After preparations at the doorway of the cold storage are complete, Gearing and Sable stand in single file waiting for their release. The door swings open, and instantly flames start kissing the air around Gearing. He grunts, and steps through it, gingerly, and into a large tray of liquid that quickly gets pushed into position by Scarlet. As Scarlet hops to the side and starts pushing the next tray into position, with the liquid closest to her starting to steam and boil the moment her hooves come in contact with the sides, Gearing continues down the laid out path of liquid filled trays. After Gearing has gotten a few trays worth away, Sable follows suit, ignoring the flames shot out by Cure as she carefully steps into the provided trays, then trotting to the nearest tray to Gearing and out of the way of the swing of the door.

Cure rhythmically continues pouring fire in the direction of the door way as she starts scooting the other containers out of the way. While the last tray is gingerly being scooted to the side, Scarlet hops over it and starts heading into the cooler with a scowl of pure malice on her muzzle.

Gearing looks back and forth, then yells out at her, but dares not leave the cleaning bath, “Scarlet! What are you doing? Shouldn’t Cure be the one to do that?”

Scarlet looks at him over her shoulder and shakes her head ever so slightly as she says with a steamy huff, “No. I want to do this. I need to do this.” She looks in the freezer and starts stomping a flaming hoof down as she screams, “I’m not this weak!” She rears up and screams at the ceiling as she waves her forehooves around, “I’m burning it all!” Then she hops through the door and lands on the worktable with a sizzling crackle.

Cure quickly shuts the door, and then bathes everything in her immediate vicinity with fire, including herself, before turning to face Gearing and Sable.

Gearing groans and lowers his head, clinching his eyes tight as he asks, “I guess we’re next… huh?”

The blast of heat coming from his companion confirms his suspicions, and he tries to prepare himself as Cure meticulously cleans Sable’s chassis with both tool and fire. He stands there, tensed, holding as still as possible as he prepares for the searing pain that is only moments away.

Instead his system is given a shock of a different kind as a deluge of cold liquids are poured all over him. He shivers and shakes and twitches as he wasn’t expecting that, then looks around and watches as Cure uses her tools and a brush to scrub his hooves ever so carefully. He lets her lead him, putting his cleaned hoof into an entirely new tub of chemicals nearby, before moving to his next one. As he is staring at her in a bit of confusion, another sensation draws his attention to his back where Sable is dutifully scrubbing him down with a bristly brush. Above him is a makeshift shower nozzle that’s continuously pumping a stream of the cleaning solution down onto him from a container nearby with Sable’s restraining cables being used to direct the flow.

After Cure has managed to get all four of his hooves cleaned and him properly transferred to the new tub, she focuses on his tail until she’s sure the dark molasses like substances are all gone from the tips of his hairs. She then begins sanitizing the other tubs that had been used, and storing the liquid in a biohazard crate for added measures and future incineration. Her part apparently done, she completely ignores the two as she carries on her own tasks.

The final tub Gearing finds himself in is larger than the others, and Sable easily has space to join him. Even more so as she practically hangs over him and continues scrubbing his entire body.

ENTIRE. BODY.

Gearing looks back at her with a smirk and asks, “So do you really think it’s that dirty, or are you just trying to start something.”

She grins at him as her flank wiggles lightly. “I must be sure my darling Gearing is cleaned properly.”

Gearing narrows his eyes at her and purses his lips to the side. “You barely touched my neck.”

Sable tilts her head and comments, “Proper risk assessment means focusing on the more important areas, with critical components given highest priority.”

He can’t help but stretch a hindleg sideways as he ends up lowering into her skilled hoofwork a bit. “And- and that’s deemed critical, but my head isn’t?”

“It’s a critical component to our love making. Risk of damage or loss is not acceptable.”

He snorts then starts slapping a forehoof in the chemical bath a bit, causing the water to splash. After a few more moments he’s apparently taken all he can. “Alright. Alright already!” he barks out. She pauses and looks at him but can’t help but smile as she hears his ears whistling lightly. He closes his eyes and asks, “Am I sterilized enough to make it to the R&D decontamination chamber?”

Sable tilts her head, then frowns a moment. “Affirmative… and that would be able to finish the process quickly as well.”

