"They were led here, following the path of a great roaring machine that disappeared. They believe it to be a sign that the old world is waking up."

Trains.

Even back when I had first heard mention of them I thought it was ridiculous. Not that trains were a strange way of transportation or that a machine of that size could move, but the idea that ponies pulled the train themselves was simply ridiculous. Wouldn’t it be more effective to just have wagons that ponies could pull? Pulling a train just seemed silly.

Then I had seen one when I battled against Tripwire. There was no doubting that the magnificent machine was something to behold, until I saw it was being pulled by a handful of ghoul ponies. Had I not been so preoccupied with my impending death at the time, I would have found the sight hilarious.

What idiot thought it was a good idea to create something that ran on coal when there was no coal to be found in equestria. The answer of course I knew. The design was a simple reminder of the peaceful life before the war. A time when trade between Equestria and the zebra homelands was a logical and viable option for both species.

And here I was, about to board that joke of a machine.

It had only taken us a few hours to walk to Fetlock train station. Crank seemed to be the kind of pony that liked to get places fast and didn’t like interruptions. While our first journey to Fetlock had been jam packed with near death experiences and a plethora of drawn out combats, our return had been quickened by Crank’s unprecedented raw power. Few raiders tried to attack us, and those that did where turned to ash by Crank’s tesla cannons before the rest of us even noticed there were red bars on our EFS.

The more time I spent with Crank, the more thankful I was that he was on our side and not at our throats. For the time being, that is. I dreaded the moment that the deal we made came to an end, be it completion of our mutual quest or simple betrayal. I doubted I actually stood much of a chance against him, even if I had more Balefire Eggs and a launcher for them that was rapidfire.

A ghoul in a tattered train conductor uniform marched up to us, a determined yet noticeably worried expression across his face. No doubt he recognized us as the ponies that had caused the destruction of half of the train station a few days prior.

“I’m afraid that you are too late, the train isn’t scheduled to leave for another few days,” The ghoul conductor insisted, stamping his hoof down to emphasize his point. “We just went out that way and need a good few days rest before we decide to pull another load out there,” The ghoul gave Crank a nervous glance, no doubt afraid that the cyber alicorn would blast him into pieces.

His fears were not unfounded. Crank lead down towards the ghoul, his metal jaw twisting into a cruel sneer. “I’m sure you’ll make it work, we are in quite the hurry,” Crank snarled, his jagged horn crackling slightly with blue energy. I noticed that his tesla cannons charged up with his horn, almost as if they were connected.

I ghoul gave a timid squeak and backed up a few steps. Finding himself unable to evade Crank’s intimidating glare he bowed his head. “I- I’ll see what I can do,” he muttered, a horrified tone creeping through his voice. The ghouls eyes wandered to the ruins of what had once been the train stations clock tower. His body began to tremble slightly. “Just give us an hour, I’m sure we can all get through this without any trouble.”

Crank grunted, causing the ghoul to flinch. The ghoul took the cyber alicorn silence as his cue to leave and blotted out of there as fast as he could. Despite his nerves, I applauded the ghoul on his ability to even confront the cyber alicorn in the first place.

Now that I thought about it, we did appear to be a rather intimidating bunch. If a powerful cyber alicorn wasn’t scary enough, we were also backed up by a psychotic flamer wielding raider in power armour and a massive black Hellhound. Brisk was bloodied and wore an eyepatch over his eye that made him look far more intimidating than he really was and Xayah… Well Xayah wasn’t overly intimidating, but zebra’s seemed to put ponies on edge. And to top all of that off, I had a murderous gleam in my eye and a Balefire Egg Launcher slung across my back.

I can definitely understand the ghouls fear.

“Sooooo, You guys come here often?” Pyre asked, glancing around at the ruined train station. “I must say, you four give terrible first impressions on ponies.”

Crank cast her a sour look, but remained just as silent as he usually was.

“And uh- you’re okay with this?” Brisk asked me, pulling me aside for a second. “I mean this whole forcing the ghouls to pull the train thing seems a little raidery, don’t you think?”

I shrugged. “It’s for the greater good Brisk. If we let this Azar character get to far ahead of us we risk him giving the A.A.S.S to Kamari, and then we not only need to worry about him doing whatever he plans to do with it, but we also run the risk of losing Crank as an ally.”

Brisk grimace. “When you put it all together like that, I don’t mind being a little raidery I guess.”

“It’s not being a raider,” I assured him. “It’s doing what needs to be done to stop something far worse from happening.”

Brisk seemed to take that for a solid answer. I returned to standing next to Xayah by the train. She looked just as worried about the situation as the rest of us, but she didn’t seem to have anything to say on the matter.

“So where exactly are you taking us?” I asked Crank as the ghouls started getting the train ready for departure. “You haven’t exactly told us much of anything.”

“Hollow Shades,” Crank grunted, keeping his eyes fixed on the ghouls.

Well that didn’t answer much. Granted I had never been outside of Manehattan so short of him saying Canterlot, his response probably wouldn’t have helped me much.

“The Hollow Shades?” Pyre echoed, casting a strange glance at Crank. “The fuck is Kamari doing out there? Last I heard that place was a abandoned?”

Crank shook his head. “The area around the Hollow Shades were used as a testing ground for Balefire bombs before the war. Ministry of Arcane Science set up there as well I believe. Last I heard there’s an old Stable up there that still has ponies in it and a small town of some sort.”

“And this is where Kamari is hiding?” Xayah asked innocently. “In the Hollow Shades?”

Crank shrugged. “Never met Kamari face to face. That was where he told me to meet him before some ponies decided to interfere,” Crank growled, casting me a death glare. I felt myself shrink under his gaze.

“So we don’t know where in the Hollow Shade he is then?” Pyre cooed, stretching out her front legs like a cat. “How do we hope to find him once we get there?”

“The Hollow Shades is a fairly small area,” Crank injected. “It will probably be easier than you think, and we can always ask the locals.”

“It’s closer to finding him then we’ve been so far,” I admitted, not enjoying the fact that I was siding with Crank on anything. “We’ll find him. I know we will.”

The train took longer to prepare than I would have liked. The hour that the ghoul conductor had suggested turned out to be more like two and a half hours, though it definitely still beet a couple of days.

We quickly piled onto the train and set off. My Hellhound quickly curled up in the corner of the wagon and fell asleep. I was glad that the creature still had enough free will to do that.

The ride was uncomfortably bumpy and the interior of the train looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in years, but it sure as hell beat walking. I marched over to one of the leather covered train seats that seemed somewhat intact and sat down on it. The seat made a gross squishing noise under my rump as I put my weight onto it. I stuck my tongue out in disgust at how wet the seat was.

Really, the wasteland couldn’t even give me a nice place to sit? Seriously?

Brisk and Xayah trotted up to me and slumped down on the seat as well. They seemed to care less about the gross noise that accompanied that action then I did.

“Conductor says the ride is only a few hours or so, we should reach the Hollow shade before nightfall assuming something crazy doesn’t happen,” Brisk informed me. He then cast a dirty glance at Pyre and Crank on the other side of the train wagon. Pyre seemed to be playing a game of staring the massive cyber alicorn down while Crank did his best to ignore her, a grouchy look sprawled across his face. “Not that I expect nothing crazy to happen. We don’t have that kind of luck,” He added flatly.

“The wasteland between Fetlock and Fillydelphia has been patrolled by a large group of bandits, with luck we can avoid an incident with them,” Xayah added. I remembered DJ Pon3 saying something about bandits that were picking on wastelanders and Slavers alike.

My ears popped up as a thought hit me. “Wait? Fillydelpia?” I asked, a small shiver running down my spine? “Isn’t that were Red Eye is?”

Xayah nodded. “It’s not far from Manehattan, in fact we will probably be passing it in a few minutes. Is that an issue?” Xayah asked, a bit of concern creeping into her voice.

“If your worried about getting involved with Red Eyes shit, then don’t be,” Pyre said, getting bored of staring down Crank and coming to join us on our side of the train wagon. “Red Eye doesn’t usually come out into this area of the wasteland. Not many ponies in these parts worth enslaving I guess. We might pass a slaver caravan out here moving to more populated areas of the Wasteland, but I doubt they’d attack us or anything.”

“How are you so sure?” Brisk pushed, narrowing his eyes at Pyre a little.

Pyre waved him aside. “How do you think this ghouls managed to collect enough caps to get this silly train into working order?” Pyre Blaze said, rolling her eyes behind the tinted visor of her helmet. “The ghouls here are neutral, they help anypony that needs a ride, that includes Red Eye and his slavers. They bring resources to Filly, allow Slavers bringin’ in Slaves a ride and in return Red Eye keeps them safe and loaded with caps.”

