As I predicted, it started raining before noon. And as I expected, it was pretty miserable. Even though my rain shield kept us all dry, it didn’t keep the ground dry, and it’d turned into a squishy, muddy mess before too long. At one point, the stream burst its banks, and we had to flee the inch deep water swirling around our fetlocks for higher ground. I don’t know what it is about this planet, but when it rains, it pours. And of course, it always seems to pour at the worst possible time.

But with Surge’s help, the rain shield didn’t bother me that much. I could almost fire and forget the spell, and that was awesome. Normally, I’d have to maintain at least a little focus on what I was doing, otherwise holes would appear in my shield and somepony would get wet. But with Surge’s help, I didn’t have to pay much attention to it other than keeping a steady trickle of mana flowing up my horn, and we sort of split maintenance of the spell between us.

We didn’t talk all that much for the first few hours of the hike. It seemed like the dreary, rainy day had sucked any liveliness out of us, and we just trudged on. Crooked, splitting trees passed by on either side, and the bushes and leaves bounced and waved as the raindrops slapped them about. A persistent breeze came in from the northwest, occasionally gusting and reminding me to keep the sides of my rain shield well reinforced. All was quiet and seemed almost hauntingly dead, and the thick mist from the rain limited our visibility to hardly further than the next tree along our path.

Despite all that, though, Teka never wavered in her path. Once I’d figured she knew what we wanted, I’d just let her take the lead, and the young mare definitely knew her way through the terrain. Oftentimes, she’d leave us trailing behind as we struggled to navigate some hazard she simply glided across like it wasn’t there, like a muddy slope or a treacherous climb up a rocky hill. But even though Gauge insisted that she was going to leave us behind, we always found her waiting at the next hill over, the next tree in line, and wouldn’t start moving again until we were close enough to get the rain shield back over her. Her constant trips in and out of the shield left her dripping with water, but I’d like to think that she wasn’t waiting for us only because of the rain shield.

Then all of a sudden, the geography changed. We crested a hill and it was like we were looking at an entirely different world. A riverbed ran from north to south, obviously ancient and not really used today, even if the heavy rainfall was beginning to accumulate water inside of it. At one point, this dried-up river must’ve been half a mile wide and had eaten a deep trench into the earth. But even more striking than that was the stark difference in vegetation. On our side, the trees were healthy and covered in leaves. On the other, they were nearly barren, with nothing but a dense collection of gray, petrified trunks jutting out of the ground like bones or teeth. A sparse smattering of live trees gave the thing a canopy, but those trees only reached maybe half as high as the petrified giants towering above them. The stone trees reached so high up that the tops of some of them disappeared into the low-hanging rainclouds currently trying to soak us.

“That’s the Spines?” I asked, staring in disbelief at the frankly alien landscape in front of us. I’d seen a lot of things since leaving Blackwash, but nothing really seemed weird or impossible until now. I couldn’t even begin to figure out how those trees had grown so tall and gotten petrified like they were now. Judging by the incredulous look on Nova’s face, she couldn’t either.

“That’s them,” Ace affirmed. “You can see why it has the name.”

“But that’s… how did they…” Nova blinked and rubbed her eyes with her feathers. “How did that happen? Surge, was it always like that?”

“It was,” Surge confirmed for her. “It’s been like that since we first discovered Auris. Isotope dating put the trees at at least fourteen thousand years old.”

“Fourteen thousand?” Gauge echoed, stunned. “They’re that old?”

“What the fuck happened to them?” I asked, repeating Nova’s earlier question.

But all I got was Surge shrugging my shoulders. “I don’t know,” she said. “Nopony knew. It wasn’t deemed that important to figure out why the Spines are the way they are. We had more pressing matters to focus our attention and resources on. Like winning the war.”

Teka looked over her shoulder and frowned at us, but especially me. I think she was starting to figure out that I talked to myself all the time, courtesy of sharing a body with Surge. But honestly, I really wasn’t in the mood for explaining how that worked to her. I seriously doubted she’d be able to understand something like that.

Then the sky did something I didn’t think was possible: it started raining harder. A fresh wave of rain hit my rain shield like a hammer on an anvil, and I winced as it started taking noticeably more mana to repulse the water trying to get inside. There was a brilliant flash of light, and a second later a booming crack of thunder echoed through the valley and shook the ground underneath my hooves.

“We should find shelter!” Ace said, suddenly having to shout to be heard over the wind and the rain. “It’s only going to get worse from here!”

