Author's Notes:

Hey everyone! I'm back to writing, for now. Else were in life has taken a hiatus and I have some actual free-time. So, here's how it's gonna work. I'll post chapters as I get them done, but I can't seem to keep a long term editor. Not sure if it's because they get bored or what the deal is (i don't argue with editors, I definitely take their suggestions into consideration). Anyways, lemme know if there's mistakes or anything of that sort. It looks like the 'import from GDoc' is finally working like it should, but I'm not 100% sure without re-reading the whole chapter.

So be sure to leave a comment or something! I don't bite, I promise! D:

Chapter 4

Old Threats Arise

“Oh, no...”

"What are you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing?" the young zebra stallion replied, looking up from his book. He was clearly annoyed by my question... He usually was.

"I don't know! That's why I asked." Now I was annoyed at my question. “Why would I ask if I already knew?”

"Reading," he said with his nose back in his book. That's exactly what it looked like, actually. What was I thinking? Of course he was reading. He never did much else in his free time.

"Reading what?" He always read that book. What it was about, he never told me.

"If you really must know,” the zebra started with a sigh, “I'm reading a book on some very ancient zebra magic. It's really quite interesting.”

I had seen him read the mysterious book many times before, though always alone. I was the only one who ever saw him read it. When any other zebra came up, he would stash it in his saddlebag, or hide it away under a cushion or something. “Never tell anyone about it,” he said. I never told anypony, of course. Or in this case, any zebra.

"Come on, Star. It can't be that interesting. I can't even read it!" I whined.

"Sucks to be you, then," my brother replied with a small smile, not looking up from his book.

The book was thick. Really thick. The thing had to have been over three inches from cover to cover. It was bound in dark red leather that reminded me of... pony hide. I hoped it wasn't, but it was ancient, and made by zebras, so who knows.

The pages were yellow with age, and some had burn marks at their edges. The cover was branded with a strange symbol. It looked like a star-burst, except the points were wavy, each point never touching the ones next to it. At the top of the cover was some kind of half-sun-half-semi-circle symbol. A blocky arc took up the open spot near the bottom. I liked the idea that it was some kind of mysterious gateway to another dimension.

Ha, that was unlikely.

I had opened it before... once. The book felt like nothing I'd touched before. It felt... cold. Not the usual cold, like when touching a piece of metal or ice. It was bone-chillingly cold, like the book was feeding off my very life force. It was kind of scary. When I opened it, all I saw were blank pages. I had flipped through it quickly, cover to cover. All pages were blank. Some felt colder than others, and others nearly burned my hoof they were so hot. Star Gazer had caught me looking at it and promptly snatched it away. He told me to never look at it. Ever. I told him that all I saw was blank pages. 'That's because I know how to read it.’ I remember his words so clearly, like he had just spoken them to me.

"I'm going to go outside and play with Lumens. You make it boring in here." Being bored sucked.

"She's that filly you have a crush on, right?"

"Shut up!" I flushed. "I do not...”

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, Xero," he laughed at me. "Just be careful, and be back before dark."

"Yeah, yeah..." I said dismissively. And with that, I was out the door.

I awoke feeling better than I had in the past week, with the exception of a headache that was creeping in. I wasn't sleeping on some two hundred year old weathered mattress that'd probably been used for more than sleeping on. I didn't have to worry about waking up with a gun against my head. I didn't have to guess if it was going to rain or if I could find shelter. I didn't wake up to find out I was blind in one eye. I wasn’t cut open, organs tossed about like bits of garbage. For the lack of a better word, I woke up... safe.

Safe wasn't a word you get often in the wasteland. There is never anywhere 'safe', only 'safer'. Here, in Lumens train-car-home, was the exception. I was safe, with none of the horrors from the wastes waiting to eat me alive or trying shoot me dead. This was a rare occasion, and I was thankful for it. Given my current state, I doubted I could defend myself from anything more than a troublesome radroach.

Looking around the room, I saw that Lumens was over at her workbench with a stack of books. The blanket slipped off as I got to my wobbly hooves, causing Lumens to turn around.

“Good morning, Xero,” she said, looking up from her book with a bright smile. “Sleep well?”

“Better than I have in a while,” I replied.

Seeing her felt good. The past few days seemed like a dream; I was glad to see that they weren’t. So many years of loneliness and wandering, and I found my best friend. I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for her, though. She’d lived the past fifteen years thinking I was dead, and then I suddenly appear out of nowhere, blue and horn-headed. It must have been rough.

“That’s good.” She put the book down on the stack on the workbench. “What do you want to do? I’m off from the clinic today, so if you want to do something other than watch me read books, let me know. I suggest you stay around town, though; your legs need to regain their strength.”

“What is there around here? This is the first time I’ve been to New Appleoosa,” I said as I buckled on my leg braces with my magic. “Or this far west, actually.” Hopefully my legs would be back to normal-ish by tomorrow. It bothered me to be in one place for too long.

“Really? Where have you been around here?” Lumens curiously asked.

“Let’s see...” I tapped a hoof to my chin. “I’ve been to Ditzy Doo’s store and the Turnpike... the town hall...” Where else had I gone? “Oh, and I’ve also been to The Diner and the Clinic, obviously. I’m sure I haven’t seen all there is to see.”

“No, that’s pretty much it. Unless you want to watch Highrise and his son, Crane, work,” the zebra mare said with a dismissive wave./

Ggrrrrrp...

“Breakfast?” she asked. She already knew the answer.

“Sounds like it,” I said, slipping my saddlebags over my back.

“I think we can go to The Diner.” She smiled and looked at the clock on the wall. 8:57. “It should be open soon.”

A quick peek at my time-perfect PipBuck told me it was 9:09. Surprisingly, the leg brace fit over the bulky thing.

“Sure,” I returned with a smile.

I seemed to be smiling a lot, lately. Maybe it was the fact that I didn’t have to worry about getting shot (getting shot a lot, that is). Or maybe it was that I had found my best and only friend in the wasteland, against all odds. What were the chances?

Breakfast was an adventure on its own; I ate eggs for the first time. The Wasteland Omelet had eggs, that tasty stuff called bacon, peppers, and something I was unfamiliar with: dark green and leafy stuff called spinach. Little did I know, eggs weren’t usually part of anypony’s diet. It tasted good, though.

Lumens had a daisy sandwich. Where The Diner got daisies was beyond me.

Once breakfast was finished, the two of us trotted around town. We didn’t go anywhere in particular, just... around. I did, however, make sure to stop at Absolutely Everything.

When Lumens and I got there, Ditzy was once again nowhere to be found. I rang the bell on the counter, and with a crash, upstairs this time, Ditzy appeared in a greyish flash. She gave me an unexpected and rather squishy hug, and wrote something down on her noteblock.

‘It’s great to see that you survived. I was worried that you wouldn’t get a chance to try out your barding. I think it’s my best work yet!’

“Thanks,” I said, “I just wanted to stop by and thank you for it. Still haven’t gotten a chance to try it out, but I thought it was the best craftsponyship I’ve ever seen.”

‘You’re welcome! The reinforced heavy leather barding should protect against most small caliber rounds. I think you’ll be very pleased with it.’

“That’s actually really good,” said Lumens. I gave her a disbelieving look. She knew about weapons and barding? Back home, she couldn’t even squish a dying radroach. “What? You don’t survive out here without knowing a little about protecting yourself. Not long, anyways.”

Wait... that reminded me of something.

“Ditzy, I have a question for you...” I started. She gave a small tilt of her head and a curious look. One of her milky, yellow eyes started to go all weird again. With a blink, it was back to, erm, normal. “Do you recognize anything about this?”

I searched around my saddlebags, quickly found the red and black .308 hunting rifle I had bought off of Clips’ caravan nearly a week ago, and put it on the counter. Had it really been almost a week? It didn’t feel like it. I had been unconscious for a majority of it.

Ditzy looked the rifle over for a nearly two minutes. Her eyes went wide as she did so. She turned the gun this way and that, a worried and slightly confused expression on her face the whole time.

‘They appear to be Zebra Resistance gear.’

‘Zebra Resistance?’ I thought to myself, pondering the strange and vague familiarity with the phrase. I was almost positive I’d heard of it before, but when and where escaped me.

