It was real.

No - it couldn’t have been! They were beside him all this time and would be until the bitter end - right? That’s what the stunned stallion had thought, no clung to ever since shit hit the fan.

His friends never mentioned the elephant in the room of how long they would last before the jaws of death finally caught up to them, instead they just lived day to day and hoped that it could wait for another sunrise. They all had ways to distract themselves from their inevitable ends, but Storm’s only distraction was them.

They were all he had.

He never thought about it or stated it aloud but it was clear he would have blown his head off long ago if they hadn’t needed him to stay alive. They needed him and he needed them. Sometimes the line drawn of who was in need more was shifted or blurred but right now it was clear.

He needed them.

“No, no, no…” Storm muttered to himself as he looked down at the four empty cots where Maverick, Ivory, and Talos would have been - no should have been.

He had completely forgotten about the rainbow-maned mare in front of him, who was probably trying to say something to him, but he couldn’t hear her.

All he heard was the ringing.

That damn ringing. It repeatedly thumped in his head over and over like a hammer would to a nail until he couldn’t take it anymore.

CLANG!

Storm had absently dropped his Sweeper - the weapon clattering to the ground loudly. He turned to the hall and took off down it before practically slamming into the door.

Then he saw it - or rather, them.

Propped up against the backboard of the stained bed was a rotting skeleton of a pony with a smaller skeleton cradled in its arms.

A foal’s skeleton.
Further down and towards the foot of the bed was another foal skeleton. Storm remembered that spot as the same one he sat at just two nights ago to comfort Raine.

Then it hit him.

He had been cradling a corpse. A fucking foal’s corpse.

Storm just kept staring at the sight before him. He didn’t blink, didn’t speak, didn’t move. Just stared while the deafening sounds in his ears assaulted him.

A feminine gasp came from behind him, but he didn’t hear or acknowledge it.

The only thing that could possibly take his eyes off of the gruesome sight were three more skeletons which were scattered at the foot of the bed. The closest one to his slightly trembling hooves was missing half of it’s skull, but the lower half of a beak and talons on the end of it’s arms confirmed what or rather who it was. In between the griffon remains and bed were two more equine skeletons. One had broken ribs and thin bones where wings should have been. The other had a horn on it’s cracked skull.

Rainbow Dash didn’t know what to do. She had helped defeat Nightmare Moon, Discord, and many others alongside them. She had overcome so many challenges both big and small in her life that all looked like a breeze compared to this.

How long had this guy been living like this? Were his friends even alive in the first place? It didn’t matter. They were gone and he was alone.

Alone.

Rainbow Dash portrayed herself as the most fearsome and dexterous pony in all of Equestria, but even she had her own fears - and being alone was at the top of the list. She rarely ever had to worry about that with five of the Equestria’s most awesome friends at her side, but the thought of something creating a wedge between them and leaving her alone terrified her, but she would never admit that to anyone.

Never.

Nevertheless, she had a faint sense of what the stallion in front of her was going through. She wanted to help even if her only interactions with him so far had involved nothing but rudeness or violence so far. Nopony deserved this kind of fate.

She was going to try and get his attention - for what purpose was lost on even her - but she had to do something. Anything was better than standing in the doorway to a den of death. Dash might have been attempting to pry her gaze off of the sights before her and turn to him, but she noticed something else in the room in the process.

A reddish-brown string of words were scrawled onto the wall behind the gruesome scene that read;

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU FUCK WITH US!

Rainbow didn’t have to be a genius to piece together some sort of puzzle about what happened with the text. The silence of the room was beginning to unnerve her. Most ponies would have screamed, broke down and cried if they ever discovered something this awful but he wasn’t.

He was just standing there and staring.

The only sign that he wasn’t a painted sculpture was that in the short amount of time she had looked away from him, his gaze had also found the writing on the wall and now it was stuck there.

Without a word, the stallion turned around and walked past her. Rainbow had to dodge against the wall slightly to avoid being knocked over in his unresponsive retreat as he seemingly didn’t even register that she was there.

Rainbow had so much she wanted to say. She wanted to ask what exactly happened. Ask who could be heartless enough to do this and what they meant by fucking with them. She wanted to try and get him to respond. Anything but this quiet game that was bound to end terribly. She could tell that much just by his reaction. Instead all she got out was;

“Hey…”

No response. Not even a glance back in her direction.

