Gearing’s diminutive form sits in nothing but his brassy metallic skin as he stares at Stormfront’s raven black combat medic. She’s taken position sitting in front of him on the floor of her room as she scans a book lying next to her. Though it is her personal bedroom, it’s much larger than the others. Not simply a matter of being a privilege of her higher rank, but out of necessity. A fact that becomes quite apparent when one realizes the majority of her ‘bedroom’ is filled with equipment for the arcane arts and surrounded by floor to ceiling shelves of books on various subjects. Tables and other, lower, shelves buried in books cover the majority of the floor space. With the only actual ‘bedroom’ portion of the room, or at least the part that anyone would recognize as such, being limited to the tiny footprint containing: her bed, a hooflocker, and a dresser that’s functioning as a night stand at the head of the bed.

Cross carefully peruses a book before she looks up at Gearing and says quietly, “Well, this is definitely something new… We’ll get our people in the Ministry of Arcane Sciences to get to work on something better, but I might be able to come up with a patch job until they get something more permanent.”

Tower walks over with a couple book stands held with a foreleg as he has several books balanced on his back. He sets the stands up on the floor then pops his back, deftly transferring the books neatly onto the individual stands as he asks, “What about paint of some kind?”

Gearing shakes his head slowly as he looks down at the ground and sighs. “No, I’ve tried that before… It’s good enough to cover up the shine of my hide, but it never lasts long and it won’t work at all for my eyes.”

Cross nods before she leans in and starts closely examining his eyes yet again. “Yeah, the paint’s film coating is enough to blind him… I don’t really understand how he can see at all, but he can…” She looks at Tower as she scrunches up her muzzle in one weird pose after another as if she had peanut butter stuck to the roof of her mouth. “Only thing I can think of is it’s sort of like a… Scrying spell of sorts… But one that isn’t disrupted by matrix canceling spells or counter spells…” She leans in even closer as she says, “The articulation of the apertures of his eyes are so thin and intricate, it’s hard to believe they don’t jam up from powder generated from them rubbing against each other like typical mechanical wear would cause.” She blinks a few times as she asks, “That doesn’t happen, does it?”

Gearing gives a slight shake of his head before he goes back to letting her examine his eyes. “Nope. Not on its own anyway… I’ve had a few problems with sand and the like getting in me a couple times, but beyond that my body doesn’t do it on its own.”

Tower laughs richly as he looks over at Cross, “Yeah, sand has a way of getting into absolutely everything, and into places you didn’t even know you had, doesn’t it?”

Cross glances at him and smirks before looking back at Gearing. “Yeah… Okay, let’s try something, and let me know if your vision changes at all.”

“Okay.”

Cross leans in close as she slowly trails her focus over every minute fold of his eyes, and her horn starts to glow. She stares and focuses until Gearing’s eyes start to glow along with her horn. As she pulls back, and lets the spell work, she gives him a wide grin. Then it turns a bit sheepish as she looks him over. “Well?”

Gearing shrugs. “No. I can see fine. Nothing changed, that I can tell anyway, why?” He looks over at Tower as he asks, “Is there anything different?”

Tower’s eyes go wide as he points a hoof at Gearing. “Okay, that’s just fucking creepy. The hell did you do to him?!”

Gearing quickly grabs a tool tray, flips it over, and holds it up with his wings as he looks at his own reflection. And what stares back at him is definitely different from what he was before.

Cross rubs her hooves together as she says softly, “I did say it was going to require a lot of experimenting…”

Gearing looks over at her and grins as he says, “That’s fine! It’s definitely a start!”

Tower leans towards Cross as he asks, “What’d you do, and why are his eyes entirely white? Like white white? Where the hell’s his pupil? Or where the color of his eyes would be for that matter?”

Cross rubs her chin as she says, “I was trying to focus on the outer parts of his eyes, and limit it to that, but apparently they’re so interlocked that it’s probably going to take a few smaller castings and focus on one little piece at a time instead of trying to do the area.” She waves it off as she says, “It’s just a basic illusion. A cross with magically dying it, so there’s no film to block his vision.” She leans in closer as she taps the end of her muzzle with her hoof as she ponders the puzzle over. “You know… Maybe if I offset it... I could even disguise the articulation points, and make it entirely smooth…”

Gearing nods as he says, “I’ll trust ya… It’s looking good to me so far!”

Cross smirks as she comments, “So, there’s a couple film generating spells that might be able to be modified to cover up the rest of you too… Wouldn’t be too hard to add in filaments to it for simulating fur beyond that. And after that it would be a simple matter of adjusting the spell matrices to get the filament properties correct for length, thickness, and color… Although we’d have to find the right parameters to simulate the approximate feel of fur... and-”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, time out!” Tower yells while crossing his forelegs for a time out. “Let me get out of here before you just mind melt me with all of that arcane science stuff!” He turns and trots out as quickly as he can as he laughs heartily and says, “Good luck with that, Nitro!”

After the door to her room shuts, Cross closes her eyes as she sticks her tongue out at Tower’s back. She returns to looking at Gearing as she says, “Just to warn you, the first versions of the spell are going to have to be simple illusions. And we’ll have to sort out a renewing, regenerating, or power situation… But, yeah, I’m pretty sure we can do something that’s more passable.”

Gearing nods and grins at her as he says cheerfully, “Thanks, Cross! Just let me know what you need me to do!”

“No problem!” Cross nods as she turns to peruse a book again. “I enjoy solving a puzzle, and this one seems like a worthy one, for more than just my own curiosity…”

They sit in silence for a few more moments as she pours over the books around their hooves and on the stands that Tower had set up for them.

“Cross?” Gearing asks softly.

“Hmmm?”

“Thanks…” Gearing replies sheepishly.

She turns to look at him with a smile as she says, “I just said it’s not a problem why are you-” She stops mid sentence as she sees the pained expression on his face. “Gearing… what is it?”

He shakes his head a bit before he slowly looks up at her with just his eyes. “I don’t mean that… I mean… thanks for not asking…”

She scoots in closer as she tilts her head. “What?”

Gearing avoids looking her in the eye as he vaguely waves at himself with a hoof and says softly, “For not asking what happened…” He opens his mouth to continue, but all that comes out are ticks and a few clicks before he manages to say, “Cuz that’s what everyone always asks…” He hangs his head as he says, “And… I can’t tell them… because I don’t know…” He shakes his head violently as he says, “I can’t tell them what I am because I don’t know… I don’t know what really happened. I don’t know what I really am. And I don’t really know what anyone could have done to deserve ending up looking like this!” He hits himself in the chest with a hoof hard enough that a loud clang reverberates off the walls of the large room. He slowly looks up at her as he says, “I d” *Tick* “on’t wanna” *click* “look like this” *Tick* “this anymore…” He stretches out a hoof and gently grabs her forehoof on the floor as he begs, “Please… anything you can do…” He hangs his head as he ticks and clicks a few times before he manages to groan out, “Please, River Diamond…?”

Cross’s eyes go wide as she looks the small pegasus over. And, despite his mass, and already abnormally small stature, he seems even smaller at the moment to her. She scoots over and wraps a foreleg around him, maneuvering the pair so she can hold him to her as she buries his face in her shoulder as she leans down. “Awwww… honey… it’s alright.” She gently nuzzles him as she says, “I’ll help you as much as I can… That’s what we’re here for… helping each other… right?”

Gearing nods lightly as he rubs his face into her chest. “Yeah…”

Cross holds him and smiles as she gently rocks him. “So don’t worry, we’ll get through this… together…”

“Thanks, River…” Gearing mumbles into her shoulder. A few moments later he asks, “Cross?”

“Yeah?”

