Fallout Equestria: Redemption
By: Cooperdawg
Chapter 4: Circles within Circles
“Our lives are the results of our choices.”

In the fraction of a second before the door gave way underneath the massive force trying to crush its way through, time seemed to slow to a stop, giving me the chance to realize one undeniable and all-encompassing truth: this was the end. Everything I had ever fought for, everything I had ever done with my life in the name of survival, amounted to nothing. This is where I would meet the one force in this world that nopony could avoid. This is where I would meet my death.

Oddly, the thought didn’t upset me. I didn’t want to die, not by any means, and I would not go willingly, but the anger that would have been present in me not two days ago was gone. In its place was a sense of calm and peace. I would face this end bravely, and even though it was more powerful than anything I had encountered before, I would, at the very least, take it with me so nopony else would meet their end the same way.

Time snapped back into reality as the door imploded under the force of impact. The force of the attack struck with such terrible force that one of the doors broke entirely free of its hinges and slammed into me, sending me flying back into the room and sending Hammer flying off into the distance.

I finally came to rest ten feet away against a pile of rubble from the floor above that had collapsed down to this level. I felt as though every single bone in my body had been shattered as each breath sent spikes of pain through my chest. Using every last shred of strength that I could find I forced myself to my hooves and pulled out my knife. Reaching into my saddlebags for the .45 was simply beyond me right now, but I would be damned if I was going to face my death unarmed.

A shape slowly became visible through the mist. My first hint that anypony was even there was a light yellow glow, coming from both the top of the pony-shape as well as surrounding the long profile of what could only be a high-power sniper rifle. I crouched down, gathering myself for one last suicidal lunge, but found myself unable to act when the shape came out into the open, past the cloud of dust.

The unicorn mare couldn’t have been more than a teenager. Her coat was the same dark blue as the night sky, bordering on becoming black, but her mane was a shock of fall colors: browns, reds, and oranges all twisting around one another as though in a fight for dominance. Her horn glowed bright yellow as it held the heavy rifle suspended in the air before her. Her levitation skills must have been incredible to manage a weight like that with such ease.

I held my ground, not knowing what to do. This mare had attacked us, had seriously wounded Crosswire, maybe even… no. I was not going to let myself finish that thought. Crosswire was tough, tougher than almost any other pony I had ever met. If anypony could survive a wound like that, it would be him. But all the same, given the threat she posed, I stood here, motionless, unable to attack simply because she appeared vulnerable. Even her expression, as controlled as it was, revealed some kind of deep inner pain.

The mare locked her gaze onto mine and swung the rifle around to aim directly at me. As her eyes met mine I realized that this attack wasn’t some random ambush on an unlucky group of travelers. This mare recognized me. Worse, it looked like she knew me. Her gaze narrowed, and I saw all of her pent-up hate for me flow to the forefront of her stare. This mare had every intention of ending my existence right here.

“Finally, I found you,” she growled, “There is no longer anything stopping me from putting a Celestia-damned bullet through your fucking skull. I have been waiting so long for this.”

“Who are you?” I demanded around the hilt of my knife, “And what have I done to you to warrant this kind of attack?” I could feel my control slipping as my anger threatened to take over. If it did, I knew there was nothing holding me back from jumping at this mare, no matter how futile the attack would be.

“That’s just it, isn’t it?” the mare said, her tone almost laughing, but still there was a layer of anger, barely contained, under it. “You haven’t got a fucking clue who I am. You didn’t have a fucking clue who my parents were either, but that didn’t stop you from putting a gun against their heads and blowing their brains out, did it?”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” I asked, lowering myself slightly lower to the ground to get every ounce of strength that I could out of my legs, should I need to jump. Unfortunately, at this range, almost any hit from that sniper would likely be enough to kill me, so any tactic I used would be a delaying one, at best.

“I’m talking about my family, you murdering bitch! I’m talking about the ponies whose home you invaded five years ago, where you shot them dead simply because they were in your way. I’m talking about me finally getting revenge for that act. After five fucking years of living hell, I can finally face my end knowing that my parents have been avenged.”

My mind was racing, backtracking through my memories of every raid I had ever been on, every raid I had ever ordered, but nothing would come forward to identify the tale that this mare was telling me.

“Evergreen, I’m losing him! I need your help here!” Suture yelled at me from across the room. Somehow, in all the chaos, she had managed to stay with Crosswire and keep him alive, if only barely.

Still, I stood my ground, staring down this strange mare. Her gaze was still boring into mine. I could see her hatred there, but there was something else as well. This mare couldn’t bring herself to shoot, not if I didn’t act first. I had just found my way out. All it would take was a gamble.

“Fuck this,” I announced and slid my knife back into its sheath. I stood up as tall as I could, considering the considerable amount of pain I was in, and turned my back on the midnight mare, hobbling over to where Suture was crouched over Crosswire’s limp form. “What do you need me to do?” I asked, coming up beside the maroon medical pony. I grabbed one of the healing potions that Suture had laid out and chugged it. Most of the pain from the attack receded enough for me to be able to walk without being in constant pain, but there was still an insistent ache throughout my entire body.