I didn’t like the idea of being on a train run by Red Eye. Pyre could tell to. “Don’t think too much about it Amber, the ghouls here help other ponies too. It’s a mutual thing.”

I glanced out the window to see the dark towering buildings of Fillydelpia looming in the distance for the first time. An ominous red halo of light seemed to shimer from behind it’s fortress like walls and strange looking hot air balloons circled the dark spires. Even all the way out here, the city looked evil.

I grimace. With my luck, I’d be heading into there someday. I didn’t like the idea of that one bit.

Xayah snarled as she spotted the vile cities silhouette on the horizon. “My family and I were nearly captured by Slavers on our way to Manehattan,” Xayah said, her gaze locked on the city. “The bastards had children in cages. They tried to take Zira as well, but we managed to escape.”

“Yeah, Red Eye’s weird like that,” Pyre grunted. “He enslaves children, then goes about teaching them and giving them toys. Course some slavers don't give a shit about educating the youth, so a lot of slavers just kill the children for fun. The guys a total nut job.”

“Hold up, who the hell is Zira?” Brisk grunted, clearly not thinking too much about what he was saying. I gave him a kick, knocking him to his senses. Almost immediately he realised his mistake, though in his defence I couldn’t remember Xayah ever talking to him about her past family like she had with me.

“Zira was my daughter,” Xayah said, her voice cracking slightly.

“You had a daughter? I thought you were like... gay,” Pyre quipped, giving me a quick wink. Brisk gave Pyre an angry glare at her comment. I would have as well had Xayah and I not been blushing. Seriously? Pyre knew about Xayah’s crush on me too? Did everypony know about it and were just waiting for her to make a move on me?

Xayah glanced away from us and back out at the landscape that flew past us out the window. “I don’t really want to talk about it,” She remarked, not answering Pyre’s question.

Great, probably another traumatic thing from one of our parties pasts that was going to come up later in some deeply emotional and heartbreaking conversation. Just what we needed.

I glanced over at Crank who was standing alone adjacent to us. He was staring out the window at the endless miles of wasteland beyond. Save for the twisted and leafless husks of charred trees and the occasional broken down single story building, there was nothing but flat open space. Having never been outside of Manehattan, I had never seen so much emptiness. The skyline had always been obscured by the towering skyscrapers and it had at least felt like there were always walls on all sides of me. But not out here. Out here was even more barren and dead. It was simply vast and empty.

Hollow. The wasteland felt hollow.

I groaned and pulled myself up from the seat, my eyes trained on the cyber alicorn. “Alright, I’m going to go talk to him,” I said, wincing at my own words. I saw Crank’s ear twitch. No doubt he could hear everything we were saying.

Brisk gave me a strange look. “Why? Please don’t tell me you are planning to make friends with that thing?”

I shook my head. “No... We need answers. He probably knows some,” At least I sure hoped he did. I also hoped he was willing to share them with me and not decide this deal of ours wasn’t worth his time and try to kill me. I could see our conversation going either way.

“Don’t make him angry,” Xayah suggested, casting the cyber alicorn a nervous glance. “I’m pretty sure a blast from his cannons will destroy this train,” I could have sworn I saw a small smile creep onto Crank’s face at that comment.

I gave Xayah a small nudge and smiled, making her blush. Holy shit, Brisk and Pyre were right, Xayah really did like me. I still had no idea how to deal with that. The idea that somepony had any form of romantic feeling for me was just strange. “I’ll be fine… probably.”

I turned from my friends and slowly advanced towards Crank. He was only about five steps away, but I took my time, afraid to get close to him.

“So you want answers?” Crank rumbled, not bothering himself enough to turn back and look at me. I shrank back slightly, having already forgotten how powerful and commanding his voice was.

I nodded, noticing that his gaze had locked on me through the reflection of the window. I pointed to the small Stable-Tec symbol at the base of his neck. “What’s your connection to Stable-Tec. Are they working with Red Eye or Kamari or something? Is that why I got a call from Stable-Tec right before you showed up in my Stable?”

Crank glanced down at the engraving on his neck. “Stable-Tec has been gone for a long time. However much of their technology is still very much active and usable. As a Stable Dweller, you should know that better than anypony,” I grunted, finally looking back at me and looking me over with his red eyes. “One of Stable-Tec’s headquarters is located in Fillydelphia. Take control of the headquarters and you suddenly have access to a lot of the Stables around the Wasteland.”

“And the symbol?” I repeated, pointing once again at the Stable-Tec logo on his neck.

“Stable 101 was filled with cybernetics,” Crank explained. “Even after Red Eye murdered his Stable, much of the contents inside were still in working condition.” I shivered at that. Red Eye murdered his Stable? The idea of that was unthinkable. “He soon realized that the cybernetics inside of the Stable, combined with a mix of MWT technology and various MAS projects could create something very powerful.”

“He being Red Eye, yes?” I asked, trying to keep up with all the information that Crank was springing on me. He was bing much more cooperative than I had been expecting.

Crank was quiet for a moment before turning back to look out the window. “Something like that,” He grunted, staring out at the ash coated wasteland.

I raised an eyebrow. “Not Red Eye? So like, another party that works closely with Red Eye?”

Crank grunted. I didn’t know if I should take that as a yes or no. So much for my previous statement of Crank being cooperative.

I could tell I wasn’t getting anywhere with him on that topic so I quickly changed to something else. “And what about this Kamari? Who is he? I figured he isn’t working with Red Eye.”

Crank looked back at me again and scoffed. “He definitely isn’t with Red Eye, that much is certain. Kamari is about as secretive as the damn Enclave, if not more so. I know he has a decent following of zebra’s and a lot more resources to throw away than even Red Eye. I don’t know much past that, though I hear he has been lending zebra’s to the remnant out in the Hoof.”

I wasn’t sure how much that information helped me. Most of that I had gathered already. The stuff about him lending troops to a faction out in the Hoof seemed interesting and most likely spelt trouble, but it wasn't something that I necessarily needed to worry about in the foreseeable future.

“Is that it?” I asked, hoping he had a little bit more info on him.

Crank though for a moment. “I’ve heard rumors that Kamari actively practices necromancy, though I can neither confirm nor deny that fact,” Crank stated flatly.

Necromancy. That word itself was simply horrifying. I racked my brain for anything I knew about that specific form of magic. I didn’t know much.

Back in the Stable, I had read a book about different types of magic that the Ministry of Arcane Science had been studying before the bombs fell. There had been pages upon pages detailing almost every form of magic out there. Every form except necromancy of course. That had only gotten a brief description and a warning saying that it was both extremely dangerous and very much illegal.

“Necromancy?” I stuttered, trying my best to not sound nervous. “Kamari can resurrect the dead?”

Crank gave me a shrug and continued staring out the train's window. “So the rumour goes. Though as I said, I can’t confirm that.”

“Okay, and what about you?” I asked, taking a meek step towards him.

Crank shot me a warning glare. “What about me?” His voice had changed to a threatening rumble. I took a quick step back, returning to the spot I had just been standing in.

“What about you?” I repeated again, trying my best to sound confident. “Like, what’s your story? How did you become a cyber pony? Shit like that.”

Crank narrowed his glowing red eyes at me. “Why do you care?”

I gulped. “I don’t know. Just wondering I guess,” Clearly Crank wasn’t a fan of answering personal questions. “I got really inside of Inferno’s head when I fought him, so I just thought that-

“You just thought what?!” Crank snarled, turning around to face me. The massive cyber alicorn loomed over me, blocking my view of the window. My friends across the train wagon saw the threatening movement and quickly drew their weapons, expecting some sort of a fight to break out.

I boldly put out a hoof and pushed Crank back a little, hoping to ease a little bit of the sudden tension. “You can take a step back. I know you’re taller than me, no need to rub it in,” I joked between quivering lips.

Crank glared down at me for a second before taking a quick step back. My friends relaxed a little and returned to their chatter, but I could tell they were preparing for a fight if something were to happen. Brisk didn’t even bother putting his pistol away.

“I am not Inferno,” Crank scowled, his eyes burning holes into my very soul. “I am nothing like that monster.”

I waved my hooves in front of my in an attempts to show that I understood. “Alright, alright. So Inferno was crazy even by your standards,” Crank continued to glare at me. I chuckled nervously. “Okay, Inferno was just bat shit crazy and you had to deal with him. Got it.”

Crank seemed to ease up at that. “Inferno was a monster in every stretch of the word,” Crank rumbled. “He was very useful in a fight, but his morals and vile lusts made him near impossible to deal with.”