“Please, don’t tell anyone you saw me crying…”

She grins and holds him tighter as she says, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I didn’t see anything…”

Out of his flight suit and with his metal hide covered in a variety of fine blue hairs, an indicator of the recent experimentation he has taken part in, Gearing continues looking over a scattering of papers in front of him as he sits on the floor of Cross’s bedroom. The room seems neat and orderly, with most of her projects having been left abandoned for some time given their recent busy schedules. She lies next to him, her legs comfortably tucked in under herself as she looks at the paper in front of them with her eyelids drooping heavily.

Gearing slides a paper out of the way as he asks, “So… the distance that can be traveled… depends on the mass being teleported… not the weight of it?”

She nods lightly as she says with a mumble, “Yeah, which is why using a spell to make the item lighter first, doesn’t actually help… it-” she lazily stifles a yawn with a hoof before she mumbles out the end of her thought, “it won’t change the mass.”

Gearing looks at her and frowns as he asks, “You just got back, and you guys have been up for a while. We can pick this up in the morning.”

Cross smiles wearily and shakes her head lightly. She reaches over and gently caresses his cheek with a hoof as she turns his face to look her in the eyes as she says, “Remember, Gearing… we can’t be selfish… Business before pleasure… even if we miss a bit of sleep or it’ll make us uncomfortable.” She traces the hoof around and gently ruffles his mane as she adds, “And you have a lot you need to learn quicker than most…” She weakly lets her foreleg flop to the ground as she says while limply patting on the papers, “And the sooner you get through all of this, the sooner you can move on to moooo-” She stifles another yawn, but fails utterly and finally finishes after the exhaust of air has run its course. “oooore important things…”

She shakes her head lightly and looks down at the papers as she gently leans her head against his shoulder and neck. “It’s a function of mass and distance… not linear…”

Gearing nods lightly as he looks over the various formulas that she’d written out for him already. “Okay… so if something either weighs a lot… sorry… has a lot of mass… or is going a long distance… it’s going to require a lot of arcane energy to complete the cycle…” He stares at the paper for a moment. In silence. After not receiving an answer at all, in neither affirmative nor negative, he turns his head slightly to look at her at his side. Her breathing has slowed even further as she hangs her head over and rests it against his shoulder.

Sound asleep.

He reaches over with a wing, grabbing a cloth that had been tossed aside previously to make room on the table, and slowly dragging it to him. He very slowly, and awkwardly pulls it over himself, then feeds it up and over both of them, before pulling it around Cross’s other side. After covering her up, he returns to looking over the books around him. Every now and then he reaches over to a pile nearby and grabs the first book from the top that he finds to read. Given how they were haphazardly placed there to make room on the table recently, there’s no discernable order to it. The book on some random installment of the Code of Military Justice was an informative, if not entertaining read. The Big Book of Arcane Science was entertaining, but not really informative in his opinion, as he had no way of testing any of its theories without any kind of magic to do so with. Gearing spends the night moving as little as possible as he grabs one book after another, and peruses its contents.

As he’s meticulously looking over a diagram of a new rifle in the Ironshod Armory catalog, Cross jerks a bit and raises her head as she mumbles, “Wha… who? What’s goin’ on? I didn’ fall 'sleep on watch did I?”

Gearing reaches over and pulls the blanket closer to her as he says softly, “Nothing, River. Get some sleep… It’s my turn on watch.” After he finishes snugging the blanket to her he says with a slight smile, “… dark shield in the night, right?”

She wipes the long stream of drool from her muzzle before she rests her head back against him and yawns as she says, “And a keen blade…” She smacks her lips a few times and snuggles into his shoulder as she goes back to sleep mid sentence, “Wake me if you need anything, Geari-”

“Sure thing,” he says softly as he watches her quickly fall asleep again. After she’s apparently completely dozed off, evident by the resurfacing of a stream of drool, he adjusts the blanket around her again and fluffs his wing along her neck and head to provide more support instead of any hard pointy bits. “See ya in the morning.” He pulls the magazine closer and continues mentally manipulating the diagram in his mind’s eye as he imagines its inner workings and lets her sleep.

The trip back to Megamart was pleasantly uneventful, and the single solitary stop along the way was only long enough for Gearing to fly into the building, and come back with the sack of loot that Dandy had hidden after they’d dispatched their ambushers. By the time they get back to Megamart, it’s getting late and the sun’s already lowering, with a few rays shooting through along that thin line between the cloud layer and the horizon. Along the way Gearing had donned the black stallion’s brown duster and is wearing it under the blanket he’s still using as a cloak. Given the chemical coating he’d applied in Megamac had been scorched off of him, he feels every extra added layer of coverage is for the best.

After they got within visual range of Megamart, and Gearing’s EFS is showing clear, except for a few individuals mingled in with the mob of bounty hunters, Gearing lands and continues the rest of the way towards the front doors on hoof. He can’t help but glancing in their direction as he debates on letting a first strike deal with the problem of the red chevrons mixed in with the blue.

See, this is why we keep that shit turned off! You can’t just preemptively kill every red bar you see! The little blue pegasus in Gearing’s head says as he fluffs up and ruffles his feathers. That’s illegal! You gotta wait until they shoot first or… like… do something!” It bops him on the side of the head repeatedly as it says, Turn that shit off already!

And Gearing can’t help but agree. It’s hard not to react to information you already know. To what you can plainly see. But, doing so can cause a lot of problems, not least of which is letting others around you know that you, somehow, know something you really shouldn’t have known.

So he turns it off and goes about the oblivious task of walking towards the group of security mares at the front gate of Megamart. But he can’t help himself from repeatedly glancing in the direction of the mob of bounty hunters as the events of that afternoon play out in his mind’s eye.

Alright… fine… How about this… if any one of them shoot at you, kick that shit back on and don’t stop shooting until the only red left in our line of sight is the blood stains. That sound fair? the little blue pegasus asks with a sigh as it keeps looking over in the direction of the bounty hunters and, again, expects someone to do something stupid.

Again.

But, thankfully, no one really pays attention to him, or his wagon convoy, as they are approaching Megamart on the road along with the rest of the normal hoof traffic.

As the convoy is walking up to the front gate where the Megamart’s security is working to sort through the hoof traffic, one of the mares steps out and waves the brahmin over towards them.

“Five caps per head, ten per Bessy,” she says as she does a quick headcount.

Gearing walks around from the other side of the wagons, after deciding they are close enough that anyone that was going to spring an ambush would have already done so to not risk getting Megamart’s security involved. He looks the gatekeepers over before spotting Keystone. Gearing walks up to the blue mare that’d flagged them down and nods towards where the green and brown mottle coated mare stands managing traffic, “We’ll get to settling that bit in a minute, but I need to talk to Keystone first.”

The blue mare looks him over with a frown across her muzzle and a suspicious narrowing of her eyes. She looks over to the side and waves a hoof as she yells, “Hey, Keystone, got a buck over here that needs to talk to you.

Keystone’s ears perk up as she lifts and stretches her head up over the crowd a bit before waving a hoof high in the air. “Be there in a minute!” A few minutes later she walks around and up to the blue mare as she asks, “Yeah, what’s up, who needs-“ She stops as she sees Gearing’s ratty blanket. “Oh, it’s you…” She looks around quickly then says, “Hey, those bucks from earlier were out stalking about. They took off a while ago, but they had some friends and I’m sure they were out looking for trouble. So you’re gonna wanna watch yourself.”

Gearing shrugs as he says, “Ah, nah, I’m not worried.”

She smirks as she asks, “What, catch them out there and knock the shit out of them?”

Gearing grins and pulls back his blanket as he asks, “Like my new jacket?”

Her eyes go wide as the smile falls off her face. “Did you seriously kill them?!”

Dandy hops out of the back of the wagon and trots over as she says, “No, I did.” She looks around and glowers at those around her as she starts sizing up the ponies around her and tries to figure out who in the crowd might be a problem.