Gearing grins and takes the sponge away from her. “Great! Let’s go so we can get to work.”

He trots off and Sable follows behind dutifully. He gets to the chamber to find the nearest door already open and welcoming to him. He hops in, and a moment later Sable enters and comments, “It would be good to have the carbonization residue washed off.”

The door shuts and the cleaning process begins washing them off with the various residues coming off and running down the drain. When the cycle ends, Sable steps over towards the door and raises a hoof to step through the doorway.

The door shuts again almost the same moment it had opened.

She stares at it a moment then turns her head sideways to look at Gearing with his hoof on the door control. He leans over and runs the sponge in his mouth down her shoulder to her flank, maintaining eye contact the whole way. Then he takes it out with a wing and grins at her as her mouth hangs agape. “What? I thought you wanted to make sure we were both nice and clean?”

She slowly turns towards him, looking him in the eyes, and then getting muzzle to muzzle as she says flatly, “How about we get dirty instead?”

Gearing kisses her and forces her backwards against the wall, as he dips down. The next moment he’s swept her hindlegs out from under her with his forehooves as he continues kissing her and hoists her up with his forelegs.

Sable approves of this very aggressive message as sporadic spurts of water and soap come from the over head dispensers as a modified cycle starts again.

After Scarlet had finished spot cremation of all of the materials in the freezer, she exits the trot in fridge and tags in Cure, who heads inside to clean up the remaining leftovers. Scarlet doesn’t feel like working on the plants and the garden yet. The smell from burnt ponies and chemicals is still strong in the atrium. She heads down to the R&D department in order to apologize. If she hadn’t freaked out by the sight, and simply did then what she had just finished doing, poor Gearing and Sable wouldn’t have been sealed up and locked in there just to keep everypony safe. She feels horrible making them go through that, and wants to at least apologize.

She trots down the hall with her head low as she tries to figure out how she can make it up to them. Saying ‘sorry’ is a good start, but beyond that? She can’t even offer them first dibs on the next batch of produce. They don’t eat. What form of emotional bribery would work on a pair of robots?

She almost bangs her head on the entry door to the decontamination chamber, and lifts her head as she hears a bit of a scraping sound and a deep thump. Her eyes shoot wide and she nickers at what’s before her through the glass of the door.

There is Sable, back to the wall, and held fully aloft bouncing slightly against the side wall of the decontamination chamber with a look of uninhibited glee on her face as she has her head back and staring at the ceiling while it rains down soap on the pair. Yes. The pair. There, standing on his hind hooves and completely supporting Sable with his own hips and forelegs is Gearing. Rutting away as Sable seems to be shaken like a proper martini.

And loving every minute of it.

“Well, they seem to have gotten over it pretty damn quick,” Scarlet mutters.

A moment later she whinnies in abject terror as Sable glances over at her and makes hard eye contact mid act, and gives her a wink with a smile. Scarlet ducks down quickly, trying to avoid the glass, but then her eyes track sideways and up to the corner.

Where a camera is staring directly at her.

She springs up, motoring her legs to run in place before she even makes contact with the floor plating. Her wings give her a bit of extra forward momentum as she runs as fast as she can away, her tail catching enough wind to turn completely linear behind her as she runs away.

She wasn’t peeping on them. She wasn’t. She’s not even interested in that. But sweet Celestia how strong is Gearing?! To hold a full protectapony aloft and impact her flanks hard enough that-, okay that’s enough of that thought! Bad Scarlet! She scolds herself.

Though the little pony in her head can’t help but pointing out, Sable seemed to be having fun with that… Good thing he’s got her, anypony else would get broke in half!

The mere physics behind it is breaking her brain. She needs someone else to talk to and there’s only two that she can think of that’d be able to have a serious conversation about it. At least, as serious of a conversation as you can possibly have when the topic at hoof is robotic sex positions.

When she gets to the medical bay she finds that, for once, it’s mostly empty. In an effort to let them earn their keep, the rest of the children are out in the stable helping clean out the quarters that will soon become theirs. Once clean, whatever repairs needed can be done and they would be free to move in. Most of the protectaponies have gone with them to make sure they were safe, a condition of Swift’s, but has left Handy and Gauge free to work on other projects.