“I’m pretty sure I have a book on them somewhere at my place,” Lumens said as she read the note. “And that’s not a good thing.”

“What do you mean?” I asked her.

“They were a group of zebras that were completely against the fight with Equestria. They interrogated or killed those who were involved in the war. If somepony or zebra didn’t want to fight the other, they could join ‘the resistance’,” she explained, putting air quotes around the the last bit.

“What’s so bad about that?” Other than the fact that they tortured and murdered others.

“Well, it wasn’t. It didn’t matter who your allegiance was with; if you were connected with the war in some way, they would kill you, or at the very least, you’d ‘disappear’. It didn’t matter if you were a pony, zebra, griffin, or even a dragon,” the zebra mare continued. Ditzy wandered away to look in a nearby foot locker for something. “But that was before the bombs fell.”

“What happened after?”

“About eighty years ago, I think, stories of something called the New Zebra Resistance and Alliance started coming from out east, from the Outlands,” the zebra said. The Outlands... the part of Equestria where I lived practically all my life. “The stories were weird. Confusing. Some were even a little disturbing.”

“How so?” Disturbing? There were some zebra magics and legends that fit that description. I’d also heard of some freaky things coming out of Canterlot.

“There were stories of entire villages being razed and burned overnight. Then, this symbol would appear around them.” She pointed to the three rings and dagger on the rifle’s stock. “There were also tales of these ponies and zebras helping settlements grow, in exchange for them pledging allegiance to the NZRA.”

“So...” I said, trailing off. “I still don’t quite see what was so bad about them.” So they pillaged a village or two. Raiders did the same thing to Coltstead and Raidersburg.

“I’m getting to that.” Lumens said firmly. “Sixty years ago, the NZRA’s tyranny was put to an end. Some stable pony and her marefriend got a band together and managed to destroy them.”

The little bell on the countertop rang out. Ditzy had a couple pieces of paper in front of her, with a pencil in her mouth, and was quickly writing.

‘Most of the ponies that fought the NZRA’s leader died during their final stand. Of the five that I know survived, one died while protecting his Dashite friend from the Enclave, and one committed suicide after she lost her filly in a raider attack, or so I’ve heard.’

Now, I’d heard of the Enclave before; they were responsible for the cloud cover, after all. No idea what a Dashite was, though.

‘The last two, the group’s leader and her marefriend, just disappeared. Some say they went back to their Stable. Others say they continued their fight against evil, and the wasteland took them. There are even conspiracies about them taking over the NZRA. For any of these ponies to be alive today, they’d have to had used a stasis chamber or become a ghoul, like me.’

“Yeah, pretty much.” Lumens said. “Any questions?”

Yes, many, but not all of them found their way to my mouth.

“Just two.” I took a breath. “What was it that made this NZRA so bad? They just sound like another raider gang, albeit a very successful one. And why haven’t I heard of them before? I’ve lived in the Outlands all my life! Did everypony just forget or something?”

“That’s technically three,” the Lumens replied. “They weren’t very kind if you didn’t want to join the Allegiance. They would slowly wear towns down, laying siege to helpless and innocent ponies. Thousands died in their conquest for absolute power. The ponies they captured were used for...” she paused, seeming at loss for words. “They were just evil, Xero. But it was evil hidden under the guise of good intentions.”

Ditzy tapped her hoof on the countertop, snagging our attention.

‘If they ever made it here, what’s left of Equestria would stand little chance. They managed to wipe out the Steel Rangers in the Outlands. The Outland Rangers were one of the largest groups to ever be founded. If the NZRA returned, they’ll be stronger, and we won’t stand a chance. I’ve seen what they’re capable of.’

That couldn’t be very good. They captured towns and completely wiped out a group of Steel Rangers. To me, they still sounded like a group of raiders. Trained, well armed raiders...

But there was still something about them seemed vaguely familiar. I couldn’t put my hoof on it. Some sort of zebra alliance or the like rang throughout the still empty holes in my memories. They didn’t echo back, unfortunately, and the name was lost in that damned, foggy void. Six years later, and I still had no idea what had happened back in the streets of Maverick. It used to scare the hell out of me, being unsure about my past. Now it was just annoying and tended piss me off.

After scooping the rifle and sunglasses up and stowing them away in my saddlebag, I noticed that I was still carrying my broken knife handle. I needed a new one, along with some more ammo for Tweety; the heavy revolver seemed to blow through ammo faster than anything else I used.

“Ditzy, Is there anywhere around here that sells weapons?” I asked.

She smiled and thumped a hoof to her chest.

“I think I might need something a little stronger, no offence.” She practically had ‘absolutely everything’, but somepony that specialized in firearms and weapons was almost always a better option. They generally kept better care of their wares.

'There's the Saturday-Night Special. Tell PK I sent you. I have other work to attend to, so I have to go. But thanks for stopping by!'

She dropped the pencil in a coffee cup filled with about a hundred other pencils, gave me a smile, and managed to fly off back to the upper floor. How could she do that? She barely had any feathers!

"Okay...” I said in a drawn out tone, still baffled by Ditzy’s abilities. “To the Saturday-Night Special it is, then."

Lumens and I left Absolutely Everything. Both of us were a little shaken, I think. There was a group of ponies, and probably zebras, possibly griffins, and maybe a few dragons, all of which wanted to eradicate all who opposed them. They kind of sounded like the raider group that attacked a few days ago. But, they said they were the Wasteland Contingency, and they didn’t have any sort of insignia that matched the NZRA.

"Do you have any idea where you're going?" Lumens asked once we were outside. The sky was its usual grey, and it felt like it was going to rain soon.

"Not a clue," I said, looking around. I was looking for a sign. Literally. One that said 'Saturday-Night Special'.

Lumens sighed. "Follow me..."

There were only a few buildings not made of train cars. Some, like the Turnpike Tavern and town hall, were built with wood and metal siding.

The Saturday-Night Special was not one of them. It wasn’t built out of a train car, either. Not completely, at least. The backside was formed up against the protective wall that surrounded the town on the west side. Three large metal letters had been welded to the top of the box car that made up the entrance. S... N... S...

The SNS had heavy armor plating covering the entirety of the outer walls. On top were two, huge, metallic beasts of tank turrets. Easily as tall as a pony, they aimed their massive cannons out into the wastes.

“Where did those come from?” I asked, unsure about their origins. They had the standard ‘Equestrian Sun’ emblem on them, but what were they doing here in the middle of some old train station?

“Those?” Lumens replied, nodding toward the things in question. “Equestrian Railway Guard tank turrets.”

“Do they still work?” My curiosity got the better of me as we approached.

“From what I hear, kinda,” she said. “Supposedly they work, but there’s no shells to fire.”

“Oh,” I said as we entered the SNS. It was a little interesting, the tank turrets mounted to the roof of a gun store.

The inside of the SNS was dark. Well lit, but the onyx walls made it seem dark. Besides the light grey shelves and wooden barrels, the room was filled with guns.

Lots... and lots... of guns...

Everything from small 10mm pistols and assault rifles to rocket launchers and anti-machine rifles. There were even quite a few Magic Energy Weapons; beam pistols and the like. I spotted some weapons I didn’t recognize, too. They looked like they could only be mounted on power armor, given their large size. One of these mounted weapons was so unreasonably huge, that there was no way a pony could use it. I doubted even Vodka Shots could lift the damned thing.

“Welcome to the Saturday-Night Special; the second largest gun supplier in Equestria...” a grey earth pony said as we trotted up to the counter, our hooves clip-clopping along the metal-plated floor. The scarred stallion was a dark grey color, with an even darker grey mane that was cut short in a crew-styled fashion. He wore a black eyepatch over his right eye. While being tall, he was also rather bulky. Not really muscular, but not cubby. Just... big boned.

“What did I tell you?” he yelled angrily the moment he looked up at us. “I don’t sell to zebras!”

“Luckily, I’m not a zebra,” I lied, tapping my horn as my leg brace clattered.

“You have stripes... you sound like a zebra... you are a zebra.” The stallion glared at Lumens and I. “Now. Get. Out...”

Tunk. Tunk.