“Hey…” She tried again only to get the same result. Rainbow knew she had to do something.

“Hey!” This time she had caught up to him and tugged on his shoulder plate. “Say something, any-”

She stopped mid-sentence when he swiftly and roughly shrugged her hoof off and turned to face her faster than she thought possible. The look he gave her practically screamed that she was going to be torn apart then and there.

“I want you gone by morning.” He stated coldly.

“What?” She asked more out of reaction than confusion.

“You heard me.” He replied. “Get a suit, keep the pistol, and get the fuck out of here.”

Then he turned away again and continued heading for the living room.

Rainbow was stunned. She was trying to make sure he was okay - if it could be called that - but instead all she got was some asshole parent telling their foal that they had reduced curfew after a stupid comment.

“What the hell gives?!” Rainbow shouted at him, nearly forgetting the recent discovery as the stress of everything that has happened so far finally reached a breaking point at his attitude. “I’m trying to help you and ‘fucking leave’ is your response?!”

He stopped, but didn’t face her.

“Help me?” He restated before snapping around to her. “You’re trying to help me? Real fucking help you’ve been so far - running off and nearly getting us both killed. Then I drag your ass back here and find out that the only family I had left is gone and to top it all off - I’ve been running errands for Celestia-knows how fucking long for corpses that can’t even use the shit I’ve risked my neck for!”

“How the hell am I supposed to know that I would wake up in some nightmare world where there are monsters and insane assholes at every turn?!” She spat back. “You think I asked for this? I would much rather be at home or chilling with my friends than here! You could have kept whatever this is to yourself and continued to bunk with your ‘friends’ for all I care!”

Rainbow almost didn’t realize what she said at the last part until it was out of her mouth. At first she was shocked and almost apologetic, but that quickly turned to fear when he didn’t respond to her outburst. She thought for sure she had struck a nerve and that he was planning to fully take out whatever anger he held in on her right here and now as soon as his ear-piece began glowing and it picked up the discarded weapon on the floor in between them.

But death never came.

Instead, he levitated the weapon onto his back and turned around before uncharacteristically opening the door gently rather than expectedly slamming it open. He stepped out without another word.

“Wait, I didn-” She tried to apologize when-

SLAM!

Yep. There it was.

Rainbow decided that it probably wasn’t the best idea to follow him at least until he calmed down so she resolved to head back over to the couch where the bandages were. As she wrapped a bundle in her hooves and prepared to wrap her injured wing, she couldn’t get the way he snapped at her out of her head.

It was too familiar. The indifferent, almost cold response. The aggressive and life threatening tone. The feeling made her shudder slightly in a way she hadn’t in so long. It was way too similar. It reminded her of him.

Storm was a patient stallion. He had lived with a griffon that seemingly tried to annoy the shit out of everyone in the group for fun, his best friend practically coined the term ‘punny,’ a mare that couldn’t go more than a few sentences without flirting, and in addition - two very ‘expressive’ foals for a majority of his life.

But something in him had snapped. Maybe it was the sight of his only family dead at his hooves, maybe it was the fact that he had been living some illusion for who knows how long, maybe it was having to babysit a full grown mare who was more daring and brash than Talos and Maverick combined, or maybe the stress of everything finally got to him.

He didn’t even know his own age and wouldn’t have known what year it was if it weren’t for his suit’s interface. He had forgotten so much that he wanted to remember and wanted to forget so much more that wouldn’t leave him. No matter how hard he tried.

Was this hell? Was he finally being punished for all the shit he had caused and his friends were made just for this very moment? Were they made to give him the slimmest sliver of hope before being yanked away just so whatever fucked up God had him constrained to this world could be entertained?

Storm didn’t know. He didn’t care. He only cared about them - or so he wanted to believe. He didn’t know if his supply runs were actually for them or for him. They were the one thing where he was required to concentrate one hundred percent on the task or he would die. It was the perfect distraction from thinking.

Was this the real reason he was out risking his life all day? Not for his group, but to fulfill his own selfish needs of running? No, surely it was because he couldn’t face his own demons so then he could at least keep others from being consumed by their own…

Right?