Nahlah’s the first to notice Scarlet enter, and gives her a wide toothy smile as she bounces the pair of foals in her paws. This causes Swift and Ivy to turn towards Scarlet and regard her.

Swift sighs and shakes her head. “I’m sorry you had to go through that, Scarlet. Thank you. That’s just a horrible thing to find.”

Scarlet waves it off as she looks around, and makes sure no one else is in the medical bay. “I burn things. It’s what I do.”

Ivy’s eyes go wide and she looks at Nahlah before bobbing her head towards Scarlet. “I’ve always thought she was fiery. Red heads, right? But to think she’s that damn cold? Remind me not to piss her off.”

Nahlah smirks and rolls her eyes before looking at Scarlet. “You hiding out here while Cure finishes getting that stuff out of the Arboretum?”

“No!” Scarlet belts out quickly. Defensively. Too quickly. She rubs her hoof against her upper foreleg before she says softly, “Not exactly…”

Swift and Nahlah exchange glances before looking at Scarlet again. Swift walks around and sits down in front of her. “What’s wrong, hun?”

“I saw Gearing fucking Sable’s robobrains out in the decontamination chamber down in R&D!” she blurts out as she slaps her hooves to her cheeks in complete disbelief. She hops up on her hind legs and mimics the motion with her forehooves and hips as she says, “He had her up in the air like bam, bam, bam. All up on the wall. And it looked like she was riding a jackhammer on a pogo stick! I mean! The hell?!” She looks back and forth between the three before she throws her hooves in the air. “How does that even work?!”

Ivy puts a hoof to her mouth as she snorts and snickers. Nahlah looks over at Ivy then just shrugs and grins.

Swift looks at Scarlet with her eyes wide and mouth hanging agape, absolutely horrified. “You were peeping on them?!”

Scarlet rolls her eyes, in a movement so exaggerated her head goes with them. “Noooo, not intentionally anyway. But. I mean, what the hell is he?! It can take a couple full grown earth ponies to lift a protectapony that’s broken. Or even one in Steel Ranger armor could with a struggle… But he just had her picked up like you’d flop a sack of flour over your shoulder and… and…” She slaps her hooves to her cheeks as she shakes her head reliving the visage, “And rutting her like a rag doll!”

Swift looks over at Ivy and Nahlah, who are doing their best not to laugh and wake the foals, before looking back at Scarlet. “How could you just spy on them, though? That’s so wrong! Ya perv.”

Scarlet waves her hooves in front of her. “You’re missing the point! How. Is. This. Possible!?” She leans in and raises an eyebrow. “And don’t give me that shit, I know how pervy you and Handy get with your ropes. You’d wanna know too!”

Ivy snickers and holds her muzzle closed for a while before she snorts and looks at Swift, “Looks like someone just got called out.”

Swift blushes hard and looks between them in horror.

“Ivy likes being spanked,” Nahlah offers with a wide grin.

Everyone looks at her, including a suddenly very crimson Ivy. Ivy zips her eyes between the others before she hisses at Nahlah, “What the hell, Nahlah? Throwing me under the wagon like that?”

Nahlah just snickers and shrugs.

Ivy looks at the others and points a hoof at Nahlah. ‘Yeah well she likes getting licked into unconsciousness.”

Nahlah looks at her and bats her eyes. “Pick a spot…”

Swift snickers and lowers herself as she sticks her hooves over her muzzle. She looks at the entirely appalled Ivy and smiles before she says, “Doesn’t quite work when the certain somecreature has no sense of shame.”

Nahlah looks at Swift and raises her face up and to the side indignantly. “I do too have shame.”

“You don’t even have standards…” Swift smirks and says as she waves a hoof, “That ghoul you shacked up with at the tavern kinda proves both.”

Nahlah looks over at Swift and tilts her head. “Hey, he paid well enough. Besides, I’d never been with someone so squishy before. It was kinda fun!” She smiles widely.

Scarlet puts a hoof over her mouth trying not to puke, and glad that she hasn’t eaten since emptying out her stomach in the Arboretum. That was not a mental image she needed right now.