A metallic knocking at the door caused the three of us to turn. We all looked back to see a pony standing in the doorway. A pony wearing black combat armor and a helmet with a star on it.

“Is there a problem here?” Sheriff Six Star asked, still firm and authoritative.

“No... there isn’t,” the pony at the counter huffed.

“Good. You know you can’t shoo customers out just because they have stripes,” she said, turning to me. “Oh, if it isn’t the one hit wonder with nine lives.” What? “It’s good to see you survived that rocket.” She paused for a second, looking me over. “Your eye is... different.”

“Yeah, the clinic patched me up,” I replied. “And Lumens created an artificial eye.”

“No loitering!” the middle aged stallion said loudly.

“Fine... I’ll get what I need and leave.” The Sheriff started to walk around the racks and bins, barrels, buckets, and boxes overflowing with ammunition.

“Now... what do you want?” the grey pony grumbled.

“You see, I have this rare gun...” I pulled out the hunting rifle, “and I need it repaired and modded.”

“Wow,” he said, actually surprised. “That is a rare gun. I’t a .308 hunting rifle, complete with recoil dampeners and a custom loader.”

He grabbed the rifle in his fetlock and set it on a stand that took up half the wooden countertop. The stand was attached to a turntable that allowed the weapon to be inspected more easily for non-magic users, such as... this pony.

“My name’s Powder Keg, by the way,” he said, inspecting the spinning gun. It seemed to lighten his attitude a little. Perhaps we had found some common ground. I had a rare gun, he was a gun dealer. Or maybe he just decided that I was here to do business, whether he liked it or not.

“Xero,” I replied. “Ditzy Doo sent me here. She said you could help.”

“Oh, Ditzy sent you?” he mumbled. “I guess any customer of her is a customer of mine. If she sent you, then you really are looking for something specific.”

Powder Keg ducked behind the counter for a second before coming back up with a hard hat with a light and magnifying glass attached to an arm.

“Oh, and I’m just chopped liver, aren’t I?” Lumens finally spoke.

“Yes. Deal with it,” Powder said flatly. “What kind of mods are you looking for? I can put a scope on it and a couple extended magazines. There might be a custom, light-weight stock for it too, but don’t get your hopes up.”

He busied himself with sliding the bolt handle back and forth, making sure everything was in working order. I didn’t know much about rifles, which was why I was letting him repair and modify it.

“Mags and a scope sounds good.” I used magic most of the time, and I was pretty good with telekinesis, so a lighter weapon didn’t matter too much.

“Six-hundred-fifty caps. That covers cleaning, repair, and both mods.” The gunsmith looked up from my rifle, his eye magnified nearly double its normal size. Lumens coughed into her hoof, trying to stifle a laugh. Powder Keg promptly knocked the magnifying glass out of his face. “As I was saying, six-hundred-fifty caps.”

I pressed some buttons on my PipBuck, which collected a small bag of caps, and gave it to him.

“This will take a little while. Ten... maybe twenty minutes?” he said, taking the caps and giving a them a slight jingle. “If you’d like, I suppose you could look around. Just don’t touch anything.”

He seemed a little protective of his stock. Maybe it was the giant power armor mounted cannons, or the expensive MEWs. The fact that many of the weapons could kill multiple ponies at once might have had something to do with it, too.

As we wandered the store, Lumens and I met up with Six Star. She was sitting near the back of the store, staring at a large display case. Inside was a large, multi-barreled gun mounted on a battle saddle. It looked much like a minigun, only it had three barrels instead of six and they had a much larger bore. On one side was a large box for holding ammo with a feed leading to the weapon on the other side. The whole thing, including the battle saddle, was a matte black and detailed with glossy black and chrome accents. The blaze orange tag hanging from one of the barrels caught my eye.

‘16,000 caps. Final Price.’

“What is it?” I asked Six Star. She let out a surprised “eep!” that also startled me.

“Sorry,” she replied, looking back at the large gun. “That is a security pony’s dream gun. Actually, calling it a gun doesn’t even begin to describe it. It’s an Omega-Prime 20 gauge Gatling Hydra. A pressure sensitive bit allows the user to fire just a single round or up to twelve-hundred rounds a minute. It comes with an auto adjusting harness, advanced kick dampeners, and easy change ammo-box, and an integrated ammo enchanting matrix. Only ten of these were ever finished. Truly a work of art.” She gave a short pause before adding under her breath, “I’d give my soul for this beauty...”

I was a little weirded out by that last bit, but one thing did catch my attention. “What’s an ammo enchanting matrix?” I’d never heard of that before.

“An ammo enchanting matrix is a reversed engineered zebra spell. The MAS got their hooves on a few zebra ‘fire spew’ rifles, figured out how they worked, gave them to the MWT, who then put them into a few weapons like these,” she explained as she motioned a hoof a the gatling shotgun. “They take standard shells and enchant the projectile. This particular one has the only multi-enchanter of any Gatling Hydra. It enchants each round differently; shock, incendiary, anti-magic, corrosive, and explosive. It repeats that pattern over and over.

“The ponies who created this weapon thought that it was so powerful, that they never mass produced it out of fear of the zebras getting ahold of some.” She reached out and slowly slid a hoof down the glass case. “Too bad it’s meant for somepony richer. I’ll see you around, Xero.”

She picked up a sack of old guns and a couple of ammo boxes with her magic and trotted toward the counter to pay for her goods. Some words were exchanged about a competition and she left without incident.

“She really wants this, doesn’t she?” I said to Lumens.

“Yeah, she does,” the zebra mare replied back.

“She comes in here every weekend to buy her security team ammo and replacement weapons. And every time she sits there and stares at if for nearly twenty minutes.” Powder Keg called back from behind the counter. He had several different kinds of scopes on the counter, trying to get one to fit. “I’d be willing to sell it to her for considerably less, but the said that the price was final. She’s been a very valuable customer for the past eight years. If it wasn’t for her, I’d probably be out of business.”

As the gunpowder grey stallion went back to trying to get one of the scopes to fit, Lumens and I browsed the store bit more. The giant power armor cannon was meant for griffon power armor, as I had found out from the instructional booklet. The ‘Griffon Chaser’ fired something called flak shells, which apparently were like anti-air grenades. Really big ones. The thing was so large, I could put my off down inside the barrel. Was it really necessary to have something this huge?

One corner of the shop was dedicated to pistols. There were so many that they filled up the racks they were on and started to fill boxes. Everything from 9mm pistols to .32 revolvers and 12.7mm sidearms and .44 revolvers. The latter two were much fewer in numbers though, and didn’t have any boxes dedicated to them.

The largest area was populated by automatic firearms; assault rifles of varying models and manufacturers. Lots of submachine guns...

The area with the gatling shotgun had other shotguns, too. There weren’t very many shotguns to choose from, but they were all in decent quality. The mostly consisted of combat, hunting, double barrel, and riot shotguns, with a few sawed-offs here and there.

The next area was designated for single shot and semiautomatic rifles. It was about as big as the automatic firearms’ area, but had a much larger variety. AM rifles, hunting rifles, sniper and varmint rifles, and many, many more.

Powder Keg came trotting up and took one of the poorer quality sniper rifles off the rack. Back at the counter, he took the scope off of it, passed a single glance at the rest of the sniper rifle, and threw it in a large bin of weapon parts. ‘Discount! 50% off!’ was painted on the side. In small letters at the bottom, I could read ‘All sales final, prices non-negotiable’. Even from near the back of the store, my new eye was able to pick up the tiny lettering.

We had made it nearly all the way around the store, stopping at the little corner for explosives and MEWs. There were a few rocket launchers attached to battle saddles, a couple gatling lasers, half a dozen or so laser rifles and pistols, a strange looking plasma pistol, and one huge behemoth of a ‘plasma castor’. One of the battle saddles I noticed happened to have twin rocket launchers; it wasn’t in the greatest of conditions and appeared a bit scorched.

My chest burned with the thought that this was probably the same saddle that had nearly killed me just days before.

Grenades and mines were all held in heavily armored transport crates, all neatly organized by their colored bands that indicated their effects. The green and blue ones were my favorite, from the few times I had to use them.

“Almost done,” Powder Keg called out to the two of us.