Keystone looks over at her and points a hoof at Gearing, then at Dandy, and then swings it back and forth before she asks, “Wait… you? Why’d you do it? I mean, they had it coming, but what was your grief with them?”

Dandy walks up next to Gearing and gives her a beaming grin as she holds her head up high and says, “The bastards ambushed us, and tried to kill me and my partner… And I don’t put up with that bullshit.”

Keystone smirks as she waves the same hoof back and forth as she asks, “Partners? You two? Since when are you two a thing, Dandy?”

Dandy’s cream face instantly glows neon pink as her eyes go wide.

“Bounty hunting partners,” Gearing interrupts and redirects the conversation. “We went after a mark the Finders wanted taken care of.” He motions towards the brahmin as he says, “Apparently at least one of the brahmin works for the Finders. Survived their caravan getting attacked. The others could probably use some work too.”

Keystone looks the wagons over before she looks between the two again. “Who the hell you take down that had all this shit?”

Dandy partially closes her eyes as she grins widely and says in a soft, almost seductive, voice, “I got Cookie.”

Several conversations around the front gate come to an absolute halt as those within earshot turn to look at her.

Keystone’s eyes go wide as she looks between them. “Are you serious? You took down Cookie?! That rapist psychopath?!” She leans closer to them and asks quickly, “You got any proof?”

Gearing gives a sheepish grin as he says, “Well… yeah… About that.” He rubs a hoof over his mane through the cloak as he says, “So… I got his head… or what’s left of it… and what’s left of his mark… But… if nothing else the brahmin can verify it.”

Both of the brahmin in the lead wagon nod all of their heads rapidly.

“Oh he’s dead alright!” Earl says with a grin.

“Done and done!” Agrees Ted

The other brahmin with the lead wagon nods both heads as the one on the right says, “I saw it! He’s deader than dead!”

“Cookie got cooked!” the other head cheers.

Keystone beckons them with a forehoof as she says, “Well, let’s see it.”

Gearing lifts up his PipBuck and looks through his item sorting list. He’d wrapped both of them pretty well to keep the mess from getting anywhere, but still didn’t enjoy the thought of putting it in his bag. But, if nothing else, doing so helped him verify, to himself if no one else, that the deed had been done. He can’t help but smirk as he sees the aptly named item in his inventory.

Cookie the Cook’s mangled head.

He reaches under his cloak and pulls the sack that had been brought to the top by the sorting enchantment, and holds it out for Keystone to inspect.

She grabs it, unties the cordage holding it closed, and sticks her face over the opening to look inside. Instantly she gags and pulls her head back and away from it as she holds the sack as far away from herself as she can with a hoof. “Holy crap! Did he smell this bad while alive?!” She sets the bag down and peeks into it from a distance as she asks, “And they let him touch their food!?” She tilts and turns the head as she says, “Yesh… you did a number on him…”

Dandy leans over and looks in, then her mouth hangs agape as she turns her head to look at Gearing. “What the hell, Gearing!? What’d I say about leaving the body identifiable?!”

Gearing looks at her and frowns as he says defensively, “Well sorry! I was a little busy at the time trying to make sure he didn’t roast your ass.” He points a hoof at the bag as he says, “He did it to himself really.” Gearing heads over to the wagon, and pulls out the wrecked flamer and as he’s setting it in front of Keystone he says, “When the fuel tank ruptured the entire area turned into a fireball. So that’s why he’s a crispy critter.”

He pulls out a cloth bundle out of his saddle bag, sets it down on top of the flamer, and unrolls it. He points at the burnt scorched hide with the remnants of brown hair barely visible across its surface and the frying pan cutie mark. “Taking him down to the ground before the tank blew at least saved this much of it.”

Keystone looks between the three items as she lets out a long gush of air. “Well… we’re gonna have to talk about this to be able to confirm the whole bounty.”

“Awww dammit,” Dandy groans as she hangs her head. “All that work for nothing…”

Keystone looks up at her and shakes her head. “No, I think this’ll be enough… especially with the witnesses.”

Gearing tilts his head as he says, “Well… if you got anyone with a PipBuck…” He raises his left foreleg as he smiles and says, “Just have them drop the stinking head in their satchel and check their inventory. There’s enough there for the enchantment to properly identify it.”

Keystone bobs her head around as she says, “Hey, that might just work.”

Dandy perks up, with her ears shooting up just as quickly as the grin on her muzzle does. She looks between them before she asks, “So… what about the rest of his gang? Was there a bonus for them?”

Keystone slowly looks up from the sack as she raises an eyebrow. “What?”

Gearing grins as he nods his head under the cloak. “Yeah. We took out the whole group.” He shrugs as he says, “At least all of the ones that were at that cookout plaza… I don’t know if anyone else was out at the time doing whatever atrocity, but I got quite the pile of identification material in the back of the wagon.” He shrugs as he adds, “And no one came back while we were there, and we’d camped out for a while-”

“Waiting for the rain to die down!” Dandy blurts out as she flushes. She looks around and rubs a hoof through her black mane, causing the blue highlights to dance across the surface, as she nervously chuckles. “Don’t wanna walk in the cold rain and get everypony sick, now do we? Nope. That’d be a hoooorible idea.” She gives Keystone a wide grin as she says, “Yup, just waiting out the rain. No other reason.”

Keystone starts getting a wider grin across her muzzle as she’s quite obviously not buying that is all that happened, but finding amusement in how her own grin is making Dandy squirm and slowly grow pinker by the second.

Gearing slowly shakes his head as he turns around and heads towards the second wagon. He comes back with a pair of duffle bags and a large fibrous sack. He drops them on the ground, causing the sack to fall over and a couple heads to literally roll out as he looks over at Keystone. “So… who do we talk to about seeing if there are contracts out on any of these?”

Dandy’s eyes go wide as she looks up at him. “Did you fucking roast all of them?!” She rears up and starts bopping him on top of his head with her forehooves. “I told you we need them identifiable!”

Gearing rolls his eyes and doesn’t even try to shy away from the volley of, very light, blows. “If they were burnt, they did it to themselves. The only three I kinda sorta had a hoof in them becoming a crispy critter was Cookie and the two that were standing nearby when his tank exploded.” He taps on his muzzle a bit before he says softly, “And that one that tried to throw the molotov at you and I shot it out of his grip… he went up like a Hearth’s Warming log…”

She flops down on her haunches as she hangs her head. “Awww man… And here I was hoping for a big pay day!”

Keystone looks over the heads literally rolling around at her hooves and takes a tentative step back. Though, others around the area jump back and gawk in both horror and surprise at the pile of equine parts. Keystone waves with her hoof at it and says with a hiss, “Hey, cover that crap back up. You’re going to scare folks off thinking we’ve gone raider or something.”

Gearing quickly complies, kicking the wayward heads into the sacks again before bounding them up and setting them upright against each other. “Well, don’t know how else I was supposed to prove it.”

Keystone waves over to the side, away from the gate and inside but before they get to the actual shopping center section. “Just… just put them over there… we’ll take a look and I’ll have Bottlecap get you any funds you need to be paid.”

Gearing shrugs and hauls them over to the area as indicated, as everyone watches him walk upright on his hind legs with the duffels and sacks held aloft with his wings and forelegs. When he gets back he tosses ten caps to the mare that’d stopped them, and as he’s passing he says, “That’s for our entry. You’re gonna have to figure out the deal with the brahmin yourselves.”

He unhooks the brahmin from the lead wagon, and as he’s adjusting the harness to take the wagon in himself, Ted turns to him and nods his head, “Thanks again for all of the help.”

“Yeah, you’re one of the good ones for sure!” Earl agrees.

Gearing looks them over, then gives them both a gentle rub on their head with a wing each as he says, “Well you two take care, and don’t get caught by any more psychopaths, hear?”