“His breathing is dangerously weak, and I’m pretty sure that there is still some internal bleeding, but a healing potion isn’t going to help here. I need to make an incision so the blood can drain and so I can stitch up whatever is causing it, but the shock may be too much to his system. If he stops breathing, you need to breathe for him. Can you handle that?”

“Yeah, I can do that. You sure about this?” I asked. I wasn’t going to lose him now. We had just reached the point where I knew he was someone I could rely on. I didn’t want to lose that.

“No, but I don’t have a choice. If I do nothing, he will die. Ready?” Suture answered, looking up at me with a worried look on her face.

I returned her gaze for a moment as I mentally prepared myself, then nodded. “Do it.”

“What the hell is this?” the sniper finally demanded, probably coming out of whatever shocked stupor I had put her in. I could hear her stepping towards us. She wasn’t even trying to hide her advance. “This is not how you would react! I know, I watched you that day, and I know how raiders think. When faced with a threat, you attack, every single time! So why the fuck aren’t you attacking me?!”

I could hear the desperation in her voice. She wanted to shoot me. She probably wanted my death more than she wanted her own life, but she still held herself to moral values that kept her from following through with that desire, no matter how much anger and hatred she poured into herself.

“I’m not attacking because to attack you would be suicide. Also, my closest, and probably only, friend is dying. I’m not going to simply let that happen. I hate to burst your bubble, but I’m not a raider, not anymore,” I answered, letting just enough of my anger creep into my voice to let the mare know that I meant every word.

“This… This is bullshit! Turn around and look at me! I need to watch you die!” she demanded. I heard her stumble as a piece of rubble shifted out from under her hooves. Two days ago, I would have jumped at the chance to disable her, and probably kill her, but now I had too many other things to worry about.

“Now, Evergreen! His breathing’s stopped! I only need a few minutes, so keep at it!” Suture shouted. Her muzzle and hooves were coated in blood from working on Crosswire’s insides. I didn’t want to think about what the blood was coming from.

I knelt down over Crosswire’s head and pressed my lips to his, forcing my breath into his lungs. When mine were completely empty, I pulled away, sucked in another breath, and repeated the process. Even while working, I could feel the midnight mare’s eyes drilling into my back and could feel her hate like a fire, spreading from where her gaze was locked onto my back throughout my entire body.

When I came up for air between breaths, I turned my head just enough to fix her in one eye. “Look, if you’re going to shoot me, shoot me and be done with it!” I snapped, “If not, drop that damn gun and let me save my friend!”

“I’m almost… there,” Suture muttered before finally backing her head out of the cut she had made in Crosswire’s chest. “Give him a couple healing potions, now. We need to seal this wound.”

I nodded and swiftly followed the order, forcing two of the purple potions down the tech’s throat. Slowly, too slowly to my eyes, the wound in his chest knitted together, but when the healing power of the potions was finished, there was still a small wound remaining. I reached for another potion, but Suture waved me away, instead pulling out a roll of magical bandages which she wrapped tightly around his chest, sealing the little remaining damage from the elements.

“Is he breathing?” Suture asked me, looking up from her handiwork. The blood on her face and across her chest was a surreal image. She looked like one of the psychopaths that every raider gang had to deal with: the kind that enjoyed eating their victims.

I shook my head to dispel the image and lowered an ear to his mouth, straining to hear any sound of respiration. It took a few seconds, but I did feel a slight passage of air go past my ear, and heard the faint exhalation coming from the buck. “Barely, but yeah, he’s breathing. You did it, Suture.” I felt a weight lift itself from my shoulders. Knowing that Crosswire was going to survive this lifted my spirits to the point where I felt like I could face anything. Right now, I had to.

Not even bothering to hide my joy and relief, I turned back around to face the sniper. Her expression was no longer one of hatred, but of division. Her eyes were still filled with the desire to kill me, but she was torn now that she had seen me work so hard to save somepony. Her weapon had also drifted down until it was no longer pointing at my head, but at my chest.

“So what’s it going to be? I know where you are, whoever you are,” I stated simply, “I’ve been there myself. You ready to take that shot? I can tell you what happens when you do, if you care to know.”

“What do you mean?” she demanded, lifting the rifle slightly, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“You pull that trigger, and it will change you. I have no doubts that every single pony you have killed to this point you have killed as an act of self-defense. But killing me will be different. I will not attack you, no matter what you say to me. If you kill me, it will be murder, no matter what justifications you give yourself, no matter how much you tell yourself I deserve it. And trust me, once you commit that first murder, the next is much easier. And the next, and the next, and the next, until you no longer think of killing other ponies as murder, but simply as another way to get ahead and survive. Are you ready to become that?”

The mare stared into my eyes, the hatred giving way to confusion and fear. “What the fuck do you know about it?” she snapped, trying to force her anger to remain, “You’re a Celestia-damned raider! You don’t know what a fucking family is!”

Under any other circumstances, I would have killed her for that statement alone. I could even almost feel Suture’s wince from where I stood. But this conversation wasn’t about me. If I was going to be a better pony, then this was where it would have to start. But that didn’t mean that I couldn’t let my anger show.

