portraits of various ponies decorated its simple walls. I took a closer look at them. On one of them, I saw a blue unicorn in a strange pointy hat, who was holding a book in his magical grip. His gaze was muddled, directed somewhere far, far away, resembling the gaze of Chic when he was lost in thought in some way. Under the portrait hung a small sign in a language I couldn't read. I guessed that it was the pony's name.

I wasn't sure how I had got here and what was this place. There were no windows so I couldn't be sure whether it was day, night or something in between. I sighed and immediately felt a pat on my shoulder. I looked round to see my fellow Chic Pants standing next to me. He smiled at me while I gulped and realised something was out of place.

The unicorn sighed deeply and looked away, somewhere behind the very horizon, somewhere where there was some kind of Promised Land or some other shit that would deliver us. I followed his gaze, as I had always done. I saw a wall; a plain wall made of polished stone. I had never been able to see what Chic saw and that somewhat bugged me.

"What are you waiting for?" he asked suddenly, looking into my eyes. His gaze was plain and held no emptions, which was unusual for such a guy as Chic.

"Um..." I contemplated for a moment. "What exactly am I supposed to do?" I wondered, for some reason feeling embarrassed, as if I had really forgotten about something; about a matter of grave importance.

"What your calling in life is," Chic Pants replied simply, not breaking the eye contact. Only now I realised he wasn't blinking. His eyes were red.

"You..." I staggered back, pushing myself into the wall, as if a wall was enough to save me. "You're a deadling, aren't you? You are dead!" I screamed in panic, my eyes widening, my voice drowning in a whisper. I was truly afraid. I was scared to death. The deadlings were something all foals had been told about by their families (or teachers, in my case). The deadlings were dead ponies, immortal ghosts taking pony form, dangerous mutated organisms that could beat the shit out of, like, a thousand ponies in one swift blow.

Chic's gaze turned into a weary and sad one. He shook his head solemnly, letting out a sigh, looking into the distance once more.

"Starry..." he said. "Are you really sure that what you've been taught is true?" he wondered, his tone not enquiring, more like speculating.

I gulped, having no words to reply. Sure, many things I'd been taught were lies; many of them, were just useless; but deadlings... Not that I had actually seen them but the tales of the merchants of the Southern Desert were more than enough to build a strong view on those guys inside my head. I'd heard merchants talking about whole settlements wiped out by a single deadling; foals taken away from their families forever, not to bee seen again or even heard of. Those creatures were creepier than manticores, and I'd seen a mad manticore once, believe me!

"Your ponies wait for you," he said, pointing his hoof towards the end of the hall. "Go behind the door and do what you're good at."

"Getting drunk?" I joked, although both Chic and I could see that the joke was out of place.

My unicorn didn't reply; instead, he simply approached me and tapped my flank with a hoof. At first, I thought it was one of his gay insinuations. Then, I wondered if deadlings were contagious. And then I looked at the spot. There, right on my flank, was a glowing image, something I'd only read about before - a cutie mark. It depicted the Sun, in its regal beauty, covered by a dark circle, so that only the rays were visible.

I couldn't really understand what was going on. I felt dizzy all of a sudden. I gasped for air to breathe, though I couldn't find any, I collapsed onto the floor, looking at my friend pleadingly. He just stood there, looking away, lost in thought. I tried to call him but my voice failed. Darkness stood tall and majestic before my eyes and...

...I woke up. I immediately drew a breath in a way that an addict would take another puff of his cigarette - 'one last puff' - or a drunkard would take a gulp of his drink - 'one last gulp'. I was in the desert; I was lying on my back helplessly, unable to move my limbs. What exactly did that dream mean? I turned my head aside wearily and looked at my flank, only to see it blank, as it should be. However, I saw something far more interesting. Next to me, in a few steps, was sitting a red unicorn, relatively young, dressed in such disgusting tatters that I thought it would be better for him not to wear anything at all. He was holding an open tin can in his magical grip, drinking from it from time to time.

What piqued my interest the most - and what made me forget about my dream - was the fact that he was also magically holding an instrument that I'd previously seen only as a piece of wood but not a working device - a lyre. After taking another sip from the can, the unicorn tossed away his long white mane and began strumming the strings, filling the chilly desert air (only now did I realise it was already early morning: at any other given time of the day the heat would've been unbearable) with a soothing and strangely familiar melody. I immediately felt envious, for we, earth ponies, could only play the guitar, the piano and some other instruments - the lyre's strings, on the other hoof, had to be tugged with magic, not with hooves.

The stranger closed his eyes and started singing. His voice was nothing compared to the singer from that Canterlot pub - how long ago had it been, it seemed to me! - but it was deep and thoughtful. He was singing plainly but with emotion, telling a story, not just delivering entertainment.