They nod and Ted says, “We’ll also keep an ear out for anyone you might want to pay a visit to.”

Earl nods as he says, “Caravans get around, I’ll make sure to tell the leaders to keep their ears out too. It’s in everyone’s best interest that the roads are safe to travel.”

Gearing nods as he replies, “Well, you do that. And I’ll do what I can.” He waves with a hoof, then turns and starts pulling the wagon full of Cookie’s spoils.

After he’s past the outer gates Earl looks at Ted and comments, “Ya know… I don’t think he actually needed us to pull those wagons.”

“I don’t think so either…” Ted says with a nod.

As he’s pulling himself out of the harness Dandy walks up to him as she asks, “So… I guess we’re done, huh?”

Gearing bobs his head around. “For today anyway, yeah.”

She perks up and smiles as she asks, “Got more planned for tomorrow?”

“I always end up finding something to keep me busy.” Gearing bobs his head around some more. “But not any other targets to go find, no. Not yet, anyway.”

She puts a hoof to her mouth as she looks around and thinks about it. “Well…” She gives him a wry grin as she pats him on the shoulder with the back of her hoof. “If I find out anything, I’ll let you know. You know how to handle yourself.” She bobs her head around a bit before she says, “A bit of the overkill kinda buck with blowing them up, but… Gets the job done anyway… so... I’ll be happy to have you along.” She grins widely as she says, “You’re a trotting wrecking crew worth four bucks, without having to split the money so many different ways!”

He looks at her sideways and smirks. “Only four? Well, damn, looks like I need to start upping my game or something.”

She giggles and looks around before she looks at the door to the inside of Megamart, “I’m really looking forward to a nice cot and some shuteye. Today wore my ass out!”

Don’t do it! I’m warning you! the little blue buck in his head says as he gives Gearing a dirty scowl. Just because she left the door open a crack doesn’t mean you have to kick it in!

Gearing leans over and whispers in her ear as she’s still staring at the doors and fantasizing about a nice cot just for her. “Well, you’re welcome for that too.”

The little blue pegasus in his head slaps both hooves over his face before he groans, Your mouth gets us in so much trouble…

Her eyes go wide and her face turns a glowing shade of peach as he starts walking by her, grinning as he looks at her sideways. After a few moments, he lets out a sigh then turns back around to her. “Hey, Dandy?”

She trips over her tongue a bit as she’s still flushing straight to her hooves. “Y-yeah? Gearing?”

“Are you going to be okay?” He motions towards her with a hoof as he says, “You’d seemed pretty sure you couldn’t be trusted around bucks…”

She looks over at him and grins as she asks,” Honestly?” He nods. She starts turning a brighter shade of red as she hangs her head and groans. “No. Absolutely not. I Still don’t trust myself… Won’t be able to for a couple days, probably.”

He steps up to her and asks, “Are you sure about getting a cot here then?”

She looks at him and gives him a sheepish smile as she says, “I don’t really think I have much of a choice.” She rubs her head as she groans. “I just got my days off somehow. I normally know when it’s coming and it’s not so sudden like that. Like a day warning minimum.”

“Think keeping you busy will help?”

Her eyes go wide and she gets a cheesy grin on her muzzle as she looks away from him and pats on his shoulder a few times gently. Almost in soft caresses instead of pats. “D-don’t get fresh…” She glances at him for a moment before saying softly, “But… yes…”

Gearing nods as he looks around. “Well, let’s find some work, and we can keep moving that way… but… in the meantime, I have a friend inside that I can introduce you to. She can help keep you from doing anything stupid.”

Dandy leans in and whispers in his ear as she has a wry smirk across her muzzle, but the boldness of it makes her flush even further, “Like you?” Gearing’s eyes go wide as he quickly looks around, earning a few giggles from Dandy as she turns and leads the way into the store. “Come along, let’s go meet these friends of yours.”

Gearing heads inside and is almost immediately set upon by Swift as she runs up to the door to greet him. She pauses a few steps away, but jumps over and grins as she says, “I wasn’t sure that was you, but it’s hard to mistake that ratty ass blanket. You just now getting back? I thought the trip wasn’t going to take so long, what have you been doing all day?”

Dandy blushes straight to her hooves as she lightly whistles, or tries too. But her mouth has gone dry and all she does is look around at random objects as she tries to avoid looking at anyone in particular.

Gearing smirks as he shakes his head. “Got caught up. Usual nonsense. But I got a cart load of supplies outside for us to barter with at least!”

“‘Usual nonsense’?” Swift stares at him and narrows her eyes as she asks, “So… did you get ambushed, shot, or blown up this time?”

Gearing looks her in the eyes then grins widely as he says, “All of the above! Plus got burnt too!”

Swift slaps a hoof over her eyes as she groans. She slowly pulls it down before she shrugs and giggles. “You always find the nicest places to visit, don’t you?”

“A real party animal, that’s for sure…” Gearing chuckles as he taps out a message on his PipBuck.

Swift looks him over as she says, “Well, that buck still hasn’t come back yet. The store owner’s actually getting a bit worried. Said if they aren’t back by tomorrow they’re going to probably send out a search party.” She looks around and sighs as she says, “I don’t think they were joking either…”

Gearing asks while not actually looking at her, “Any other leads?”

She shrugs as she looks around. “Nothing major. A few things here and there. Mostly random salvage. But we need some pretty specific things.” She looks over at Gearing as she says, “At least we don’t need any talismans… Word on the street is just asking about those could get ya murdered.”

Gearing nods then looks up as he says, “Well, I’m going to go check with Patches, the armory mare, and see if she’s got any leads for me on some of the equipment I’ve been asking her for.” He hits send on his PipBuck then motions with it towards Swift as her PipBuck alerts her to a new message.

She raises an eyebrow to look at him, and then lifts up her PipBuck to read what Gearing just sent her.

Gearing reaches over with a hoof and taps Dandy on the shoulder as he says, “This is Dandy. She’s a bounty hunter that’s worked locally, and a good one at that.” He nods towards Swift as he says, “Dandy, this is Swift. We’ve been traveling together for a while and stopped in up here at Megamart to pick up some supplies.”

Dandy looks over at her, and then starts trailing her eyes over Swift’s body before stopping at the powerhoof on her foreleg. “Wait… you don’t mean Iron Hoof Swift… do you?” She looks back and forth before she asks, “The Reaper?”

Swift looks up from her PipBuck screen at her and raises an eyebrow as she asks with a faint smile, “And… just where’d you hear about that from?”

Dandy looks back and forth between them a bit quicker as she points west. “I came up though Freight Cars’ territory. I asked them what happened to all of the Wild Ones and they said Iron Hoof and her friends pretty much obliterated them for getting on her bad side.”

Gearing grins at Swift as he says, “Your fame’s catching up to you.”

Swift glares at him as she says, “If you weren’t slinking around all of the time yours would have caught up to you long ago.”

Dandy’s eyes go wide as she stares off into space. “Wait… green wings.” Her horn glows as she lifts up the edge of Gearing’s ratty blanket and brown jacket with her magic and looks at his wing neatly tucked in against his side o.

Gearing raises an eyebrow then smirks as he pushes the improvised cloak back down with a hoof. “Hey… don’t get fresh.”

Dandy leans in closer to look him in the face as she says quietly, “Sweet Celestia, it is you!” She looks over at Swift as she says, “They said Iron Hoof was traveling with a group, including an insanely strong not-quite-black pegasus with green wings.” She turns to look at Gearing as she says, “A black pegasus that apparently could shove his hoof through an earth pony’s head with a single kick.” She arcs an eyebrow as she asks, “Sound familiar?”

Swift looks between them as she asks, “Uh… What’s with that look?”

Dandy turns to look at Swift and points outside where the mob of bounty hunters have been gathering. “Some dumb ass wanna be bounty hunter that was after Security jumped Gearing and tried to stab him. So he broke the buck’s head like a dropped melon.”

