Chapter 13: Science and Secrecy

It took Red Eagle and Sparks only fifteen minutes or so to find the townsponies. They were bunkered up deep within the stadium’s inner structure in bolstered halls and corridors -emergency shelters as they had said- and the fear mingled with confusion in their eyes was apparent as dozens of them quivered and shook, already roughly knowing what had happened through the mind-speech.

One of the guards, the one that Eagle had spoken to over a month ago when he had went to see Mayor Madame, looked at Eagle with slight apprehension that gave way to skeptical gratitude as he asked after the creatures that had attacked.

‘Are they... dead?’ he had asked with confusion in his eyes, and Eagle merely kept limping past him saying ‘They’re gone’. The response wasn’t what the guard expected, but either without a care of how or not wanting to accuse the deliverance they so desperately needed he took the news with a guttering sigh of relief and backward stares to Eagle, Tato, and Sparks, the strange Stable mare who followed close behind.

The townsponies looked to their saviors with mixed gratitude as their own recurrent terror made their words jumbled, incoherent at times, but thanks and such were given by the dozens as they shivered in remembrance of how the presence of the mind-speech made them all uneasy. Within their gratitude though, it was apparent that the lingering stares there was confliction. A griffon mercenary and a Stable dweller had saved them, as Tato was quick to correct those who included her with their gratitude.

It wasn’t so strange to them, they thought, but after so long of being convinced of how outsiders were nothing but trouble or inconveniences they reconsidered their prejudices as a filthy little earth pony filly jumped to Eagle in strange amazement. It was the foal that Eagle had seen in the distance, when he had flown up to the Mayor’s office so long ago, and she hugged him shouting her thanks repeatedly with Eagle suppressing the urge to push her aside, awkwardly patting her on the back as he stared around for the foal’s parents... who never came for her from the crowd.

Some of the townsponies visibly smiled at the sight, others silently balked or held sorrowful gazes with Eagle as he searched, but all in all it was a resounding message to them they took harshly. That perhaps they were wrong about Red Eagle.

Sparks, strangely enough, received similar lingering distrust she recognized, but unaware of the cause she shook her head as she pulled from her soaked saddlebag her doctor’s kit and began treating what injuries they had sustained in the attack. She stitched and mended their wounds as best she could, making an impromptu triage within their shelters and, soon enough her hooves were coated in a strangely different kind of blood.

Blood of the injured as she helped them; truly helping the hurt, the dying. It was a somber feeling, but one she felt good about helping to remedy.

As the wounded were tended and greetings exchanged they emerged from the shelter in groups, clearing out into their skies darkened Crystal City to rebuild what was destroyed and fix that which was broken. Their lingering gazes hung on the massive murky pool of water that covered the ground, and the shacks that were blown to pieces as their smoking ruins billowed fumes from smothered embers. They grimaced and their faces twisted into despair as they took in the sight of their town, their home, and some fell to their knees and gave numbed sobs in the wake of the destruction they never thought would be able to touch them behind their walls.

After a time, they managed to create the illusion of control as the leaders emerged from the guards and common folk, directing ponies to certain jobs and necessities that would be crucial to their immediate survival, and most took the direction with eagerness for normalcy once again like sheep heeding their shepherds. Eagle saw with his own eyes history repeat... again, and it was no less numbing as it occurred to him before.

The broken remains of a people with little hope to keep them afloat, with the ones among them who wore brave faces to support the weak and lost, and slowly but surely the illusion of safety inched its way back to their lives. Eagle, Tato, and Sparks worked with the effort to secure themselves, and he shook his head again, for the same reasons as before mere weeks ago, as attachment came back to him exhuming his long buried emotions.

*** *** ***

It wasn’t until nearly evening had come that Eagle and Sparks sat in the torn to shreds office of the grievously injured Mayor Madame as she sat with them on her sodden couch. Mayor, her burgundy coat and platinum mane spotted with dark blackish blotches of dried blood, was crisscrossed with bandages and soon to be scars as her once impeccable visage was tainted by the horrors of conflict. Sparks had helped her out of her once critical condition, but she still echoed pain in her motions.

Her breath was labored and spoke little due to the shooting pains like fire in her once comely frame, and Eagle spoke to her with a flat, gravelly voice to the guard next to her who, despite their rescue, kept a close distance to the mayor in reflexive protectiveness. “How many dead?”

The guard shook his head and hung it low as he gave a guttering sigh and wiped his shaggy mane aside. “Well... until we get a head count we won’t know for certain. Off the shoulder I’d guess we might have a lost fifteen or twenty... More than likely more.”