The lyrics danced with the wind that had just begun lowing in our direction, creating whirlwinds of sand but never provoking a sandstorm in our direction. The words seemed painfully familiar; so did the tune, although I was quite sure it was the first time I had heard the song.

To the land where there's no war.
To the land where there is light.
When the battle has been won,
Will you travel by my side?

The red unicorn seemed lost in his own music, which was coming to a slow bridge between the verses. I was lost in it as well, even forgetting about my hunger, thirst and pain for a while. But only for a fleeting moment.

I don't know what future brings
But I believe and know it's bright.
When the final challenge stings,
Will you travel by my side?..

I expected the musician to finish the song with a gentle pluck on the strings so as to meet the general style of the tune but he strummed on the strings hard, jerking his head back in passion, leaving a strange after-taste of uncertainty in my mind. Finally, I came out of the charming effect of the song and tried to ask for help. Maybe the unicorn didn't notice me; although, being near the source if light which had lured me the previous night (the magic faded; it was a simple barrel set on fire, which was now out of use, just standing on its edge near the white-maned stranger), I assumed he was the one to drag me to it.

However, no words came out of my mouth, which was dried to the limit; only soft, almost snake-like hissing, could be heard. But that was enough: the unicorn heard me and turned his head towards me, levitating a small flask towards me. I immediately pressed my lips against the object and drank and drank and drank till I finally felt satisfied. As the flask was levitated away from me, I managed to spot a small, maybe insignificant, detail: it wasn't a simple canteen like the one I had, or all the other ponies of the North had; it wasn't a round glass vessel like the ones ponies of the South used. It was a flat flask with an "S" letter engraved on the front.

"Finally awake, pal?" the unicorn asked sympathetically, drilling me with his blue eyes. Something about his eyes made me shiver; fortunately, he mistook it for my being cold and, with a flash of his horn, I felt warm, warmer than while being under the warmest blanket. I marvelled at how potent the stranger's magic was. I had never imagined that unicorns were capable of anything beyond simple levitation, and now this pony had just channelled heat directly into my body!

Seeing my reaction, which was, needless to say, beyond amusement, the stranger just chuckled. His horn glowed once again, and I felt pain and fatigue leave my body momentarily. I never missed the opportunity and rose to my hooves immediately, stretching my limbs. The pony had obviously saved me from certain death and it was high time for some conversation.

"Can you make food with this magic of yours?"

Great, Starry Eyes. Just amazing. Such a polite things to say. Forgot your how do you dos?

I mentally scolded myself, blushing feverishly, embarrassed that hunger had got the best of me and occupied all of my thoughts. I expected the unicorn to frown or show his disapproval in some other way; to my surprise, he simply chuckled again, shaking his head.

"No, pal, I'm sorry, I'm not that good," he replied, looking at me estimatingly, one of his eyes partially squinted - a gesture I'd only seen on older ponies' faces. "But you're good, on the other hoof - when I found you unconscious, you were still holding the string in your mouth."

He was talking, of course, about the string that pulled the trigger of my rifle (my newly acquired rifle, that is). I wondered if my subconscious was really so self-protecting that it made me guard myself even when I knew I had no chance of surviving. I felt that the string was still in my mouth and while it didn't prevent me from speaking clearly, I spit it out to look more friendly, if it was possible after such a messy introduction.

"Forgive me my politelessness," I apologised, recollecting any manners my mind had stored among other shit that was filling it, not sure whether 'politelessness' was even a real world. Well, the new world asked for new terms, such as 'wasteland', 'radiation', 'mutation'... and 'deadlings'... so 'politelessness' could easily be a suitable invention. "Thank you for saving me, sir." I pondered for a moment. Why hadn't I called my bald saviour from the past a 'sir'? He had been much older than me, while this unicorn looked in his early twenties. I guess something in his attitude, the way he played, the way he sang, the way he looked at me brought about a great deal of respect towards him from my side.

My second saviour - I really am lucky, to have been saved from certain death twice in a day - only laughed, although his laugh seemed a little uneasy, as if he had practised it for a long time and never reached perfection. This unnatural laugh made me shit uncomfortably - mentally, not physically, of course: I didn't want to show my 'politelessness' again - for the wasteland had taught me to be careful with hypocrites.

"I'm no sir," he pointed out with a chuckle. "Call me..." The unicorn pondered for a moment, letter 'L' almost escaping his lips: I could see it, knowing how to lipread quite well. "Silver Dawn," he blurted out, hiding the fact he had probably just created this name on the spot. "Call me Silver," he repeated, nodding, as if he were assuring himself that it was all right to lie in such a situation. Well, if this 'L-Silver Dawn' wanted to hide his identity, so be it.