“I don’t know what a family is? Are you fucking kidding me? My parents raised me until the day raiders put them down mere inches in front of me! Those instilled in me the exact same hate I see in your eyes, and I’ll tell you, that hatred did nothing to help me! It consumed me, changed me, and twisted me into becoming the very thing my parents died to save me from. If you pull that trigger, you’ll be just like me. That is a promise,” I growled.

The sniper took a step back, shaking her head. “No, no it doesn’t work like that!” she protested, “You’re a raider, it’s all you’ve ever been! Why else would you kill them?! Why would you leave me in this world with nothing?!”

I took a step towards her, keeping my held up high and making sure my steps were careful and not in any sense threatening. At any violent move, I would be dead, and I knew it. “I killed them because I was a raider, and it was what I did. They were in my way, and I was angry. I was always angry. I’m still angry. I didn’t even know you were there,” I explained. I took another step, then another. With every step, the mare seemed to shrink in on herself as she crouched down to the ground until she was simply lying there, helpless. Her ears folded back and her eyes welled up with tears. She didn’t know how to deal with this situation I was giving her, and it hurt her, probably more than anything I had ever done.

When I was just a couple steps away from her, I stopped. Her magic grip on the sniper failed as she looked up at me and the weapon clattered to the ground. “You’re going to kill me now, aren’t you?” she asked, “This is how you work now, isn’t it?” Her tone was almost pleading.

This mare was hurt, and that hurt was far deeper than anything I had ever had to endure. I had never been forced to face the object of my torment. The raiders that had killed my family had been killed in the same battle in which my parents died. But this mare was now faced with me, but I wasn’t the pony I needed to be to let her vent her emotions and anger in the way she wanted to. But that way wasn’t the right way anyway.

I knelt down until I was down on her level and could look her straight in the eye. “I’m not going to kill you,” I said softly, “I’m going to apologize. I did kill your family, and the fact that I can’t even summon up their image, or even a memory of that day speaks volumes to the depths I fell to. But I have realized where I went wrong. If I can help anypony avoid that same life, then by Celestia as my witness, I will do so! Now get up. I’m not killing anypony today that I don’t have to, and you are not going to become a victim to the wasteland.”

I rose back to my hooves and held a hoof out towards her. She watched me quietly, looking for any hint of deception or betrayal, but I was offering nothing like that. Two days ago, I would have killed her as soon as she dropped the rifle, but now I could see that killing her would accomplish nothing. She no longer had the drive to pull the trigger on me, so I wasn’t in any danger from her. Crosswire wouldn’t be happy with the decision, but I couldn’t care less. The situation was exactly like I had told Suture yesterday: the moral cost of simple survival was too high, so I had to do what I could to save what little bit of a soul I had left.

After a full minute of tense silence, the mare reached out, hooked her own hoof around mine, and pulled herself to her feet. “Why?” she asked, her expression one of confusion, “Why are you sparing me? Why are you doing any of this?”

“Because I was wrong, and I want to make it right now. Can’t really start doing that if I kill everypony I meet, can I?” I answered, “So what’s your name? I’m Evergreen.”

The mare stared at me, completely dumbfounded. Finally, however, her anger and hatred dominated over any other emotion and her horn started to glow again, bringing the heavy sniper back up. I backpedaled to get away, but the rifle followed me. Even after I was twenty feet away, backed up against a wall, I was staring done the carefully-engineered barrel of the sniper rifle.

“Fuck!” she yelled, “What the hell is going on here! I don’t give a fuck how different you might be, or how fucking bad you feel about the shit you’ve done, you killed my fucking family! Because of you, I have nothing. Nopony out there gives a shit about me, and nopony has ever since my family was fucking killed! By you! Now fucking attack me so I can finish this!”

I forced my heart to slow down and took a deep breath, only exhaling once I felt my body beginning to relax. “No.”

“What the fuck do you mean, no?” the sniper demanded, taking a step forward. The rifle moved forward with her, only coming to rest a couple of inches from my head. I could now easily make out the rifling of the barrel.

“Exactly what I said. I’m not attacking you. I am not suicidal, and I want to help you,” I responded calmly, “What’s your name?”

“Fuck you!” the mare shouted, “You don’t deserve to know that! All you fucking deserve is death!”

“Then pull the fucking trigger! End it! But I will tell you now that that is the beginning of a very dark path, and you will hate yourself when you realize how far you’ve fallen!” I shouted back. I was finished with being nice. Either this mare would allow the wasteland to consume her, or she would be better.

“Evergreen, no!” Suture shouted. I saw her take a step towards me.

“Stay out of this, Suture,” I snapped, “This doesn’t concern you. It’s between me and her. If she pulls the trigger, get Crosswire back to Metro and make sure he’s taken care of. Promise me that, please.”

“O… Okay, Evergreen,” Suture answered, “I promise.”

“So what’s it going to be?” I asked, taking a step forward so that the barrel of the rifle was pressed against my forehead, “You have the guts to pull the fucking trigger and end this Celestia-damned charade, or are you going to drop the rifle and tell me your fucking name?”

“Fuck!” the mare shouted and I felt something shift, followed by a wall of light and noise that left my ears ringing and my head spinning.