I tried to imagine needing to work alongside Inferno, needing to put up with his violent behaviour and his sickening tendencies to rape every pony he could. The idea was horrifying. That said, I had seen into his past. Lived it. I had seen exactly what had driven him to become what he had become. “I’m not sure he was a monster actually,” I replied with an uneven tone. “Twisted and fucked up sure. Insane and violent, definitely. But in the end he was a pony like the rest of us.”

Crank gave me a hate filled sneer. “What the fuck did you witness in your little encounter with Inferno that gave you that twisted idea?” Crank hissed.

I kicked the floor of the train wagon awkwardly. “I uh- Well I kinda dug around in his head and made him relive all of his past traumas.”

Crank just stared at me coldly. Finally he shook his head. “And what you saw made you think he was deserving of forgiveness and redemption?”

That gave me pause. Did Inferno deserve either of those? I doubted it. Even with his past, nothing could excuse the things he had done. “No, I don’t think I could forgive Inferno for what he had done, but I do think that had things turned out differently for him, he could have been a better pony.”

Crank’s even stare was beginning to make me uncomfortable. His glass eyes kept looking over me as if trying to find something hidden on my body. “Having a good sob story doesn’t change the fact that you’re a monster. It only gives the monster a way to shift the blame onto something else,” Crank Replied grimly. “Inferno was the product of what happens when the wasteland consumes a pony. He could have been a pony had things been different sure, but that doesn’t mean he was one.”

I gulped as I readied my next question in my mouth. “And uh- are- are you a pony?”

The second the words left my mouth Crank froze. His entire body went rigid as he took in what I had asked. The momentary reaction of panic that flashed across Crank’s face was almost instantly covered up as he hid his feelings behind a cruel sneer. “I’m trying to be,” He scowled, his black, slug like tongue pressed tightly against his jagged fang like teeth as he released a hiss that sent a numbing chill down my spine.

“But you aren’t currently?” I pushed, cocking my head slightly to the side. I could see by the burning hate in Crank’s eyes that I had hit a nerve with him on that last question. I took a step back as I realised that I might have overstepped with my questions.

Crank bared his teeth at me, his tesla cannons slowly charging up as he stared me down. For a horrifying second, I thought he might actually fire at me. Then, just as quickly as his anger had come, it subsided and Crank turned to look back out at the window. “No, not yet. But I will be. Soon as this is all over…” There was a strange tone in his voice I understood far too well. In a painful second I didn’t see Crank standing before me, but rather I saw another version of myself. I saw a pony that for reasons I could not yet explain, had lost everything and was consumed by the rage that forced them to pursue the one thing they thought could undo all of their problems. For me it was revenge on Kamari, for Crank it was the completion of this mission for one reason or the other.

I gave a forced laugh. “I guess we’re both pretty fucked up, huh?”

Crank gave me a skeptical look. “Amber, you’re little squad is probably one of the most fucked up groups of ponies I’ve stumbled across in the wasteland. And that’s saying something.”

That made me stop. I glanced over at my friends across the train wagon. “We aren’t that fucked up,” I said protectively, looking them all over. “We’ve got a few problems sure, but nothing the average wastelander doesn't have.”

Crank gave out a hollow laugh. He pointed over at Pyre with a metal hoof. “I think that bitch has more problems than she wants you to think. Ask her about it some time. There is a level of fucked up in her brain that gives the mighty Inferno a run for his money,” his hoof shifted until it was pointing at Brisk. “And that one’s been through some shit. Judging by the way he keeps checking to make sure his Buck is still safe, I’d say he’s dealing with some nasty form of addiction towards it. And that Stable messed him up bad too. My caps are on a mix of suicidal tendencies and having been raped as a kid.”

My heart thudded in my chest at that. How the fuck could Crank have possibly guessed that after having know Brisk for only a few hours. It had taken me days to find out that bit of information on him out. And I had never even considered the idea that he might be dealing with some form of depression. “I- How did you…?”

Crank gave me a pitiful look. “I’ve had to work alongside Inferno long enough to know the victim of a child rapist when I see one. They have this…” He rolled his tongue around as he searched for the right word. “...This shame. I can see it in their eyes. They feel ashamed of their body, their past… they hate themselves.”

I wanted to yell at Crank to shut up. I didn’t want to hear anymore of this, but my tongue seemed to have turned to stone in my mouth. “Bu- But what abou-”

“And then there’s the zebra,” Crank soothed, his steady, stoic glare rolling over Xayah’s body. “Where to begin with her. She’s lost some ponies very close to her quite recently, that much is certain,” He paused; his eyes inspecting each movement Xayah made. “She’s been the victim of harrowing circumstances her whole life. Rape, torture, discrimination,” He glanced down at her hooves. “Her constant state of misery is evident in her ever shaking hoof.”

I glanced at Xayah’s hooves. Sure enough her left forehoof was trembling ever so slightly. I felt a pang of guilt that I hadn’t noticed it until now, especially since Crank had spotted it so quickly.

Crank’s words were sinking into me. How fucked up were my friends really? Was it my fault? The stuff Crank was talking about was all the things that had happened to them prior to meeting me, but- For some reason I couldn’t help feeling that I was responsible for their pain.

Crank finally turned and rest his eyes on me. “And you…” His eyes darted around as he took in my whole being. He forced himself to withhold a sickening grin. “Well I’m sure you can figure that out for myself.”

I realised my whole body had tensed up as he psychoanalysed my friends. I took a slow breath and let my muscles relax. “I’m what?” I asked, not fully sure if I wanted to hear his answer. On one hoof, he seemed to be able to read all of our emotions like an open book. I was interested as to what I might hear. On the other hoof however, the last thing I needed right now was some crazy emotion destroying mental crisis because he had made me realise some sick twisted detail about myself I had been ignoring.

Crank gave me a cruel smirk. “Where to begin with you Amber Aura?” He rolled my name around the inside of his mouth as if deciding exactly how good my name tasted. “You are hurting from the loss of your Stable, the death of somepony very close to you and the pain of a recent betrayal,” He began circling me, looking over every inch of my coat. “You’re… you’re angry.”

I chuckled at that. “Oh yeah? Tell me something I don’t know.”

That only made Crank seem to grin more. “You direct your anger at the wrong ponies,” he stated bluntly.

“I- what is that supposed to mean?” I gasped, trying to put what he was saying together in my head. “Are you trying to tell me that I shouldn’t be angry at Kamari?”

Crank raised a hoof in mocking defence. “I mean you aim your anger at your enemies to hide the fact that the pony you’re really angry at is yourself.”

I took a step back, his words hitting me like a ton of bricks falling onto my head. “I- you don’t know what you’re talking about,” I stammered, trying to prove him wrong. I wasn’t angry at myself for the death of my Stable. Right?

Crank finished his first circle around me and began his second pass. “You blame yourself for the misfortune that has befallen those around you because you believe you were born for greatness and failed miserably. Deep down you feel like you deserve the pain of the wasteland as punishment for not living up to the expectations you have placed upon yourself. You hate yourself Amber Aura. You wish you had died back in your Stable with the ones you love, and you are praying that this rage burning away everything inside of you will leave you as empty as you feel, because then at least you will have a good reason to blow out your own brains and end your pitiful suffering.”

I stumbled backwards and fell on my rump as his words washed over me like waves of fear and dread. My heart pounded in my chest and I had to suppress the growing urge to scream. “No… No I don’t think that.”

My friends were around me in moments, weapons drawn and aimed up at the powerful cyber alicorn that towered over me. He glanced at the weapons with mild amusement as they faced him.

“What did you do!” Brisk hissed, placing the barrel of his gun against Crank’s forehead. His eyes narrowed as he stared down the massive Cyber alicorn.

Crank chuckled, turning from them and marching away to the door leading to the train wagon behind us. “Just telling little Amber here the truth,” And with that he slipped from the train wagon and out of sight.

I let loose a long sigh and slid to my haunches. Xayah quickly knelt down to my level. “Amber, are you alright?” She asked, a worried tone in her voice.

I gave them all a forced smile that I’m sure more than just Brisk could see though. “I’m fine. He’s just getting in my head is all,” I reassured them, pulling myself up and sitting down on the seat I had occupied when I first boarded the train.

“Well if he does it again I’ll blast his brains out,” Brisk scowled, casting the door Crank had exited through a hateful glance.

I shook my head. “You know just as well as I that that wouldn’t do anything but make the issue worse.”

Brisk gave a low growl and propped himself up on the sill to the window where Crank had once stood, looking out at the desolate landscape beyond. “Did you at least get any useful information out of him?” Brisk asked in a begrudging tone.