"All right, sir," I replied and facehoofed immediately. "I mean, Silver." Way to go, Starry. Way to go. Go offend some more ponies in this desert and be ready to get killed painfully, I told myself not without dark self-irony. However, Silver didn't look offended, he just smiled at me as if I were a foal and he was an elder. Which he was not, being young and all. Or so it seemed.

"Want some?" Silver suddenly turned towards me, directing his magical grip towards me, in which I saw an open tin, from which he'd been drinking.

I wasn't sure of the origin of the liquid so I took a careful investigating sniff. Whisky. I felt an urge to vomit, remembering the previous events. No, from this day on, not a drop of whisky would enter my body and corrupt it beyond all possible limits! I gently but firmly refused the drink, slightly touching the tin with a hoof.

"Thank you, Silver, but I don't drink on an empty stomach," I replied, hoping that such a lame excuse would work. Looking into the red unicorn's eyes, I saw that it had, indeed, worked, for the guy simply levitated the tin back and took a gulp himself with a shrug.

For a while, silence endured. I couldn't say it was an uneasy silence, 'cause both of us (I was pretty sure) felt relaxed and somewhat humid, bathing in the sands of desert (both physically and mentally). The much desired wind finally came, bringing not fear and plague, as I'd been told of the Eastern wind, but simply a relaxed state of mind. I felt my worries fade away, not at once, but gradually, as the vivifying coolness enveloped me, making a perfect balance between coldness and hotness. I tried to contemplate the events of the previous day from an objective point of view.

So, I drank some heavy shit because I became disillusioned in the world around me. Not a big deal for ponies of the wasteland. Then, I ended up being unconscious in an unfamiliar desert. Not a big deal either: I'm not the first one and most certainly not the last one to get in such a situation. Then, I killed a few ponies, one of them presumably being one of my rescuers. Not that was some serious shit. Of course, killing and being killed were two main freedoms of the wasteland so I would have ended up killing somepony eventually. Still, I felt some strange sombre obscurity inside, with a slight hint of mental pain.

Never had I thought about death before. Sure, ponies died every day, and died in most bizarre, gory and disgusting ways; but I'd never encountered death face to face, nor had I even been the one to develop the killing blow. Had the deaths of those ponies changed my life? Hardly. Did I really, honestly blame myself for killing them, lest my own life be taken? Scarcely. Was that a big shock to me? Barely. Did that mean that I had recently become a heartless murderer, like thieves and gangsters and raiders? Hell, who knows. I, for one, did not. And, in order to change the subject stuck in my head, I tried to think about the song that Silver had played some five minutes ago (or had it been longer? I surely got lost in time), concentrating on the melody. While the words were completely new for me, the melody seemed strangely familiar, as if I had heard it before, and, in addition, not a very long time ago.

"Silver," I wondered with caution, not to offend my second saviour with my ill manners. "Your song, the one you were playing..." I specified, mentally facehoofing: but of course he knew what song I was talking about. "It's beautiful and I wanted to know what led you to create it?" Now I gave myself a mental brohoof: not only had I managed not to look nosy but also complimented the musical pony on his creation.

"Create it?" The white-maned unicorn chuckled and looked at me indulgently. "This song goes centuries and centuries, back to the reign of Princess Celestia," he said, looking towards the (presumably) horizon, his gaze vacant, lost in thought, not unlike Chic's. I swear, for a second I had thought that it was a look of a pony who was lost in memories! Of course, it couldn't be true, for the Cataclysm had occurred centuries ago. I shrugged off the idea.

"I just translated it from Old Equestrian," Silver concluded, returning back to the waste ground from his heavenly thoughts.

Old Equestrian! He speaks Old Equestrian! a thought rushed through my head. He could be useful... I mused but stopped myself immediately. Useful? Since when did I judge ponies by their 'usefulness' or 'unusfulness'? He'd just saved my life, by Celestia's beard! (I wasn't sure whether the Princess-Goddess-of-the-Sun of the past had actually had a beard but the expression was widely used among merchants and served as a good alternative to the ear-shattering swearing of raiders and thugs.) But what does that change? a voice in my head told me, whispering in the very depths of my mind. I shut my eyes to stop it; after all, the voice was nothing but the part of my subconscious that wanted to make me stray from the righteous path. If there was such a path, that is. He's saved me, so I owed it to him; I was the one to be useful to him, not vice versa. Besides, it's not like you'll need a guy who can't do anything but sing and speak Old Equestrian... I hushed the voice, knowing very well this wasn't true: Silver was obviously a very potent spellcaster.

"Wow, you speak Old Equestrian!" I exclaimed, a little fake, just to get rid of those thoughts. "That's... cool." Amazing, Starry. You're amazing. Your vocabulary is beyond recognition. Such simple words as 'impressive', 'astonishing' and 'marvellous' avoid you completely. All you have to say is 'cool'. That made me want to mentally facehoof... for what time it was that day? Like, the hundredth?