Swift looks between the two then nods. “Yeah, sounds about right…” She smirks as she asks, “What? Didn’t shoot them from the dark and a bajillion miles away where nopony saw where it came from?”

Gearing smirks then partially covers his mouth and disguises his smirk by rubbing his muzzle with a hoof as he says softly, “No... That was this morning… Different buck, different day…”

Swift sits down and starts laughing as she says, “Damn, I just can’t leave you alone for five minutes without you running off to find some kind of fun, can I?” She grins a bit longer before turning to look at Dandy. “So, you’re Dandy right?”

Dandy looks at Swift and nods as her eyes go wide. “Yeah… Iron Hoof, Ma’am…” She leans in towards Swift and asks, “Did he really kill a Reaper in like five seconds?”

Gearing quips, “Was closer to ten, and I don’t consider No Shoes a Reaper. Just a loud mouth braggart that got lucky to get as far as he did.”

Dandy looks over at Gearing and says softly, “No Shoes wasn’t a push over. He didn’t wear any gear to toughen himself up, and he did. He was known for giving as good as he got. And then some.”

Gearing looks over at her and says flatly, “Well that streak ended pretty damn quick… Shouldn’t have gone threatening foals within earshot of me, let alone to my face.”

Dandy grins then looks over at Swift and asks, “Bit of a family buck, ain’t he?”

Swift’s eyes dart over to her and she smirks before she leans in and says softly, “Okay… Yeah. Let’s go get you a place to lay down at.”

Dandy looks around quickly as she asks, “What?”

Swift nods as she says, “Gearing already let me know what’s going on. Come on. I’ll make sure to keep the bucks off ya. Move it sister, walk in front of me and don’t present posterior to any of the bucks, it’ll cause more problems than we’ll wanna deal with.”

Dandy flushes as she looks between the two then asks, “Yeah… I’m sure a Reaper could keep them off me… but…” She gives a sheepish smile. “Can you keep me off of them though?”

Swift nudges her in the side and starts pushing her towards where all of the cots are in the makeshift hotel. “Yeah, I’m sure I can… but you need to get in bed and get some rest.”

Dandy looks at her and smiles warmly, nodding as she stifles a yawn. “Yeah… you’re right. Some sleep sounds good.” She turns and starts walking away obediently.

Swift looks at her wide-eyed and says, “Wait... You’re not going to fight me over it? You’re just going to go to bed? Just like that?”

Dandy looks over her shoulder at her and smiles as she nods. “Well, yeah, been a busy day… Why?”

Swift stares at her for a few moments as she says quietly, “A filly in heat who’s more interested in getting some shuteye when they’re surrounded by bucks…” She slowly turns her head and looks at Gearing. Her eyes trail over him for a bit before she asks flatly, “Gearing, is there something else you need to be telling me?”

“Nope,” Gearing says flatly with an emotionless expression.

Swift sucks on her teeth a bit before she says, “Yeah, right… uh huh…” She points at him with her hoof a bit as she says. “We’re gonna have a talk later.”

Gearing waves at her and smiles lightly as he says, “Sure. Just let me know when.”

As Swift escorts Dandy back to the makeshift hotel, and giving any buck that pays just a bit too much attention to Dandy a case of near death by dagger eyed stare, Gearing heads off to talk to Bottlecap. There are a lot of points that they need to go over, and he wants to bring up Cookie’s bounty being in the process of being claimed as soon as possible. It’s not really about the money at this point, though that would help, but the rep it’d help him build should put him in an even bigger positive light with the Finders. Maybe even give him access to some of their harder to get goods.

Because it’s rather common knowledge among those in the know, and other swindlers, that business folk always keep the best shit for themselves, their friends, family, and their most treasured clients. And he’d like to work his way into at least one of those categories if he can. Because they are seriously well connected and that is something he desperately needs at the moment.

So, time for some good old fashioned Glorious Bastard humble bragging… minus the humble aspect of it. Gearing thinks with a grin.

Squeaky wheel gets the grease and all that, the little blue pegasus in his head comments sagely.

As he’s passing through the crowds of various individuals his eyes are drawn over to the side. In a booth hanging above everything else, is a treasure beyond compare for Gearing. He slowly walks towards the booth as his mouth hangs open and he swears he can hear angels themselves singing as he looks at the gift from above.

Wait, no, that’s just Sweetie Bell on the radio on the vender’s desk. The little blue pegasus in Gearing’s head observes. Angelic like enough.

Gearing steps through the crowds walking by, which most of them don’t even pay attention to the salvage heap that seems to be making a small berm around the vendor’s space. But he’s not interested in the berm of salvage anyways. Not the scrap metal. Not the electronics. Does any of that even matter when that delicious thing is being dangled in front of his snoot so seductively.

Gearing points up at the oversized picture frame with a shaking forehoof as he asks, “Hey. That. How much for that?!”

The mare on the other side of the berm of junk turns to look at him from eating a salad of some unknown composition of vegetables and what looks like might be mixed in some sugar apple bombs. She looks at his hoof, then follows the trembling limb up and to the top as she asks, “Oh… like that do you?”

Gearing steps to the side, trying to get as close as he can and lowering the linear distance between the two as he nods his head. “Is that for real!?”

She gets up and walks over, looking up at the picture frame as she nods. “Yup. It’s the real deal.”

Gearing lowers his hooves and stares in wonder as he says, “That’s one of the last ones made… is has to be. It must have came out right before the bombs dropped.”

She looks at him and smirks as she says, “You must be some kind of history nerd to know about that.” She nods as she looks up at it. “Yup. That one’s apparently the last one in the series that was ever made. Was released about a month before everything went tits up.”

Gearing waves a hoof at is as he asks, “Is it for sale? How much is it? Can I see it?”

She encompasses the picture frame in her levitation field and lowers it over to him as she grins. “Yeah... Everything in the booth’s for sale, that’s why it’s here.” She smirks as she says, “Uh… except for me… before you start getting coy.”

Gearing carefully grabs the picture frame and looks it over carefully. His eyes trail over the artwork of the comic he’d never even knew existed. “Oh... this is just amazing… How much did you want aga-” He pauses and looks in closer. “Wait a second…”

He pulls the picture frame up closer, and tilts the glass as he’s trying very hard in the provided light to see under the cover. The comic book cover is spread open and ready. Like it’s ready to be read at any moment. All you have to do is turn it over, and boom, there ya go. You’re off on a super hero adventure.

Except the staples in the center of the magazine are missing. They were there at one point. But not now. And, from how flush it is with the back paneling, he can tell the image he’s looking at, is simply the cover. Nothing more. Like someone took the cover out and framed it.

No. That would be giving it too much credit.

The frame is obviously from something much larger, and for something much larger. He flips it and looks at it’s back and sighs as he notices the two sets of wires. The older set, professionally done, and the new set, not so much professionally done but functional. Which confirms this frame isn’t even for this purpose.

He looks over at her and frowns as he asks, “This is just the cover for it, ain’t it?”

She laughs as she says, “Well yeah… who’d put the whole thing in a picture frame?”

Gearing frowns as he looks it over and sighs, “I know a few who would… Just to keep it from getting damaged… or to display the art if is was good enough.”

She frowns as she asks, “Well, ya want it or not?”

Gearing looks over at her as he asks, “Well, how much you want for this thing?”

She looks him over and notices his golden hooves holding the picture frame and looks him in the face as she grins. “100 caps.”

Gearing narrows his eyes and says, “For just the cover, not even the whole book? Seriously?”

She points at it and says defensively, “It’s in a very nice picture frame! Completely intact. Glass isn’t even cracked!”

Gearing looks at it again and at her and asks, “How much for just the picture, not the frame?”