When the world finally returned to some semblance of normality, I found myself lying on the ground, trembling, with blood flowing down the side of my head. I twisted around so I was looking up and saw the sniper floating above me, smoke curling around the barrel. The wall next to where I had been standing had a fresh bullet hole in it; one that was easily twice as large as any other bullet hole I had ever seen. Some of the shrapnel from the shot had lacerated the side of my head, not to mention the blood flowing from my ear from a busted ear drum.

A shadow passed over me and the sniper’s head came into my sight. Her face was scrunched up in a grimace and her eyes were simply radiating hatred. “Fuck you, Evergreen. I’m staying with you, and the moment you do any fucking thing that is even the least but raiderish I swear to any god that may still exist that I will kill you on the spot, got it?”

I rolled back over and tried to gather my hooves under me, but the repeated trauma of getting hit with a door, then having a heavy sniper going off right next to my head left me so unsteady that my attempt left me lying on my side, gasping for breath.

Suddenly, a yellow glow surrounded me and I was being lifted into the air and lowered on to my hooves. The glow remained until I had some semblance of stability. Was this mare really that skilled with levitation that she could maneuver a sniper as well as a pony with such ease?

“My name is Autumn Mist, and from this moment forward, consider me your conscience, Evergreen. If you fuck up, you’ll get to rejoin that family of yours and mine can finally rest in peace. And trust me, I am not going to let anypony else kill you. That act belongs to me alone,” the mare snapped, chambering another round in her sniper to make her point.

“So long as you aren’t shooting me, I could care less what you do. If you insist on coming along, I won’t say no to another gun on my side,” I mumbled, still trying to get my head working properly, “But one rule: never do that again. If you’re going to pull the trigger that close to my head again, make sure to hit me.”

“No promises,” the mare answered, flipping her rifle around and sliding it into a set of leather loops on her barding so that it rested comfortably on her back.

I shook my head and hobbled over to Suture. I nearly fell over several times, since my busted ear was really throwing off my balance, not to mention everything else that had led up to this point.

The medical pony met me halfway, supporting me with her body and leading me over to where she had our medical supplies spread out. “You really can’t go for more than a day without getting yourself hurt, can you, Evergreen?” she asked me. At any other time, I’m sure her tone would have been somewhat joking, but with everything we had already faced today she couldn’t bring anything but weariness into her voice, and it was barely past noon.

She got me a healing potion, even going so far so to pull the cork and hold it to my lips. I took it in my mouth and tipped my head back, letting the thick purple fluid flow down my throat. The cuts on my head healed quickly, then my ear popped as my eardrum mended itself as well. Too bad the potions did nothing for headaches.

“Thanks,” I muttered, shaking my head to try and clear it and to get my ears to stop ringing.

“Of course. You sure about her, though? I don’t know how I feel about this. She almost killed Crosswire,” Suture said, quieting her voice to little more than a whisper.

“She shot a heavy sniper less than a foot from my head. Of course I’m not sure about this. Not like she’s giving us a choice, and I’m not about to murder her either, no matter how much I may want to.”

“You would have last time we met,” Suture pointed out, a slightly hard edge coming into her voice, which meant that this was probably a test.

“Last time, yeah, I wouldn’t have hesitated. This time, she’s in the right. Besides, what’s the worst that can happen? She decides that I fucked up and puts a bullet in my head. At least that would be a quick end. I could think of much worse. Hell, I’ve done much worse.”

Suture shook her head at me. “Well, at least you’re doing something for the right reasons for once.”

I ignored her comment and instead asked, “So how’s he doing? That shot did a lot of damage.”

Suture sighed and turned her head to look at the grey buck. He was lying completely motionless, his face, neck, and chest all drenched in blood. While he was breathing regularly, it wasn’t nearly strong as I would have liked it to be. “I just don’t know. He’s stable, but he lost a lot of blood. I wouldn’t trust moving him unless we could get some more into him, but we didn’t bring any blood packs with us.”

“There are some preserved blood packs in the clinic a short way away from here, in what’s left of Hilltown,” Autumn Mist announced from the door where she was standing, peering out into the wasteland. Her voice was still laced with anger, but it seemed as though she was beginning to calm down.

“Perfect. I can go get them, then we can get Crosswire back on his feet and get to Millberry by nightfall. We can rest there and give him time to recover,” I announced.

“That might be a bit more difficult than you think, Evergreen,” Autumn stated coldly, “Maybe even impossible.”

“Then why bring it up?” I demanded, walking up to the mare, frowning. What would possess this mare to bring something up that we couldn’t do?

“Because there’s only a slim chance that it’s doable. The town belongs to a gang; call themselves the Iron Hooves, and they don’t take kindly to strangers, caravans, or any sort of pony that isn’t part of their game. Not much difference between them and a bunch of fucking raiders, now that I think about it.”

“Then the solution is even more simple,” I pointed out, “You’re going to come with me and support me. Between your skill with that rifle, and my combat ability, we should be able to get in and out of the clinic in no time. It’s not like my goal is to wipe out the gang.”