"Yes, kind of..." Silver's reply was somewhat solemn and way too serious, as if knowing an ancient language was a burden and not a blessing. To me, it would've been an opportunity to... I pondered for a moment. What would have I done if I were to know Old Equestrian? Trying to find anything worth mentioning and failing to do so, I gave up. Here, in the wasteland, the only language of mass-communication was the language of the gun. Or knife. Or whatever shit could pierce the flesh of a pony.

I had never been an expert on weapons, you see? Sure, I could tell one gun from another, but stories told by the merchants outshone even my very imagination. Clubs, hoof-spikes, mine-throwers... How the hay can one use a bucking mine-thrower?! Still, those were the weapons of the desert and I had a nasty feeling that I would soon have to familiarise myself with them.

An uneasy silence would have established itself once more, were it not for the fact that a sound of a muffled gunshot pierced through the desert air somewhere not far from us. My ears jerked up and I chewed on the gun string once more, looking around fervently, trying to locate the source of the sound, ready to face the danger... well, face to face, that is. Muzzle to muzzle, if you prefer.

Silver, by contrast, didn't seem worried at all; he had heard the gunshot, for his ears perked up ever so sightly, but he visibly paid no attention to it. All he did was taking another sip from the tin-cup, full of whisky, a drink loathed by me as of now. Still, I had no time for contemplating my relationship with alcohol as of now, 'cause, you know, I was under the risk of being shot and all. I looked at the red unicorn in surprise, wide-eyed. Sure, I'd try to protect him - after all, he'd saved me - but was he going to do anything? Run, hide, take a defensive stance? As in, anything?

Just as I was going to ask him this very question (in a little more polite form, that is), a few black dots appeared on the horizon. The surface was flat, and that sure as hell didn't add any bonus points to our current condition: if there were a hill, it would've been easier to take aim. The one who takes the higher ground has a higher chance of success, I remembered one of Miss Spades' lessons: though the whorse was mostly useless, that one lesson was one of the few that were actually useful. I squinted my eyes to make out the shapes of five ponies approaching us at a trot.

Five ponies. Fuck me with Luna's horn, I swore mentally and cursed everything once more. There were five ponies; I had five bullets. That meant I had no privilege of missing. I lowered the gun slightly and sighed. I had to wait till the ponies came closer; as of now, I thanked Celestia that, at least, they weren't shooting as they came closer, saving valuable ammunition. I cast a side look towards the white-maned unicorn; he merely glanced at our potential enemies and went back to drinking again.

Aren't you going to do anything, you bucking drunkard?! I wanted to ask him but held the urge at bay. It's strange how, even at the face of danger (and possible death), I still didn't want to show my 'politelessness' to the pony who'd saved me. Instead, I raised my rifle again, hoping that the wreck of a gun would actually be able to shoot. The ponies were approaching but I still couldn't make out their forms; they were still only muddled silhouettes, not targets to shoot at.

I chewed on the string, straining myself. My whole body felt tense and a drop of sweat formed upon my forehead, sliding towards my brow. I prayed to Celestia and Luna and whoever was out there that it wouldn't get into my eye - that would mean losing aim, and that meant certain death. Just as the ponies came closer, I could see them well enough.

They approached us in a line, in a classic battle stance. The pony in the middle was a grey blue-maned unicorn, who was holding a revolver in his magical grip. The gun was obviously just a means of self-defence: if that pony was in the middle, that meant he was the group's spellcaster. On the left and right of him ran two earth ponies, both of whom were wearing machine guns strapped to their forelegs. The one on the left was blue, and white-maned; the one on the right was white, and blue-maned; I chuckled at how they mirrored each other, in spite of my fear. On the ends of the line galloped two pegasi, neither of whom held any firearms; that worried me slightly and I squinted my eyes as much as I could to see what was wrong. The thing is, both of them had knives strapped to each of their feathers! To each of the bucking feathers! That made them not only killing machines but also walking shields - a single motion of their wings, and any bullet would simply ricochet on them in the direction on the uneventful enemy. No wonder they were placed at the ends of the line!

Wondering idly how heavy those knives might be, I didn't notice my saviour rise from the ground and take his place to the right of me. I shivered at the sudden presence of another pony but, seeing it to be the red unicorn, calmed in a way (if you can remain calm in the middle of an upcoming shitstorm, that is). Silver looked very serene, even somewhat bored. He didn't need to squint his eyes to make out the shapes of approaching enemies. I felt ready to pull the string to activate the trigger of my gun but Silver, as if he were reading my thoughts and intentions, stopped me by levitating the string out of my mouth. Before I could protest, he shook his head, smiling at me.