As we wandered the store, we came across one last place we hadn’t been yet: melee weapons. Most consisted of blunt objects; security batons, sledge hammers, pool cues. A couple Super Sledges sat on a table, too. Of course, there were other weapons. Past the power hooves and displacer shoes were the blades.

One blade in particular caught my attention. It was short, about as long as my leg, and only about a third of a hoof wide. There was no curve to the shiny, silvery-blue saber. Strangely, the tip wasn’t tapered to a point, but rather ended flatly in a sharpened, squared-off edge. A deep emerald, flame-like filigree danced up its length from the small guard, accented by shallow etchings in the metal. The green gemstones that had been pressed into the black cross-guard were filled with the markings of unknown enchantments. The black leather grip showed signs of being mouth-held, and was accented with green threads that seemed to weave in and out of existence.

Picking the weapon up in my magic, I was surprised by many things, the first being that it was incredibly light. Like, almost weightless. The second thing was the dull throb and quiet hum it generated. When I asked Lumens about the sound, she told me she didn’t hear anything. Curious as to how it felt while in motion, I gave it a few swings.

Shwing-shing... Shwing... Shwing-shwing-foof!

“Whoa!” Lumens shouted, jumping aside and brushing the end of her now slightly shorter mane. “Careful with that thing.”

“Heh, oops,” I said.

The zebra mare gave me a clearly disapproving look. It wasn’t like I tried to cut her mane.

The price tag read ‘250 caps. No refunds!’. After the incident with the Toll Gang, I needed a new close quarters weapon. Granted, hooves were quicker and more accurate, but at the very least I still needed a new bladed tool. I asked what the markings on the blade and handle were, but Lumens just shrugged.

After replacing the sword to its scabbard, Powder Keg called out that he had finished his work with my rifle.

“Looks like you found a sword. Not too many ponies know how to use them,” he said as I put the weapon on the countertop. My rifle was also there, a new large scope on the top and two banana shaped magazines beside it.

The grey earth pony took one look at the price tag before starring me dead in the eye.

“I’ll sell it for half price if you promise not to bring it back. I’ve sold that sword more times than I care to count,” he started. “It always manages to find its way back here. Some say it’s cursed, other’s believe it’s trying to get somewhere. I just want to get rid of the Celetia-damned thing once and for all.”

“Uh... sure...” I didn’t believe in curses; there were no such things. It was something I learned from my brother, who challenged practically everything about zebra superstitions just to prove them wrong.

And he was always right.

I hoofed over the caps, put the newly modified rifle in my saddlebag, and buckled the sword’s scabbard across my back. After a quick belt adjustment, it fit quite comfortably. My PipBuck chimed softly, adding a small crimson note to the top left of my vision.

‘Zek’s Combat Execution Sword added.’

There was no pop-up for my rifle; I assumed it was because I had already been in possession of it and it wasn’t new.

I thanked Powder keg, much to his surprise, and left the SNS. I felt a drop of rain land behind my ear and pulled out my cloak. I frowned looking at it; I had yet to repair it.

“Where would I be able to get some cloth and wonderglue?” I asked Lumens. She turned to me with confused, raised brow. “I still need to repair my cloak.”

“I’m pretty sure we can get that stuff at Ditzy’s,” she replied. “You really need to learn to get everything you need in one stop. I swear, you’ve been to Absolutely Everything half a dozen times since you got here.”

“Yeah?” I said back, trotting down the slightly dusty road. “Well, I’ve been comatose for three days. I still need to get my bearings straightened out.” New Appleoosa had been good to me in all ways, except I kept forgetting to repair my cloak or got distracted.

“You’ve been walking around for the past two. If you still haven’t ‘gotten your bearings straightened out’, that’s your loss.” The zebra mare brought up her pace to keep up with me.

“I guess I’m just going to have to deal with it then,” I said with a smile. Everything was just in fun, of course.

“And how do you plan on doing that?”

I thought for a minute. How had I dealt with my amnesia? It wasn’t anything I was really concerned with, though I probably should have been. In the blink of an eye, years of my life had been erased. The memories... just... poof! Gone. I never gotten them back, and whatever I’d done had vanished with them.

I guess I would just have to make do like I had back then and just move on with my life.

“Hey, you alright?” Lumens asked, snapping me back to reality.

“Yeah,” I lied, “I’ll figure it out eventually.”

Usually... it doesn’t bother me.

The Saturday-Night Special wasn’t very far from Absolutely Everything, just down the road a couple blocks, around a corner, and down another short, makeshift road.

As we turned the corner, I noticed while some ponies still gave me strange glances, most just ignored the two striped quadrupeds trotting down the street.

A small grey blur zipped in front of me, which I tripped over and caused me to face plant into the ground.

Yum... dirt.

“Hello, Railright,” I groaned as I picked myself off the dirt-paved road. The sprinkling rain had started turning it into a slick mud.

“Hi,” the little colt replied, his eyes going wide... again. “You aren’t that scary, ya know?”

“Well, thanks. Just watch where you’re running next time.” My neck cracked and popped as I turned it about.

“Yeah, right.” He nodded quickly.

“Railright! Come inside!” a mare with a sunhat called from her train-car-house. “It’s starting to rain!”

“Gotta go!” And in a flash, he was gone.

“That was a little weird,” Lumens said as we continued towards Absolutely Everything.

“We met the first day I was here. His mother doesn’t like me very much.” I had no idea why and really, I didn’t care.

“Who couldn’t like you? You’re nice, considerate, smart, caring, funny...” She paused for a second. “Maybe a little boneheaded at times, but you’re a good pony. Zebra. Person.” She flushed as she corrected herself. “How could anypony not like you?”

“Uh, Lumens?” I pointed a hoof at my horn and then along my side. “I’m a zebra... a blue zebra, with a horn. I’m the only one I’ve ever seen, and I doubt anyone has, too. But that’s alright. Everyone’s different, some more than others. And sometimes, there are those that can’t accept that.”

Lumens gave a small smile of approval as we entered Ditzy’s shop.

The ghoulish pegasus was, as usual, nowhere to be seen. It wasn’t very long before I finally found what I needed: a bottle of Wonderglue and a few strips of cloth. The cloth was actually heavy leather; I couldn’t find any lightweight cloth.

Back at the counter, there was still no Ditzy, so I rung the bell with my magic. And cue in three-two-one...

Crash! Thud.

The grey pegasus poked her head from the back room, a mess of wires hanging from what was left of her dirty blonde mane.

‘You’re still here? I thought you would have left down by now,’ she wrote on a noteblock.

“I probably would have. But as it turns out, I need to repair my cloak. Forgot to get the supplies when I was last here.” I scratched the back of my mane awkwardly. It was rather difficult with the leg braces.

‘Ha ha. That’s okay. Your total comes to 17 caps. Will there be anything else?’

“Do you have a workbench I can use?”

Ditzy nodded happily and pointed a hoof to the back wall, where a workbench and even a reloading station sat.

“Thanks,” I said, hoofing over the caps and taking my items.

“How do you plan on fixing that thing with leather and glue?” Lumens asked as I pulled out my more-than-not torn cloak and set it on the hard wooden surface of the bench.

“Magic,” I whispered with a smile. Zebra magic, of course.

A pair of heavy shears, manipulated by my teal aura, quickly snipped the leather strips to size. It was more difficult than I last remembered. ‘Probably just the injury to my horn,’ I thought to myself.

“Really? Magic?” she snickered. She practically scoffed at the idea, as if it couldn’t be.

I just nodded and applied glue to the leather strips.

“And what kind of magic can repair something like this?” She waved a hoof to the destroyed cloak. “A repair talisman might be able to, but your cloak clearly doesn’t have one of those.”

“Arcane zebra magic.”

“Wonderglue is not ‘arcane zebra magic’. Or any kind of magic at all. It’s... glue!” Lumens said in disbelief.

Ignoring her protests, I slipped the tattered cloak over my head and examined the tears, cuts, and holes. The area over my back was torn so badly that each side hung off and touched the ground. Using my magic, I pulled the edges together. I then grabbed one of the longer strips of gluey leather and pressed it against the seam. I fixed the rest of the holes in a similar manner, being careful not to glue it to my hide. I’d only glued myself to something once. On accident.

