Chapter 27: A Long Trek

James floated in a dark haze, space expanding all around him infinitely. Strange echos thoughts bounced through his head. Slowly, his mind began to reboot. The first sensation that came to him was pain, pain all over his body, which was good. It meant he wasn't dead. From what he could tell, he was on his back, loose rock and rubble covered him, but fortunately he wasn't buried. The next was of a warm sticky liquid flowing down the left side of his head. The air around him was thick with dust and debris from the cave in. He opened his eyes. Darkness. Either he was blind, or his goggles were broken. Hopefully it was the latter, but neither scenario was good. He suddenly heard a noise and moved to unsheathe his knife with his right hand. All he got was an intense pain shooting from his shoulder, the arm remaining motionless.

"James, you alive?" It was Feather.

"Yeah, I'm over here." The human grunted through the pain.

James reached over with his left hand and felt around his shoulder. It was tender to the touch, but nothing seemed to be broken.

"Feather, how are you feeling, anything broken?" He asked his friend.

"No, just some cuts and bruises. How about you?" The earth pony replied.

"I got a gash on my head and I think my shoulder is dislocated, but otherwise, I'm fine." James said, sitting up.

James checked his face for his goggles. As he ran his hand over them he discovered they were broken. The casings were dented and the lenses felt cracked. He cursed and removed them. He groped around for his rucksack, which had been ripped from him during the collapse. When he found it, he stuffed the damaged gadget inside.

He heard the pony trot over to his side.

"Feather, I'm gonna need your help."

"What do you need me to do?"

"We're going to put my shoulder back in place."

"Right here? Isn't that going to hurt?"

"Like hell, but it's either that or I become a liability to you. Now I need you to put one of your hooves against my back, where my arm is attached. When I say go, give it a good shove." James instructed.

Feather complied as James pulled up some of his parka with his other hand and stuffed it into his mouth. He then gently grabbed a hold of his right shoulder.

Through clenched teeth and the parka he gave the muffled command, "GO!"

He pulled his shoulder forward as Feather did his part. James grunted in intense pain through his gag as his shoulder popped back into place. The pain vanished almost immediately. He rotated his arm a few times, making sure it worked and getting the circulation flowing again.

"Thanks brother," James said gratefully, "your NVGs still work?"

"Yeah, they do."

"Good, 'cuz you're gonna have to be my eyes, mine are busted. On that note, can you see where we are?"

"Looks like another tunnel. Did the comms repeater survive?"

"Shit, I forgot."

James checked his pack and found the small bag where it was kept. It felt intact so he felt along the wire. Unfortunately it ended. They were completely cut off from the surface.

"The repeater's fine, but our makeshift antenna isn't." James informed.

"Horseapples."

"Yup."

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The two had been walking down the tunnel for a few hours now. Sometimes it went up, others it went back down. There were shallow curves here and there, but for the most part it seemed to follow the same direction. James made his way through the darkness by holding on to the end of Feather's tail. James' compass still wouldn't work and so they had no idea where the passage would take them. Even worse, the marks of many feet covered the floor. The only good signs they could see were intermittent hoof prints in the soft dirt. It meant the captives they were searching for were still alive. Although it also meant they could run into a large host of Lotkin at any time. Because of this, the going was slow as Feather carefully checked around every corner the came to and they made frequent stops to listen for any signs of trouble. They continued like this for one day. Then another, and another. They stopped only to rest, sleeping in shifts, and to eat. They both only had enough rations between them to last a couple days so they had to stretch them out. On the third day they began to feel a light warm breeze coming down the passage. Wary of danger, they slowed their progress. James noticed that there seemed to be some light. His eyes adjusted and he could faintly make out the shape of the tunnel around him. Before long the level of the light began to intensify.

"I think we're coming up to something," Feather said, "The light is starting to hurt."

"Then take the goggles off."

"But then I won't be able to see."

"Just sit down and keep your eyes open. They will adjust in time, as long as there is a light source, you'll be able to see." James explained calmly.

The two warriors sat and waited while Feather's eyes adjusted to the low light. When they had, they continued on. The tunnel began to incline upwards. As they climbed higher, the level of the light grew. Eventually it grew to a point where James stopped his teammate.

"This looks a lot like sunlight. I think we might have found a way to the surface."

"Thank Celestia!" Feather exclaimed quietly, "I don't think I could take anymore of this!"

"Ditto buddy. Hold on, I'm going to readjust our eyes."