He shook his head again, showing the subtle feeling in his head that he wasn’t sure it was over, like a fantasy after those creatures had played with his mind in such a fashion. As an earth pony Eagle had guessed that a fear of the paranormal would hit them hard; harder than most. Even Sparks still seemed shaken as she did all she could to keep a brave face.

The guardspony continued after a brief and distant stare. “I know everypony got hurt, in some minor fashion... but the initial attack is what hurt us the worst. Once we knew what was goin’ on the majority of the town fled in a mad panic, gallopin’ all over the fuckin’ place... by that time we had already lost too many guards to their surprise attack. Any who lifted a weapon basically got killed outright.” He chuckled madly, as the fear seeped and hardened to an expression of ebbing shellshock. “Kinda hard to kill somethin’ that’s messin’ in your head like that...”

Eagle grunted in agreement, his own distant stare betraying the rattled sensations that were left in their wake; only a deeper feeling is what fueled the most of his expression. Sparkslooked up at Eagle and the guardspony after gazing out over the town below, speaking solemnly with a suspenseful voice. “So... what were they? They... well, they looked like...” She couldn’t say more than that, but all assembled knew what she meant.

“They looked like the Goddesses...” Mayor Madame said, breaking the silence. “Definitely wasn’t my idea of them at all, to be sure.”

Ward breathed deeply as he shifted uncomfortably and spoke. “But... why would, well... Goddesses do this kind of thing? I mean... I assume everypony heard that... that shit in our heads?”

“What they were doesn’t matter much anymore.” Eagle cut in as he drilled the wall opposite of him with his eyes. “They attacked you, and in the end we fended them off. What matters now is how you’ll recover.”

Ward straightened himself, and sighed before he spoke again. “We rebuild. Bit by bit ‘till we’re back to where we were, then hope to... well, Celestia those freaks don’t poke their heads around here again...” The guardspony’s eyes lingered over the devastation below as his words caught on his swear, and he sighed in frustration over the now seeming inadequacy of what they were prideful for; ‘near perfect’ protection from the wasteland beyond. “I don’t think we could of shored up enough to handle those things... Maybe the Steel Rangers could but those fuckers are equally freaky in their own way... no hurry at all to come runnin’.”

Sparks looked at the guardspony with a confused expression and turned to Eagle for clarification, but he only sighed with a dismissive shake of his head. “Later, Sparks.”

“Short story is... we’re bleeding in the water, and we need to get our defenses back up before another group gets funny ideas.” Mayor Madame interjected in a pained voice as she lethargically shook her head, coughing as she did. The guardspony moved to her with a supportive hoof, but she just smiled slightly and held up her own. “No... I’m... I’m fine Ward.” He nodded his head and backed up to his previous position, and the mayor continued to speak, albeit with subtle pains in her speech.

“Once we... we manage to drain the water and center ourselves we should... should be fine. Once commerce flows again we will be more... more than capable to bounce back. That I promise...” Her words seemed mostly directed at Ward, whose tense stance eased as she stayed objective and optimistic.

Eagle knew though that, in a time like this, the town couldn’t afford indecision or misdirection, and morale was every bit as important as anything. He only hoped that Mayor wasn’t simply putting on a brave face for the townsponies. They needed more than illusions. He sighed as he looked over to Sparks, and with a slow return of his head he locked eyes with Mayor Madame again.

She knew what he was thinking, about her contract with him, and she gave a guttering sigh as she realized what was to happen next would be dangerous for her and the town. “I’m... I’m sorry Red Eagle but...”

“We had a deal Mayor.” He said levelly and accusingly, no hint of emotion behind the words and she flinched from the jab.

“I know we did... but it isn’t that simple anymore.”

“The fuck it isn’t.” With Eagle’s outburst Ward advanced on him with a sudden steely determination to protect the mayor at any cost. Eagle locked eyes with Ward as Sparks’ startled gaze darted back and forth between them as the sudden escalation surprised her.

Mayor Madame threw a hoof up with physical pain wracking her frame as she gave a clear order to him. “Stand down Ward... they saved us!”

“Yeah, and he’s plannin’ on being a nuisance!”

“I said stand down!” Ward reluctantly withdrew to her side as his nostrils flared in anger. Mayor gave a full body cough as pain shot through her bandaged wounds, and after she regained control of herself she spoke. “Here’s what I mean Eagle... I can pay you, despite the fact that we now need... every cap we can get our hooves on... that isn’t the problem.”

“Then what is?” Eagle said flatly, and Mayor Madame turned her head behind her to the door leading to her office’s backrooms. She sighed as she realized the only way to convince Eagle was to reveal a great many secrets and truths about her situation, and she hoped it would be enough.