Autumn Mist stared at me with obvious dislike. “And why should I help you do that? I said I would follow you to make sure you follow through with this supposed new lifestyle of yours, not to be your lackey. Also, here you are, less than ten minutes after I tell you that I’ll kill you if you even think about acting like a raider, suggesting that we attack a settlement of ponies.”

I turned on the mare, briefly letting my anger control me. “You said yourself that they are barely better than raiders themselves. By your own definition, you should hate these ponies. Also, you are coming with me for a few reasons,” I snapped, “Number one: you are the one who shot Crosswire, so you are going to do everything you can to help heal him. Number two: you said you were going to follow me and make sure I live, and I am going there regardless of your choice, so if you want to make sure I survive, you had better come along. Third: if you don’t, and he dies, I would be completely in my rights to kill you for murdering him, seeing as we were simply travelers when you opened fire. Again, by your own definition, you acted the raider. That is why you are going to help me.”

Autumn Mist glared at me. I could see her mind working behind her eyes, trying to come up with some excuse or reason to refuse me, but I could see that she was coming up blank. “Fine,” she finally ground out, “Let’s go get this suicide mission over with so I can get on with my life.”

We were just starting to walk out of the building, sidling past the new boulder in the building, presumably the one Autumn had used to bash the door in and pausing only long enough for me to recover Hammer, when Suture called after us. “Wait, what the hell am I supposed to do? You two have all the fighting experience!”

“I gave you a gun,” I pointed out, “And there shouldn’t be anypony else coming this way, and if they were, they don’t have a reason for coming in here. We shouldn’t be gone long, you’ll be fine.”

“Evergreen, this isn’t okay!” Suture yelled, “What if something happens? What if somepony shows up here, I don’t have the skills to protect us!”

“Then make sure Crosswire lives. He deserves that chance,” I answered, and stepped beyond the threshold of the building.

Hilltown was ugly. That was all I could think of to describe it. We were crouched down at the top of a hill overlooking the town, and all I could see were piles of rubble that had once been buildings, though I couldn’t tell which had been shops or which had been homes. Occasionally, I could spot a still-intact wall, but those were few and far between. The only structure that had survived the war and intervening years was the clinic, which sat squarely in the center of the Iron Hooves’ camp, which meant it was probably functioning as their headquarters.

A flimsy wall had been constructed around the building, but as I watched, it looked like the wall had been designed to be weak, because the number of ponies patrolling it provided enough intimidation that even I was thinking twice about taking the risk to get in there.

Within the wall, the ponies in the gang had constructed simple shacks and shelters with leftover rubble and metal, much as my gang had done back in the mountains. Within the settlement I could see ponies moving around, going about the business of their daily lives.

“Autumn, let me see your rifle. I need a closer look at the ponies on the wall,” I said, holding out a hoof for the gun.

The dark mare hesitated, probably wary about giving the object of her hatred her most prized possession, but she finally hefted it over.

The weight of the gun surprised me. I had thought it looked heavy, but it weighed much more than I had thought. I audibly grunted when I took its weight, which elicited a chuckle from Autumn.

“Heavier than you thought?” she asked snidely.

“Something like that,” I admitted. I maneuvered the weapon awkwardly to see through its scope, then adjusted myself so that I was looking down at one of the ponies on the wall. It would have been impossible for me to even try to shoot this thing, but, luckily, I wasn’t trying to do that.

I wanted to see the state of the ponies tasked to guarding the settlement. Since it was just past noon, I was expecting them to be relatively alert, but they were still just gangers, so there couldn’t be any real professionalism. Or so common sense told me.

Instead, the guards on patrol appeared to be alert and well-supplied. They were placed fairly regularly about the perimeter and almost none of them appeared to be the least bit distracted. There were even what appeared to be shift supervisors going around and making sure everypony was doing their jobs properly. This was going to be much more challenging than I thought.

“See anything you like?” Autumn asked me, her magic lifting the rifle away from me. Her tone was mocking and set my teeth on edge.

“No, and that’s what worries me. These ponies are much more organized and professional than I was expecting,” I muttered, trying to suppress my annoyance with her, “This isn’t going to be easy.”

“Impossible, I say,” Autumn countered, “This entire venture is suicide. There’s no way in hell you can get in and out of there.”

“Not alone, no. Luckily for me, I’m not alone. Can you provide sniper cover while I’m down there? The longer you can keep them off of me, the better chanced I’ll have.”

“Are you serious? It won’t matter how many of them I can pick off. They’ll corner you and finish you off before you get within a hundred feet of that clinic!” Autumn protested.

“Not if they don’t know where I am,” I answered as a plan started to form in my head, “These ponies look professional, but I doubt they’ll react that way. If you start picking them off on the far side of the base, they’ll probably mass over there to repel some attack, which should make it easier for me to slip through over here.”

“And if they don’t?” Autumn asked condescendingly.

I shook my head at her. “Then I’ll figure it out from there. Give me five minutes to get down there, then start shooting. The base isn’t that big, so I should be in and out in no time.”

“Your funeral,” the dark mare muttered, then set herself up and starting aiming down at the base. I watched as she started to fiddle with the scope and rifle, wondering exactly what she was doing, then forced myself to turn away and started down the hill.