“I’m not sure. I still don’t know what Kamari or Red Eye want with the A.A.S.S and I still have no idea what awaits us in the Hollow Shades, but bits and pieces of things seem to be coming together.”

“So it was Red Eye that sent this cyber ponies after this Ass thing?” Pyre questioned.

I shook my head, not bothering to correct her on her crude joke. “I don’t know. It seems like it, but Crank seemed to suggest that somepony else was behind it.”

“A pony that works for Red Eye?” Xayah suggested, hopping up onto the seat next to me. “Red Eye has a lot of allies out in the Wasteland. Perhaps the Talons?”

Pyre shook her head. “I’ve dealt with Talons plenty of times. They’re somethin’ and sometimes they do stuff you don’t expect, but this aint their style.”

“Crank said that their operating out of Fillydelphia,” I added. “They seemed to have some connection to a Stable called Stable 101.”

“That’s Red Eyes Stable,” Pyre blurted, rolling onto her back and looking up at the roof of the wagon. “This all just sounding like Red Eye shenanigans to me.”

“Maybe,” I shrugged, looking out the window. The distant silhouette of Fillydelpia had become little more than a small black dot on the horizon, surrounded by a villainous red glow. “I guess will find out sooner or later. For now, let's just focus on dealing with Kamari. We can figure out who Crank’s other client is later.”

Seeing that the conversation was more or less over, Brisk turned and continued looking out the window, his matted green mane flowing in the strong breeze outside as the train raced along the tracks.

Pyre… Well I don’t really know what the heck Pyre was doing. She lay on her back with he eyes transfixed on the ceiling, occasionally reaching up and trying to grasp at something that wasn’t there. I could only assume that she was on some sort of chem.

I glanced out at the window myself, looking at some strange shaped rocks far off in the distance that I assumed were the Hollow Shades. It didn’t look like a very pleasant place.

After a few moments I got the feeling of someone staring at me. I looked behind me to see Xayah watching me carefully, her emerald green eyes watching for… something. She quickly glanced away as I spotted her.

“You doin’ alright?” I asked, pulling myself from the window and scooting a little closer to her. I could almost hear her heart pounding from where I sat.

Xayah gave a quick nod and looked up at me. “Yes, I am glad your plan is working out so far,” She soothed, rubbing the back of her neck with a striped hoof. “But uh- there is something I’ve been meaning to ask you…”

Welp, this was it. I braced myself for the worst and pulled my lips up into a thin smile, hoping that it looked comforting and not menacing. “Ask away, what’s on your mind.”

Xayah’s eyes darted to the door Crank had left though. “Do- do you think that if we find the A.A.S.S before we kill Kamari that Crank will turn on us?”

That was… not what I had been expecting her to ask. “I uh- don’t know,” I admitted. “I’m just hoping we can find Kamari. Dealing with Crank as well is more than I think I can take at the moment.”

Xayah shivered. “I think Crank is planning something. I keep seeing him smiling at us,” She said, more worry creeping into her green eyes. “I don’t like it.”

I hadn’t noticed that, and I definitely didn’t like that. “I’m sure he is planning something,” I soothed. “But when he does whatever it is, we’ll be ready for him. Together.”

Xayah nodded, but the worry in her face didn’t seem to go away. “O-okay. Thank you.”

“For what?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

Xayah blushed slightly. “For being yourself, I guess. I’m glad you still seem to be with us, even after everything that happened with the Stable. I know your angry right now, but I am glad that you aren’t letting it take you over completely.”

I winced. If only she knew just how much that rage was really consuming me. I doubt she would have said that if she knew the truth.

I sighed and gave her a small pat on her fore hoof. “No problem. I’ll always be here for y'all,” I stated. Goddesses I hope that was true and what Crank was telling me about myself had only been a lie to get under my skin.

Xayah glanced down at her hooves for a second before looking back up at me. “There’s uh- one other thing I wanted to talk to you about.”

I braced myself again. “Yeah? What about?”

“Well- uh- What was it I told you, It is better to know and possibly get rejected than to live the rest of your life wondering what might have been?” Xayah started, glancing back down at her hooves.

Yup, this was definitely it. I gave a nervous chuckle. “Yup, that was definitely what you said,” Damn it, why was I acting as nervous as she was right now.

The nervousness in my voice caught Xayah’s attention. Her eyes widened as she glanced up at me. “You know! You already know, don’t you!”

I bit the bottom of my lip and pretended like I didn’t know what she was talking about. “I uh- I don’t know anything of the sort,” I insisted, giving her the best fake smile that I could.

Xayah’s eyes grew even wider. “Brisk told you didn’t he!”

“What? Noooo…” I stumbled for an excuse. Xayah raised an eyebrow as I searched for words. I dropped my head. “Okay, maybe, definitely he told me.”

Xayah shrunk in her seat and pulled the hood of her stealth cloak up over her head before quickly wrapping herself up in her black and white tail. “Goddesses, now I just look like an Idiot…” She whimpered, trying to push herself as far back into her cloak as she could.

“What? No, you don’t look like an idiot,” I assured her.

Xayah peeked out at me flatly from beneath her hood. “Really?”

I made some sort of weird spitting sound that I hoped would signify me saying I didn’t think she was an idiot. A little white pony in my Saddlebag smiled at my reaction. “Not at all,” I said, seeing that the strange spitting sound didn’t comfort her at all. “I mean, I had a crush on Brisk for like, what? A week or something?”

“But he didn’t know till you told him,” Xayah moaned, curling up even tighter.

Well she got me there I guess. I shifted my body closer to the curled up zebra and placed my hoof over her. She flinched at the touch, but didn’t move away. “So you have a bit of a crush on me. So what? I’m flattered, honestly.”

I could see Xayah’s green eyes looking up at me. Small tears had weld up in her eyes and were rolling down her cheeks. It took my a moment to realize the gravity of what I was looking at. Xayah hadn’t even cried when her family was murdered in front of her, or at least she had managed to get ahold of her emotions enough in the hours that followed that she was able to refrain from shedding tears afterwards. That fact that this made her cry was… something I was having trouble understanding.

I pulled back her hood a little, allowing me to see the rest of her face. She quickly wiped her tears aside, but remained keeping eye contact. “W-well?” She asked in a cracked voice. “What do you think?”

Well wasn’t that the question of the day. I had been preparing for this moment since Brisk had told me Xayah had a crush on me, but I hadn’t managed to come up with an actual answer yet.

I sighed and scooted even closer to her, which was difficult as we are already shoulder to shoulder. “To be completely honest with you Xayah, I don’t know. After everything that’s gone on with my Stable, all my emotions have been so fucked up that I probably wouldn’t be able to comprehend love if it was staring me right in the face. I think I’m having trouble feeling anything but anger right now,” I sighed and slowly stroked her striped mane with a hoof. I was surprised how soft she was. “I do care about you a lot Xayah, but… I don’t know if I care about you the way you’d like me to.”

Xayah sniffled and nodded, slowly unraveling herself from the knot she had tied herself in.

I looked up from her and glanced at Brisk who was busy staring out the window. Typical Brisk and his windows. “Besides, I’m still trying to get over my feelings for Brisk at the moment. I do care about you Xayah, and I don’t want you to just be a rebound for me.”

Xayah quickly wiped away another tear. “So that is a no I guess,” She sniffled, giving me a sad smile.

“To being a couple you mean?” I asked her. She gave me a timid nod. I shook my head and stared out the window. “It’s less a ‘no’ and more of a ‘I don’t know yet’,” I answered. “Maybe after all of this is over I can give you a more solid answer.”

“But it’s a no for now?” Xayah pushed.

“Yeah. It’s a no for right now.”

Xayah took a deep breath before exhaling. “Then that’s okay. I was honestly expecting your reaction to be much worse.”

I glanced up at Brisk again. He had turned from the window and was watching us with his one good eye, his eyebrows raised. I sighed and dropped my gaze back to the shivering zebra. “Yeah. I know exactly what you mean.”

I wrapped my other hoof around her and let her curl up closer against my chest, her tears had died down, but I could still feel the occasional droplet land on my coat.

I looked from Xayah, to Brisk, to my reflection on the closed window of the train wagon. What was I going to do with the three of us. We were all a mess. An awkward, silly, emotional mess.

Pyre rolled across the floor so that she was lying below our feet, her eyes peering up at us though her visor as we cuddled. “D’awww, aren’t you two just the cutest,” she smirked, reaching out her forehooves to us.

I glowered at her. “I am not cute,” I insisted, trying to put on my most intimidating look. For the first time in a bit I found myself unable.

Xayah pushed back and looked up at me with her smug little zebra grin. “You are a little cute.”