Ivy looks around and gives a crooked smile. “I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be feeling insulted here.”

Nahlah leans over and nuzzles her cheek. “Awwww… You’ve managed to make me a one mare feline, you should be proud!”

Ivy rolls her eyes, but can’t help sneaking a smile as she looks away from Nahlah.

Scarlet claps her hooves together to get their attention. “Hey! We’re getting off topic.”

Ivy glances over and smirks. “I think we’re still well within the range of your pervy brain.”

Scarlet looks around and flops down hard onto her rear. “Oh come on! I can’t be the only one wondering?”

Nahlah looks at her and follows her down to the ground then grins widely. “Well now! If you wanted that kind of hard pounding you should have asked if you could join!”

Scarlet looks at her in absolute horror, as the other two snicker. She waves her hooves in the air and screams, “I don’t want no fucking stallion!” She clamps her hooves over her muzzle as she hears one of the foals stir and fuss as they started waking up. After a long silence where nopony moves, Scarlet says with a hiss, “It just hurt my brain trying to figure that out.”

You’d been wondering the same thing about them before, though at least your question was just partially answered, Swift’s little pony in her head reminds her.

Swift coughs into her hoof and says with her eyes closed, “Maybe we should just let them have their privacy and leave the worrying about how they do what to each other, to them?”

Scarlet nickers and purses her lips to the side as she grumbles, “You really not curious about it?” Swift opens her mouth to say something, but doesn’t as an overhead speaker kicks on.

“If you really want to know the specifics behind how Gearing’s love making functions, I’m more than happy to tell you,” Sables voice chimes in happily. “How would you like the breakdown? Relative PSI? Hoof pounds of force over distance? Friction coefficients?”

Scarlet starts sputtering and choking on her own spit as she looks at the others, who all look like their on the verge of dying from laughing as silently as possible.

“Although, I do regret to inform you that I have to deny your request to join us, Scarlet,” Sables voice comes across evenly.

Scarlet dives over under one of the medical beds that the children had been using. She yanks down the sheet and covers her head with the blanket and her hooves as she moans and tries not to die of embarrassment.

“Although, you do have a cute flank,” Stable’s voice teases.

Scarlet yanks the rest of herself under the sheet and out of view entirely. The others snicker and laugh at her for a few moments as she rolls around under the medical bed in her own embarrassed misery. Nahlah finishes snickering and looks over at the speaker as she grins and asks, “Hey, Sable… were you serious about telling us about it?”

“What would you like to know, Nahlah?”

Swift heads into the back of the Arboretum following the marker on her pipbuck. As she comes around the wall blocking her view of the open sided tool shed that’s blocking the trot in cooler she gets the unmistakable tinge of carbonized material tickling her nostrils. She frowns and calls out towards the open door, “Gearing! You in there?”

Sable’s head pops out and she waves a hoof at Swift. “Greetings, Subject Swift. Yes. Gearing is inside the cooling unit administering repairs. Do you need something?”

Swift takes a tentative step forward as she asks, “Is it safe to enter? For me I mean?”

Sable nods and grins. “Perfectly. The contamination has been completely removed.” She waves her hoof beckoning Swift in as she turns around and rejoins Gearing inside.

Swift trots over and looks in, and her eyes take in the sight before her.

Currently, Gearing is working on rewiring the lights in the ceiling. The indiscriminate fire that Scarlet had unleashed had blown out all of the lights and melted most of their contact points. The walls are covered in varying degrees of thermal damage from scorch marks that Sable is working hard to scrub away, to warped paneling that will probably need to be hammered out if not reforged entirely.

Gearing looks down at Swift as he flutters in place with his oversized wings and gives her a light wave of a hoof before jamming his screwdriver into a gap between panels and asking, “What’s up?”

Swift looks around the room and lets out a sigh before she asks, “How long until the freezer’s fixed, you think?”

Gearing hops down and ruffles his wings a bit before settling down. “If you mean fully repaired, that’s going to be a while. Need a few more components. And some of this needs to be remanufactured before it gets installed.” He waves a hoof and grins as she starts to frown. “But, she’s functional. Not like deep, deep freeze level. But she’ll keep food cold and from rotting.” He points a hoof where Sable is trying to buff out a deep scorch mark in the metal sheet. “Most of it is just cosmetic really. Might not be pretty, but works.”