“Follow me, there’s something... something I want you to see...”

*** *** ***

Even the backrooms were torn to shreds to Eagle's subtle surprise; the once obvious glory and cleanliness reduced to scraps that so often littered The Wasteland had invaded this once separate place like a virus, rending the impeccable with decay. Furnishings and furniture were strewn about in a maddened lack of pattern, and scorched holes the size of melons in the scorched wallpaper that once showed cheery images of ponies or animals acted as the telltale signs of the winged unicorns’ magical attacks.

Eagle wondered how long they fought for, and how far damage had actually been done before they had arrived and defeated them; a development that Eagle had not expected at all. When he caught a glimpse of one, and their magical potential, he thought he could kill one by himself, which he did just barely, but Sparks being there to distract the rest proved invaluable taking on no less than three of the monsters. An entire wing dead, and it once again got under his skin about his growing unvoiced debt to her.

She had saved him four times now; once from the wounds he suffered saving her against the Enclave’s troops -a debt he swept aside for the fact he did it for her to begin with, again with the raider fiends merely two days ago -even though that it was more accidental than intentional, again with Garret and the Talon mercs by blowing a wing off of him mid-fight, and again today as she kept one of those things on her tail and with a stroke of unimaginable luck took out another before it could move, and somehow convincing the third to break pursuit. The entire development was equally as unexpected as defeating them all.

Three of those overpowered monsters felled, and one without help, and she was fresh out of the Stable. ‘A natural... or plain fucking lucky,’ he thought as he grumbled that he was impressed.

Mayor Madame had Ward lead the way, and he opened doors and cleared debris as she limped along using an old refurbished crutch to support herself. Finally reaching their destination in what looked like a storage room of sorts that held steel cabinets and crates, boxes on top of boxes for what Eagle could only assume was a pseudo vault for precious trade goods or caps. The piece that Mayor Madame was approaching, however, was a low steel wrought table against a wall that was covered in a light blue tarp concealing something oddly... pony shaped below it; like a morgue’s body bag.

Eagle sighed as he looked at the table, wondering just how some dead no-name was going to convince him to relinquish their debt to him before the mayor began a long winded speech in an overtaxed voice about just how it in fact did. “Two days ago... before... before the attack that launched this afternoon with that... damned storm, my contact with the... eh... ‘Employer’ I told you about, arrived in town -very early, much like yourself- to await your arrival. Only... with the attack he-” she paused, reconsidering her words as she tilted her head slightly and squinted her eyes. “... It, I should say, was killed in the fighting.”

Eagle’s expression remained stoically still and distant, but the correction caught his attention with a small measure of puzzlement. “What do you mean ‘it’?”

Mayor Madame gave a hoof signal, and Ward reluctantly threw the tarp from the table, revealing something that neither Eagle nor Sparks had ever seen before, and both were stunned by what they saw.

It was a metal pony.

Not at all like the classic, and infamous, Robronco sentries or Robobrains; clunky, lacking dexterity or aesthetic in design cranked out on an assembly line for war only roughly resembling their makers. No, this metallic equine before them looked almost, but not quite, like a slaved over work of art; despite the obvious critical damage the machine has suffered. Its strange and dull, sterile white polymer ‘skin’ that wasn’t charred by blasts looked smooth to the touch, and in sections like the joints it separated showing the internals. Elegantly wrought and polished silver servos and joists that stretched from the limbs and neck into the body cavity mounted the sophisticated, almost alien internal mechanisms to its chassis.

The Face was the most intriguing piece of the wrecked machine however. It was Equine, absolutely, but almost deceptively close to equinity. So close that if all one saw was the head they could mistake it for a master’s carved statuette or bust, hewn and polished from white marble complete with realistic lips, cheeks, teeth, tongue, brow, eye lids, ears, and eyes; all of which were locked in an empty expression of the dead. It even had the remains of a fibrous mane and tail that glistened like carbon fiber between silver grays and blacks.

Eagle’s eyes locked tightly, wide and baffled, on the foreign... thing. It was something he had never seen before at all, and no robot he had ever seen even remotely came close to the complexity and advanced tech that lay before him. Sparks shared the bafflement in far greater strides however as even all the technology she had seen; between the Enclave’s and her Stable’s and all the exotic machinations in old magazines of prewar gizmos and gadgets, none of it even compared.

Her eyes traced the designs that were almost magical in how striking the details were. The graceful inner mechanisms she examined in the blast holes looking so much like sparkle generators or flux dynamos among computer parts a fraction of the size of the usual equivalents; if she was even sure she recognized them. She could have even sworn some of the mechanical boxes and spheres inside it resembled certain vital organs, and even more impressively these ‘organs’ were placed correctly in the anatomy like they were meant to serve the functions of their corporeal look alikes.