“I fucking noticed!” I growled back at her. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much in the way of shelter on our side of the riverbank, unless we wanted to backtrack half an hour to an outcropping of rock we’d passed by on the way up here. I squinted and tried to peer through the mist toward the Spines to see if there was any cover there, but couldn’t make much out. “Do you see anything?”

Ace pulled out her rifle and started using it like a makeshift telescope. She scanned back and forth for a minute before she lowered it and pointed ahead. “There! There’s a cave under the far riverbank. I reckon it’ll be a tad bit soggy, but ain’t worse than getting rained on!”

“Cool, that’s all I needed to hear!” Shouldering my load of supplies once more, I started moving toward the riverbed, which had already developed a stream about three inches deep. “Let’s fucking go! I don’t want to stand out here any longer than I have to!”

Teka blinked in surprise as I trudged past her, taking the lead of our group. “Embaw?” she asked, frowning and trotting up at my side. “Wo leol’set U’a? M’a Feati ka stum, ka’un ite!”

“We’re gonna get out of the rain, Teka,” I said, even though I knew she couldn’t understand me. “Very wet. Very bad. And a wet Ember is a sad Ember.”

The tribal mare stopped in place as she tried to process that, but the encroaching rain got her moving again before I carried my rain shield too far away. Gauge shook his head, sending a few droplets of water that’d managed to stick there simply from walking through the rain out of his mane. “You know she doesn’t understand that.”

“Maybe one day she will,” I said.

“One day?” I could hear the suspicion in Ace’s voice. “As soon as we get this filly back to her people, she’s gonna end up staying there. She ain’t following us where we’re going.”

“I know,” I said, but that didn’t change what I was thinking. This young mare was a natural tracker and had crazy tattoos that could do all sorts of weird shit without her even having a horn. They could heal wounds, and that’s pretty crazy magic even for a unicorn. Not even Surge could do it that well, and she told me my horn wasn’t naturally attuned to it so there wasn’t any way in fuck that I’d be able to use it that well. Having a companion who could heal me whenever I got shot in the ass would be so much better than lugging around Stabil-Ice, bandages, and all those other medical supplies.

Thankfully, apart from a sharp sniffle, Ace didn’t press me on that. Instead, she spread her wings and started to hover, and a moment later I knew why. When I stuck my hoof into the ground, it sank about four inches into the mud before finally coming to a stop. The ground squelched as it absorbed my weight, and I sighed as I stepped back and leveraged my hoof out of the sucking mud. It felt like five pounds clung to the end, slowly sliding off of my fetlock and plopping on the ground. I shot Ace a look and she just shook her head. “Great. Lucky you, with the wings.”

Ace winked at me. “Use what your mama gave you.”

“She can’t,” Surge said for me. “Her magic is fire attuned. I couldn’t get her to make ice and freeze the mud without a lot of hassle.”

“Well fuck me right in the ass,” I grumbled, once more stepping out into the mud. “Stars, sometimes it really fucking sucks to be a unicorn.”

“Try being a zebra,” Gauge said, stepping into the mud next to me. “We don’t have any magic.”

“Yeah, but you’ve got weird shaman voodoo martial arts moves and stuff.”

“Uhh… No I don’t, Em.”

I shook my head. “Not even living up to your own stereotype. Good job, Gauge.”

“Yeah, whatever,” he grumbled back.

Of course, Surge felt the need to add her two Cs. “Zebra commandos were one of our most feared opponents on the field,” she said. “They were stealthy, silent, and could kill without weapons. There was an irrational fear among the grunts that they could show up anywhere at any time and kill everypony in a compound without taking a casualty. In reality, they were limited in number, and every casualty they took was one they couldn’t afford to replace. They weren’t a threat to us after a few decades of losses.”

“Couldn’t they just train more?” Gauge asked, grimacing as he pried his hooves out of the thick mud and continued to stomp across the riverbed. “If I were them, I’d have schools dedicated for training commandos like that.”

“They couldn’t,” Surge said. “We’d razed most of their homelands to the ground fifteen years prior and turned it to glass. They were a dying race on Equus without anywhere to call their own.”

“No wonder everybody wanted to kill the Synarchy,” Nova grumbled, taking wing with a hiss and hum of her metal prosthetic. “Nopony ever thought that would backfire?”

Surge was quiet for a moment before saying, “The hope was that a show of force would cow the rest of the species into submission. It… backfired.”