He didn’t know. Not anymore. He couldn’t think and didn’t know what to feel. All Storm knew was that he had to get out of there before he took any of it - or anymore of it - out on that mare. She might be a pain in his flank, but she wasn’t the problem. He already knew what the problem was...

Just not how to solve it…

It had taken him everything to not vent - no, unleash - any of that anger on her right then and there. He just had to make it out of there. Anywhere but that sight. Those words.

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU FUCK WITH US!

What did that mean? Who did they mess with to prompt that - or more importantly why weren’t they dead before even getting the chance to hurt his friends? Then a thought hit him. A terrible thought that he tried to beat down like he would to a pissed off Damned attempting to take his throat.

Did I do that? He couldn’t help but think.

It was entirely possible. If he had been hallucinating all this time then maybe he accidentally or even purposely killed them.

Storm didn’t realize it at first but he had been starting to breath heavier. His jaw was set and teeth clenched tightly, which were now starting to ache from being in that position for however long. His wings were also being harshly pressed into his sides.

He managed to pry his wings free and breath a little more evenly, but he couldn’t unclench his teeth. It felt like they were the only thing keeping him from exploding right then and there. He couldn’t yet. Not until he was far enough away from her.

He was feeling the weight of everything all at once. Anger, sadness, guilt - all the emotions that had been festering up inside of him for years were now boiling up like a pot of scalding hot water with a sealed lid that in time would burst open.

And he was close.

Dangerously close.

But he couldn’t burst just yet. Not when somepony else was watching. Even if he barely knew the mare who was dropped in front of him the day prior - hell, he didn’t even know her name still - but that didn’t change anything.

He wouldn’t show everything that had been eating away at him long before the world went to shit but now he couldn’t. Letting your emotions out made you look weak. Looking weak got you killed. Either something out there got you killed or something inside would.
Finally, he had reached the workshed where he practically broke the door down to get inside before slamming it shut and collapsing on the other side with his back sliding down the door. The metallic scraping on the wooden door resounded through the whole place, but it was better than the silence.

Anything was.

Storm crossed his forelegs and placed them on his chest before burying his head into them and sighing. His outtake of breath sounded more like an attempt to hold in a breakdown than just a sigh.

He didn’t know what to go or where to go now. What would he do now that they were gone. He could just go out there until something finally killed him and that would be the end. Storm Surge; one of the last survivors of this hellhole - taken not by any of the horrors Equestria had fallen to but rather his own guilt.

“I guess it’s true what they say, huh?” A male voice asked from directly in front of him.

Storm shot his head up and pulled his Sweeper from his back while deactivating the safely all in one motion. The weapon’s flashlight beam scanned the dark shed and discovered nothing.

No one was there.

“The only one strong enough to kill you, is you.” The voice continued. “Funny isn’t it?” This time it was right in his ear.

Whipping his head left revealed nothing once again. Storm stopped moving and held his breath as he listened for any sound of the voice’s owner. After a few moments, he started to think that he was just imagining things and was turning back to resume his earlier position.

That's when he saw him.

Then it started to come back.

“Can you hear me, asshole?!” A rugged male voice asked.

Storm could in fact hear him now that the ringing in his ears had started to dissipate, but he couldn’t see the owner of the voice as a flashlight clipped to a rifle barrel was aimed directly at his face. His lack of vision didn’t mean much as he already knew who the voice belonged to.

Something hard and blunt stuck him on the side of the head, causing him to fall to his side before being yanked up roughly.

“I asked you a question!” It continued.

Suddenly, the flashlight beam was removed from his vision, allowing Storm to see the dark purple stallion with a stained green mane who the voice belonged to. The stallion’s expression conveyed a mixture of slight annoyance and sadistic enjoyment at once.

Despite the proximity of the stallion’s face, Storm wasn’t focused on it but was rather listening to the sounds of the stallion’s friends having their way with Ivory and Nourish just meters away from his downed position. The two mares clearly weren’t enjoying themselves as inferred by the sobbing, gagging, and grunts of pain when one was stuck violently across the face or cut with one of the stallion’s blades.

Storm couldn’t look the stallion in front of him directly in the eye as his comrades continued to violate his own friends.