Oh goddesses. Damn it, now I was blushing. I crossed my hooves. “Excuse me? I’m pretty sure you’re the cute one here Xayah, not me. No sir. I am the least cute thing on this train.”

I heard Brisk chuckle at that. I shot him a pouty look for his betrayal. He simply shrugged back at me. “Face it Amber, you’re pink, tiny and have huge adorable puppy eyes. You’re cute.”

“Puppy eyes!” I was starting to blush even more. “I’m an intimidating wasteland heroine! I am not a cute pony.”

“You have got to be one of the least intimidating ponies in the wasteland,” We heard Crank call from the other train wagon in his loud, booming voice.

We all stood in silent shock at the terrifying cyber alicorn’s sudden contribution to our ridiculous conversation. Then, for the first time since I had watched the death of Stable 25, we laughed. Not some fake laugh to cover up our sorrows and hurts. A real laugh that made our stomachs hurt and the sides of our mouths feel like they were getting pulled apart. I felt all our spirits lift and the darkness that had settled over us for the past few days brighten. The pain wasn’t gone, not by a long shot, but it had receded just a little. Just enough for things to be okay - at least for a little while.

As our laughter slowly died down to a slight chuckle, I leaned in and gave Xayah’s shoulder a little nuzzle. “See, things around here are going to be just fine,” I said with a smile, getting a large blush from her in return.

I met Brisk’s eye and he gave me a genuinely happy smile. Things were going to be okay. We were going to be okay.

“Welp, this has probably been the happy moment we’ve had since I joined the party,” Pyre said with a grin. “I was starting to think you three were nothin’ but a bunch of mopes.”

“We have our happy moments,” I said with a grin. “You should have seen us at Friendship City on our first visit. We spent half the night dancing to DJ Pon3’s radio.”

Pyre had to cover her mouth to stop herself from laughing. “I’m glad I missed that. Sounds a little too sappy for me.”

I gave her a sly smile. “I don’t know, we got DJ Pon3 on my pipbuck. I think we should do a little bit of dancing right now.”

Pyre’s eyes popped wide with horror. “Oh no! You ain’t getting me to dance. Not today, not tomorrow, and definitely not while I’m sober.”

“I picked up a couple bottles of Wild Pegasus on our first trip through Fetlock,” Brisk said smugly, leaning over Pyre and giving her his usual devious look. It was good to see that look back on his face.

Pyre pulled herself up and waved her hoof in front of her face. “Oh no you don’t. There will be no dances today my mischievous green friend.”

I gave everyone a wide smile. “Don’t worry Brisk, I got this,” I said, reaching out and wrapping my magic around his saddlebags where he had left them by the window.

Brisk’s grinning face quickly morphed into a look of sudden alarm. His eyes popping wide in panic as he reached his hoof out quickly to stop me. “Wait Amber! Don’t-”

Whatever he was going to say next was cut off as my magic fully enclosed around his saddlebags and the world swirled away from me.

I was standing at the top of a staircase.

Shit! There must have been a memory orb in Brisk’s Saddlebag when I picked it up. I made a mental note to not magically lift anymore saddlebags until I had checked to see what was inside. This was what? The second time this had happened to me now?

A sudden thought flashed through my mind. Why the fuck did Brisk have a memory orb in his Saddlebags? His horn could do little more than cover itself in an aura. He was incapable of doing even basic telekinesis, let alone tap into memory orbs.

The walls of the building were cracked and coated in a thick layer of mold and dust, a clear indication that this was a memory after the bombs fell. The floor was slathered in a thick layer of sticky red fluid that I could only imagine was blood.

In front of me stood a unicorn raider. His armour was like that of most other raiders, assembled from jagged chunks of metal, spikes, chains and anything else he could get his hooves on. His grease coated black hair had been pulled back into two pigtails on the top of his head and his face was covered in a sickening mask of a screaming pony face.

I gulped as I recognised the mask, or rather, what I had assumed to be a mask. It wasn’t the kind of thing that you forget.

The raider had literally pulled a skinned pony head over his own.

Out of the corner of my eye I could see both Brisk and Xayah staring wide eyed at the vile raider in front of us.

This was my memory!

This was shortly before we had our first encounter with the Steel rangers. Brisk and Xayah had told me the raiders had hit me over the head and knocked me out. A horrifying feeling began to wash over me as I realized that something much more sinister had transpired.

The raider before us held a large serrated knife in its magic and had pushed the blade up against the neck of the yellow filly we had followed in. The fillies eyes were wide and her shaking pupils had turned to pinpricks.

“Don’t take another step or I’ll slit this fillies throat!” The raider cackled, grinning at us through his skin mask. A terrible feeling of déjà vu flooding through me as he said those words

I felt myself raise Boneless. The raider dug the edge of the blade deeper into the fillies neck, causing me to quickly lowered my gun again.

The raider laughed his terrible laugh again. “That's a good girl! Now put your weapons down!” more déjà vu.

I looked around, trying to spot a more effective way out than violence or surrender. There were red bars everywhere on my EFS. My eyes darted around the room, trying to spot the other raiders to no avail. My amber eyes landed on the yellow filly the raider held captive. My eyes narrowed. Why didn’t I see any green bars?

There was a sinister twitch in on the corners of the fillies mouth. I stared at the slightly curved edges of her lips, taking in her vile grin.

I raised my shotgun again and took aim. Xayah gave me a worried look. “Amber, what do we do?”

The edges of my mouth quivered as I took aim on the head of the raider. I could see the raiders knife cut deeper into the filly. I bit my bottom lip to keep myself from screaming. This wasn’t fare.

Boneless fell from mouth and clattered to the floor. I couldn’t take the shot.

Both the raider and the filly gave me a wicked grin.

“Take them now,” The raider ordered.

Faster than I could have reacted the doors on both sides of us burst open. A group of ten Fillies and colts all clad in raider armour spilled into the hallway and charged at us with their knives. It had been a trap from the beginning.

Brisk, Xayah and I reeled back as the swarm of raider children flew towards us. I turned for the stairs and prepared to sprint away when we found ourselves blocked by five more armed children rushing up the steps to meet us.

I pulled out my baton and prepared for the first child to reach me. I aimed, pulled the shock baton back to crush the fillies skull and froze. They were just foals! I couldn’t do this!

I saw Brisk and Xayah react the same, their weapons aimed, but refusing to fire as the fillies raced forwards.

I felt three fillies jump onto my back, their rusted blades sinking deep into my coat. I screamed in pain and tried to buck them off of me, but they had clamped on tight, weighing me down and forcing me to fall to my side. My head hit the ground with a thud, a sharp pain ringing through my ears.

I felt multiple tiny hooves bind my legs together with barbwire and shove me aggressively against the wall. Through my blurry vision, I saw Brisk and Xayah fall to the ground too, their limbs also tied in the sharp barbwire.

I tried to reach for Boneless with my magic, only for my horn to do nothing but shoot a sad spark into the air. “Fucking horn burnout,” I sputtered, remembereing my horns currnet condition.

The masked raider chuckled and released his grip on the yellow and blue filly. Instead of dashing away from the raider in fear, she trotted along beside him with a huge smile sprawled on her face.

The raider leaned over me and gave me a vile grin from below his skin mask. “You ponies would not believe how many ponies fall for this trick. Any pony that would come to this little fillies aid wouldn’t have the guts to kill her,” He gave the filly a gentle pat on the head.

I tried again to reach for my weapon, this time stretching my hooves as far as I could. I felt a sharp pain spike through me as the raider stabbed his serrated knife through my foreleg. I squirmed in pain, trying to dislodge the blade from my flesh to no avail.

Grinning wickedly, the raider withdrew the blade from my leg and passed it to the Yellow filly we had followed into the building in an attempt to rescue. “Kill the zebra,” The raider ordered, pointing his blood soaked hoof at Xayah. “Make it slow.”

The Yellow filly took the knife in her mouth and began walking over to Xayah, no longer trying to hide her evil grin.

I thrashed about, trying to free myself from my bonds. The more I thrashed, the tighter the barbwire seemed to get around my hooves.

Brisk screamed out and tried to lung at the filly as she neared Xayah, but the binding on his hooves made him topple to the ground, hitting his chin against the floor with a painful sounding crack. Two colts rushed forwards and pushed down on him with their hooves, holding him down as he tried to break free and attack.

Xayah had gone pale with terror, her pupils had dilated into pinpricks and her whole body had begun trembling.

The lead raider guided the filly down to the base of Xayah’s neck. The cold blade pressed against her, sending chills through her body. “Remember, take it slowly,” The raider instructed. The filly nodded gleefully and began to apply pressure to the knife.