I crept forward quickly and carefully, making sure that I wasn’t making any more noise than was absolutely necessary. It took me most of the five minutes to just get down the hill without being spotted, and that only because this wasn’t the way I was used to doing things. My style was much more the ‘walk up and shoot them’ style.

Once at the base of the hill, I kept myself low to the ground and basically crawled up to the wall. Somehow, the guards on duty didn’t see me, and I made it right up to the base of the low, flimsy wall. Here, I knelt down, silently waiting for Autumn Mist to start shooting.

Her first shot thundered through the base a minute later and was met almost instantly with shouts of alarm and surprise. The sound of pounding hooves passed near the spot where I was hiding. My plan may actually be working!

I positioned myself so that I could see through a crack in the wall and saw several ponies running away from me, towards whatever side of the base Autumn had chosen as her firing range. Another shot rang out and I began to hear cries of ‘Bandit!’ or ‘Raider!’. I grinned and bucked at the wall as Autumn fired again, striking as soon as the thunder from her rifle passed over me, hiding the sound of my kick.

The wall gave on the first try, toppling over and giving me a clear shot to the clinic. It looked too easy. I cast about for an alternate route and spotted one of the piles of rubble that was all that was left of one of the buildings that had once stood in the town. It appeared to be insignificant enough that there wouldn’t be anything of value over there. Just in case, I pulled Hammer from its holster, then dashed across the open ground for the rubble. I made it without incident and dove behind a large slab of concrete, ears poised for any sound of pursuit or detection, but heard nothing but another round from Autumn.

I crept my way up to where the rubble met open ground closest to the clinic, then knelt down and watched carefully. There were sounds of gunfire and shouting coming from the far side of the base, so the gangers must actually believe there was somepony attacking them. Fine by me. I was just surprised that they had pulled everypony from this side of the base; it would have made an actual flanking attack too easy to pull off. It made me think that their intimidating appearance was just that, an appearance.

I took a step forward, intending to start running for the clinic, but the sound of something beeping made me stop in my tracks. I knew that sound. It was a fucking landmine. I tried to jump back, but was a moment too late. The mine detonated in a rain of shrapnel and the shockwave grabbed me while I was in the air and tossed me back several feet into the rubble. This was really not my day.

I was still in enough of one piece that I was able to roll back onto my stomach and collect my hooves under me, but as soon as I tried to get up, a lance of pain through my right leg made me collapse in a heap. I turned my gaze to my leg and found a piece of metal jutting out of it, blood trickling out around the hole it made. It looked to be about as long as my hoof was wide.

I replaced Hammer in its holster, then reached down for the piece of metal and took it between my teeth. I tensed up in expectation of the pain, then wrenched the piece of shrapnel out. The only reason I didn’t scream in pain was because I had a piece of metal in my mouth. My first act after spitting out the length of metal was to reach into my saddlebags for a healing potion and drink it on the spot.

The wound closed slowly, but not completely. The small hole that was left wept blood, but not nearly enough to make me worry, so I chose to ignore it. I gathered my hooves under me once again, then tried to stand. The potion had done just enough for me that my leg was able to support my weight, but not much else.

Once again, I crept forward to the open ground and looked out. It didn’t appear that anypony had noticed the explosion, but this journey would be much longer than I had anticipated if I had to watch for landmines every step.

I started forward, taking each step only after I was sure that the way forward was clear. Several times a landmine almost went off in my face, but each time I managed to stomp on the disarming button before they could only because I knew exactly where they were when they started to beep. The ones I disarmed I collected as I went; it would provide me with a clear alley to hobble through on my way back.

The next thing I knew, I was standing at the back wall of the clinic. Now all I needed was a way in. I remembered seeing a back door a short distance to my right, so I crept that way, but I was beginning to worry because Autumn hadn’t fired her rifle in some time. The guards here were going to be coming back any time now.

The door swung open easily when I finally happened on it and I stepped through, making sure to close it once I was inside. Now all I needed to do was to find a few blood packs and get out. I pulled Hammer out and started forward.

Both Autumn and I believed that this building also functioned as the gang’s headquarters, so I was even more careful than I had been outside, ears perked for the sounds of any gangers who would be inside, but it was oddly quiet.

As I moved forward, I was shocked by just how empty the building was. Everywhere I could see evidence of ponies living here, but there was no sign of them. I got my answer why a few moments later while I was rummaging through a chest in one of the old examination rooms, searching for the blood packs I needed.

“These fucking raiders are toying with us now. I kept telling Stainless that we needed to reinforce the wall, but she kept telling me to fuck off. Now see where it got us. We are so fucked!” somepony was complaining as the sound of a door swinging open echoed through the building.

Several voices answered the first and I could hear several sets of hooves entering the building. They must have all left at the sound of the attack, which made perfect sense now that I thought about it.

That left me with the problem of being trapped in a room with nowhere to go to hide. Guess I would get a chance to use Hammer after all. I closed the chest again and marched up to the doorway, mentally preparing myself for the fight. The halls were fairly narrow, so the gang’s numbers shouldn’t mean much in here, so long as I could keep reloading quickly. And I still needed to find out where those blood packs were.