“You don’t fucking say,” I grumbled.

“I can’t offer commentary on why Equestria’s leaders acted the way they acted,” Surge retorted. “At least, not back then. I was still a filly when it happened.”

I grunted and forced myself forward a few more steps. By now, I’d accumulated enough mud on my hooves that they had the surface area to prevent me from sinking too far into the riverbed with each step. “Yeah. Still think the Synarchy didn’t deserve to be fucked up like it was?”

“The Synarchy was strength for ponykind,” Surge insisted. “It allowed us to prosper in a world where the other species wanted nothing more than to bring us down.”

What about what you said to Flask? I mentally prodded her. I figured I’d get a better answer if I didn’t force her to sound like a hypocrite in front of everypony.

I saw memories of the dream flicker in my mind’s eye as Surge sifted through them. Eventually, she settled with a mental growl. My memories are none of your business.

And mine don’t get the same treatment? I know you look through mine all the time. It’s not exactly subtle.

That brought her into a fuming silence. We will talk about this later, she growled at me, and I could imagine the scowl on her face as she thought it.

Of course, me suddenly falling silent and making a bunch of different facial expressions at nopony caught Nova’s attention. “You alright, Em?”

“Fine,” I said. “Just… having a private discussion with Sparky.”

“There wasn’t much to discuss,” Surge spat. “It’s nopony’s business.”

Nova blinked and drifted a little closer to Gauge. “Riiiiiight…” she said, eyeing me warily. “You two have fun with that.”

“It’s not fun being the crazy mare,” I grumbled. “Eventually you realize that you’re the last person you ever want to talk to, especially when you’re shouting racist bullshit all the time.”

“Or imagine being forced to ride around in the brain of a primitive and you can’t do much about it,” Surge said. “You can only watch the world through her eyes without any agency of your own.”

“You’re pretty fucking insistent on taking the wheel whenever you want…”

A strong gust of wind roaring down the riverbed nearly bowled me over, but in this case, the mud anchoring me to the ground was actually good for something. Nova and Ace, however, tumbled and struggled to right themselves before they hit the mud. When the wind finally passed, a flash of lightning and a crack of thunder boomed across the landscape, and the leaves of the trees flailed wildly in the wind around us.

“Fuck, it just keeps getting worse!” I shouted into the storm, just struggling to be heard over the noise.

“That cave sounds really awesome right about now!” Gauge shouted back. “Come on, let’s move!”

Gritting my teeth together, I started cantering across the riverbed as fast as my weighted limbs would let me. The rainfall had already accumulated an inch of water on top of the mud, and it was starting to develop a current pulling toward the south. But while me and Gauge struggled to cross, I saw Teka practically prancing across the surface on hooves that seemed to be light as feathers. She’d apparently grown tired of waiting behind us, and with the cave entrance just a short ways ahead, she galloped off on her own, her silver tattoos flickering and glimmering in the misty haze of the rain. When she finally reached the cave entrance, she shook her coat off and turned back to watch us, her body glowing like a beacon in the dark.

“That filly’s something else,” Ace said. “I’d heard tales about the Feati ponies before, but seeing one in person is so much different.”

“Now imagine an entire village of them,” I said. “Because that’s where we’re headed.”

“I can’t wait!” Nova exclaimed fluttering her wings. “Do you think any of them know how to speak Equiish? If they’re known by the ponies of Three Rivers, then surely they’ve had enough contact for some cultural exchange to take place.”

“That’d be really helpful,” Gauge said. “If they can talk with us, then we can find what we’re looking for that much easier.”

“And hopefully before Yeoman does as well,” I said. “I’m afraid of what he’d do to them if he stumbled across them.”

“You know full well how that bastard’ll greet them,” Ace muttered. “With lead and death.”

“Then we just need to get there first and give them a warning. Maybe we can even get the jump on Yeoman and deal with him once and for all.” I can’t even begin to describe how much I wanted to do that. I was still craving revenge after what he did to Zip at the dam. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to settle down and go back to Blackwash until I avenged her, one way or another.

But we finally reached the cave, and the four of us darted inside as I let the rain shield fizzle away. My horn ached and was a little warm to the touch, which was to be expected given that I’d been using it almost all day. Thankfully I could split some of the load with Surge, otherwise I never would’ve gotten us this far. I would’ve burnt out long ago. The relief at not drawing mana through my horn anymore hit me so hard that I almost got dizzy.