Sable looks over at Gearing and flutters her eyes at him as she asks, “Where as I both work and am pretty?”

Gearing’s eyes go wide and he shifts his gaze between them for a moment before he just shrugs and grins. “Bet your sweet can you are.” Sable giggles and shakes her flank at him a bit before happily returning to scraping off the metal slag and carbonized flakes.

Swift rolls her eyes before muttering, “Should I leave you two alone?”

Gearing trots over and grabs a part from a crate on the floor and returns to the light in the ceiling. “Nah. Work gets done either way. Nothing wrong with a little on the job flirting and multitasking is there?”

Swift nickers then asks, “Think we’d be able to start storing some meat in here?”

Gearing looks over at her and says flatly, “That’s … kinda what they were using it for before.”

Swift slaps a hoof over her eyes and groans. “I mean like… real food. Not ponies.”

Gearing tosses a few busted pieces of electrical components into a bin below as he’s working. “It’s the same really. I mean. If you think about it.” He looks over at her and sees the look of abject horror on her face. “I mean the temperatures needed to keep it from rotting! A freezer is a freezer, it either makes ice or it doesn’t that’s as far as it cares.”

Swift nods. “Oh. Right. That makes sense.” She looks around as she comments, “I wanted to make sure we had some place to store some meat. I really need to go blow off some steam. This bullshit with the Gunners, and the Institute, and the Institute Gunners…” she nickers. “I really wanna kill something and the bugs were fun but just not as…. Satisfying.”

“Mind some company?” Gearing asks while he’s still got his head partially in the ceiling.

Swift looks up at him and raises an eyebrow. She allows herself a momentary flick of eye focus to Sable to see if she’s staring, but she’s not, before she asks, “Why?”

Gearing ducks down and looks at her, with his hooves still holding the conduit in place. “I’d like to make sure my rifle’s sighted in properly. And I need distance for that… Also if you’re going a distance away I’d like to snag any salvage that might be out there that we need.” He reaches up, bites down on a cluster of wires and pulls them towards himself. He spits the fragment of conduit he had fished out of them with his tongue into the container below as he drops down to the floor again. “So I’d like to tag along and see what there is to get.”

“I’m probably going to be heading quite a distance.” Swift waves a hoof dismissively. “Most of this area has already been hunted out before we even got here. Just give me a list of what you need and I’ll keep an eye out for it.”

Gearing rolls his eyes and sits down. “There’s no point in making a list. I already know everything we need, and I’ll be able to tell if something is useful enough to us or if I can jury rig it to do or be something we need. That’s not the kind of thing I can just write on a list unless you want me to say something like ‘every piece of metal, ceramic, and even tiny fragments of arcano-tech’ cuz that’s about as far as I can tell someone that can’t just do it themselves.”

He stares at her for a while as she mulls the request over. There’s many things that he wouldn’t even put on a list, even if it was that simple. Some things that are important to him. Things he wouldn’t be willing to admit to. He looks over at Sable and sighs as he thinks the only sure fire way of keeping something secret is keeping it to yourself. Admitting vulnerabilities is just asking for it to be exploited.

Swift smiles and waves a hoof after a bit. “Well, I’m sure you won’t slow me down too much. You know how to stay out of sight and not give yourself away.” She leans away from him and says softly, “I still don’t see how someone so shiny and heavy can be that damn sneaky.”

“Finite control,” Sable offers as she puts her weight into a bristle brush scraper and continues to knock off the composites from the wall.

Swift looks over at her and tilts her head. “Huh?” Gearing looks as well, unsure of where his metallic mare is going with this.