She raises an eyebrow as she says, “You don’t want the frame?”

He shakes his head. “Nope. Not at all.”

She frowns and looks around as she says, “Shit, then I’ll have to find something else to stick in there.”

Gearing chuckles as he leans over the pile of scrap around him. “Ahhh… So you just put something pretty in it, and don’t actually care about the cover.”

She looks at him and frowns as she says, “Shit… shouldn’t have opened my big fat mouth.”

Gearing taps on it as he says, “Look at it this way… You’re going to be getting paid for something you considered trash… How much you want for it?”

She scrunches up her mouth one way than the other before she says, “Twenty caps.”

Gearing narrows his eyes and replies flatly, “Isn’t that like two Sparkle Colas?”

She looks off to the side and huffs as she says, “Well then Sparkle Colas.”

Gearing pulls a Sparkle Cola out of his bag as he says, “Here, how about this?” He nods over to her dinner as he says, “To go with your meal? And you’ll have an extra cap to boot.”

She smirks and bobs her head around before telekinetically grabbing both the bottle of Sparkle Cola and the picture frame. “Here, I’ll take it out for you. So you don’t end up breaking the picture frame, since you don’t want that and aren’t paying for it.” She quickly unlatches the back, pulls out the paper, slaps another paper in it from a pile behind her, and floats the cover over to him. He carefully grabs it, folds it along the crease that it already has in the cover along the spine, and carefully puts it in the middle of Cookie’s recipe book for safekeeping before putting the whole thing back into his saddle bag.

When he turns back to thank her, he looks up as she’s hanging the picture frame up where it had been a few moments before. He tilts his head as he looks at it for a few moments.

“Oh sweet Celestia, don’t tell me you want that picture too?” She groans as she’s pocketing the cap from her freshly acquired Sparkle Cola.

Gearing shakes his head. “No… it’s just weird. I don’t remember seeing that particular cat and ball of yarn picture before… But lately I’ve been seeing the exact same thing in nearly every building I go into…”

She turns to look back at the picture as she asks, “What? Got something against kittens playing with balls of yarn? I think it’s cute…”

Gearing shrugs then shakes his head. “No. It’s just… weird… never mind.” He pats on his saddle bag. “Thanks!”

She mumbles around her bottle as she takes a drink, “Mmmhmm.” After she pulls it away and lets out a satisfied gasp of breath she waves after him and replies, “You too!”

Gearing walks around and heads towards the office, hoping to spot Bottlecap in her native environment before having to track her down all over the store. When he gets there he notices the door is open and he gives it a quick respective rap from outside as he asks, “Bottlecap? Are you in?”

A loud rumbling flush sound comes from the door to the side, and a moment later Bottlecap walks out. The two stare at each other for a moment before she casually shuts the door behind her with a hindleg. She looks at him for a moment longer before she asks, “Uh… how are you with fixing toilets?”

Gearing walks into the office and chuckles as he says, “They’re a lot easier to fix than a lot of things… Why, what’s wrong with it?”

Bottlecap looks back at the toilet and shakes her head as she says, “Nothing now. But I’m concerned with it possibly needing some maintenance soon after what Security put it through.”

Gearing looks around as his ears perk up. “Security’s here?”

Bottlecap shakes her head. “No, thank goodness.” She motions towards the bathroom door as she says, “It’s just been acting funny for the last couple days since she unleashed her noisy bowels on it.”

Gearing starts laughing as he sits down. “Sounds like an interesting time.”

She glances at him and gives him a faint smile as she says, “Quite…” She looks him over for a few moments before asking, “How may I assist you today?”

Gearing grins as he says, “I think that’s my line.” She looks at him and arcs an eyebrow, so he steps in, shuts the door behind himself and casts off the cloak as he says, “I mean… I’ve already taken care of Cookie… Who else is giving you guys guff?” Her eyes go wide and he fans his wings up in the air, directing the dim lights in the room to sparkle around himself as he grins at her. “I mean… I’m not gonna say I’m good… but we both know it… right?”

She narrows her eyes before giving them a slight roll as she starts walking towards her desk. Though she keeps glancing at the few golden brassy exposed parts of him as she makes her way to her seat. “You would have to be to take down Cookie…” She looks over at him as she asks, “I suppose you’ve brought back more than just your word on the matter to prove it?”

Gearing nods and points off towards the front of Megamart as he says, “The head and part of his cutie marked hide is at the front door with Keystone.” He taps his forehooves together as he asks, “And… was there any bonus for taking out the rest of his gang too?”

She almost falls off of her desk as she had been leaning over and opening up a desk drawer as he drops a very unexpected question on her. She straightens up and looks at him as she asks, “Come again?”

Gearing points off towards the front of the Megamart. “Well. I think I got them all. There might be some stragglers that weren’t home at the time… But there’s a couple sacks worth of heads and an entire metal crate full of cutie marks that we skinned off of his crew.” His ears perk up as he adds, “Oh, and we brought back a few brahmin from there. They’re looking for some work and hoping you could help them out. Apparently one had already been working with the Finders so that shouldn’t be a problem.”

He grins at her as he says, “I also brought another wagon full of goods to trade… so…”

Her lips crack into an amused smile as she asks, “You really are pretty efficient, aren’t you? Took out the target, then while there took out the rest of them, and, just because it might have a bit of value, you brought everything you could carry back on the way back, hmmm?”

Gearing shrugs as he says, “Nah. I left quite a bit of stuff there. Wasn’t worth the hassle. Not with everyone else I had to watch. And the brahmin were wanting to get away from there as fast as they possibly could.” He lets out a sigh as he looks around. “From what I gather that place was its own level of hell.”

“A ‘level of hell’ that’s now closed for business?” Bottlecap asks with a raised eyebrow.

Gearing nods. “Yup. Just as advertised.”

She taps her forehooves together as she asks, “So, what do you plan on doing now?”

He looks around the office as he says, “Well, if you have any more tasks you’d like done, I’m all ears… but I also need to go talk to Patches. I really need to get my armor finished.”

She looks him over as she sucks on her teeth. “Well… your current set is looking rather dapper… you electro plate it or something?”

The little blue pegasus in Gearing’s head grumps, Great, this shit again…

“Uh… no… Was just scorched and blown up enough that it burnt all of that crap off of me,” Gearing mumbles.

She nods and points over to the door as she says, “Well, I don’t know any other armor that actually gets cleaner the more you damage it… but… Patches had been asking for you earlier. Apparently she’d found a few things that you had been wanting or that she thought you could use for… whatever it is that you’re making.”

Gearing grins at her and looks over at the door as he says, “Hey, thanks!”

“Gearing,” she says flatly, but with a tone that causes him to turn back to look at her. She taps her forehooves together slowly as she says, “I know you’ve been trying to help out Security with a few of the stunts that you’ve been pulling… but… I think you should know there’s been a lot of talk.”

Gearing raises an eyebrow as he gives her his undivided attention. “What kind of talk?”

She frowns as she looks him over in silence for a few seconds. “The kind that I’m sure you already knew would be coming up with what you said you were going to do…” She raises an eyebrow before saying softly, “And… doing…?”

Gearing shrugs. “Anything specific you can tell me?”

She shakes her head. “Not really. But there are more and more folks talking about maybe trying to take you down first, to make their job easier. Since you have already killed a couple bounty hunters that were after Security. There was a group trying to get the others to go in with them to go and take you down. While most don’t want to stir up more trouble than they have to, there’s quite a few of them that are actually listening to the whole thing and I think they are actually going to do it.”

Gearing looks at her and replies, “Well, I dug myself into this mess, I’ll get myself out of it.”

She taps her forehooves a bit before she asks, “You going to go back south? Maybe draw them off? It’d probably be the smart thing to do, honestly. But, I don’t think that’d work with your overall plan. It’d simply prove your lack of resolve.”