Teka sniffed at us and wiped some mud off of her almost perfectly clean hooves on the stone wall of the cave. “U’a pohna’hn spili’un,” she said, a smug look settling on her face. “U’a nabb’un A oe A wippa leol.”

I just nodded at her for wont of a better way to respond. “Yeah, sure, Teka,” I said, flashing a smile at her. “We won’t be leaving for a bit.”

Teka frowned at me, I guess because I didn’t understand what she said to me and I’d responded wrong or something. But frankly, I didn’t care all that much. I had more important things to worry about than solving her language, like scouting the cave and getting a fire set up so we could all warm up and dry off. Throwing my saddlebags against a far wall, I pulled out some of the fuel I’d collected earlier and threw it in a pile a ways back from the cave entrance so the wind and rain wouldn’t get to it. While I rummaged for some kindling to get the fire built up slow, considering the wood was damp, Teka just walked over to the pile and stuck her hoof in it. Her tattoos flared red, and there was a few sharp pops of crackling sap before the blaze engulfed the wood, leaving a flickering, healthy flame on it.

“She can make fires with those tattoos, too?” Nova asked. “That’s amazing!”

I frowned at the young mare, who’d curled herself up in front of the fire and shut her eyes as the heat started working on her damp coat. “I can make fire too, you know…” I grumbled.

Gauge shook his head and smirked at me. “Poor Ember, feeling jealous of the new mare’s crazy tattoos.” He patted my back and winked at me. “Don’t worry, we won’t be replacing you with her. Yet.”

“You better hope she knows how to use a gun,” I muttered. Ultimately, though, I decided I was too tired to bother getting egged on by him and I’d rather just sit by the fire for the time being. “I’m gonna dry off and try to get some of this fucking mud out of my fetlocks.”

“I’m gonna explore the cave some,” Ace said, her hooves echoing on the stony ground as she walked past us. “This thing goes back for a bit. Reckon I might as well figure out how far.”

“Please don’t find a cave monster or something bad like that!” Nova pleaded after her.

“But if you do, just shoot your rifle a bunch if it starts mauling you to death,” I quipped. “Or scream a lot. Just make sure we can hear you so we know to leg it.”

Ace rolled her eyes. “Tsch. Yeah, right. Be back in a bit.”

And then she was gone, her tail swaying back and forth and her head moving all around as she observed the dim walls of the cave. A flashlight on her rifle left a glowing white circle on the walls in front of her, and pretty soon that disappeared around a bend in the stone.

Gauged moved closer to the fire, sitting down at Nova’s side. “Wandering a spooky cave on a planet where everything wants to kill us. What could possibly go wrong?”

“She’s a big girl, she’ll be fine,” I muttered, moving to the fire as well. The fingers of heat working into my coat felt absolutely fantastic, and I was tempted to just use my fireproof spell and walk into the fire to dry off. But I wasn’t in a hurry, and my horn hurt from keeping a rain shield for five up all day, so I didn’t want to bother with it. Instead, I figured Teka had the better idea. The tribal mare was already asleep by the fire, her hind leg kicking slightly in her dreams, her tattoos occasionally flickering or glimmering through different colors before returning to silver.

But of course, I couldn’t bring myself to lower my guard. I was on edge like I’d pretty much been since leaving Three Rivers. Some paranoid part of me worried that if I closed my eyes without Ace around to pick up the slack, my friends would get jumped by a monster or bandits and they’d all die. So I stayed awake, staring at the fire for who knows how long, while my friends dozed around me.

The rain lessened a bit outside, so I moved to the entrance of the cave and simply took in the dreary sight. The trees swayed on the opposite riverbank, and a slope of leaves rose and fell with the low mountains and hills we’d just hiked through. The riverbed finally resembled a river once more, and a speedy current of water a couple of inches deep rushed to the south. I was glad we’d crossed it when we did. Otherwise we’d have had to deal with sinking mud and water rushing past our knees. At the very least, the cave entrance was a bit off the ground, so the water from the riverbed didn’t flow down it.

I felt Surge watching the outside world with me, so I frowned and mentally prodded her. You wanna tell me what that dream was about now?

There was a moment of irritation and disgust coming from somewhere in the back of my mind before Surge replied. It shouldn’t mean anything to you.

I just want to know what’s your deal. Why did a mare who had nothing but praise and reverence for the strength of the Synarchy talk with a friend behind closed doors about how bad it was?