“Organics primarily move around by letting gravity yank them back to the ground. And movement with muscles is simply a factor of which muscle is pulling in which direction. While it’s counterpart goes lax. However, Gearing’s clockwork form provides resistance in every conceivable direction. The gears don’t just slack and spin freely letting gravity do the work. All of the gears turn, intentionally, as he moves. So there’s no unnecessary movement, and he can stop and go at will, even mid-movement.” She looks over at Swift and adds, “At least as much as inertia allows.” She looks back and forth between the two then says softly, “At least… that’s my hypothesis…”

Swift points a hoof at Sable and looks at Gearing. He nickers and shakes his head. “Hey, don’t look at me about that. I have a hard enough time just trying to explain what the hell I am to ponies. Though…” He looks over at Sable and grins. “As far as ideas about it, that’s probably the one I’ve heard that makes the most sense really.”

Sable grins widely as she scrunches her shoulders up to her head and continues working.

Of course Gearing, like any good card player, knows it’s best not to lay everything out until the time’s right. He’ll just let them have fun trying to figure it out in the meantime. He’s got a few tricks that neither of them have realized yet, but that’ll come in time.

Especially if a couple of them ever start working again.

Swift looks at him for a few moments as she gives the situation a ponder. “Well,” she starts. “If we go out far enough there’s a town I know we can trade at.” She bobs her head around. “If we find enough things to trade we can just drop it off there and sell it for caps or trade for something else we need.”

Gearing’s ears perk up. “A town? Like… an actual town?” He looks back and forth between Sable and Swift. “One survived?”

Sable looks over at Swift as she is similarly curious. Swift waves a hoof then says, “No. I mean. Sort of? It’s been rebuilt. Most of the actual towns had been hit. Even if they’re still standing the areas still too dangerous to get into because of radiation or cloud.”

Gearing shakes his head as he looks around. This is a new bit of information for him. He’s glad that at least somebody survived the death of the world. He’s a bit conflicted though. There are many things that can go wrong when you meet up with new people, not to mention all of his personal problems. He hopes they don’t take one look at him and shoot at him. Ponies are far less likely to shoot another pony, than they are at an automaton. At worst, from their perspective, they can just take the precaution and say ‘oops’ since it can be repaired.

He knows; he’s already had that happen. And that was before everything went to hell.

Gearing shakes his head and nods towards the door. “I’ll get everything I need and I’ll meet you at the stable door. When do you think you want to go?”

Swift shrugs and puts her hooves in the air. “Well, I was wanting to go as soon as this is done. If it’s ready, we can go now. The sooner we get what we need the sooner we can get back and you can continue repairs on the stable.”

Gearing nods and turns to look at Sable, who’s completely stopped work and staring at him. He rubs a hoof over his upper forearm as he asks, “Would you mind staying behind and finishing up here? It’d really help us out. It’s mostly cosmetic but I’m sure you can handle it.”

Sable gives him a wide smile then walks up and throws her forelegs around his neck. “If that is what my darling Gearing wants. I am more than happy to help.” She pulls him into a hug then gives him a kiss. “Please stay safe out there. There are many bad ponies in the wasteland and they can be rather violent.”

Gearing hugs her back with a hoof before turning to leave. “Don’t worry. I’ll be careful. Besides…” He turns back to look at her over his shoulder and gives her a grin. “I know that you’ll be waiting for me and I’ll want to hurry back to you.” He starts walking away and, as he notices her eyes drift down, he starts exaggerating shaking his flank with each step.

She hops forward towards the door and shakes a hoof at him. “That was unnecessarily mean of you, Gearing! Shaking your glorious flank at me and just… leaving like that! It’s not fair.”

Gearing turns around and grins at her, then throws his wings in the air, directing the light to sparkle around him as he flashes her a smile. “Drink in the view, hon. But don’t worry. I’ll be back.”

She shakes her flank a bit and groans, “You are sooo mean sometimes, Gearing!”

Swift rolls her eyes and trots out the door past Sable as she moans, “Just get your shit together and meet me at the door. If you two start fucking again, I’m not waiting on you.”

Sable looks at Swift with her mouth open. “And you are mean as well, Subject Swift!”

Swift chuckles and hurries up at a fast canter before she loses it and ends up rolling on the ground laughing at the pair as they banter.

Gearing eventually gets away from Sable, but not before she zips out and demands another kiss, or two, and gets a hefty-hoofed smack on his flank for good measure. Hard enough that it actually hurt. She grins at him as he’s walking away. “The sting will remind you what’s waiting!”