When the repairs were finished, I had my cloak again. Only this time it had a very shoddy patch job.

“See? All better,” I said with a smile. Lumens facehoofed with a groan of frustration.

I gave the silver clasp a light nip, listening carefully for the enchantment to start working. It gave a soft click and started to make a sizzling sound like a drop of water hitting a hot pan. The heavy strips of leather along my back and sides sunk into the cloak’s shorty, furry fabric, leaving no trace of it every being ripped and torn.

“Wait. How? Did you just? What?” she stammered. I found her reaction predictable, but still funny. My brother took very good care of the old cloak when he owned it, so almost no one ever saw it being repaired.

“Arcane. Zebra. Magic.” I paused between each word to let them sink in. “I don’t know how, but I think it has something to do with the runes in the clasp and the markings on the cloak. And as you just saw, it can easily be repaired with glue and cloth. It also never gets dirty; the dirt just brushes off.”

“That’s interesting,” the zebra said as she dug in her small saddlebag and took out a notebook and pencil. At first they had no apparent face value, but when she opened it, I noticed the pages were packed with drawings, annotations, and notes. Hundreds... no, probably thousands, of notes. They all appeared to pertain to glyphs and runes, both of pony and zebra origins. Most of it was clearly legible, though there were symbols and markings that I couldn’t make out. They were too clean to be accidental, but I had no idea what they meant.

She dropped the book on the workbench and used her mouth to scribble something on one of the blank pages.

“Would you mind if I studied it a little? I think the magic could be useful in easy-repair limb prosthetics,” she said, dropping the notebook back into her saddle bag.

“I, uh...” I hesitated. I never separated from my cloak; it was one of only four things I never went anywhere without, and three of those things I were all I had left of my past. If anything were to happen to them, I’d... I didn’t know what I’d do, but it wouldn’t be good. Then I remembered who I was talking to; she’d never let anything happen. “Sure.”

“Don’t worry, Xero,” Lumens said. She delicately folded the cloak up and gently put it in her bag, too. “I know it means a lot to you. I’ll be careful with it.”

I nodded and turned to leave Absolutely Everything. Outside, the sky was getting darker with impending storm clouds, which occasionally lit up brightly with flashes of lightning.

A second later, there was a long, low rumbling. Then it started to rain.

“Looks like we’re going to get wet.”

“Aw, it’s not that bad; it could be worse.”

As if on cue, there was a thunderous crash and it downpoured.

“You just had to that, didn’t you?” I said with a shake of my head.

Ditzy quickly flew around the inside of the shop, placing empty buckets under the few small roof leaks.

We decided to suck it up and sprint to Lumens’ house. However, on the way there, Lumens slipped on the slick mud. In a panic, she grabbed at the nearest thing: me.

We slide and went down in a tangle of muddy legs and saddle bags.

“Eugh... blech...” I groaned, spitting out a mouthful of the brown mud. There was this cutest damned giggle behind me, and I knew exactly who it was. “Oh, think this is funny?” I smiled, showing off my dirty teeth.

“Come on, you gotta admit,” she started. “It was kinda fu-”

She didn’t get a chance to finish as I half-slapped half-swatted the surface of the giant puddle beneath us, showering her pristine white coat with the brown muck.

“Ugh!” Spit. “My mouth-” Spit. “Was open-” Spit. “And everything!” Spit.

Now I was the one laughing, but only for a moment. Something very wet and very messy landed on my head with an audible splat! I felt the cold sludge slowly roll down around my ears and horn, between my eyes, and off my muzzle and neck.

“There! How do you like them apples?” Lumens said, flicking the residual mud off her hooves.

“Return fire!” I yelled. I jumped as high as I could, lifting myself slightly higher in a teal aura before landing in the deeper part of the puddle. The miniature tidal wave completely covered both myself and my enemy in a good coating of foalish mud.

“Ah! Really?!” Lumens shook the mud off to no avail. She gave up her futile attempt to stay somewhat clean and charged, tackling and successfully pinning me to the ground.

Something stirred next to me, bringing the world around back from a cloudy haze. We were in Lumens’ house, laying on the couch, a nice, warm blanket wrapped around the two of us.

We had horsed around in the muddy streets, for no other reason than “because we could”. After Lumens threw her second hoof full of mud, a few kids joined in. It was colts versus fillies, with the advantage of numbers belonging to us. Railright was the first one to get completely covered, head to hoof, in mud. His fun didn’t last very long, unfortunately; his mother had a few words to say.

Even with the numbers tied, the girls still beat us. What baffled me most was the little dark red-coated filly on Lumens’ team. The little shield spell she was constantly using not only kept her clean from the constant barrage of mud balls, but actually kept her dry. Everything the earth pony colt on my team and I threw at her simply went splat against the shield like it was a wall and ran off as the rain washed around it. She would then use her telekinesis to form small globs of fodder and launch them at us while still keeping the shield up.

Cheater...

Eventually, the two younger ponies left. Lumens and I stayed out in the heavy rain for a few minutes longer to wash the mud off before heading indoors, too. From there, one thing just sort of lead to another... and... yeah, life was good.

I was laying on my back in the corner of the couch where the arm and backrest met. Lumens had cuddled up beside me and fallen asleep after our little... endeavour. To be honest, being as a it was my first, it was awkward. But after awhile, the two of us had a good rhythm. How she felt about it, I didn’t know. Though, from the faint hints of a smile on her muzzle, I was pretty sure I could guess.

Lumens subtle breathing was peaceful and feeling her warm breath gently roll across my chest. Not wanting to move, in fear of waking the sleeping mare, I simply dropped my head back. The ceiling was nothing of note, not even the bullet hole surrounded by a green stain.

“You awake?” my partner tiredly asked.

“I guess you could say that,” I replied, nuzzling her neck and blowing a zerbert.

“Ah!” she squealed with a laugh, trying to push me away. “Stop that!”

“When you stop laughing and smiling and being so damned cute,” I said.

“Like that will ever happen.” She pulled herself up a little closer to my level and snuggled herself against my side.

There was a peaceful silence before either of us spoke.

Actually, neither of us spoke; my stomach growled.

“I think almost dinner time.” I looked down toward my belly, mentally telling it to shut up because it was ruining the moment.

“Aww, I don’t want you to get up...” Lumens whined. Her voice was muffled by my chest fur that she had buried her face in. “You’re nice and warm...”

Despite her protests, I got up anyway and left her to flop on the couch.

“You know what sounds good?” she asked. “Vegetable stew.”

“That does sound good,” I agreed; it’d been awhile since I’d had a decent meal.

I strapped on my leg braces again while Lumens prepared the stew.

“If you’d like, there’s books on the shelf you can read.” She said as she pulled a pan out from under one of the cupboards. “Or maybe there’s something you can do about that paperweight on the desk...”

Looking to the desk near the ‘kitchen’ area, all I could see was the terminal.

“I could get that terminal working,” I said.

“If you manage to get it working, I could spare a few caps for you.” She took a knife and began cutting some fresh looking vegetables from the refrigerator.

“Nah, that won’t be necessary.” I pressed the orange power button on the terminal. The startup sequence played, but stopped halfway through. The screen became pixellated and broken up, shuttering about before finally stopping on a screen asking me to contact administration.

With a quiet groan of frustration, I levitated my saddlebags to the side of the desk, wrapped my magic around the terminal, turned it around, took a torx driver from one of the bags’ pockets, and started taking the back off.

The inside, despite being powered with magic gems, perpetually-recharging spark batteries, and talismans, was very conventional: non-magic electronics and computer chips. After some cutting, stripping, and splicing of wires, shattering one of the talismans, and repeatedly shocking myself, I finally got the terminal working again. It was a lot easier than I last remember; my new eye made it easier to see the fine wires clearer and quicker. My eyesight wasn’t terrible before, but it definitely wasn’t as good as it should have been.

“Stew’s just about ready,” Lumens said after putting a mixing spoon on the countertop.

I nodded and turned the terminal another 180 degrees so the screen was facing me. I pressed turned it on again, resulting in a soft, static-y crackle and the screen buzzed to life.

“I think I got the terminal working.” I couldn’t believe it. It worked!