Surge was quick to correct my terminology. I never said the Synarchy was bad, she thought. I respected the Synarchy. I respected the strength it had given ponykind, the land it had won for us, the foes it had vanquished. The Synarchy saved Equestria when it was on the verge of collapse, long before I was born. And in my lifetime, I saw it rise to its peak. But then…

When she didn’t finish the thought, I ended up finishing it for her. Then you lost, I thought. The Synarchy started losing and you saw the ugly face underneath the mask of unity and strength for ponykind. Sucked off it like the illusion from your High Queen.

We became weak and desperate, Surge replied in a low tone, Once upon a time, the Synarchy did mean strength and unity for ponykind. There was a time when we were unchallenged by the world. Our technology advanced at an astronomical rate. Our economy boomed. We did so many wonderful things… but then a rot began to fester in the trunk of the tree. I couldn’t tell you when it started, and I doubt anypony could, dead or alive today. But the Synarchy failed us during the War of Survival, and all the cancers in the government and military revealed just how weak and frail we were—just like the skeleton I called my High Queen.

Her words brought a memory to the surface of her mind, and I think she willingly shared it with me, considering how crystal clear the image was. In one moment, a tall, proud, regal alicorn of lavender coat and indigo mane stood next to me, mane streaked with pinks and reds and yellows while stars glistened inside like the endless expanse of space. Strong muscles held her slender frame together, belying amazing strength beneath such a fragile form. Her face was full and young, even if her eyes shone with wisdom and knowledge of countless years. A proud horn rose from her skull, larger than anything I’d ever seen. Strong wings hung folded at her sides, almost too large for her body. Her cutie mark, a large magenta star surrounded by five smaller white ones, twinkled and shimmered like the stars in the night sky. Beautiful platinum regalia decorated her body, at once elegant, royal, and final.

And then I saw a completely different mare, yet I knew she was still the same. Her ribs showed through her chest, the vertebrae of her spine jutting out of her back like little blunt spikes. Knobby knees complemented shriveled legs that left me amazed to realize she could even stand on them. Her wings were almost featherless, having shriveled up into ugly, naked things, and her horn carried cracked and pronounced grooves all the way up its length. Her cheeks were gaunt and hollow, her muzzle streaked with white hairs, and her mane and tail little more than limp rags clinging to her body. Her sunken eyes widened in shock, and even Surge-in-the-memory drew back in fear, alarm, and surprise.

And then the memory was gone, and when Surge spoke to me again, there was a shakiness in her voice after reliving something so vividly after centuries. She was our High Queen, Surge thought in a quiet voice. Her royal majesty, the High Queen Twilight Sparkle. She was the face of our nation for generations. She was the Synarchy’s strength and its resolve. But, like the Synarchy, she was dying on the inside, beneath the mask. We all believed our High Queen would keep us safe, no matter what befell Equestria. But I don’t think she could’ve saved herself from a drunken stallion with a knife.

I swallowed, a million questions flying into my mind all at once but no good way to go about asking them. Instead, I went with the most topical one. What did she do? Did she really control the heavens?

That and so much more, Surge replied. The Equus system is unlike every other star system in the universe. It’s geocentric with a tiny sun, comparatively speaking to most stars. The entire thing is held together by ancient magic nopony ever understood, but the alicorns could control that magic. And so could Twilight. After Celestia, Luna, and Cadance died, she had all their magic. She was responsible for moving the sun and the moon. She kept the whole thing together.

And that led into my next question. …What would happen to Equus if the High Queen died?

Surge was quiet, but I could feel her thinking. I don’t know, she said. Tradition holds it that her powers would find new bearers to keep the sun and moon moving and maintain the balance. But it’s never happened before—at least, not in recorded history.

And if they don’t?

Then the sun and moon stop moving, Surge thought. It would destroy the planet. One side would boil and the other would freeze. Life could maybe survive in a temperate band of twilight in between, but the rest of the planet would die. Equus would die.

Do you think… maybe that’s what happened? That’s why the Silence started?

Surge solemnly shook my head. It’s a possibility. But a probe carrying a message entered the Meadowbrook system not too long ago. You heard it before anypony else did. How could an FTL probe arrive in this system centuries after the Silence began if there wasn’t anypony to launch it within the past few years?