Only... a snagging thought entered Sparks’ mind as she tilted her head and moved closer to get a better look. What need would a robot have for lungs, or a liver? The heart she guessed could be a power source; the generator for the machine hiding a sparkle generator or magical talisman. Maybe the liver could have been like an oil filter or some other purification system for internal fluids in the rubber lines and pipes that ran between it's multiple parts and pieces, and the lungs could serve as pumps... unless the machine used oxygen or other gases from the atmosphere for its internal processes.

Her head was spinning by the strange and beautiful combination of medical and technological wonders that would only be intensified if it was either winged or horned, which it bore neither of, and she was left with a hanging mouth and stunned expression as Mayor Madame caught both their confusion. She nodded slowly as she brought the crutch closer to stand more comfortably, favoring one set of legs. “Filly and Gentlegriffon... I give you a ‘Synth’.”

“A... ‘Synth’?” Sparks asked with purely stunned amazement in her expression and Mayor Madame chuckled a little, taking a subtle pleasure in being able to reveal one of The Wasteland’s most obscure secrets that even the Steel Rangers would salivate to become privy in their mad quest to sequester away all advanced technology. Even Eagle she saw was locked onto the sight like a wild eyed tribal witnessing magic.

“A ‘Synth’ is short for synthetic... of course that’s obvious but... Synth specifically refers to these. ‘Sentient, sapient even, Equid-’... eh... Oh what did it call itself...?”

“Ekweeday Mockena, I think...” Ward struggled to say, his lingering eyes on the synth betraying his reluctance to trust it or its mere presence, or if it was even truly ‘dead’; if a machine could be considered as such.

Sparks looked up and she recognized the phrase, it was part of an Old Ponish dialect that she took as an elective in her youth, as for some odd reason all the old medical names and phrases were in the language. “Equidae Machina... Equine Machine in Old Ponish...” She said as she looked ever deeper and longer in the synth.

Mayor Madame chuckled again as she grew a smirk. “Well, at least you understand what it said... This fellow didn’t exactly elaborate on that, but... they weren't wrong though if that’s the case; ‘Equine Machine’. A frighteningly good replication of ponies and, by what I heard from it, the only giveaway is the strange plastic-like skin and the techy bits poking out. It even spoke like us.”

Eagle gave a subtle scoff as he broke his eyes from the synth and scratched his scarred beak with a talon. He shook his head and looked to Mayor with a burning question in his head. “This is... interesting and all... but what’s this got to do with my payment?”

The mayor hung her head slightly as if measuring her next words with extreme care, and after breathing deeply she spoke. “Well... for starters this synth was meant to take... Sparks here... along with him, back to... wherever it came from. Truth is I don’t know where he was going to take her; somewhere west. Add in the fact that I don’t have any method of direct contact I can’t tell it’s... eh, ‘owner’ I guess... that it died here. They contacted me, and they might make contact again once they find out it failed but... odds are that will take way to long.”

She shook her head slowly and breathed deeply as her eyes lingered on the synth. “Worse is the fact that the Enclave... Thunderhead specifically down in The Hoof, is doing this under the table from the rest of their government. It’s bad enough that a... covert operation like this is going on -in my city no less- but with that massive storm The Enclave above us will be showing up to investigate.” She gave a grim chuckle as she shook her head speaking low. “A massive storm like that is a Double-you-Em-Dee to the Enclave... after all, with all their ‘Cloud-Crops’. No telling when they will show up.”

She chuckled darkly at the irony that something as simple as torrential, hurricane style weather was so dangerous for the lofty Enclave, despite their technological superiority. So dangerous in fact as to be labeled just as bad as the bombs and megaspells that shredded Equus a century ago, nevermind her puzzled fascination with the idea of growing crops in clouds; of all things.

“Skip to the punch line Mayor.” Eagle said impatiently, and Mayor Madame gave a guttering sigh as she shifted uncomfortably.

“Point is... If an Enclave troop arrives and finds out anything, and I mean anything, related to Thunderhead the town itself may as well be what they call ‘impounded’. Between her, her suit, and her PipBuck -which we don’t have any of those goddess damned lock tools to remove it- they’d connect the dots with their databases.

"They know Ninety-Six is in The Hoof, which is Thunderhead territory. They find her after their excessively thorough investigation and this town is screwed, even harder than with those... things. Not to mention my invaluable contacts in Thunderhead will dump me faster than a Brahmin out of one of their sky-tanks.”