“Really?” she asked in disbelief, too.

>TERMINAL HARDWARE MISSING OR DAMAGED
>CONTACT ADMINISTRATOR FOR REPAIR INSTRUCTIONS OR CONTACT A TERMINAL REPAIR SERVICE DIRECTLY

>FILE CORRUPTED
>FILE COMPRESSED: DECOMPRESSION IN PROGRESS, PASSWORD NEEDED
>FILE CORRUPTED
>FILE FRAGMENTED: SUGGEST DEFRAG
>FILE CORRUPTED
>AUDIO FILE
>OCEAN MIST’S DIARY: DAY 203
>OCEAN MIST’S DIARY: DAY 193
>AUDIO FILE
>OCEAN MIST’S DIARY: DAY 159
>FILE CORRUPTED
>MULTIPLE FILES DELETED
>OCEAN MIST & FIRESTORM: DAY 1

“Why are so many files corrupted?” Lumens asked as she motioned a hoof at the screen.

“Not sure. Might have something to do with rewiring the inside, I may have shorted out those disk drives.” I brought up my PipBuck and pressed some buttons. Within a couple seconds, I had downloaded the few readable files.

“Any idea why the second one is compressed?” she asked.

“Nope.” I clicked down to it and tried to open the audio file.

>PASSWORD REQUIRED
>PLEASE ENTER PASSWORD
>_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
>ATTEMPTS REMAINING: 1

“Wow,” I said, not so much surprised as I was annoyed that there was only one attempt before the terminal locked us out. We stared at the terminal for at least a minute, maybe two, trying to figure out what the password could be.

“I’ve got nothing,” I said in frustration, throwing my hooves into the air.

“Try... ‘marefriends’...” The zebra mare seem unsure, but confident.

“Are you sure? This is the last attempt before the terminal locks us out, and I won’t be able to to get back into it.”

“Yes. Besides, you already downloaded the files that can be read, so there’s not much more we can do with it.”

“Alright, then.” I typed the word with my magic.

>M A R E F R I E N D S

I tapped the ‘Enter’ key with the tip of my hoof. I may have been spoiled with my magic, but I didn’t use it for everything.

>PROCESSING...
>PASSWORD ACCEPTED
>VIEW FILE?

“How did you know?” I asked. That was luck. There was no other way to explain it.

She grabbed the top drawer left of the terminal and pulled it open.

“Just a lucky guess.” she answered, smiling proudly.

I looked into the drawer. Other than the usual refuse found in a old drawers: a few caps, a pencil, a coffee cup, ... the words ‘OM&FS MAREFRIENDS FOREVER’ were carved into the wooden bottom. The word MAREFRIENDS was circled with a line coming out and pointing to another word: PASSWORD.

Huh... interesting.

“Should we view the file now, or wait until after supper?” I asked.

“Supper?”

“Supper... Dinner... same difference.”

“Let’s wait. The stew’s ready, and I’m hungry...”

After finishing our stew, which was absolutely delicious, Lumens and I started to go through the files I’d managed to recover. Chronological order seemed like the best approach.

“Ready?” I asked Lumens, who was sitting on a floor cushion of her own beside me.

“Probably as ready as you are,” she replied.

I went to the oldest file and pressed Enter.

>OCEAN MIST & FIRESTORM: DAY 1

>I can’t believe it. We got out... without anypony knowing. They probably know by now, though, since neither of us reported to our stations this morning. Call me reckless, call me selfish, call me whatever you want, but Storm and I have finally made it out of that damned place. I wasn’t accepted, shunned and hated simply because I don’t have a horn. I was picked on all throughout school and even after. Looked down upon... Our love was a crime against nature. Why shouldn’t we have left? Even our parents were disappointed in us. Dad hasn’t spoken to me in almost a year and Firestorm’s mother tried to kick her out of her own living quarters.

>“You want to love a filthy dirt scrubber? Then go live with them!”

>Those were her words. That didn’t sit too well with the overmare, of course, even though she didn’t approve of our relationship either.

>But we’re out now. The world is not what we expected. Firestorm expected it to be lush, green, and full of life. I expected it to be a great big nothingness, just an unending void where we could be together, without anypony to judge us. We were both completely right and neither of us could have been more wrong. The world is an unending painting of... dead. A... wasteland, almost void of life. Yet, where what little life remains and takes hold, it flourishes. We just got this... house... earlier this morning. It’s a strange thing, apparently made out of something called train cars! The ground floor is very basic, with only a small food prep area and a lounge. Storm has plans to put a workbench along one of the walls, since she knows how much I like to tinker with things. Upstairs, there’s a bedroom for two (squee! yay!) and an outdoor area. I think it’s called a ‘deck’ or ‘patio’. She also has plans for that, perhaps a library or a study for my need of literature.

>The mayor, what was her name again? Mayor May? I believe that was her name. Mayor May said we could use this place if we each got jobs. It was a generous offer. Storm and I work, we get a free place to live. I was a bit hesitant about her off. I still am. Firestorm just told me not to worry about it. I just think the deal was too good to be true, which means it probably is. But alas, I trust her. She’s may not be the smartest pony in Equestria, but she has great intuition and she’s never done me wrong.

>I start my work at the local watering hole, keeping the water purifier running, after a few days’ rest; I injured my leg and shoulder during our escape. Firestorm starts her job in Security the day after tomorrow. It’s funny. We both come from Stable 59, me working in ‘the dirt slums’, aka maintenance, and Storm working in Stable Security. We come to the ‘outside’ with the choice to do whatever we please, and we go back to the jobs we had before we left.

>It’s getting late, so I think I’ll call it a night. Besides, Stormy keeps saying she has something ‘special’ to show me...

>END OF FILE
>AWAITING COMMAND

“Aw, that’s sweet,” Lumens said.

I just smiled an agreement before going to the next one.

>OCEAN MIST’S DIARY: DAY 159

>I just don’t see why?! Why would somepony do that? HOW could somepony... No. Not somepony... something. Anything! Do... THAT!

>Apparently, there’s some hotshot gang that’s been trying to unite the towns in the East. That sounds good and all, but those who refuse get killed! Helpless, innocent ponies just... slaughtered. Those that do join are forced into their army or slavery. Or worse! Not even zebras deserve that. Firestorm is absolutely furious and wants to charge in with a dozen others and just kill them. Such a brash decision. I’ll have to talk to her about it later. Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow...

>I hope she doesn’t do anything foalish. Again.

>END OF FILE
>AWAITING COMMAND

“Hm, that sounds familiar,” Lumens said after read the entry.

“No kidding.” I had a feeling I knew who it was. Well, not who, but what gang they were talking about.

The next file was an audio file. There was a static-laced crackle and a mare’s voice flowed out of the terminal’s hidden speakers. Her voice was sweet and friendly, and had this pleasant ring to it.

“Check? Okay, the little light is on, so I’m going to guess it’s working. I hate using this microphone. I burned my hoof today at work, and my other one is still sore from that mysterious cut. It got infected do to my own stupidity, and I had to go the clinic for some antibiotics. The doctor that fixed it up only charged twenty-five caps, which was very generous of him. Anyways, I’ve been talking to-”

“Hey! Misty! Are you on that damned computer thingy again?” a different mare’s voice interrupted. Her’s was a bit rougher and less formal sounding. She sounded quite distant, too, like she was in another room.

There was a sigh from the mare on the terminal, who I assumed could only be Ocean Mist.

“-Firestorm,” she finished.

“Hey! I can hear you, ya know?”

“Yes, Storm, I’m on the terminal. I’m just doing a short entry.”

“Well, hurry up and make it quick. You HAVE to come see this! It’s AMAZING!” Firestorm shouted excitedly.

“Yeah, just give me a minute,” Ocean Mist called back. “Where was I? Oh, right. I’ve been talking to Storm lately about the gang that’s been harassing towns in the East. She still thinks we can take them. But even though she’s more than just my friend, I keep telling her it’s a bad idea. We can’t just... ‘go in and clear them out,’ as she puts it. Not without getting somepony killed, and it’ll probably be one of us. I couldn’t bear losing her. I hope I can talk some sense into her soon, though. Otherwise...” She let out a long sigh. “...I don’t know. End of entry, day... one-hundred-seventy-two.”