I nodded along, engrossed in thought. Honestly, I didn’t know which was better and which was worse: that Equus might be a destroyed ruin of a tomb world, or that somebody there was still alive and shooting off probes into space using the Synarchy’s codes and encryptions. If the Synarchy was still alive and they came here to reclaim their colony…

Two feathers jabbed me in the sides, and I immediately jumped about three feet into the air and started yelling and squawking in surprise. I grabbed my gun in my magic and spun around, heart pounding, only for a beige hoof to knock my rifle away and blue eyes to roll in their sockets. “Jumpy, ain’t we?” Ace asked, standing almost nose to nose with me, a stupid and amused grin on her face.

I shoved her back a bit, frowning and more than a little pissed. “Fuck off,” I growled. “You’re lucky I didn’t shoot the shit out of you.”

“You’re lucky I weren’t some monster ready to gobble you up like a tasty treat.” Ace winked and nonchalantly slid over to my side so she could look out the cave entrance as well. “Whatchu been up to?”

“Having conversations with Sparky while the rest of the gang sleeps,” I said. I looked over my shoulder and confirmed that they actually were still sleeping. Sheer exhaustion, it seemed, kept Nova and Gauge down, but I noticed that Teka’s ears were pointed in our direction, even if she kept her chin on the ground and her eyes shut. I nudged Ace’s side and pointed, and Ace shook her head with a chuckle.

“Can’t say I blame her,” she said. “She don’t know none of us well. I’d be suspicious as hell that my would-be rescuers might not have my best interests in mind after coming from a bunch of slaving miscreants who abused me and the like.”

“I just wish we could talk to her,” I said. “It’d make this so much easier.”

“I’ve been trying to puzzle out her language,” Surge said, stepping in to make use of my mouth, “but it’s hard to make any headway without notes to keep track of what she says and how she acts.”

Ace shrugged. “Maybe Nova’ll be right. Maybe one of them knows how to speak Equiish and can translate for us. Celestia knows we ain’t doing it ourselves.”

“Just count me out if it comes to that,” I said with a shake of my head. My eyes slid over to the tunnel in the back of the cave. “Find anything neat in there? You’re not dead, so that’s a good thing.”

“Tunnels,” she answered me. “Lots and lots of tunnels. Shit goes on forever. Ups and downs and everything. Big caverns. You could get lost in there.”

“Nothing living?” I prodded.

“Cave slugs, spider rats, not anything out of the ordinary.” She scoffed as she added, “Cave slugs are weird, though. They’re shaped like triangles. Ain’t ever seen anything like that. They’re weird, even by Auris’ standards.”

I stretched myself out and slowly shook my head. “Now that’s impressive. No big monsters, though?”

“Maybe once. There’s some big bones back there. Exoskeleton bits from huge bugs, too. Almost pony-sized, I reckon. Spooky stuff.” She shivered. “Didn’t see any living or freshly dead things they might’ve come from, though. It’s almost as quiet as the grave.”

“Don’t say things like that,” I muttered. “I really don’t need that stress in my life.”

Ace frowned at me. “What, dead stuff? Filly, you and I kill so much shit. Between the two of us, I reckon we could fill a cemetery.”

“Well, the tolan would certainly fill a big chunk of it.”

The outlaw snickered and winked at me, fluffing her wings at her sides. “That’s for sure. Ain’t many ponies who can say they’ve killed one of those monsters. I certainly haven’t.”

“Really?” I asked. “I figured you’ve done everything. You certainly know what’s what out here in the wilderness.”

“Ah, that’s just paying attention. They say failure’s the best teacher, but there ain’t no room for failure out here in Auris. Watch somepony else do the failing so you don’t have to. You learn better when you ain’t dead.”

“I’m sure,” I said. My ears twitched at another boom of thunder, then twitched again and again as it echoed through the caves. When I looked back over my shoulder, I saw Teka sitting upright, eyes wide as she hyperventilated for a few seconds. But after realizing it was only thunder, she swallowed hard, looked around the cave, and barely made eye contact with me before she lowered her head and looked away in embarrassment. Nova and Gauge just shifted positions some and muttered to each other when the noise finally stopped echoing.

Ace had a little amused smirk on her face. “Ain’t gonna get much sleep during this storm,” she said. “Thunder’s right on top of us.”

My ears were still ringing a little bit from the boom, and I pressed my half-ear flat against my head with my hoof. “Gee, I didn’t fucking notice.”

“Don’t bitch at me about it, just because I’m a pegasus don’t mean I can clear those clouds.”