She gave another guttering sigh as her speech took the wind out of her, and she shook her head as Eagle was standing there like the picture of danger. Tattered and filthy as he was with that stone cold expression that told her all he thought and more. ‘And this is my problem?’ was the question she knew he was thinking, and before he could voice it she continued after taking a breath. “And... the reason why this is a problem is that I’ve got another job for you. It’ll put us in debt to you because I barely have the caps to pay you what I already owe you... but I will be willing to consider it as barter-credit towards the town until the job is finished...”

The offer was, in Eagle’s judgment, a rather convenient dodge for her. He maintained his cold stare and spoke with an equally chilling voice. “How much?”

“I’m willing to double what I owe you; sixteen thousand, minus the two I paid you a month ago.”

Ward balked from his gaze at the synth and practically yammered in utter shock and confusion to the number, and Mayor held up a hoof to him stopping him short from his coming protest. Eagle on the other hoof merely scoffed as he looked off to the side with a disbelieving smirk. He had a hard time believing eight thousand at first, but fourteen grand?

He couldn’t, wouldn’t believe it for no better reason that no one in The Wasteland had ever fronted caps like that for any job; not even a Canterlot salvage run. “I’d recommend you stop yanking my chain Mayor.” She maintained a stoic face without a change in expression or a twitch in her eyelids. She was dead serious.

“I’m not ‘yanking’ your chain Red Eagle, when I say fourteen I mean it. If that’s the price of my town’s future prosperity, instead of being under the Enclave’s scrutiny, then I’ll pay it.” Eagle simply paced around Sparks as she stared longly at the synth body, all but unaware of the conversation happening around them. He stared at the synth and shook his head in indecision of whether she was being serious or not, and before he could respond she upped the ante. “Alright Eagle, how about eighteen?”

Both Ward and Eagle shot her glances of near stupefaction, and Eagle’s voice accused her of insanity. “You can’t be fucking serious?”

“She cannot stay here Red Eagle!!” Mayor retorted in desperation as she thrust a bandaged hoof at Sparks, the sudden shout snapped her euphoria as she shook her head and looked at Mayor with confusion in her eyes. Mayor staggered a bit before catching herself, and adjusted her stance with a whooping cough. “Eighteen thousand to take her west; to find out where the synth was going to take her.”

Sparks looked back and forth between Eagle and Mayor, and she weighed how much value her own entrusted confidential information was given the current situation. If they really didn’t know then what little she knew would at least give them more direction that ‘west’, but she didn’t exactly know if it would help.

Sparks spoke lowly, and measuring her own words she recalled what her Overmare and the Enclave officer had told her. ‘Of the utmost secrecy’ and ‘need to know only’, among other things... “Well... I think I can help with ‘where’ but I’m not sure...”

Eagle and Mayor glanced at her as she picked herself up from the synth before her; loath to take her eyes from its enrapturing magnificence. Mayor spoke first, shook her head and spoke with a cautiously low voice. “Now Sparks, anything you’ve been told is to be kept in confidence... Need to-”

“Need to know basis... yeah, but-”

Eagle scoffed and interrupted flatly as he decided to humor her, taking the job seriously. “I can’t take any creature anywhere without a destination; so yeah, I need to know. There’s hundreds of thousands of square miles between here and the west coast, and you surely don’t expect me to flip over rocks for a decade.”

Mayor hung her head and shifted her crutch as she spoke, trying to convince him of the gravity of what he was asking. “Listen Eagle, as much as I hate classified horseshit the... ‘Employer’ is worse than the Enclave, Steel Rangers, and all the Stables combined in terms of secrecy; might even top the Ministries. I’m willing to bet that the Enclave only knew of them because they were contacted by them first, and even still my feelers in Thunderhead only pulled names and possible directions, all without any coinciding details.”

She trailed her eyes over to the synth with a lingering fear in her expression before she shook her head. “It is what warned me of how precarious my own questions were. It knew, ‘they’ knew of my investigations; as if by magic.”

Eagle maintained his flat expression and wondered why she was so spooked by this. Worse than the old Ministries in terms of secrecy? He had trouble believing that, as they were massive governmental institutions of prewar Equestria in its peak, with the funding to fuel their operations against the Zebras in war and espionage. They failed in that endeavor, obviously, but most ponies barely ever heard the term ‘Ministry’ before, and far fewer knew a thing about them.

Only... as the past few days had shown him one improbability after another his disbelief was suspended for such outlandish events. He spoke lowly, squinting his eyes as he enunciated every word. “I. Cannot. Take. Any creature. Anywhere. Without a destination.”