“So how’s Alloy? That sniper sure fucked him up. Think the doc can fix him up?” somepony asked. I stopped dead in my tracks to try and get some hint at where the doctor might be. Chances were that the blood packs would be there as well.

“I don’t know,” the pony’s companion answered, “Arcweld is good at what he does, but this might be a bit beyond even his skills. So many ponies are being brought over to that hidey-hole of his in the west wing that I doubt he’ll even get to Alloy. There are a lot of others he could save first.”

Good. Now I had a goal. I knew from where I had wandered after entering the clinic that I was in the northern section, so I was at least relatively close to where I needed to be. Relatively close with Celestia-knows how many ponies between me and there.

Well, there was nothing to do but go for it. If I was lucky, Autumn would notice something was up and support me, so long as she didn’t decide that just letting me die was good enough. If I was unlucky… well, I didn’t really want to think along those lines.

I left the examination room I was in and turned towards the west wing. I started trotting forward, Hammer held ready, and waited to meet my first adversary. The wait wasn’t long.

A ragged yellow mare turned the corner in front of me and started in surprise. She obviously wasn’t expecting to run into anyone here. I quickly took aim and pulled the trigger. My shot echoed loudly in the narrow hallway as the bullet slammed into the mare’s jaw and exited out the back of her head, taking most of her skull along with it. She dropped limply to the ground amidst shouts of alarm from deeper in the building.

I stepped over her body and ran down the hall as fast as my leg would let me, racing for the west wing. Judging by what those ponies had been saying, I expected this part of the clinic to be sparsely populated, and was lucky enough to discover that it was so. But I could still hear the sound of several ponies coming after me.

I bucked through a door and slammed it shut behind me. The ponies behind me had been gaining much quicker than I expected, and some had even gotten close enough to take a few potshots at me. Luckily enough, the few that were on target had been deflected by my barding. This door was just the first piece of solid cover I could find.

“She ran into the infirmary!” I heard somepony yell, “Back off and let Arcweld take care of this!”

That did not bode well. Not many gangs would leave an intruder to their doctor. Unless, of course, the doctor earned that reputation. I didn’t have any more time to consider the issue as somepony wrapped their hooves around my chest and tossed me away from the door as if I were a ragdoll.

“So you think you can just come into our home and start shooting ponies up?!” a voice demanded. It was loud and booming and held levels of rage I couldn’t even begin to comprehend.

I was still trying to regain my hooves when the source of the voice, a massive, dark brown unicorn buck, reached me and slammed both of his forehooves into my gut, dropping me back down to the floor. The only thought that was going through my head at that point was ‘So that’s why they call themselves Iron Hooves.’

Before the buck could repeat the attack, I rolled to the side, groaning as my injured leg was twisted, but managed to get out of his reach, momentarily. I used the momentum of the roll to get my hooves under me and pull myself to my feet. Hammer had been lost somewhere after I had been thrown, and I didn’t have time to retrieve my .45 from my saddlebags. I really needed to invest in another holster on my barding. Instead of going for a firearm, I simply pulled out my knife.

I had fought enough ponies hoof-to-hoof, including bucks like this one, that I should be able to hold my own, at least in theory. With an injured leg, my chances weren’t great against a healthy opponent. And it looked like he knew that.

He was grinning broadly as he stared over at me, giving me the time I needed to steady myself. He obviously thought he could easily win this fight, regardless of how prepared I was, which meant that he was over-confident and arrogant. Maybe I could win this after all.

“All I want are a few blood packs. My friend is dying and he needs them to survive. Give me those and let me walk and we won’t have an issue,” I snapped around the hilt of my knife.

The buck laughed at me. “You've gotta be fucking kidding me! You come in here, kill nine ponies, then ask for our supplies? You’re fucking insane! And soon you’ll be fucking dead!”

“And would you have traded with them had I come up to the main gate?” I demanded, widening my stance for the charge I knew was coming.

“Fuck no! We don’t deal with wastelanders!” Arcweld yelled. He lowered his head and charged forward, intending to knock me from my hooves with his bulk alone.

I held my ground until he was almost within reach, the jumped to the side, letting him crash into a gurney behind where I had been standing. While he was dazed, I lunged forward, striking out with my knife.

He moved quickly, faster than I had expected him to be able to, and blocked my blow with one massive hoof. Instead of plunging my knife into his neck, it glanced off his leg, leaving only a shallow cut and giving him and opening to land a kick against my side, which sent me tumbling against a wall.

Knowing he was charging me again, I rolled towards him, twisting my head so the knife’s point was pointing towards him, and braced for the impact. It felt like getting hit with a train as he slammed into me with all of his considerable bulk. I lay on the ground, dazed, trying to regain my senses.

When the world finally began to snap back into focus, the first thing I realized was that I was still alive. The second was that my knife was no longer in my mouth. The last thing I noticed was that Arcweld was no longer breathing normally, but rather drawing in breaths in ragged gasps. I shook my head and slowly got to my hooves, looking around for the buck.

I found him dragging himself along the wall towards a cabinet set on the far side of the room. That must be where he kept the medical supplies. He was trailing a thick line of blood behind him, and his attempts were to move were growing weaker with every passing second.