Gearing grins at her as he says, “Nah. Not my style at all.” He grins even wider as he says with his eyes closed, “I’ve been told I’m as hard headed as an earth pony.”

She smirks and taps her forehooves together before she asks, “So, what will you do?”

Gearing pulls the coat back, showing his brassy body, as he says, “Deal with it as it comes. Either they’ll give it up, or I’ll put them down. Up or down. Their choice.” He lets out a sigh as he looks over at the door to the rest of Megamart. “Frankly, I’d rather they just give it up. As nice as self-deploying sandbags and rapid ammo deliveries are, I’d really rather not have to kill anypony if I don’t have to…”

“Says the buck with a body count approaching a hundred already…” Bottlecap says flatly.

He looks over at her and, after exploring her expression for a bit, he can tell it’s not a judgmental statement. More like she was sad about it. Sad about the necessity. And, possibly, glad it wasn’t her. Or was that a slight hint of guilt across her face as if she feels at least partially responsible? It’s hard for Gearing to tell. And the mood’s gotten so sour in the room that he gets an idea to do something that not many others would probably want to attempt.

Crack an inappropriate bad joke at an inappropriate time.

He starts laughing as he shakes his head. “Bottlecap… your numbers are off… If you’d seen the full weight of the ledger I bear on my back, you’d know I crossed that bridge looooong ago.”

She taps her forehooves a bit before she asks, “And… you’re proud of that fact? Because, I’ll be honest, aside from the bravado, I don’t really believe you’re the type.”

Gearing bobs his head around as he looks around. “At one point I was proud of the job I was doing. Someone losing their life wasn’t the goal. But, things change. And suddenly sometimes someone losing their life was the goal… To save others. To protect others. To keep something bad from happening. After a bit you worry you’ve lost sight of what’s important.” He shrugs. “And you just. Don’t want to anymore. But… the world just don’t seem to want to let you catch a fucking break.”

She lets out a sigh as she shakes her head and says with a bit of consolation in her voice, “No. The world doesn’t. The wasteland least of all. But the more we work together, the better it’s going to get.”

Gearing looks over at her and nods as he says, “Exactly… and my only hope is that we get to figuring that part out before the rest of equinity gets annihilated by their own stupidity.” He grabs the blanket and throws it over himself, making the improvised cloak again. As he’s walking towards the door he says, “I’ll be in touch, Bottlecap. Let us know what you all decide about the Cookie and gang’s bounty. We’ll be in and out over the next few days as we sort some things out.” She gives a slight wave of her forehoof as Gearing quickly closes the door behind himself.

Gearing cuts around through the crowds, keeping his ears rotating this way and that as he tries to get to Patches’ vendor booth as quickly as he can, but keep an ear out for any bit of information that might be useful. Sometimes it helps. Sometimes it’s a complete waste of time.

This time falls in the later category as all he seems to hear along the way is bantering, bartering, and inconsequential gossiping.

He walks up to Patches’ stall and finds that it’s still open, with her standing off to the side, leaning casually against the displays, as she looks back and forth at the passing crowds as she waits for anyone that might be interested in an armor up. Probably left simply standing there after hurting her voice trying to bark out deals all day.

“Hey, Patches,” Gearing calls as he walks up.

Her head whips over like a suddenly angry turret, abrupt enough to make him actually pause in his stride, before a massive grin explodes across her muzzle. “There you are!” She hops over and giggles as she wraps a foreleg around his neck and starts pulling him towards the booth. “Come on in. Come on in.” He politely complies and, the second she has him most of the way into the booth, she spins around and grabs his cheeks with her forehooves as she squats down and looks at him. She pushes back his cowl with her magic as she stares him in the face and practically giggles at him, “You! You are a fuckin’ artist! I don’t even understand how you did this! You… you…” They stare at each other for a few moments before she pushes his cowl up and out of the way a bit more, but she carefully makes sure not to let it fall back entirely and keeps his head covered from every angle except the one she’s viewing him from currently. “You… seem to have already gotten yourself a set of armor…” She leans in and looks at his eyes closely as she asks, “Articulated apertures?” She leans in closer, almost like she’s about to kiss him, and he narrows his eyes as he stares at her and expects an array of questions.

Oh here we fucking go, the little pegasus in his head grumps.

Her eyes shoot open to their max size. “Oh… Oh, I’m so sorry… I didn’t realize…”

Huzbawhadda now? the little blue pegasus asks in genuine confusion.

Gearing’s ears perk up as he asks, “Uh… realize what?”

She covers his face back up with the cowl, and looks around quickly to make sure she hadn’t inadvertently given away anything that she shouldn’t have. “Uhm.” She leans in as she whispers, “That that’s not armor… I haven’t seen anypony so seriously augmented before…” She looks around again and leans in closer as she says in the same low tones, “Don’t let any o’ those Steel Rangers even see you… They’ll probably want to rip you to pieces for parts…”

Gearing growls as he says, “They could try and I’ll have me some spare parts instead.”

She giggles and steps back as she nods. “I… see why you need full coverin’ armor now…” She reaches up and rubs her mane as she says sheepishly, “And here I just thought you wanted to have a bunch o’ spares or were a collector of sorts or whatever… I’m sorry.”

Gearing steps over closer and taps her on the side of the foreleg as he says, “Hey. Don’t be. You couldn’t have known. I keep my head down for a reason.”

“I can see that,” she says with a sigh. She looks around then turns behind her as she grabs the face mask portion and helmet he’d been working on. She lifts the two pieces up as she says, “But… regardless… You are a fuckin’ artist with electronics and armor.” She spins it over and rotates the fully assembled helmet in the space between them as she asks, “How did you do it? You took electronics and components from multiple companies, even competin’ companies with proprietary parts… and managed to fuse them together into one piece that is so well harmonized with itself that it’s damn near seamless!”

Gearing looks it over and gives a sheepish smile as he slowly taps his forehooves together. “Oh… well… It wasn’t all that complicated… I just made a transformer, and wound new coils around it… then used a voltage regulator from a busted toaster, and ran the power through that area before it goes to a controller so that the power flow is smooth.”

She stares at him for a moment before she asks, “You manually wound a small transformer?”

Gearing nods as he says, “Yeah… have to make sure the turns are right and all of that, but once you get the basics of it down, it’s not really all that difficult…”

She looks at it then slowly passes it over to him in her magical field as she says, “Wow… just… wow…” As he’s taking it she comments, “I’m still not entirely sure where you used the sunglasses at… I know you did, considerin’ the pieces I found, but I can’t even tell.”

Gearing sticks his head out of his cowl enough to wink at her before he says with a grin, “Technician’s secret.”

She shakes her head as she giggles and turns around. “Okay, so… I’ve managed to get hold of a few things for you that I think might work… I couldn’t get a full on bomb disposal unit’s armor, but I did find this, and I think it’ll be a pretty good base for what you’re talkin’ about… What ya think?”

She slides a metal chest out from under her table, where she normally keeps her private things, and pops the latches with her magic. And a moment later she’s pulling out a set of barding that’s olive green with an earthy tone to the thicker rigid plates that cover the entire thing. She holds it up for him to look at as he steps further into the shop.