Mayor sighed deeply as she hoped the slip of information wouldn’t come crashing down on her head, or her town for that matter, and gestured to Sparks with a hoof as she wore an expression of subtle worry. “Alright Sparks... let’s hear it...”

Sparks scratched her chin with a hoof as she wore a contemplative expression. ‘Where to begin’ was the question that burned into her mind until she decided the best way to start would be a name, one spoken with nervousness in whispers she didn’t understand. Only if this synth was their handiwork then there must have been something to fear. The technology matched the Enclave officer’s description of just how far ahead of them they were.

“Well... they’re called ‘The Institute’... for starters. The way I heard it nopony knows where they came from or who they are... but technology wise, well...” She gestured her hoof over the synth that lay broken, yet astounding all the same on the table before them; amazement was still lingering in her eyes. “You can see their work for yourselves... they’re based somewhere out west of course, but the only geography I remember being referenced was a place called... The ‘Undiscovered West’.”

Eagle scoffed as he shook his head, and he grimly chuckled. “That’s as far west as it gets on the map; the border of prewar Equestria, past the Smokey Mountains.”

“There’s more.” Sparks said as she shifted uncomfortably. “The rough location that the officer gave me included a name, said with equal dread it seemed.” she hung her head in a pause, unfamiliar with the name but sure that it might shake them. “A place called ‘The Divide’...”

Eagle’s stoic expression twisted subtly as he became as rigid as a statue at the mention with wide shot eyes, with Mayor balking in a voiceless gasp and Ward matching Sparks’ confused expression. Mayor spoke first in a curse as she pulled her bandaged hoof to her forehead. “Oh fuck me running...”

*** *** ***

Mayor Madame stood in front of the large wall covering map in her office, with Ward close by as Eagle and Sparks stared on its semi blasted marker lines and dividers as old world locations mingled with newer Wastelandic ones that rose over the century. They shuddered as the massive glass window that served as the mayor’s shielded, queenly view of her dominion below now served as a grim reminder of the terrors that had befallen them; a chilling, whipping breeze cutting through their clothes and coats.

Sparks recognized some of the map by her PipBuck’s, and she switched to it with a few deft magical button pushes to fill in the gaps left in the battle’s wake. The subtle bafflement returned as her eyes spanned across Equestria in its entirety.

Mayor Madame cleared her throat as she scanned over the once nearly pristine log of The Wasteland from the irradiated ‘Frozen North’ to the arid and empty ‘Badlands’ in the south, and it spanned from the ‘Celestial Sea’ all the way to the north and south ‘Luna Oceans’ across; the ‘Undiscovered West’ planted firmly between the two oceans as a massive land mass dominated by what was once lush forests and mighty mountains. She silently mused her reservations as to what now dominated the landscape; a whole continent of nothing save for deserts and megaspell scars of the old world.

As far as she knew, anyways... only stories and tales -from random travelers no less- came out this far east as even the small communities that arose in Vanhoover, Tall Tale, or New Pegas never ventured into the beyond, for fear of what ‘The Divide’ held in the all but uncharted region.

She planted a hoof on the map, squarely in the scribbled name emblazoned in red hued inks as a radiation symbol hovered above it, and she sighed deeply. “The Divide... is bad news if that’s where the Institute is.”

Sparks turned to Eagle with lingering fear of the coming answer to her question. “What’s the divide?”

“As she said. Bad news. Doesn’t give it justice though if half of what I’ve heard is true.” He stared long and hard with an intensity that showed Sparks he was dead serious. His eyes traced down to The Hoof, nearly opposite of The Divide on the map’s edges, and he mused once again that the map’s cheery little radiation symbol wasn’t nearly enough warning.

“From the rumors I’ve heard The Divide is a section of old Equestria that was far more remote and distant than any other Equestrian land claims. They say that the country only started exploring it in earnest once the power struggle made them desperate for resources, or maybe just more of what they were burning through.” He shifted and grumbled as he poured over the legends around that large unknown, but only one detail was absolute or vaguely certain.

“Equestria supposedly had a staging area for their megaspell facilities there, maybe other types of Ministry buildings and projects; the details are scarce. All I know is they call it ‘The Divide’ because the plains became canyons from underground detonations -whether from Zebra attack or a hugely miscalculated accident no creature knows. It makes it nearly impossible to trek there because those megaspells are still churning to this day.”

Mayor coughed and added to the dilemmas that ponies near it suffer as she spoke lowly, with the words oozing from her with hatred of them. “Thus the ever popular ‘Storms of The Divide’ that tear apart even some of the more distant settlements who are too foolish to move on. Those massive irradiated sandstorms can chew through unprotected ponies in minutes, barricaded settlements in days -if not hours.”