“That certainly would’ve been nice. My coat is still pretty damp.” To emphasize my point, I used my magic to pull some water off of my charcoal body and let it splash onto the floor.

Ace just rolled her eyes. “Should’ve kept up a better rain shield.”

“You should have stayed closer to us,” Surge countered. “Ember kept expanding it to cover you when you drifted too far ahead or back while flying. I would’ve just let you get wet.”

I blushed a little bit, feeling a little tingly inside. “I was just trying to look out for you,” I said, defending myself. “I didn’t want you to get wet.”

“Good thing I can count on you to watch out for little old me,” Ace said.

I smirked back. “Somepony has to.”

I could feel Surge rolling her eyes inside my skull. Just fuck already…

Ace fluttered her wings a little in the ensuing silence, and I was too embarrassed to say anything after Surge called me out on it. But I honestly didn’t know what to say at the moment and was too nervous about pressing the obvious issue between us, so I started down probably the least romantic thing I possibly could. “Back there in Three Rivers… what happened between you and Wayward?”

The outlaw scowled and looked away. “Ain’t none of your business.”

“You were seconds away from murdering that griffon in cold blood,” I countered. “If somepony on my team is gonna go berserk and turn into a psycho killer on a moment’s notice, I want to know why. Fuck it, I need to know why. That’s what I’m supposed to do as a leader, right?”

“You ain’t my leader,” Ace grumbled. “I could fly off anytime I like.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “Yeah, well for now, you’ve been traveling with us and following my lead, so I’m your leader, reluctant or not.” Sighing, I ultimately yielded and abandoned the topic, not wanting to get in a shouting match with a valuable teammate and surprisingly close friend. “Fine, whatever. I’ll drop it. Sorry.”

I lowered my head onto my crossed forelegs and decided to just watch the rain instead. But after a few moments, I saw Ace’s wings begin to tremble in my peripheral vision. Raising my head once more, I looked aside at Ace and saw her sniffling and trembling. Without a second thought, I slid up against her side and tried to use my warmth and presence to steady her. “Ace? What’s wrong?”

“I would’ve liked to stay a Ruin Runner,” Ace said in a fragile voice. “It weren’t them that made me leave. It was him. Him and him alone.”

I closed my eyes and crossed my neck over hers in a comforting half-embrace. “What happened?”

Ace squeaked out three tiny words. “He raped me.”

That was like a hammer blow to my chest. It took me a second to process it, but when I did, I could only think about how much that horribly made sense. “Stars, Ace, I’m so sorry. I… well, I didn’t know.”

“Nopony does,” Ace whimpered. “I only ever told Z and Lines. That was the night we quit. I was thirteen, almost fourteen, and he got me during a run when nopony else were around. Stuffed a gag in my mouth and told me he’d kill me and Z and Lines if I ever told anypony. So I never said a peep for the longest time. It was almost a year before I finally worked up the courage to leave the Runners. Realized that being on my own scared the shit outta me, but staying there with Wayward scared me even more.”

She sniffled and wiped at her eyes with a wingtip. “I didn’t tell Z and Lines until the day we left. They got me outta there. They were such great friends to me. I didn’t hang around Three Rivers long before me and Z decided to explore the world. I feared I’d lose my shit if I saw Wayward again. Guess years later, I proved myself right.”

And now I totally understood why Ace was so furious back in Three Rivers that she was going to paint the walls with Wayward’s guts, consequences be damned. Would I have acted differently had I been in her position? I couldn’t imagine what that must’ve been like for her. I mean, I’d nearly been raped at Blackwash, but I’d fought off my attacker and killed him before he could do anything to me. Even through the emotional burnout that night had been, I’d still been terrified and panicked. Actually having to suffer through the whole ordeal like Ace did…

So I wrapped my forelegs around her and held her close, whispering soothing words into her ear as she started to cry. “It’s okay,” I whispered, even though I knew it wasn’t. “You’ll be alright,” I told her, even though I knew she’d never be. What else could I do, really? Not even Surge was being all that helpful, instead just watching events unfold from a distant, if horrified, position in the back of my brain.

What do you do for a badass of the wilderness who’s fundamentally broken at her core?

Only one thing. Sit with her. Hold her. Let her know she’s not alone. I can never fucking find anything to say in situations like that… but I could definitely be there for her. And so I was. I don’t know if it helped or not, but in that bleak, lonely cave, that tiny safe port in the storm, I think it did.

That was all I could do.