"You needn't," he said, looking at our enemies (who were beginning to raise their weapons as well!). "Those are the Worshippers," he added, as though that explained everything. In fact, it did not. The red unicorn closed his eyes and a red glow enveloped his horn. The light was intense and it matched perfectly the colour of the caster's coat. Just as the ponies - the 'Worshippers', whatever that meant - approached us and were at a shooting distance, Silver opened his eyes once more.

In a moment, all five ponies fell on the ground, gasping for air, although it was clear that they couldn't get any. They were gradually turning pale, their face reddening of an intense blood pressure inside. I marvelled at the scene with my eyes wide open. As the ponies stopped moving completely, I turned my head towards Silver, my mouth agape. This pony had just strangled five ponies. Magically strangled five ponies. Now that was a level of spellcasting that only pre-Cataclysm ponies were capable of performing. Everypony in the wasteland knew that radiation lowered the magical potence of unicorns and there were hardly any ponies who could perform such spells.

Still, I had just seen one. And he was standing right next to me, his eyelids half-closed, a look of boredom plastered upon his face. I staggered back a little, just a little, but still not little enough for him to notice: he looked at me and smiled; his smile was somewhat kind and... caring? so I felt slightly assured that this pony wouldn't kill me. Not now, at least.

"You needn't be afraid, Starry," Silver told me, extending his hoof towards me - a friendly gesture many ponies had forgotten - with a friendly smile. "You're no enemy to me," he added, killing my worries somehow.

"Well, if you say so..." I wiped sweat from my forehead and released my breath I'd been holding all the time. All the bucking time. How had I managed to do so I'll never know. Then, a realization struck me, "Wait a minute, how'd you know my name? I-"

But the red unicorn's horn was already glowing - he was preparing a spell. With a flash, the world around me became dark and I felt slightly dizzy; not as dizzy as I would've become from blood loss, though - so I concluded the spell wasn't an offensive one. And even if it was, I wouldn't die suffering, like those five ponies.

"I'm just sending you to the nearest town," Silver's voice echoed through the darkness. It was drowning and I couldn't make out the next phrase he said. It sounded like 'Welcome to Stealth'... But that wouldn't make sense, would it?

Coming back to my senses, I rubbed my eyes and sent a prayer to Luna that I was alive, not blind and somewhere near civilization, if Silver hadn't lied to me or hadn't failed teleportation. Somehow, I questioned the former but not the latter. I looked around, only to see a small settlement ahead, with a steel fence and the usual shit you'd find about small towns. I took a few hesitant steps towards it. There were no guards and that bugged me, in a way. Didn't bug me more than the fact I was hungry, that is. Very, very hungry.

"Now where d' ya think ya'll goin'?" a distinctive feminine voice cooed from behind.

Shit.

I made a motion to turn round but a barrel of a gun was placed against the back of my neck in an instant. I gulped and sent a prayer to Celestia, concluding that Luna was enough of a whorse not to help me.

"I'm-" I tried to speak but the prodding of the gun told me otherwise. I gulped again and shut my eyes, as if it would save me from certain death. I guess that was just a basic, intuitive action for most ponies, if not all.

"Now jes' a lil' raider here, eh?" the same voice questioned, accompanied by laughter, presumably coming from two stallions. So she had companions.

Well, make it two shits.

"Doesn't look like a raider to me," one of the masculine voices said. I was about to kiss that pony's hooves in an instant. And yes, I know Chic would've never let me live it done if he learned it but hell, that one pony was my ticket to the train ride called 'Bein' alive'.

"More like a thief," the other stallion's voice concluded. Well, that one surely wasn't going to get any kisses. At least from me.

"All right, we'll fin' out later," the mare's voice ended the dispute firmly. Well, finally! At least now I could look at my-

I got hit at the back of my head with the butt of the gun and the world became black.

Well, three shits, is it?

I tried to struggle but staggered and fell on the ground, giving myself up to the already familiar feeling.

I fainted.

I awoke with a splattering headache. Sure, I know such an adjective doesn't go well with headaches, but do believe me, nothing goes well with headaches. So the headache was splattering. I felt like a part of my head had actually decided to live on its own, for it was numb, which was kinda nice, 'cause it didn't hurt. The other part of my head did ache miserably, making me wince with my eyes still closed. Hearing muffled voices around me (three familiar voices! Hooray!), the last part of my head that hopefully included the least damaged and the most sane part of my brain ordered me to open my eyes.

And so I did, only to see myself in a strange building, lying on a pristine white bed (clean sheets and everything! A rare sight for the wasteland!), surrounded by four ponies, three of whom were dressed in light armour and were wielding guns, while the fourth one was wearing a white gown, not armed at all. Taking a quick glance around, I saw that there was nothing in the room besides my bed, a small cupboard on the right of the bed and a window with thick blinds that prevented sunlight from coming in. So I decided to study the ponies in the room, at least until they realised I was awake.