Xayah screamed, her high pitched wails surged through me. Hot tears spilled from both my eyes and hers as the filly began dragging the serrated blade down Xayah’s soft underside, pulling apart the skin.

Blood gushed onto the floor as Xayah was slowly pulled apart before our very eyes. Soon Xayah’s screams became gurgles as her blood rushed into her mouth and began to drown her. Her body was wracked with horrific spasms as she tried to free herself from her tormentors.

And yet the knife continued to drag itself down the length of her underbelly.

The filly stopped as the blade reached Xayah’s hind legs. She withdrew the blade and spat it out to the floor.

Xayah lashed out, trying to attack at the filly with her barbwire bound hooves. The filly easily stepped away from the attack. Three more raider children moved in behind Xayah, they hooves steadily holding her in place.

Her grin widening, the filly advanced yet again on Xayah, her hoof extending and plunging deep into the new gaping wound. Even through the garling of blood, Xayah’s screams could be heard as the filly slowly began pulling Xayah’s intestines out of her stomach.

Something inside of my broke. The world around me seemed to freeze and the corners of my vision blurred with red. I screamed and lashed out at the filly, ignoring the searing pain that shot through my leg as the barbed wire tightened around my hooves.

I wrapped my hooves around the yellow fillies neck, quickly crushing her windpipe with my own bound hooves. I snatched the serrated knife up off the ground with my mouth and jammed it into the fillies eye socket, penetrating her brain. blood and yellow fluid sprayed from her eye coating my coat in viscera.

The raider barked orders I didn’t hear and rushed at me, but I was faster. The blade in my mouth already having cut through the barbed wire on my forehooves, I lashed the rusted blade upwards impaling the raiders skull with his own weapon.

The raider stumbled back, his hooves frantically beating the protruding blade in a desperate attempt to dislodge it as blood began to spill from the open orifices on his face, seeping over the skin mask and oozing down the front of his body.

The crowd of raider children held back for a second, a wave of shock and panic washing over them as they stared down at their dead leader, giving me a few seconds to untangle my back legs from the barbed wire. Their shock didn’t last long however as a burning rage filled their eyes and they charged towards me.

I picked up my baton in my mouth and began to scream around the handle as I began bashing in the children's skulls. One by one they fell, their bodies broken and oozing with blood where I had battered them. Legs snapped, faces caved, spines were shattered. It didn’t matter where I hit them, the hit was lethal. It didn’t matter if they were children because they were wrong. It didn’t matter if they died because I was right.

I was the moral one. I knew what was right. They were wrong.

A filly managed to knock my baton aside in the middle of my rampage, sending it clattering across the floor. It didn’t matter, I would use my hooves.

My hooves lashed out at the remaining colts and fillies, fracturing their skulls and crushing their legs. I felt their blades dig deep into my flesh as they did their best to survive my rage. Then I felt nothing. Not the beating of hooves against my chest as I stomped on their throats, not the cutting of blades against my skin as they tried to free themselves from my grasp or the spasming of bodies as I broke their legs.

The haze around me cleared and I found myself standing in a room of corpses. My coat was drenched in the blood of children and my hoof was embedded in a colts chest. I could feel the hot tears spilling down my cheeks as I took in the havoc I had brought. My legs were shaking and I was having difficulty standing, but I couldn’t tell if that was from the various incisions on my legs or the emotional devastation of what I had done.

I looked over to where Xayah lay. Brisk had managed to pull himself free of his bindings and was fretting over Xayah, trying his best to hold her intestines into her open stomach. I had to resist the urge to vomit as I took in Xayah’s state.

Brisk stared up at me, horror spilling across his face. “Healing potions! Now!” He demanded, doing his best to hold back tears. “NOW!” I rushed towards them on shaking legs and dumped my saddlebags out on the floor. All of our healing potions clattered around us. “Give one to her! I’m going to need to keep her intestines in!” Brisk ordered, shoving one of the potions into my hooves.

I quickly moved myself to Xayah’s head and propped her up. A wave of blood poured from her mouth, coating me in red. I raised the potion and trickled the liquid down her throat.

Xayah began to cough and sputter, her chest heaving up and down, causing more visera to spill across the floor. A mix of blood and bile spurted from her mouth and nose again as she sputtered, much of the healing potion coming up with it.

Brisk tossed me another one and I quickly poured it down her throat before clamping her mouth shut and forcing her to swallow. The massive wound on her underbelly slowly began to pull itself back to normal as Brisk held the two flapping pieces for blood soaked flesh together.

Brisk grabbed another potion in his mouth and tossed it up to me. “Again!” he instructed, doing his best not to let the wound reopen as Xayah began a second fit of coughing. As soon as the coughing subsided I shoved the healing potion against her lips and tilted her head back, causing the potion to flow down her throat. Once again the gaping wound began to mend itself.

“Again!” Brisk insisted, passing me our second to last potion. I emptied it contents down Xayah’s throat as I had done with the others. Finally the bleeding subsided and Xayah gave a shaky cough before finally going still. Her only movement was the slow rising and falling of her chest.

I slumped back against the wall, my blood soaked hide sticking slightly to the surface as I tried to catch my breath. I could feel my tears beginning to obscure my vision again as I took in the lifeless bodies of all the colts and fillies that I had massacred. My body was wracked with painful shaking sobs as the horrors I had just committed flooded my mind. While I had been killing them it had been so easy, but now each and every one of their faces were flashing across my vision with perfect clarity.

Brisk reached over and handed me the last healing potion. I pushed it aside and continued to weep. I didn’t deserve it. I was a monster. Brisk repositioned his hoof and handed me the potion again. Again I swatted it aside.

“Damn it Amber! Take the fucking potion!” Brisk demanded, giving it to me again.

“I don’t deserve it,” I cried, staring at the pile of bodies in front of me. “Give it to Xayah.”

Brisk scowled. “Xayah has stabilized and will live. You will not if you don’t tend to those wounds on your legs,” he growled, gesturing to the large amount of cuts on my forelegs.

Begrudgingly, I took the potion and drank it. I felt the itching sensation as my muscles and skin stitched themselves back together. I felt better, but that only made me feel worse.

My eyes lingered on the bodies of the foals around me. I could feel myself shaking as the memory of me murdering them continuously replayed itself over and over in my mind.

Then Brisk was standing over me again, Xayah’s unconscious and limp form draped over his back. “Amber, we need to get out of here,” His words were fuzzy and sounded far away. “Amber! Get up! We need to go!”

Almost as if in a trance, I pulled myself to my hooves and silently followed Brisk out of the building. I glanced back at the broken remains of the foals, the image burning itself into my mind. Then we were gone, moving down the street and away from where we- I had committed my greatest failure. I had done what was right. What was moral... but to what extent. The corruption of morality is a far crueler mistress than having no morals at all. At least then you would know what you did was wrong… but this… I knew what I had done was right, and I hated myself for it.

At last Brisk came to a stop at the edge of a street corner and gently placed Xayah down on the ground. I slumped down next to her and stared off into the vast sky above me. How I wished I could fall up into that horrifying sky and disappear from the pages of history.

To my surprise Xayah had at some point opened her eyes and curled up into a tight ball, her hooves wrapped tightly around her stomach as is she were afraid it would pop open again and spill her innards across the street.

“Xayah, are you okay?” Brisk asked kneeling down next to her.

Xayah let out a shaky breath and nodded. “Yes, I will be fine. Just give me a few moments,” She glanced at me, her face filled with concern. “What about you Amber. Are you alright?”

I remained silent and continued staring up at the sky. I couldn’t stop my body from shaking. Why couldn’t I stop my body from shaking.

“Amber?” Brisk’s voice managed to break my concentration on the sky and make me look down at him. “Amber, talk to us…”

There was a loud boom from around the corner of the street. We could hear the sounds of yelling and gunfire as some battle unrelated to us started to unfold only a few feet away.

“Shit,” Brisk muttered, pulling out his machete. “Xayah, can you take watch? Make sure they don’t sneak up on us. Whoever the fuck is fighting over there.”

Xayah nodded and hauled herself up and towards the corner of the street where she ducked behind a pile of rubble.

Brisk lifted my chin up with his hoof and looked down into my eyes. “Amber, can you fight?” He ask, his eyes passing over me as he tried to get a reading on my emotional state.

I shook my head, and searched for the will to speak. “I… I can’t keep going Brisk… it won. The wasteland wins.”

Brisk gritted his teeth and knelt down next to me, doing his best to sound calm and composed. “Amber, you gotta keep going. Think about the Stable.”