“You hear that?” The stallion continued. “That’s the sound of what happens when you fuck with us, asshole!”

Out of the corner of his eye, Storm spotted the recently deceased corpses of his best friend and helpful annoyance, Maverick and Talos. The once boastful and filterless griffon was now missing most of his head as it had been blown off by a sniper while he was on watch duty. Instead only a portion of his lower jaw and back of his skull remained.

He was the lucky one…

Normal it would be crazy to call someone who’s head had been blown off as lucky, but it was the truth. Talos had the quickest death. He had probably only heard the shot, felt the pain for maybe a fraction of a second, then everything would have gone black.

Maverick wasn’t so lucky.

The violet pegasus had been in Storm’s position at first. They were both shot multiple times in the gut and hindlegs, rendering them immobile and at their attacker’s mercy. The two still managed to take out a considerable amount of their attackers while downed, but their sheer numbers overwhelmed in the end.

They were dragged into an upright sitting position along with Ivory and the pregnant Nourish while a purple and green stallion - who they assumed was their leader - had asked who the leader of their own group was.

When nopony would answer, the leader had pulled a pistol on Raine, who was balling loudly after the chaos of the fight had woken her up. Nourish begged and pleaded for them to take her life instead but the leader still waited expectedly for an answer. While it was true that the group had no official leader, somepony had to take the blame.

And that somepony was Storm.

Afterall, the attack on their community was his idea. Storm had been out bartering for supplies when he came across them - a group of nearly two hundred stallions and about sixty mares all holed up in the remains of Manehatten’s hospital. Storm had discovered the true nature of the place - that it was a breeding facility and its owners were the sickest pieces of shit the wasteland could produce.

While he wanted nothing more than to drop every stallion in that place, Storm wasn’t stupid. He knew he couldn’t take on two hundred armed ponies by himself, but he was also desperate. About this time, Nourish had been with them for over a month and they had to prepare for the birth of her third foal. They lacked all sorts of equipment and medicine needed for a nonfatal labor session but now in the middle of a decently-well stocked hospital, the answer had been clear to Storm.

They had to steal the supplies.

Later that same night, Maverick, Talos, and himself snuck in, took out guards, and had made it out with some medicine and small machines for the birth. They would have made it out clean, but Talos managed to lose his Tethertech in the building, thus giving them a holographic map of where they laid their heads and brought them to this point.

It brought them to their end.

The leader of the hospital community smiled upon finally getting his answer. He lowered the pistol with his magic and turned to Nourish.

“See? A little cooperation is all it takes.” He said with a sincere smile.

Then in a flash, he raised the pistol once again and fired.

BANG!

Raine’s tiny head stood no chance as it became a crimson paste on the wall.

Nourish screamed, Ivory had tears beginning to well up in her eyes, while Maverick sat there slack-jawed. Storm just stared at the foal’s remains, a blank look on his face. The gunshot had been right next to his ear, so all he heard for a few seconds was a pestering ringing noise.

“Why did you do that, you sick fuck?!” Maverick yelled, being the only one to dare and lash out.

He had spread his wings and lunged for the leader only to be yanked back by the stallion keeping him upright. Now pressed face down with a barrel against his head, Maverick waited anxiously as the leader approached him and lowered his head to be on the same level as the downed pegasus.

“Why?” He repeated with a false oblivious tone. “Because you took too long to answer.”

“That’s no excuse to take somepony’s life!” Ivory added, tears spilling from her eyes.

“Oh, so I should suffer for your friend’s dumbass decision of stealing my shit,” He replied, gesturing to the unresponsive Storm, “-and not get to spend time with my girls?”

“You have daughters but are okay with shooting somepony else’s?!” Ivory spat back, confused and angered at the same time.

The leader looked surprised at first. He turned away from his hostages and looked at the other armed stallions before they all burst into laughter. When the chorus of laughter died down, the leader returned his gaze to Ivory.

“Sweetheart, I don’t mean daughters. I mean my investments - broodmothers. See, the guys and I were planning on having an all nighter to beat our top scores, but now we are stuck here punishing you and your friends. Oh, how life is unfair.” He said that last part with a shake of his head.

Then he smiled. Sinisterly.