Two of the ponies were earth pony stallions, presumably the ones that had argued whether I was a treat to them or not some time ago. (By the way, how long had I been unconscious?) They were holding similar guns strapped to their forelegs, the gunstrings held firm in their mouths. One of them was purple and lavender-maned: somewhat beautiful, for a stallion, that is. The other one was by no means handsome: he was a gruff black pony, with a silver grey mane, touched by the ever-present ageing. I immediately concluded he was the one who had accused me of being a thief. Well, that's great, 'cause he's the one who wouldn't be getting any kisses from me! I held the urge to snicker, remembering my desperate oath to myself. A pony who I'd really love to exchange kisses with, though, were it not for the circumstances (and the fact that she'd knocked me out a while ago). was a blue unicorn mare in the middle of the room. Her gorgeous white mane was falling on her shoulders protected by light armour; by the look of her (and the presumable cost of her armour), I assumed she was the leader of the ponies. As of now, she was arguing with a pink unicorn mare in a white gown. My ears perked up and I hushed my thoughts to listen.

"What I'm saying is he needs proper rest and treatment!" the pink mare said angrily, stomping her hoof against the wooden floor. Great, there was at least one pony who was on my side! I counted it as a small personal victory. Though, I decided not to express my gratitude, lest I be noticed.

"What I'm saying is he needs a good ol' gun stuck down 'is-" Aaand that's enough, thank you. That was indeed this one armoured mare that had knocked me out, thank you and goodnight. I noticed that her accent was partly Southern but not completely: in the Southern Desert, they say things like 'Ah' instead of 'I' and so on. This pony didn't. I made a mental note of it. Unfortunately (fortunately?), the end of the phrase escaped me, for the mare noticed I was awake.

"Oh, look who's up," she said with a confident smirk, trotting towards me. I felt slightly uneasy; don't get me wrong, she was hot as Hell itself and stuff - but she had hit me painfully and I had no intention of re-experiencing it. At least, unless it was a roleplay... I mentally smacked my head with a hoof to get rid of such thoughts, may they be damned. Until night, that is. Shut up, Starry. Just shut the buck up, you're not making this easy.

"So are ya gonna lie in bed all day?" she enquired, tilting her head to the side, looking at me expectantly.

I tried to get up - and managed to do so - but felt dizzy at once: my headache was progressing, as it seemed. I fervently looked around for some vessel to vomit in (forgive me my straight-forwardness but that's exactly what I wanted - no, what I needed to do at the moment) and found it! There was a glass vase standing right next to my bed! I started crawling towards the, as it seemed to me, life-saving vessel.

"See?" I heard the blue mare say to the doctor (or nurse, or whatever - I realised I was in hospital). "He's so eager to get outta-"

I threw up in the vase, cursing my manners, my illness and my very existence.

"-bed..." she concluded, not a hint of disgust in her voice, only surprise. "I guess he could spend another day in bed..." She looked at me, shaking her head. "...Or two."

She flipped her tail in the air, motioning for the guards to follow and began walking towards the exit. I jerked up in bed, risking falling asleep or unconscious again.

"Wait!" I yelled. Better to say, hissed, because the sound that came out of my mouth could be specified as hissing, unless, of course, the standards had changed since I ended up being here.

Yet, the ponies heard me. The white-maned mare turned round and raised a brow at me, looking both surprised and annoyed at my wasting her precious time.

"What'cha want?" she asked, not very rudely, but with a decent level of 'politelessness' in her voice.

I pondered for a moment, contemplating what I was going to ask.

"Which one of you guys assumed I wasn't a raider?"

Wonderful, Starry. Just wonderful. You could've asked anything: who they were, what they were after, why they had caught you... even their names, at the very least! But no, you ask this question. This important, essential question. Congratulations, Starry. You're officially a genius.

The two stallions burst into laughter. The younger stallion wiped a tear off his eye. "That's what you wanted to ask?" he wondered with a smile.

I know, stupid, right? Just thought about it myself.

"That's him," the purple stallion continued, pointing at the older pony, who nodded his head slightly.

Damn, I was mistaken. But still, he wouldn't be getting any kisses!

"Can we go now?" the mare (their leader, presumably) enquired mockingly, looking at me, flashing her eyelashes. Damn, I even had to tell... um... 'Little Starry' (go on, laugh at me) to calm down 'cause he was obviously getting pretty excited at the mare.