He reaches out and starts rotating it this way and that as she holds it aloft with her magical aura. He looks at the breastplate’s right side and sees where the piece of armor has already done its job by blocking some pretty egregious wound, at least judging by the gouges and scrapes across the front of the chest portion of it. Enough to scrape at the already faded painted on lettering that states HPD RIOT with a string of numbers under it. The string of numbers makes Gearing wonder if it was a serial number assigned to a specific pony or if it was just for inventory management and to keep track of the equipment. Along the lengths of both sides the same HPD RIOT text is plainly visible, without the serial number, but Gearing wonders what the point of that would be given it would most likely get covered up with saddle bags or battle saddles anyway. The armor has a thick ridged throat guard springing up from the middle of the chest portion as it juts out and away from the neck. It probably would limit some movements, but it would be excellent for protecting the softer underside of the neck. Maybe not from direct fire, maybe so. But, never the less, it would be amazing for shrapnel and other bits of throat terrorizing debris. Across the surface of the throat guard is a faded three digit number that he can’t quite make out. The first two digits are definitely ‘10’ but the next one is either a ‘1’ a ‘C’ or an ‘8’. It’s so worn on that particular part of it, from either normal wear and tear or from direct damage, that it’s impossible for him to know for sure. But, that doesn’t really matter at the moment.

The entire thing has plates of some kind of reinforced resin over sheets of steel. The composite armor layers have aged well, despite the damage its had inflicted upon it. And, like many armors in its class meant for military or government purposes, this one is a full suit. Every part of the body is covered. Even the underbelly, which tends to get over looked because of its location, has a grid of plates designed to provide protection to vital organs, while allowing mobility. Then, on top of all of that, the fabric holding it all together is practically a suit of kevlar in and of itself. The flexibility and stretch of the fabric provides an excellent juxtaposition with the strength and rigidity of the composite plates. Combined they make an excellent combination of strength and mobility. Gearing’s pretty sure whoever designed this must have had a family member in mind when they made it because it’s almost as over engineered as Hoofington itself.

But, as amazing as it is, it’s also a bit disheartening. He knows he’s going to have to make some modifications to it. Even if it can fit his body, the age old problem of having to make sure it won’t get caught in his gears rears its ugly head again. Even more so with so much cloth being the foundation of the entire piece.

Patches claps her forehooves together rapidly as she tries to get Gearing’s attention. She grins at him and asks as she nods to it after he peels his eyes off it and to her for a moment. “So, what ya think? Think this’ll work for what you need?”

Gearing nods as he keeps turning it in the empty space between them. “This is a good start… yeah. With a few modifications it’ll do for what I need.”

She balks as she looks at him.” Modify? You want to modify it?!” She shakes it with her field as she says with a crooked grin and a snort of disbelief. “I got this because I was sure it was pretty much exactly what you needed! Put this on, the firefighter’s jacket, and that helmet you made, and boom, there ya go.”

Gearing looks over at her and a sly smile crosses his muzzle as he asks, “You saw the helmet, right?”

She nods. “Well, yeah… that got me all hot and bothered like I’d done started my cycle, I’ll tell ya.”

Gearing rolls his eyes and shakes his head before he says, “If I’m going to modify the helmet to that extent, why wouldn’t I do the same with the other pieces as well?”

Her eyes start growing wider as she sees the train of thought and all of the possibilities start prancing before her mind’s eye. “Ouuuuu. Yes…. Yes… That’s … That’s goin’ to be so much nicer.”

Gearing looks around as he asks, “Any luck with the firefighting jacket?”

She slumps her shoulders as she says, “No… Not yet… sorry.” She looks at the armor as she asks, “You goin’ to go ahead and get started on this one first?”

He bobs his head around a bit before he shakes his head. “No, I need to have the jacket that I’m going to use it with so I know where to make what modifications that it needs. No real point until then.”

Patches lets the armor flop down in front of them as she says, “Nuts… I was hopin’ I’d get to see some more o’ your fancy hoof work.”

Gearing waves towards the armor as he says, “Once I get the rest of the pieces, sure. But until then I got a few other things I need to work on.”

She tilts her head as she asks, “Do you ever sleep, buck? Like you worked on the helmet all night, then you ran off on that bounty huntin’ adventure all day, and you just got back… Doesn’t seem healthy to be runnin’ all day every day even with… well… you know.” She vaguely motions towards him and his body with a hoof as she looks around.

Gearing shrugs as he says, “I’ve been known to sleep from time to time, yeah.”

She snickers as she turns and puts the armor back in its chest and kicks it under her table again. “Well. Keep me updated if you find anythin’, and I’ll do the same. But take care of yourself. I can’t see this armor get finished if you run yourself into the ground!”

He laughs and waves as he continues down the lane and starts walking around the perimeter. He’d heard about the medical clinic, but hadn’t had a chance to stop by. Apparently it was one of the places that Swift had managed to offload her medical supplies that they didn’t need.

But there were other things he’d wanted from the buck with the saw for a cutie mark. Namely: Information.

After some talking and finagling with the older buck, Gearing walked away with a few books and medical texts that Bonesaw had. Though, for a good portion of them, Bonesaw wanted them back and Gearing had to give a substantial deposit to make sure he got his books back when he was supposed to.

Gearing heads over to the ‘hotel’ area, and quietly walks through the cots where many ponies are already fast asleep. As he’s getting in the back corner, where Dandy currently lays with her rear decidedly pointed towards the wall next to the cot, Swift bolts up in her own cot and thrusts out her powerhoof at Gearing’s face.

He looks at the powerhoof, inches from the end of his muzzle, then trails his eyes from it up her leg to her face and says quietly. “Hello to you too.”

She glares at him a moment and then says, “I thought you were another nosy nose following their snoot to trouble.”

Gearing smirks as he asks, “Have to bop many of them?”

Swift grins and shrugs. “Not really. Usually just having the powerhoof in their face is enough. But… what are you doing over here?” She raises an eyebrow then says softly, “Don’t tell me your hormones are getting the better of you too?”

Gearing rolls his eyes and spins around, sitting down next to both of them as he says, “Hardly.” He stretches out with his loaned books as he says, “I figured since I was going to be doing nothing but reading tonight, I might as well keep watch.”

Swift rolls her eyes as she says, “I don’t need you watching over me, Gearing. I can take care of myself.”

Gearing stares at her then points back towards Dandy without even looking back. “She needs all the help she can get at the moment. So, no offense, but it’s not about you all of the time.” He finishes with a slight smile so she knows it’s meant more of a joking cut instead of an intentional insult

She smirks and rolls her eyes before rolling over entirely. “Well, if you’re going to keep watch, I’m not going to lose any more sleep than I have to.” She yawns and quickly starts falling asleep again as she says, “Night, Gearing…”

Gearing is about to go through his books to figure out which ones he wants to read first, when he hears a nasally snorting half loogie hocking snore. He jumps his head up and looks around at the source. The noise draws his focus to see Handy on the other side of Swift, completely passed out, with his right foreleg flopping over the side of the cot and limply hanging down to the ground with his head turned towards them and his mouth hanging open.

Gearing shakes his head and decides to start reading up on the medical notes that Bonesaw had loaned him first as he mutters, “Didn’t realize he was such a mouth breather…”

As he’s opening up a book, Dandy asks from near his head, “Gearing?”

He turns sideways to look at her. “Yeah, Dandy?”

She partially opens her eye as she looks at the figure sitting down next to her. She reaches out with her foreleg, patting him on the shoulder a bit as she seems to test if it’s really him, then stretching out her limb as she drapes it over his shoulders after apparently being satisfied. She tugs him a bit closer as she says, “You’ve got some good friends. You’re a good buck.”

“I try,” he says softly as he looks at her sideways.

She scoots her front half over to the edge of the cot, partially hanging over it as she wraps her foreleg around him in a hug and pulls him closer so she can rest her head on his shoulder. “Thanks,” she mumbles as she goes back to sleep while using his shoulder as a pillow.

Gearing stays in the same position as he looks her over and watches her return to her slow rhythmic breathing patterns. He redistributes his weight among his legs as he carefully turns and goes back to reading the notes he’d gotten from Bonesaw. All while not moving any part of himself that would cause Dandy to fall off the cot or disturb her rest.

---

Footnote: Resuming reboot procedure. . . please stand by . . .

‘credential matrix’, sync failure. Retrying. . . please stand by. . .

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