I shook him off and curled up into the fetal position on the side of the road. “I just want the memory to go away. Please make it go away. I can’t live with this,” I moaned, trying to curl up even tighter. I memory flashed through my mind and I pulled out the memory recollector I had collected in the Four Star Apartment Buildings and slipped it onto my head. I looked up at Brisk with pleading eyes. “Take the memory away from me.”

Brisk’s eyes widened as he realised what I was asking off him. “What! I can’t do that! Amber, that’s insane!”

I snarled at him, tears spilling down my face and pooling around my hooves. “Take them away from me!” I screamed, burying my face in my hooves as the regret of everything I had done began eating away at my brain.

“I- I don’t even know how to do that!” Brisk exclaimed. “I can’t do magic remember!”

I shook my head. Or at least I tried to. It was hard to do anything with my body shaking as much as it was. “You- you don’t need to use a spell. Just touch it with your aura.”

Brisk bit his lip, questioning his own morality about erasing my memory. Then, he lowered his horn and placed it against the recollector. His horn began to glow a pale white for a second, then the world blink out of existence.

My eyes jerked open to see the roof of the train wagon above me. I was lying on the dusty floor of the train, my back pressed against the cold surface. Brisk, Xayah and Pyre were all looking down at me with worried looks on their faces.

Xayah reached out and placed a hoof on my shoulder. “Amber… are you okay?” I let my eyes wander to Xayah's underside. There was the massive fleshy, pink scar that raced from the base of her neck to between her hind legs. It was there and very much real. It was all real...

I stared up at the three of them for a long moment. With each second the weight of what I had just watched myself do began to pulsate through me. I felt my body begin to tremble and tears creep into the corners of my eyes.

“Amber, we’re uh- we’re here for you if you want to talk or-” Brisk started, but I pushed myself to my hooves and rushed away from them. I couldn’t let them see me. Not now. How could they possibly still want to be friends with me after what I had done. How had they continued to travel with, knowing that I was a foal murderer.

“Amber! Wait!” I heard one of them call out, but I couldn’t tell which one it was. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered.

I burst out of the train wagon and hopped into the car ahead of us. I turned and slammed the door, bolting it shut so that no pony could follow after me.

I stood alone in the train wagon. My body began to tremble all over again and my vision was fuzzy with tears. The I went still for a moment, my breath taking a terrible second to catch up with me.

The faces of the foals I had killed flashed through my mind. Their blood spilling across my hooves as I crushed their skulls.

Then I screamed. I screamed until my lungs ran out of air and there was nothing left for me to scream. It didn’t sound like the scream of a pony, but a mad monster of the wasteland, so twisted and tortured that nothing could salvage what little scraps of sanity it had left.

I felt blood trickling down my nose. My body began to convulse and I fell to the floor as a squirming, sobbing mess. I tried to scream again, but no sound left my screaming lips.

Images of Inferno burning a family alive as I watched flooded my mind. I saw him raping fillies and crushing them below his hooves. I saw me…

I was a monster. I was becoming something that could not be salvaged, could not be forgiven and could not be reformed. Slap some spikes on my and I’d be a raider. I was a raider. Pyre had been right all along. The wasteland had beaten me, like everypony knew it would.

And what made it worse was that I couldn’t pin this on Kamari like I had pinned everything else. This had been my doing. This had been my mistake. I was the real monster.

Crank had seen through my lies. He had known the truth about me even before I did. I wanted to die. I wanted it so fucking badly.

I levitated out Boneless and checked the ammo. Thee barrel’s, three shots.

Tears streamed down my cheeks as I raised the shotgun and placed it against my head. Just a simple pull of the trigger and everything would be okay. The pain would go away, and more importantly I would have rid the wasteland of yet another monster.

“Just pull the trigger Amber,” I whispered to myself. I felt my magic slowly tightening around the trigger of the shotgun. “Just pull the trigger. What do you even have left.”

I had nothing. No home, no family, no purpose. All that had been pushing my along was a desire for revenge and the twisted idea that I was actually saving ponies and making the wasteland better. What a fucking lie that had been.

This was my punishment for having the audacity to even suggest that everything might be okay. It was never going to be fucking okay.

There was a knock on the door. More tears spilled down my face as I pushed the barrel harder against my forehead.

“Damn it Amber, just pull the fucking trigger,” my whimpers were drowned out by the sounds of my sobs. “Pull the trigger you fucking foal killer.”

“Amber…” it was Brisks voice. His tone was soft and tired. “Amber, can I come in?”

I froze, my eyes locked on the door. Why hadn’t I pulled the trigger yet. What the fuck was I holding onto anymore? What was the goddess damned point of anything!

I took a deep breath, steadied my gun and prepared to fire. I felt a single tear roll down my cheek. “Good bye,” I muttered.

Then my eyes landed on something. In my screaming fit I had knocked my saddlebags off of me and send all my belongings spilling across the floor. Among them sat a dirty, beat up looking box with the faded image of a rainbow and a paintbrush on the front. The painting kit that Brisk had gifted me the night before we returned to Stable 25.

I stared at it for a long moment, my whole body frozen as I tried to figure out what to do next. I felt more tears come and run down my face.

Slowly, I lowered my shotgun and glanced up at the door to the train wagon. I wasn’t going to let the wasteland beat me. Not yet. Not after I had lost so much.

I took a shaky breath and let my shotgun clatter to the ground.

“Amber?” I heard Brisk’s voice from beyond the door again. “Amber please let me in…”

“J-just you…” I finally managed to get out between ragged breaths and sobs. I reached out with my magic and lifted the bolt on the door.

Slowly, Brisk crept into the room, closing and bolting the door behind him. He looked me over with sad eyes before his gaze finally landed on the shotgun laying at my hooves. A look of terribly understanding crossed his face.

“Hey…”

I swallowed and let him approach. “Hey…”

“You doing okay?” I gave him a flat look. “Alright, alright. Stupid question."

I glanced down at my hooves. “I’m a monster Brisk.”

Brisk sat down next to me and wrapped his hooves around me. “You are not a monster Amber, you just had to make a difficult choice to do what was right.”

Corrupted morality. Some fucking virtue that was.

I looked up at him, the bottoms of my amber eyes brimmed with tears. “But I killed them… all of them! They were only foals.”

“And if you hadn’t then Xayah would have died. Do you really think that if you had let them live they wouldn’t go and kill other ponies?” He asked flatly.

I shook my head, sobbing louder into his chest. “But… what if-”

“You are not a bad pony Amber,” Brisk interjected firmly. “You’re a good pony. One of the best. None of this fucked up shit is because of you.”

I began shaking even harder, the only thing managing to keep me together being Brisk’s comforting embrace. “What’s happened to me Brisk. Why can’t I be the pony I used to be?”

Brisk shook his head and frowned. “You look like the same pony to me.”

“What happened to the days where my biggest problems were fixing a generator and wishing that ponies would stop calling me cute,” I looked up at him again, taking in his steady eyes. “I’m so angry all the time now Brisk. Why can’t I go back to being me? Why can’t I just be a cute little pink pony wanting to impress her dad?”

Brisk gave me a warm smile. “For what it’s worth…” He booped me on the nose, making me jump back a little and blush with embarrassment. “I still think you’re pretty damn adorable. And I think we both know that Xayah thinks you’re cute too.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “I’m not cute…”

“Well either you’re cute or your angry, take your pick. And for the record, I think you’re cute when you’re angry too,” He booped me on the nose again, once again making me jump.

I covered my nose to protect myself from a third booping and looked up at him. “Fine, maybe I’m a little cute,” I admitted, trying my best to give him a smile. To my surprise, I managed to give him a real one, and he knew it too.

A big grin broke out across his face. “A little cute? Nah, you’re probably the cutest pony in the whole wasteland,” He smirked, pulling me back in for a hug.

I poked him hard in the chest, making him jump back a little himself. “Now you’re pushing it buddy,” I scolded, but I was smiling now. My smile fell when my eyes landed on my shotgun. “Brisk, can I ask you something personal?”

Brisk raised his eyebrow and nodded. “Yeah, I’m all ears.”

“Have you- well that is to say-” I stumbled as I tried to figure out how to put what I wanted to say into words. “Have you ever tried to kill yourself?”

Brisk froze, his gaze locked on the window. He took a deep breath. “Yeah… twice. Once after my parents were killed and another time right before I met you,” his eyes were sunken and sad. I nuzzled in closer to him.

“And how did you get through it?” I asked, closing my eyes.

Brisk stifled a pained laugh. “Spite, I guess,” he said, his embrace tightening. “The idea that I could get out of the Stable. That I could win…” He trailed off, his eyes now transfixed on the ceiling.

“And what keeps you going now?” I asked, trying to pull him even closer.