I nodded but the three ponies were already out. I sighed in exasperation and exhaustion (I'd never thought those two feelings could go together, but buck me with Celestia's left wing if they did not) and leaned back in bed, my thoughts returning to the only safe (at least, in my view) topic - food. And still, here I faced defeat. I was so hungry that I was no longer feeling hunger as a specific emotion - it was as essential part of my myself as the blood circulation system and other shit. I was so hungry that hunger would easily fit for my middle name. Starry Hunger Eyes. Or something like that.

I sighed again, closed my eyes and tried to fall asleep again. At least, this place was like heaven - I could rest here, undeterred, unperturbed by the dangers of the waste ground, wherever I was actually located. It would be complete and absolute heaven if I weren't hungry...

"Time for dinner!" a soft voice cooed. I opened my eyes to see the doctor (nurse?) standing before me, looking into my eyes. The pink pony smiled at me and repeated, "About time you had something to eat. What kind of dessert would you like?"

Complete, absolute heaven.

The last few days had been a personal bliss for me. Not only had I got free food and water, I also had been cared for by Nurse Meekheart (why nurses' names always end with a 'heart', I wonder?) and had been paid occasional visits by the blue unicorn mare (whose name, for some reason, was not to be revealed to me; I hoped, yet) and I had managed to make them believe in my story (maybe because I simply told them all the truth, no matter how shameful it was) - or at least convince them that I was no raider or thief, and by no means a treat to them.

One morning, I finally felt that I could get up. And by 'get up', I mean not just rise from bed and stagger in the direction of the toilet (that, fortunately, wasn't far away) but really rise to those good old hooves of mine with a clear intention to give my limbs a good stretching - running, jumping, maybe fighting a manticore or two... No, scratch the last one. Still, I was full of vigour and was looking at myself in the mirror, snorting disapprovingly at the state of my mane, when the familiar purple unicorn entered the room, taking me by surprise.

"Like what ya see?" she smirked, wiggling her brow playfully. It turned out, she wasn't that bad after all... save for the fact that she'd totally knocked me out a few days ago and held captive in this very room as of now. I'm not dumb; I can see the obvious. When it's clearly visible, that is.

"Can ask you the same," I parried mockingly, leaving my place near the mirror. "I'm as good as new!" I couldn't help but exclaim proudly, though knowing very well that she would make fun of me for the rest of the day. Or week. Or month - depending on how long she would hold me her 'free-to-go-but-too-tired' prisoner.

To my surprise, she didn't laugh or even smile. "That's exactly what I'm 'ere 'bout," she said in a business-like tone, putting on a serious face.

I'd never seen her serious before so I motioned with a hoof for her to elaborate her idea. She glanced out of the window with some lament in her eyes, in her beautiful sky-blue eyes that suited her coat so well, especially her sexy curvy fla- and that's enough, Starry! I scolded myself mentally, shaking my head quite physically at the same time.

"We need'ja help," she said simply, looking at me again, her face straight as a Celestia-damned rail. "With a mission," she concluded with an estimating look, as if she thought I would be jumping up and down with hooves upraised in a matter of a few seconds. I resolved to take a somewhat defensive stance, though.

"So, you need your prisoner's help, huh?" I wondered, backing down slightly, my eyes fixed on the unicorn's fla- eyes. Eyes. Big, round, blue... eyes. Eyes indeed.

"Hey, no one holds you prisoner," she protested, throwing a hoof in the air and waving it right before my muzzle - a gesture that I'd never been fond of. "You've been ill - now you're all right; so you can leave," she concluded with a shrug.

Although I felt that there was more to it, the premonition of potential freedom overwhelmed me. I felt warmness inside; not the meek kind of warmness from a hot bath but that one kind of warmness when you're ready to achieve something you've been longing for.

"Well, that's great 'cause-" I began cheerfully.

"Soon 's ya pay for your stay, food 'n' treatment, that is," the white-maned mare concluded with a devilish smirk.

"Wha- How much?..." I felt my excitement pop like a bucking toy balloon, and not just any balloon - a balloon full of high-quality shit that was now splattered all over me. My eyes fell down and, hearing the sum, I felt like I myself was going to fall down as well.

"Five hundred bits."

"Sweet mother of Celestia fucking her throat with Sun in heaven!"

Now I didn't know I was capable of such profanity; it turned out that yes, I was well capable. I blushed at my sudden outburst; the unicorn only smirked with some delight and... respect?

"Now that's how we do it in the South!" she exclaimed and patted me on the shoulder, making me blush again. "I reckon ya've no such bits on ya right now?" she asked, already knowing the obvious answer. It was more of a rhetorical question, really. If she knew what a rhetorical question was, that is. I, for one, highly doubted that.