“Well… I guess this whole thing isn’t entirely a waste.” He continued happily. “Afterall, I did get two new toys out of it.”

Ivory’s eyes widened. Nourish was too busy sobbing over her daughter that she hadn’t heard that last part.

“In fact, I think I’ll take you two for a test run right here and now.” He stated matter of factly before whistling to one of his men.

Two stallions grabbed Ivory as they attempted to pin her down. The mentioned mare kicked and fought as hard as she could to no avail. Maverick was shouting threats and curses at the stallions, then to the leader, who just watched without a care in the world.

Eventually, the leader sighed as he looked at Maverick, who had tears of anger in his eyes at seeing his marefriend being abused and violated in front of him.

“I can’t enjoy the show with this one making all this racket.” He scoffed. “Cut his tongue out.”

When nopony moved, the leader pointed to a random stallion in the group, and that stallion moved forward with knife in hoof. Maverick was beaten just to make sure he couldn’t resist, and had his tongue - along with many other things - cut out or off. He died with his gaze forcefully on Ivory being raped while he bled out.

The leader made a sound with his tongue to get Storm, who couldn’t stand to look at his friend’s discarded corpses any longer, to look back in his general direction. Storm still couldn’t meet the leader’s gaze.

He killed them. No, not this bastard in front of him.

He - Storm Surge, had gotten his friends killed.

It was all his fault.

It always was.

It always would be.

“We’re going to leave you now.” The leader stated, not caring if Storm saw or heard him. “We’re going to finish up with the girls, shoot them and the remaining kid, then we are going to leave you to live with what you caused.”

The leader then roughly grabbed Storm’s destroyed suit by the collar and yanked it to get his attention for real. “And if we ever see, hear, or even smell you near our place again, then you won’t be so lucky. Got it?”

True to his word, the stallion had killed Ivory, Nourish, and Snow after they had their fun. They didn’t force Storm to watch as he kept staring at the floor with a broken and blank expression on his face. Then they left.

They left Storm bleeding and broken on the floor surrounded by his dead friends. His dead family.

“Can you hear me, asshole?!” The stallion asked as if nothing was different.

“You…” Storm hissed through clenched teeth.

The angered stallion got up and readied his weapon only to have the hospital leader raise a hoof casually.

“You can lower that weapon, sport.” He said without any real care in the world.

Storm didn’t reply, but rather kept his piercing eyes locked with the leader’s from the other side of his weapon’s sights.

The leader chuckled while looking him over.

“The world hasn’t been kind to you, has it?” He asked, almost sincerely.

No answer.

“I feel like I’m turning into you, ya know - the whole talking to myself thing here.” It continued with a chuckle.

“What do you want?” Storm finally asked, his tone displaying zero tolerance for the pony that stood before him.

“To help you.” Followed by a genuine smile.

An explosion of glass filled the room where the leader once stood as Storm fired at him and into the glass-side of a window. Shards scattered in all directions, a few even cut Storm’s face, but he didn’t flinch, instead he just kept staring down the iron sights at the spot where that stallion had just been.

“Where was all that fight when I killed your buddies?” The same voice asked from his right this time.

Before even realizing it, Storm had already swivelled on a dime and fired off another shot in the voice’s direction. He knocked a couple of cans and tools off of the table in a loud choir of clattering noises.

“You are only hurting yourself there, sport.” From his left. “You’ll just have less ammo to deal with the real monsters if you keep this up.”

“Real monsters, huh?” Storm replied coldly. “And what makes you any different than them? You kill, torture, and break ponies just like them.”

“Ya know, I spent a lot of time asking myself that very same question.” The leader said as he looked almost dazed slightly, gazing off into the distance. “It took me a lifetime to find an answer and trust me, you aren’t going to like it.”

“Try me.”

The leader smiled. Storm couldn’t tell whether it was a genuine amused one or a sadistic one. Maybe a bit of both.

“Decent folk don’t make it. They don’t have what it takes to make it like us-”

“Us? We are nothing alike!” Storm spat back, clearly growing tired of the conversation’s direction.