Eagle shook his head in raw disbelief that this was supposed to be the place he was to take her. The Hoof was bad enough, but that at least he understood that was far more of a simpler threat; despite the hearsay of what it held exactly. The Divide’s sheer lack of hard information simply made what was known far more intimidating, and all creatures really knew of it was that those sandstorms could tear the flesh from ponies and all others alike within minutes, with only dragons or other hard-skinned beasts able to withstand them.

Regardless of the creatures within them, the storms left radiation clouds as thick as clicking hot craters from the balefire bombs in their wakes, so the odds were any creature would be dead anyways from sheer exposure. Those storms tainted the very ground, ensuring nothing could live there besides mutants or otherwise that could survive the steeply buzzing cacophony of clicks of rad-counters as their electronics slowly fried from the sheer intensity of it. Nevermind whatever else hid in that canyon... or the region around it.

“If you think for a moment... I’d be willing to head into that clusterfuck of death and radiation... even for eighteen grand -or twenty or twenty five, it doesn’t matter- you’re out of your fucking mind.” Eagle said as he locked eyes with Mayor Madame, his gaze dripping with malicious accusation. She merely shook her head as she figured that’s what he would have said; no mercenary in their right mind would willingly go there without a suicidal death wish.

She didn’t blame him either, as with the revelation even she balked inside at the consideration despite how desperate they needed it. It took Sparks in the end to throw a bone to their hopes and fears as she approached the map, eyes locked with the space they discussed, and nodded her head grimly.

Her expression exuded fear, but she shored her determination to see her mission through. “I’ll go; by myself if I need to. I’ll need a... map route though... and provisions.”

Ward and Mayor both shared a mixture expression, one of utter shock with subtle relief that was smothered by their combined fears of The Divide, but Eagle just scoffed as he spoke mercilessly in a flat gravelly voice. “That place will eat and shit you out dead girl, even if you get that far. There’s more than six hundred miles of raw Wasteland between here and the border -and that isn’t counting detours.”

Sparks shook her head harshly as she got fed up with his mercenary attitude, shooting him her own dangerous glare as she accused him of cowardice. “As I said, ‘Anything for home’ Red Eagle! If I don’t get to the Institute my Stable doesn’t get the gems it needs and The Enclave will press my people down harder than ever! Nevermind whatever the Institute will do when they find out the deal got reneged!”

She began to shout her mind as she threw her hooves around, gesturing to Mayor and Ward and the devastated town beyond and below the broken window; the chilly wind wafting through her filthy and knotted blonde mane and tail.

“Besides, if I don’t leave soon this town will also be screwed! You heard her, Enclave troops will be here in a matter of days if they’re going to be lazy; which they won’t! If they find me or anything related to Thunderhead, even remotely, my Stable suffers hoof in hoof! I can’t let that happen!” She huffed viciously and shook her head in frustration to what she had committed herself too, but as she had said she felt as if she hadn’t a choice. “So I’m heading for The Divide, with or without you! Maybe if I’m lucky I’ll die horribly to some... giant and hungry mutated monster, or get... raped alive by raider fiends until I die of infection!”

“Sparks, just wait a mome-” Eagle said as he tried to interrupt with agitated eyes, but she didn’t relent.

“Why would I wait Eagle!? Why would I!? All I’ve done since I left my Stable is gallop like my life depended on it! Three days of crossing Hoofington with those soldiers then two with you as I betrayed my own conscience because ‘It was necessary’! I’ve only had eight or nine hours of decent sleep this entire week! Why stop now!?”

“Sparks!!”

Eagle shouted harshly, bringing her tangential rant to a screeching halt. She locked her eyes with his, the boiling anger apparent in his gaze and snarling beak. He scoffed, looking off to the side and out beyond the broken window into the wrecked city as his mind was doing cartwheels trying to wrestle with the resurgent emotions. The metaphorical crack in his calloused dam that began when he first laid a talon back in Crystal City had broken to a flooding mayhem of confliction as Sparks’ visage reminded him all too much of Jade.

The passion, the fire in her eyes, the resoluteness to do the right thing while spurning the consequences, all of it sparked a pyre in his thoughts, culminating to one burning decision that he couldn’t understand as subtle wordless voices echoed in his mind fighting for supremacy.

He spoke firmly, grimly, yet a subtle warmth was to be heard in his gravelly voice. “Mayor Madame... by the time I get back I expect the eighteen thousand caps to be collected. Minus what I’m taking for travel provisions. Am I understood?”