"Not that I'll ever have them." I resolved to play fair; after all, I have nothing to hide. "Other options?" I wondered, hoping that those options wouldn't involve fighting manticores... or deadlings... I shrugged any possible remnants of that dream with Chic and shit and tried to concentrate on the current situation. Which was easy, considering the fact that the mare had already given her answer.

"Ya can help us with our mission and we forget all 'bout your pay. Deal?"

I sighed deeply. I was trapped - between a rock and a hard place, no less. And if this mare was a hard place, then I'd certainly prefer the rock... But my dumb curiosity (may it be damned with Luna's sexy flank) took the best of me.

"Deal," I said carefully but raised a hoof just as a wide grin appeared upon the unicorn's face. "On one condition," I continued.

"Oh, an' what is it?" the mare wondered with a smile, still celebrating victory.

"You have to tell me your name. Now," I stated firmly, supporting my words with a stomp of a hoof. "Your real name," I added, looking into her blue eyes. "I'll know if you're lying." Now, that was half true: I might know if she was lying; but hell, who gives such secrets away simple as that?

"No, I won't," she said, repeating the same phrase she'd repeated for the last few days.

"Then I'm not coming with you." I crossed my hooves, making it hard (if not impossible) to maintain balance. Still, I managed somehow. "What will you do? Kill me or something?" Now that was a risky game I was playing. I was bluffing; and it was possible for her to see that I was bluffing. Also, though these ponies were no gangsters or raiders, they still could be quite all right with killing me. But it was too late; what's done is done, and all I could do was hope that the mare would rather reveal her name than dispose of me (or torture me... in the bad way, not the good way! If there is a good way to be tortured, that is...) and cursing my ill tongue as hard as I could.

"Ya won't like it," she finally said with a sigh, after pondering for a while.

"Oh, why not?" I asked, growing more and more confident. "I'm sure that such a nice mare like you-"

"Rubber... Rubber Fun."

My mouth fell agape. I blinked a few times in silence.

"You must be fucking kidding me..." I whispered, desperately trying to hold back laughter, which was approaching my throat as of now. I chuckled. "Rubber as in rubber ducks or rubber dil-"

"One more word and I'll shove my gun down your ass," she warned. "Like, real, real hard."

"Point taken..." I snickered. "Rubber... Fun..." I burst out into laughter, not noticing the unicorn turn red.

Now remember her warning? Looks like it was true...

A few seconds later, I was sitting in the corner of the room, trying to shield myself with my bare hooves.

"Now if ya'll just turn your sorry ass t'rds me, 't would be a tad more easier!" Rubber Fun (damn, that's a funny name, really; the funniest I'd ever heard! And I'd heard names like Purple Vomit and Little Weenie!) yelled, waving her gun in the air before me.

"Help! Nurse! Help! A madpony's attacking me!" I shouted in half-mocking, half-real fear.

The door slammed open and a disgruntled pink pony ran in, stopping dead in her tracks as soon as she saw us. We - Rubber Fun and I - looked at each other as well, and, realising the whole comicalness of the situation, burst into laughter.

"I don't want to know..." the nurse whispered and backed down, closing the door behind her, making us laugh a bit more.

After a while, we both rose to our hooves (Rubber helped me) and looked at each other a little more friendly.

"So... ya game?" she asked, already knowing my reply.

"I'm game," I said, extending my hoof towards her with a smile.

"I've misheard - ya said 'game' or 'gay'? 'Cause, considerin' your looking in the mirror..." the unicorn said with a sly grin, shaking my hoof.

"Oh, how shall I call you - 'rubber' or just 'fun'?" I parried easily, not losing my face.

"Rubber," she answered angrily, mumbling something about shoving something down my throat among the lines.

"So, Rubber, what's this mission of yours?" I wondered, looking around. I hoped it would involve some movement, for I'd been chained to bed (metaphorically, of course!) for too long to my liking.

"We need t' get t' the Earth Brothers' camp 'n' kill 'em." She shrugged. "Easy 's that. I'll tell ya 'bout them on the way."

"And... how many enemies will be there?" I asked carefully, not wanting to reveal my encounter with the Earth Brothers yet. (Yes, well, maybe I haven' told her all the truth, but still! A pony can have his secrets, right?)

"'Bout twenty or twenty-five," she replied casually, as if killing countless ponies was all she did. Well, on second thought, maybe it actually was.

"And..." I continued, already feeling that something was wrong. "How many of us, then?"

"Four, including ya."

I facehoofed.

Well, shit.

Author's note.

Woah woah woah! That's a long chapter we have here! A long chapter calls for a bit of rating and feedback! You know what that means! Go write some comments, please! Your hooves won't ache! ...Mine do, as of now. Holy depths of hell - almost ten thousand words in less than a week! If you excuse me, I'll go and apply an ointment. To my hooves, of course! Hands, I mean.

Peace.

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...Hands? - Lyra