“Oh? Is that so?” An exaggerated raised eyebrow followed the stallion’s response. “We’ve both killed - both the living and dead - just to keep ourselves alive. We’ve both taken from others to survive. We’ve both gotten those we loved killed-”

The leader stopped himself and faked a hurt expression upon mentioning that last part. “Actually, no we haven’t. They got themselves killed because they were too weak - too decent. Not like us, Storm. You’ve seen it. You know what it takes to survive and the only reason your friends aren’t here anymore isn’t your own fault. Hell, it isn’t even my fault. Its their-”

“Finish that fucking sentence and watch what happens.” Storm growled.

“What would happen, Stormy?” He asked, mimicking Ivory’s tone. “You can’t do any worse to me than you already did.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?!” Storm was yelling now, finally reaching the end of his extremely long rope - showing that eventually they all have an end. “You tortured, raped, and killed them for my fucking decisions! You should have taken me out instead! They didn’t do shit but you all walk away free!”

“You really don’t remember?” The leader asked, curiosity coating his voice.

The look of still hatred he got was enough of an answer.

The leader chuckled his awful cackle once more before replying. “After we left you, the message was clear or so we thought. Three weeks later and you had already repaired your suit, weapons, and healed enough to fight back. You took my men down one by one - not sparing a single one…”

Storm’s angered expression turned to one of disbelief and slight confusion at this.

“Wait, there’s more. When we finally figured out what was happening, I still had half of them and sent them all after you. You slaughtered fought more savagely than I have ever seen any creature - monster or living - in this whole wasteland. It was actually impressive - not at the time, but looking back it was impressive. You even choked one of them with his own organs!” He laughed at that last part like it was the funniest joke ever.

“What happened to you?” Storm asked, clearly wanting to get to the chase and not amused.

“You made what I did look like foals play. Let’s just put it that way. Celestia, that was the worst three slow hours of my life. You kept me alive through most of it too. Once again, impressive, sport.”

Neither one of them spoke after that. The leader just held his shit-eating grin while Storm didn’t break eye contact. The leader watched him as he processed this information.

After a few moments, the leader finally spoke up again. “You still feel guilty, right? I can see it in your eyes. Ponies like you don’t say much with words, but I can read your eyes and let me tell you, Stormy - they say a great deal about what you are thinking.”

“Don’t fucking call me that.”

“Oops, my bad.” The leader said in mock surrender as he raised his hooves momentarily. “I forgot that only mommy is allowed to call you that-”

The stallion couldn’t get the rest out as a volley of shots rang out in the small building, breaking objects, shattering glass, and making a ton of noise - drowning out his taunting in the process. The firing only stopped when it was replaced with a faint click! Click! Click! sounds.

Storm didn’t have to look down to discover that the ammo counter on the side of the weapon flashed a red ‘zero’ for it’s ammunition count after becoming accustomed to the very weapon he invented. But that wasn’t in his mind right now. Right now, tearing the bastard limb from fucking limb was his only priority regardless of the true nature of that stallion’s real being.

Suddenly, the door to the shed behind him slammed open with such force that it sounded like a pissed off parent coming into a foal’s room after discovering they had failed a class. Storm spun around and aimed all five barrels and flashlight into the face of…

The mare. The same rainbow-maned one from before.

She made a sound that was a mixture of a surprised scream and an annoyed huff of having a bright light in her face. It took Storm a moment to come down from his anger-filled delirium but when he did, he realized what was happening and lowered the weapon.

The mare had her good wing shielding her face from the beam - or was it the weapon? Not like it would do much. Anyway, she lowered it and faced him.

“What’s going on here?” She asked after her vision was freed. “It sounded like a war was happening in here.”

“No, just the ‘lumbering lunatic’ going crazy, remember?” He replied half spitefully, half sarcastically.

He noticed that the mare’s gaze gradually started to refuse to meet his own. “Yeah, uh - about that…” She continued while absently rubbing a hoof on the back of her neck. “I shouldn’t have said those things. Especially the uh - ‘friends’ part.”

Storm didn’t respond but kept examining her. He couldn’t decide if he was trying to determine if she was just another hallucination or just trying to detect bullshit in her apology. Years of being forced to read others helped in determining that she was being sincere.

Neither one of them said anything more in that moment until Storm made the next move. “I shouldn’t have either. You just… just caught me at a bad time. It’s not your fault and blame will be placed where it is due.”