Eagle’s words struck a cord of surprise in all of them, and Sparks’ fury ebbed to shock as her expression twisted into bafflement. Her eyes darted to Mayor who was equally stunned. “Y-yes, Red Eagle... Eighteen thousand... I... I cannot thank you eno-”

“No, you can’t. I’m not doing it for you anyway.” Eagle spoke accusingly before sighing with a hard and harsh distant stare as he shook his head. “Unless there’s more Equus shattering business to see to, I’ve got work to do.” Was all Eagle said before he turned and trotted out the door of Mayor’s office with a tense pace, and Sparks traded shocked glances with Ward and Mayor as they did the same.

When he was gone, Mayor let out a deeply held sigh of relief as she limped to her couch and sat down hard; wincing from the searing pain as she spoke. “I... did not expect that...”

Ward gave a grim chuckle as he shook his head, gesturing at Sparks and the direction of Eagle with a hoof. “I never heard of The Divide before, but as... nasty as he made the place sound I’d say you’re lucky Sparks.”

She screwed her face up as she tried to think about anything of her current situation was remotely ‘lucky’, and she voiced it with the last of her anger before it dissipated. “‘Lucky’? How is me tromping through Tartarus going to be in any way lucky?”

Ward gave a grim chuckle before he shook his head and waved a hoof. “No, not that; him goin’ with you, I mean. If I didn’t know better I’d say he probably likes you.” The idea was like a single warm, ashen coal that embedded into her mind. ‘Liked her’? What reason did he have to like her?

“How do you figure Ward?” Mayor said as she voiced the unspoken questions inSparks’ pondering expression, and he shifted in stance as he looked out the door.

“Well... mercs like him tend to get gloomy in old age. Could be he’s... eh I don’t know.” He shook his head as he turned to Mayor and Sparks, a flat expression on his face. “You heard him though, wouldn’t do it for twenty five -or worse. Money like that could buy a palace these days, personal army to boot; what other reason would he have to go to a place like The Divide?”

He nodded as he gestured to Sparks, her eyes deepened with questions around that very topic as he spoke. “The only other factor is you; goin’ there, alone and... well pardon my saying it but ‘naked and afraid’. It’s obvious you’re a newbie out of a Stable, even without the confession. Might be he’s concerned for you.”

Sparks’ eyes displayed the confusion plainly as she hung her head, staring off into distant nothingness as she poured over any reason why he would care. They had only known each other for two days, and while she had been through more ‘excitement’ in those forty eight hours combined than the rest of her life she couldn’t come up with any feasible reasons she could see. “Why would he care though? It’s not like I’ve... done anything for him but patch him up once.”

Ward shrugged with an empty expression, and sighed as he spoke lowly. “I don’t know. As I said, mercs get gloomy with age.”

“Could be even he doesn’t know...” Mayor added, as she shook her head trying to come back down to Equus after the equivalent of a miracle happened for her. Silently thankingSparks she gestured to her with a nod. “Eagle’s right though, the two of you need to prepare. I’ll risk letting the two of you rest up for the night here in town but come morning you have to hit the road.”

She looked to Ward who returned the solemn expression on her face. “Besides, we need to get moving ourselves; town to rebuild and a story to compile for the Enclave troop sure to come. Need our ‘paperwork’ in order, as they’re so fond of putting it.”

Ward nodded and turned around as he dug through the scattered wreck of the Mayor’s office, her eyes lingering with pain on the destroyed state of her once luxurious holdings. Sparks looked at her hooves, examining the dirt, dried blood, and caked mud on them, and the jagged hole in her suit’s sleeve not quite concealing her first terrible injury that she had ever received; replaced by a raw and pinkish, coatless scar beneath it.

She sighed lowly, and tried to run her hoof through her knotted and equally filthy mane and once braided tail; now nothing more than a bedraggled knot of muck and hair. She huffed in frustration as she turned to Mayor with a subtle hope in her voice, and a small smile. “You wouldn’t happen to have a... shower or something here, would you?”

Mayor looked at her as Ward gave a short chuckle, muttering something under his breath that sounded like ‘if only’ but she wasn’t sure. She sighed with a small smile of her own, and pointed a hoof behind her as she spoke. “Well if the... Goddesses, are kind my salon might be intact... You can use it if you want to.” She gave a saddened expression though as her eyes dimmed and her lips curled into a small frown. “No soaps though, I haven’t got any I can spare.”

Sparks looked at her, her eyes beginning to beam at the chance of a real chance to clean herself, not damp cloths swabs or rainstorms but an honest to Goddesses bath. She spoke lively again in her cute voice. “No problem, I’ve got my own.”

Footnote: Red Eagle level 22

Sparks level 4

Next Chapter: Chapter 14: What Remains Estimated time remaining: 4 Hours, 13 Minutes