The recording ended with a click and backed out to the file listings.

“Huh...” Lumens said, looking around the single, ground floor room.

“Something wrong?” I asked, also looking around.

“No, it’s just that this use to be their home,” she said. “It feels strange.”

“Do you want to continue?”

“Yes.”

>OCEAN MIST’S DIARY: DAY 193

>Celestia damn it. That’s not a very good way to start off an entry, but that’s the only way to describe this. Where do I start? Firestorm and I have- No. A couple weeks ago? Yeah, that’s a little better.

>A couple weeks ago Storm seemed like she was ready to snap and run off on her own. I managed to do nothing but delay what happened today. Starting tomorrow and during the next couple weeks, she and I will begin our training regiment. Yes, we will be leaving to take care of that gang in the east, which has grown considerably. I made a deal with her. She knows I can’t go back on a deal. I never have and never will; it’s just who I am. She was going to leave when I told her that “I’ll go with you if, and ONLY IF, there’s another attack this week. Until then, I beg you, please, PLEASE DON’T LEAVE!” I don’t remember what else I said, but I do remember crying like a little foal. She means so much to me. I don’t know what I’d do without her.

>So, yeah. Tomorrow I’m quitting my job at The Diner and Firestorm will be training me how to fight. She says she’s just going to teach me the basics of firearms: shooting, reloading, cleaning and maintenance. She’s been in the Security scene almost all her life, so she definitely knows what she’s doing.

>Why am I doing this... why are WE doing this? It seems so asinine! Storm thinks we can handle it, though. There are a couple others coming with us. If we need more, she says we can just pick some up along the way. She said it like it was as easy as flipping a switch, which I guess is easier for a unicorn than an earth pony.

>I think it’s going to be dangerous. No, I KNOW it’s going to be dangerous and she does, too. She said I could stay here, where it was safe. I could, if I wanted to. I can’t, though. She’s my entire life! As I filly, I didn’t fit in anywhere. I thought of things that no filly should think about doing to herself. I was at an end. Then, out of nowhere, Storm showed up. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: she just means so much to me. And out here, in this ‘wasteland’ as everypony calls it, she needs me. More than that, I need her.

>More than she knows, I think.

>END OF FILE
>AWAITING COMMAND

“They really loved each other, didn’t they?” Lumens seemed to ask nopony in particular. But since I was the only other one in the room, I responded.

“Yeah. Do you think they’re the same two that Ditzy mentioned? The ones that mysteriously disappeared?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” she said, looking around the room again. “It’s kinda sad, though.”

“Let’s finish the files before we both break into tears,” I said. It was a little sad; they were most likely dead now. “There’s only a few left.”

>OCEAN MIST’S DIARY: DAY 208
>SUBTEXT: LAST ENTRY

>Today’s the day. We spent almost two weeks training and these last two days resting and gathering supplies. I suspect this will probably be my last entry for a while, if not... ever. Firestorm says we’ll be back soon enough, maybe a few weeks at most. I hope she’s right.

>Our ‘party’, as she likes to keep calling it, currently consists of us two, obviously, a local pegasus, and strangely enough, a griffon. Storm had told me yester she had made a contract with the her, whatever that was suppose to mean. I told her that we would need more than just the four of us, but she keeps insisting that we can just grab some along the way.

>I’m scared. Absolutely terrified. There. I said it. I don’t want to go. I think it’s a death sentence. I don’t know how I’m managing to fool Storm by pretending to be strong. I’m scared of what we might fight against, scared that I’ll get hurt, scared of dying. Scared of HER dying...

>There’s nothing that can be done now. The four of us are leaving in a couple hours. I better finishing packing, not that I have much to pack anyways...

>END OF FILE
>AWAITING COMMAND

There was nothing to be said after that entry, so I pressed Enter again on the next file.

“Hey.”

It definitely was not Ocean Mist this time. The sad mare on the recording sound much more like the interrupting mare in the previous ones.

“It’s me, Firestorm. Although, you probably figured that out already; you’re such a smart pony...

“I know you don’t like other ponies going through your personal stuff, but I feel like this is the only place I can tell you.” She gave a long pause. So long, that I thought the recording was corrupted.

“I’m sorry...” Another minute and a half of silence.

“I love you, with all my heart. Nopony anywhere... can love another... as much as I love you.” The mare sniffled.

“I’m sorry that I didn’t do anything back in 59 to show them how fucked up they are. I should have made them understand. I should have. I’m sorry I came up with the idea of escaping and that they didn’t deserve us...

“I’m sorry I dragged you into this... stupid... fucking... quest. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you,” Firestorm said as she broke into a quiet sob.

“You’re truly better than me. You deserve somepony better. You’re the most wonderful, talented, prettiest mare I’ve ever seen. I don’t see what you see in me. I hope I can... eventually. I also hope that I never do, because... what is love? We strive to figure it out and when we do, it’s not what it appears to be. Love is ever changing, and the more we try to figure it out, the more it changes, for better or worse.” The mare cried a little, but it sounded happy. In the background, faint voices were drawing in close, like they were just outside.

“I’m leaving this here for two reasons. One: I want to leave a little something for future ponies. And two: if the worse happens, whatever that may be, I want something you can remember me by...

“Ocean Mist... My caring, loving, Misty... I... love... you...” Firestorm sighed then whispered quietly under her breath, “more than you know...”

The static-y audio ended with a click after some more silence. Lumens looked like she was on the verge of tears. I was feeling a little sick. Remorse? Compunction? Some sort of immense sadness? Maybe it was anxiety.

“Do you want to access the last one?” I asked.

“Uh, sure.” She bit her lip in anticipation. If it was going to be sad, I had a feeling that she would probably cry. I might, too.

>FILE COMPRESSED: DECOMPRESSION IN PROGRESS

>...

>FILE COMPRESSED: DECOMPRESSION IN PROGRESS

>...

>FILE DECOMPRESSION: SUCCESSFUL

>PLAY AUDIO FILE?

I hit Enter for the final time.

“Hey, long time no see. I’m surprised I still know the password.” The pony in question was definitely Ocean Mist, but she sounded so... different. Hardened. Inured, a word I’d heard before but never really used. I knew what had happened. It happens to many wastelanders, weather they be ponies, zebras, griffons, hellhounds and sand dogs.

She had grown accustomed to killing.

“I don’t know why I’m doing this. Just to get some things off my chest, I guess. Wow... I never thought I’d be doing this again.” Ocean mist waited silently, tapping away at the keyboard, with her hooves, no doubt. “I also didn’t think I’d be going to TenPony, Hoofington, and even Caledonia. I never would have thought...” She stopped, leaving us hanging in suspense.

“Six... Six long years, we’ve been fighting. And it’s finally done. Just a week ago, I put an end to the New Zebra Resistance and Alliance. I put an AM round right through Cinder’s head. Point blank. And then I shot her body. Again... and again... and again... and again... Reload. Repeat Again. And again. And again... I really hope she’s dead.”

The mare didn’t sound like she was happy. She almost sounded regretful. Something inside her, something important, something... fundamental, had been smashed. It just seemed... off.

“Hey, Ocean Mist.” Firestorm also sounded different, like she’d taken a broken Sparkle-Cola bottle to the throat and eaten a brillo pad; it was all scratchy. There was little emotion in her voice, like the place she was in was just another blip on her map. Everything about the file sounded wrong. They weren’t the same ponies from before. “I’ve been searching for you. Look, I know you wanted to make a stop here for some reason, but Alpine’s Death Squads are after us. We can’t stay here for more than an hour.”

“Yeah, I know...” Ocean Mist sighed. “I’ll be out in a minute. Why don’t you wait outside? Don’t go too far, though.” She was as calm as ever, but clearly sad about something.

“Uh, sure,” Firestorm paused for a second. “Is something wrong? You seem sad.”

“No, nothing’s wrong. Just tired. So, so tired. Please, wait outside. I’ll be there in a minute. Whatever you hear, please... don’t come in.” Ocean Mist was still just as calm.

“Alright...” Firestorm replied uneasily. “This place gives me the creeps, anyways, like I’ve been here before. But that’s silly, I’ve never been here before.”