Another spurt of silence as the mare was trying to figure out what to say and then she finally found it. “It’s not your fault eith-”

“Don’t.” He said, sighing before rubbing a hoof over his forehead.

The longest period of silence began with neither one of them knowing what to say or due. So instead of standing there awkwardly, Storm began picking up everything he had knocked over in his frustration, scrapping the unusable pieces and salvaging what he could.

Without a word, Rainbow turned on the lightswitch and began to assist him in grabbing some of the items on the ground. She almost jumped when the switch also activated a nearby Tethertech, which beeped loudly as it resumed playing a song that had seemingly been muted until now.

Storm listened for a moment with a dead look on his face that said more than words ever could. Rainbow caught the look and reached for the device to turn the song off when a hoof stopped her own. Storm couldn’t look her in the eye as he softly shook his head.

“Maverick loved Maretallica - this song especially.” He said while his trance was fixed on the accidentally activated device on the table.

Rainbow didn’t know how to reply to that so she tried to change or at least brighten the subject. “Uh - he had great taste in music then. Love rock.”

“Yeah…” Storm replied almost distantly. “He is the whole reason I got hooked on it too.”

The two continued to clean up in an awkward silence only penetrated by the music. When they finally threw out the scraps and organized what was still usable, Storm stopped at the next suit on the rack beside where his own was recently placed.

He saw a few holes in the golden suit, so now he would have to check for additional damages in addition to finishing the prepping for getting it combat ready once again. Sighing and grabbing a tool belt, the stallion used his Tethertech to wrap the utility belt around his back then he placed some welding goggles made from old Wonderbolt goggles around his head.

“What are you doing?” Rainbow asked, stifling a yawn. “Don’t you ever sleep?”

“When I have to.” He replied, his tone and attention clearly on the holographic diagnostics screen in front of him rather than focused on her. “You might want to get some though.We’ve got a long journey tomorrow.”

“We?” She asked, not entirely sure if he was serious.

“Unless you want to take my hallucinations with you as a guide, I’ll help you make it to Ponyville tomorrow.”

Rainbow didn’t reply to that at first, but he continued before she got the chance.

“Don’t worry, they won’t even see me. I’ll be gone long before you are reunited as soon as I deem it safe.” He said, sensing a possible question about to come out.

“And if it’s not?”

“Then I’ll deal with it.”

She had been expecting an answer like that but it didn’t make it any less unsettling. This guy definitely wasn’t going to stick around for Pinkie’s reunion party. Wait, ‘this guy?’ Had she still not even learned his name yet? He probably didn’t know hers either.

“Hey, what’s your name?” She asked, throwing the previous subject out the window.

“Storm. Storm Surge.” He replied. “I’m guessing yours is ‘Rainbow Brash’ or something?”

Rainbow responded with a ‘really’ look at his attempt at what she guessed was his form of joking. “Gee, how’d you guess?” She replied sarcastically before adding; “It's Dash. Rainbow Dash.”

When neither one of them went further with the banter, she began observing Storm’s work on the yellow suit that she guessed was hers now.

“Need any help?” She asked.

“Do you even know what this is?”

“I think I can figure it out.”

The skeptical look she received was the biggest nonverbal way to say ‘are you sure about that?’

“Do you want my help or not?”

“Well, you might as well get used to this thing now.” He replied before tethering a rolling stool next to him.

Rainbow plopped down on the stool as Storm grabbed the suit’s helmet and displayed some of the internals. The night went on similar to that as the two worked on getting their equipment up to speed for a journey that Storm hadn’t made in forever, but was sure about one thing;

It was going to be trouble.

It always would be.

Author's Notes:

This chapter took a lot more time than I thought it would after I finished it, but wasn't happy with the direction and ended up rewriting the whole thing except for the flashback scene, but I'm very pleased with the finished product. Was able to add a shit ton of direct and indirect foreshadowing to future events/topics in it as well.

Also its not just a coincidence on the song choice towards the end. I chose it because it represents Storms feelings now that his eyes have been opened to the painful truth and now we must suffer alone as one. They were all that was keeping him together and could be compared to his limbs, sight, sound, and speech in a way.