He looked down at me with his one good eye and gave me a small grin. Before I could stop him, he booped me on the nose a third time. Damn it, I shouldn't have let my guard down. “You,” He said. He glanced over at the door to the train wagon. “And Xayah, and yes, even Pyre Blaze a little bit.”

I smiled and wrapped my hooves around him as tightly as I could. “Thank you Brisk.”

He just kept grinning down at me. “Yeah, no problem. I am kinda awesome.”

I gave him a playful punch. “I’m glad we’re friends. I’m glad that little awkward patch we went through didn’t ruin that.”

“I think we’ve had this conversation already,” Brisk commented.

I shrugged. “Just making sure you know it you big dork.”

He ruffled my mane with a hoof. “Cutie patootie,” I gave him a small scowl for that one.

“Are you two almost done in there?” Pyre Blaze groaned from the other side of the door. “You might want to get out here!”

Brisk cast a nasty glance at the door. “Really a bad time Pyre!” He shouted, causing me to flinch slightly.

There was silence on the other side for a second. “Uh- yeah okay, that’s nice Brisk-y poo, but I really don’t care. Now get your green and pink asses out here,” Pyre growled back, rolling each word around in her mouth as if the words themselves were sour. “We’re almost there.”

Brisk and I exchanged a glance and pulled ourselves back to out hooves. Brisk looked down at me with his single eye. “You think you’re going to be okay now?”

I gave him a smug grin. “Yeah. I’ll be fine,” I raised Boneless and looked over the weapon. It really was a beautiful weapon. “Now let’s go give Kamari a piece of our min-”

The train stopped abruptly, making me fall flat on my face. I pushed myself back up, rubbing my nose with a hoof.

There was a loud bang and I saw a large explosion erupt a few feet away from the train out the window. I groaned. Of course we couldn’t have a simple ride without a fight.

Brisk and I raced from our wagon to join with Xayah and Pyre as they readied themselves for an oncoming attack. “What is it?” I asked, pulling up next to Xayah and aiming Boneless out the window. “Slavers?”

Pyre scoffed. “I told you slavers aren’t going to attack this train,” She grunted, the tips of her flamers flaring to life with a small hum. “It’s those damn bandits everypony keeps talkin’ about. The ones that are given' Red Eye some grief.”

Bandits. I had dealt with worse.

A bunch of bandits charged at the windows, their automatic assault rifles firing a wave of bullets towards us. The glass on the windows shattered and peppered us with jagged shards as we dropped as low as we could to avoid being shredded by the deadly assault.

Pyre grinned at the rest of us, then quickly leapt from one of the broken windows, crashing into one of the bandits and flattening his skull under her powerful metal clad hooves.

Xayah winced as the bandit was flattened. “I am glad she is on our side, and not attacking us like other raiders,” I agreed with that sentiment.

My Hellhound, which until this point I had forgotten was sleeping in the corner of the train wagon, sprang into action, charging after the bandits and ripping them to shreds with its massive claws or blasting them apart with its arm mounted energy weapon.

The bandits flashed by for a second assault. This time I was ready for them.

Blam! Blam! Blam!

I emptied Boneless in quick succession. Three bandits dropped to the ground dead, their bodies ripped open by the powerful buckshot. Brisk and Xayah fired as well, their shots lancing out at taking down two bandits of their own.

I dropped back to the ground as another wave of bullets bombarded us. More glass and bits of metal shrapnel flying over my head as they took out chunks of the window and blasted holes through the aged metal of the train's rusted wagons.

The hatch on the roof of the train wagon burst open and three bandits dropped down from above us, landing heavily on the train floor. All of them were earth ponies, with either brown or dark grey coats. A red bandana was tied tightly over their mouths, hiding most of their faces.

I turned to attack them, but before I could, I felt the familiar static filled crackle of energy on the back of my neck. The bandits reacted with surprise as the far doors of the train wagon burst inwards. seconds later, Crank launched himself at rocket speed towards the bandits, his Tesla cannons blazing with light.

I pushed Brisk and Xayah down and did my best to cover their bodies as Crank’s tesla cannons fired. He might as well have shot off a Balefire bomb! My vision suddenly erupted with blue and white light and one wall of the train was blasted apart. The blast’s shock wave sent me flying against the wall where my back collided with a heavy thunk.

I groaned and pulled myself back up, rubbing the top of my head with a hoof to try and ease my growing headache. Glancing over to where the bandits had once been I saw little more than three glowing piles of ash.

Goddesses I really dreaded when I would have to fight Crank.

I glanced out the window and watched as Crank slammed down from the sky, his hooves colliding with one of the bandits backs, snapping it in twain.

As the mighty cyber alicorn slammed into the ground, a massive cloud of ash and dust burst into the air, obscuring my view of everything outside of the train wagon. The dust cloud would only take a few seconds to dissipate, but in that time, the bandits were blind. Crank however was not.

A small glowing blue light began pulsing from the center of the dust cloud. Then there was a blast of light and a massive lazer lashed out through the ashes. The beam of glowing blue energy spun, slashing through the air in a chaotic frenzy. And where it went, blood would follow.

The dust died and the carnage of Crank’s battle could be seen clearly in the light of day. Every bandit lay dead at Crank's hooves, their bodies sliced clean in half or simply disintegrated into a fine blue powder.

I gaped at the bloodsoaked cyber alicorn in horror. Five seconds… he had killed them all in just five seconds!

Brisk peered over the top of the windowsill and looked over all the bloodshed. He gave a nervous glance at Xayah. “Pyre Blaze ain’t the only one I’m glad is on our side right now,” Xayah simply nodded in utter bewilderment.

I hopped out of the smoking train and looked over at Crank. “Holy shit!” Was all I could manage to get out.

Crank shrugged, the blue electricity that flowed through his tesla cannons and jagged horn slowly sizzling to a halt. “I don’t like being interrupted.”

“Apparently.”

The ghoul condutor from the station rushed up from the front of the train and looked over the damage that Crank’s attacks had done to the train. He grabbed his conductor hat and threw it angrily against the ground with a small yell of frustration. “Luna fucking damn it!” he turned and glared at all of us, no longer seeming to care how intimidating of a group we were. “You fucking ruined my train!”

“Will you be able to fix it?” I asked, walking up and surveying the damage with him. Almost half of the train wagon we had been occupying had been blasted apart, but the engine of the train seemed to be perfectly intact.

The ghoul scowled at me, showing off his rotten teeth. “Fix it?! Sure. I can fuckin’ fix it! Might take me a bit. Probably won’t be able to move again until tomorrow mornin’ if I really work my ass off! Course it probably won’t have walls for another goddess damned fuckin’ month!” he screamed in frustration. He pointed an accusing hoof at Crank. “Damn fuckin’ cyber ponies. Always wreckin’ your stuff.”

“So you won't have the train fixed until tomorrow morning at the least?” Crank rumbled, taking a step towards the angry ghoul.

The ghoul took a small step back, holding his hooves over his head to protect himself. “Well uh- probably not. Gotta fix up the wheels and all that. Thought I guess I could probably just ditch the wagon if I had a bit more muscle.”

Crank grunted and began moving away from the train and towards a large collection of jagged sharp rocks in the distance.

“Hey, where are you going?” I asked, trying my best to catch up with the cyber alicorn.

Not bothering to slow down or even look back at me, Crank grunted. “Hollow Shades. It should only be a short half hour walk from here. I’m not going to wait for the train. I hate waiting.”

Brisk glanced around at the desolate wasteland around us. Somehow the area managed to look even more dead than the graveyard that was Manehattan. “I don’t know. It might be safer to wait for the train to be back in order,” he said as some strange distant howl echoed in the distance. “Who knows what stuff is waiting out there…”

I looked around at my group of friends, then a quick glance at Crank. I gave a small chuckle, an action that was so polarizing to my earlier mood. “Brisk, I think we’re the most dangerous things in the wasteland right now.”

I turned and followed Crank towards the ominous rocky landscape of the Hollow Shades.

As we began moving away from the train the ghoul conductor grumbled to himself and turned to start fixing up his train. “Fuckin’ wastelanders. Always leaving me to clean up their goddess damned mess.”

Footnote: level up.
New perk: Life Giver -- +30 hit points

Author's Notes:

It only took me 155,819 words, but I finally got them to someplace that isn't Manehattan! Yay!

Also, for anyone that's confused when that memory was taken from Amber, it was right at the very beginning of the chapter 6 - Comradery of the Steel Rangers

As usual, huge thanks to Kkat for creating the wonderful world of Fallout: Equestria

Hope y'all enjoyed and have a good day (or night I guess).