I wanted to rewind the audio to make sure I heard that right, but a terminal can only do so much.

“Of course,” Ocean Mist said. There was the sound of heavy metal hoofsteps and the door closing. A second later, Ocean Mist burst into tears.

“I JUST DON’T KNOW WHAT WENT WRONG! I FUCKING FUCKED UP EVERYTHING! EVERY! FUCKING! THING!” she bawled some more.

“Everything was going great until two years ago. We had all the caps we could ever need, friends and companions who wanted nothing more than to help. W-we.. I... St-Stormy... F-F-FUCK!” The audio was filled with sorrowful crying and a single, loud crash of breaking glass.

It was at least a minute before she spoke again, and the file wasn’t even a third of the way done. No wonder it was compressed.

Ocean Mist sniffled, making a sound like she’d wiped her runny nose with a foreleg.

“Everything was going good. I figured Firestorm would lead our group and she did, for four years. But just over a year ago, there was an accident. And Stormy... she... she doesn’t remember anything. She doesn’t remember starting this quest. She doesn’t remember our friends. She doesn’t remember this place, the Stable. She doesn’t even remember me! US! Together!”

The microphone picked up dull thud and the clatter of a bunch of keys being pressed at once, along with the inevitable error bleep that followed such a thing. There was a muffled scream of frustration that ended in even more crying and sobbing.

Eventually, though, there came a small, weak voice.

“I thought that bringing her back home might jog some memories. But... nothing. She says there are things that seem strangely familiar, like deja-voo, but nothing solid.

“I don’t know why I try anymore. I’m so ungoddessly tired. Tired of running. Tired of the sleepless nights. I’m tired of all the killing. Being alone. I just want it all to end...” She trailed off. There was the click of a revolver hammer being pulled back.

BANG!

Thud.

The gun hit the floor along with something else. Lumens and I both jumped and looked at each other, horrified.

“Did she just...” Lumens asked.

“Fucking ‘roaches,” Ocean Mist said quietly. “After the accident, I assumed leader position. Everypony agreed that I was the best candidate. Everypony, except two: myself and Alpine. After I was put in charge, he left. He was our best engineer. Our only engineer, actually. He hated me and Stormy. Ever since I became our ‘fearless leader’, ponies started dying. Dying... from my mistakes. Slowly, one by one, we started dwindling. Fourteen one day, thirteen the next. A month later, twelve. Then nine... and now four...”

There was a deafening silence that filled the speakers, keeping us on edge.

“Firestorm and I are running from Alpine’s Death Squad. He left us, and joined Cinder and her Alliance. With her, he created one of the strongest Special Ops forces in the wasteland. He finished off the Steel Rangers... he destroyed the last of the Resistance Resistors, a group of ponies that decided to follow our hoofsteps. He killed off all of us. All of us except Blackwater, Berry and Sound Breaker, Stormy, and myself. Berry and and Sound Breaker both flew off a couple days ago. The Enclave are after them, and therefore us, so they got their attention and got them off our tails.” She sighed again.

“I don’t know why I’m telling anypony this. For all I know, there’ll be nopony to read these files in the future. And in a hundred years, why would anypony care?

“So, I’m telling you goodbye. Probably forever. It’s been a hell of trip, Diary. I hope that maybe, just maybe, we meet again someday.”

After some more silence and key tapping, Ocean Mist spoke for a final time.

“I love you, too... Firestorm...”

We just sat there for a few minutes, just thinking about what we had just heard.

“Wow... just- wow,” Lumens said quietly. She turned to me and smile. It was a weak smile but a smile all the same. I could only return with another, equally weak smile.

The clock on the back wall started to ding. 11:00. Lumens looked at it almost instantly

“I’ll go get a couple pillows and blankets.” With that, she got up from her floor cushion and trotted up the stairs.

I stared in awe at the dark terminal. Two mares and probably more than a dozen other ponies tired to do what I was thinking about doing. Only, I was thinking of doing it alone, since I was always by myself. On one hoof, there was no record of Ocean Mist and Firestorm being successful. On the other hoof, there were no proof that they failed.

There was one thing nagging at my mind, screaming to get out. Why did it all seem familiar? I could have sworn that I’d heard of someone named Cinder, but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember where.

The name Alpine was terrifying and dreadful in itself. It was a rare name and not one that was easily forgotten. I’d heard of something called Alpine’s Pony and Zebra Allegiance from my time in the Outlands. They were a militant faction that were occasionally mentioned on the radio by New Wave, a popular Outlands DJ. I didn’t listen in on the broadcasts very much, so what I knew about them was limited. I sensed a connection between the NZRA and ‘Azapa’.

Then, there was the letter. The letter with the knife and three rings symbol on it. The letter from Galvano to Flintlock. Flintlock’s letter. It couldn’t have all been a coincidence.

I trotted over to the door, where I had tossed my saddlebags after fixing the terminal, and took out the mysterious paper. It was a little wrinkled and had a mud splatter on it, but still legible.

Dear Ms. Flintlock,

Yadda, yadda, yadda...

Your most faithful client,
Galvano.

Even after rereading it multiple times, I didn’t find anything. I still needed to look for a key, which was supposedly under a piece of wood near one of the entrances. If it was still there, maybe I could get a clue or lead on what I was doing, whatever that may be.

My thoughts were interrupted when Lumens came back with a some pillows and blankets.

“Since it’s getting late, I’m going to go to sleep,” she said with a yawn as she place a pillow and blanket on her end of the L-shaped couch.

“Yeah, I’m thinking that myself.” I fought the urge to yawn. Why was it contagious?

The zebra mare walked over to the the small blue crystal that activated the lights above and gave it a small tap, the overhead lights slowly dimming. She crawled onto the recliner and covered herself with the blanket.

I sat by the door for a moment, lost in my own blank thoughts.

Was I really going to do this? Tomorrow?

“You headed to bed?” Lumens asked, snapping me back to reality.

“Hm? Yeah, sure...” I took my leg braces off, unbuckling them all at once with my magic. My weak knees now just felt stiff. I was at the coffee table when I realized I still had Tweety attached to my foreleg. After taking that off, I hopped onto the couch where I had slept the night before. With my head on the soft pillow and the blanket pulled over me, I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep.

At least, that was the plan. I laid there for a few minutes in the near pitch-blackness. Now that I was ready to sleep though, I felt a second wind. I just laid there, listening to the soft tapping of the rain against the box car. There was a small shifting and I felt Lumens crawl up next to me. I wasn’t the only zebra having trouble sleeping, apparently. She had wiggled herself under my blanket, under my foreleg and stopped with her head on my pillow, being silent the whole time.

“Hey, Xero?” she asked, barely over a whisper.

“Hm?” I responded.

“Are you planning on leaving tomorrow?”

“Yes. I... still have to finish my courier contract.” It was a lie. I’d been paid in advanced. I didn’t want Lumens worrying about what I was really going to do. In reality, I wasn’t planning on doing it by myself. I still needed to confirm if there was an old threat on the rise, and if so, gather enough supplies and bodies to help, and then try to figure out a way to stop them. But first, what I really needed was knowledge of what I was going up against.

“Oh, okay...” I was pretty sure she saw through my lie. I wasn’t very charismatic. Or a good liar.

“I’ll be careful,” I said, trying to comfort her with a soft hug.

“Please do.”

“I will.” I didn’t want her to worry more than she already was, which was a lot, considering she wasn’t asleep yet.

“I want to come with you,” she said a little while later.

“What?” Did I hear that correctly?

“But I have an obligation to fulfill here,” she said.

“Hm,” I murmured, for no real reason.

“Xero?”

“Yes, Lumens?” I was trying to sleep.

“Good night.”

“Good night...”

Footnote: Level up!

New Perk: Master Administrator - Nerd. If you're locked out of a terminal, with no way to re-hack it, and you don't have the administrator's password, you can physically hack the terminal's hardware. This takes time (1 hour), the proper tools (1 screwdriver, 1 pair of pliers, 1 wire cutter, and 1 soldering iron and solder), and 1 unit of scrap electronics. The solder and scrap electronics are used up during the rewiring. This perk does not work on 'Hard' or 'Very Hard' terminals.