James took out his torch and held his palm against the lens before switching it on. He gradually increased the intensity of the light by slowly sliding his palm off the lens until he could shine it around them without their eyes hurting. Cautiously, they advanced up the tunnel. When they neared the exit James switched off the torch and shouldered his weapon. Feather took out one of his daggers, expecting the worst, just like he was trained. James exited the mouth of the tunnel with his teammate at his side, ready for action. He scanned to the left, then to the right. Before him was a great expanse of... sand. Nothing but sand. A vast desert with washes scattered about stretching past the horizon. Behind them a lone mountain rose above the barren landscape. James dropped his arms and turned to Feather.

"You wouldn't happen to know where we are, would you?"

"Well, if I had to guess, I'd say somewhere in the south western area of Equestria."

"You ever been around here before?"

"James, before you hired me on, the only places I've ever been to were Manehatten and Ponyville. I'm completely lost."

"Well... fuck."

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The duo decided to continue following the direction of the tracks which, according to the position of the sun, went east. Hopefully they would find some form of civilization soon. They had expended their rations and Feather was subsisting off of random scrub grass they occasionally came across. Eventually, they also ran out of water.

Feather and James sat at a small fire they had created to guard against the cold.

"I'm SO thirsty, are you sure we don't have anymore water?" The stallion complained.

"Yep. Trust me, I've friggin' triple checked. There's only one thing we can do. You remember your training." James said while taking his boots off.

"I really hoped it wouldn't come to that."

"If I didn't think it would, I wouldn't have taught you." James said dismissively as he removed his sweat drenched socks.

It was disgusting, but it had to be done. James had never given up without a fight and he wasn't about to do so now. He took up one of his socks in both hands and brought it over his lips. Then he began to wring the sweat out of it, letting the salty fluid dribble into his mouth. it was disgusting and he had to stop himself from gagging, but in the long run it would keep him alive. Unfortunately for Feather, he didn't wear socks or shoes and would have to make do with a different waste fluid. It was a daunting task for him, but he followed through, drinking every last drop his urine from the canteen he had deposited it in. It was a nasty business, bit necessary. James also had to end up hunting for his food. The desert was sparse, however, and all he had managed to catch was a rattlesnake. It was the first time in many months he had eaten any kind of meat. The meat of the snake was bland and tasteless, but it would keep him going. Even so, once he had finished cooking it, James ravenously devoured the thing, picking the bones clean. If Feather was disturbed by this display, he didn't show it.

On the sixth day of their journey, they reached a small river that ran from the lone mountain. Both human and pony rushed to the clear rushing water and took long sips from the sparkling liquid. As they quaffed the water down they thought it was the most delicious thing they had ever tasted. After slaking their thirst, they decided to follow the river on the reasoning that if there was any kind of civilization nearby, it would most likely be near the source of water. They traveled another two days along th path of the river before they began to notice some strange things. Silhouettes on the horizon, tracks leading in different directions through the sand. The wierd thing about these, though, was that none of these matched either ponies or the Lotkin. It was some kind of hooved animal, of that they were sure, but far heavier than any pony.

Soon, they came to a lightly wooded forest. James and Feather traveled about half a day into it before making camp. Feather volunteered to take the first watch and James made himself comfortable on the hard rocky ground. He used his rucksack as a pillow and drifted off into an uneasy sleep. Once again, all his brain would do is replay scenes from the past over and over again. Because of this, he drifted in and out of consciousness until it was about time for his shift. After one particularly bad episode, he snapped back into reality suddenly after hearing movement at his side. Assuming it was Feather coming to wake him up for his turn to stand watch, James began to rouse himself.

"It's alright, I'm already up." The human said tiredly.

"Uh, James. If I were you, I'd lay very, VERY still."

"Feather, what are you talking about?" James opened his eyes and almost wished he hadn't

Around him were five large buffalo, each with a spear held mere centimeters from his neck. Around the edge of the camp were many more, all had their eyes on the human. About three yards away, Feather stood, flanked on either side by two buffalo. All of them held a look of deep contempt on their faces as they glared angrily at the human.

"Feather, would you mind explaining?" James asked his furred friend.

"I wish I could James. The coast was clear one minute and the next, we were surrounded." The earth pony informed him.

"Well, at least there's one silver lining here."

"Yeah, what's that?"

"They haven't killed us yet."

One of the buffalo motioned for James to get up. Not wanting to instigate a potentially altercation, he complied. Then a few of the buffalo gathered James and Feather's equipment while the others set the two operatives marching further into the woods. The buffalo escorted the two separately, keeping an especially close watch on James.

"What are they going to do to us?" Feather asked nervously.

"I don't know man, I don't know. Hopefully we won't have to wait too long to find out."