Gearing heads straight to the R&D department and rummages through his personal armory, and takes a few items from the armory that he’d set up for the rest of the stable. Unlike previously, and against what might have been otherwise acknowledged as best practice, he goes ahead and takes his own advice to Sable and puts on his entire suit of combat armor. Yes, it’s bulky. Yes, it looks absolutely ridiculous on a mechanical creature such as himself, and, yes, unfortunately, it might very well increase the likelihood of him getting shot. But, it’s a precaution he’s loath to leave behind. At least until he gets more adjusted to the surrounding area. But the combat armor should increase his own resistance enough to not entirely have to worry about getting put down with a single well placed round.

Even as astronomically hard as that would be to accomplish, he knows it’s actually possible. And underestimating your opponents would typically lead to death. Something he also highly understands as he’s used that to his own advantage repeatedly in a past life.

He straps on his 10mm pistol and his saddle bags. And, finally, last but not least, he takes the long rifle off of its rack and slings it over his back. The weapon is far longer than anything else he’s used recently, and he’s sure that, given his break down and understanding of it, this rifle has a high potential to help keep him safe.

And, in doing so, present a high likelihood of proving exceptionally dangerous to anypony stupid enough to take shots at him.

By the time he gets to the stable entrance, Swift is already there waiting on him. Sitting leaned back on some railing, Swift fiddles with her powerhoof as she waits as patiently as she can. She looks up as she notices movement out of the corner of her eyes. She shakes her head and blinks a few times before she stands up fully. “Huh. I figured you two would be busy polishing off the walls with your flanks.”

Gearing stops mid stride, and stares at her with his mouth agape and eyes wide.

Sable’s voice comes over a nearby speaker excitedly, “That is an excellent idea, Subject Swift! We should perform a series of experiments to test the effectiveness!”

Swift watches as Gearing sputters and starts whipping his head around as he tries to say something, anything, but fails. Swift reaches up her hoof towards a speaker nearby as she grins, then thrusts it towards the speaker. Over the speaker a sound plays back as if a hoof clopping against another, in a digital hoof bump, and Swift just grins even wider as Gearing looks at them in confusion.

He hurries towards the door while shaking his head. “Alright, come on. Let’s go. Unless you two want to sit here embarrassing me all day.”

“You sure you don’t want to wait until your ears quit whistling?” Swift asks. “You might give away our position with all that racket.”

“I think it’s cute the way his ears whistle when he’s embarrassed,” Sable says with a giggle.

Gearing sits down and yells out with his eyes closed and shaking his head around on the end of his neck in disbelief. “What ever happened to hurrying up and leaving so we can hurry up and get back?!”

Sable giggles. “You don’t have to leave, you know?”

Swift rolls her eyes and begins working the controls on the stable entrance. “Alright, alright. Let’s go. Plenty of time to pick on Gearing later.”

Gearing sits there in a huff staring at the door with his mouth pursed to the side mumbling and muttering to himself.

The door opens and Swift walks up and watches the sequence play out. She glances over at Gearing, but can’t help but smirk at his sour disposition. The door finishes opening and Swift trots through the opening and out into the entrance area.

As Gearing gets up to leave the speaker next to him announces, “Gearing?”

He pauses his trot and looks over at it with a slight frown.

“I love you, Gearing. Stay safe,” Sable’s voice comes across softly.

He looks around for a camera and spots one above the Stable 68 front door. From it’s atypical movement he can tell she’s paying particular attention to this camera. He looks up at it and grins, then blows a kiss towards it before he says, “I love you too, Sable,” then heads out of the stable door and joins Swift at the stairs up.

Footnote: Internal Monitoring component beginning diagnostic. . .

Internal component 01 not responding. . .

Internal component 02 not responding. . .

This chapter is more about setting things up between characters for future developments and reveals instead of mysteries to solve, but things are moving right along.

Timeline progresses and soon I hope to crest the wave and it all be smooth sailing from there. Until then? Increasing stress, but the sorta good kind that's motivating instead of soul crushing. And a lot of that has to do with making progress and having extra aid in getting it done. You all are amazing!

-Quillsy