Wary of any deception, I slowly made my way towards him. When I drew level, I saw the hilt of my knife sticking out of his chest. The buck saw me standing over him and stopped his attempts to move, deciding instead to use the last of his strength to stare up at me. “Guess you got what you wanted, murderer,” he wheezed, “but good luck getting out of here alive. The second you walk out that door, the weight of the Iron Hooves will crush you underneath and leave nothing behind but a smear!”

I couldn’t bring myself to feel pity for this buck. As hard as I was trying to be better, there were some things about myself that nothing would change. My drive to kill ponies who had tried to do the same to me was part of that. I glared down at him, trying to decide what to do, and he returned my glare with anger and hatred.

I wrenched my knife out of the wound and turned away, leaving him to his fate. The first thing I did was search for Hammer. It was only after I found the revolver five minutes later that I noticed the dozen beds arrayed around the perimeter of the room, every single one occupied with gravely injured and terrified ponies.

“Are we next?” a mare asked. Her hide was a dark blue in color and her mane was a lighter shade of the same color with some streaks of white going through it. I could tell by the look in her eye that she was terrified for whatever life she had left.

I quickly looked her over while I thought of my answer. She had a stark white bandage wrapped around her midsection that contrasted sharply with her hide; most likely some gunshot wound that kept her from doing anything strenuous. She was also thin and unkempt, which led me to believe that this gang didn’t allocate a lot of resources to the sick or injured.

I was being careful in picking my answer, because I knew that had our situations been reversed, this mare would most likely have killed me without a second thought. Except our situations weren’t reversed, and I was being faced with this problem. These ponies hadn’t attacked me, and they weren’t threatening me, but my brain kept making the argument that they would be attacking me if they could.

“No,” I found myself answering, the word catching me by surprise as much as it was them, “I’m not going to kill you. You haven’t tried to kill me, so I see no reason to.” I marched past the beds to the medical cabinet and flung it open.

Inside was a treasure trove of medical supplies. My own supply of medical potions was quickly declining, between both mine and Crosswire’s injuries, so I swept a few of those into my saddlebags, followed by three full blood packs. Hopefully Suture would be able to use them. I left the rest of the drugs and chems behind; they would only slow me down.

“Is there a back way out of the clinic?” I asked, turning to the mare who had spoken before. She was sitting on her bed in sullen silence, not entirely convinced that I wasn’t a threat.

“Why should I tell you?” she demanded, “You killed our doctor! You’re probably the reason some of us are in here!”

I sighed and hung my head. “Fair enough. But I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t need these blood packs. My closest friend is dying and I need to do something to save him! I’d rather die a murderer than simply allow my friends to die without at least trying to save them.” I lifted my head back up and stared the dark mare down, daring her to speak against me.

She returned my gaze, and I thought I saw a glimmer of understanding appear there. “There’s a door ten feet down the hall, on your right. It will take you to a maintenance entrance on the west end of the building. You’re on your own from there,” she grumbled.

I nodded in acknowledgment of the directions and turned to leave, but she called after me at the door. “If your friend survives, tell him he owes us, and we always collect our debts.”

I stopped in my tracks and turned to look at the mare. “If he survives, it won’t be because you lot decided to help. It will be because I decided to do something about it. Be thankful that I left you with your life.”

Turning away from her, I stepped past the threshold and out into the hallway. I shut the door behind me and crept forward, listening carefully for the sound of anypony who could be near, but heard nothing. As the mare had said, there was a door nearby, but I hesitated on entering it. What reason would she have had to help me, especially since the rest of her gang was actively trying to tear me limb from limb?

Deciding that I really didn’t have any better options at my disposal, I opened the door, Hammer out and ready, and stepped through.

To my surprise, the mare hadn’t been lying. I found myself in a maintenance hallway. The walls were a dull, uniform grey, rather than the peeling yellow color of the main parts of the building. I started forward, watching my steps, moving as quickly as I could for the exit. It didn’t take me long to reach it.

Once at the door, I paused again and checked my E.F.S. I couldn’t see any bars immediately in front of me, but that didn’t mean a whole lot. I swung my head from side to side, and caught sight of a few bars just ahead of me to both sides. If I was unlucky, those ponies would be at the perimeter, where their guard stations were. They would most likely hear the opening of the door, and be on me before I had a chance to react.

On the other hoof, if I was lucky, they would be in other rooms nearby, and not even outside. Well, it wasn’t like I had much of a choice.

I carefully opened the door and took a step outside. The sun was beginning to set on the horizon, behind the cloud cover, casting the world in a slightly darker shade of grey that made it harder to see anything at a distance. That could play in my favor.

I crouched down low and started walking, praying that I would remain hidden, but my luck wasn’t going to hold out that long.

Shouts of alarm sprang up off to my left, the direction I needed to go if I wanted to meet up with Autumn, since I had approached the base from the south. I swore to myself, and turned to face the threat.

Three ponies were bearing down on me. The mare at the front of the formation was wielding a wicked-looking machete and the buck on her left was holding a piece of wood with a nail stuck in it. The third pony, a mare, was the only one with a firearm, and that was only a small 9mm pistol, nothing to really be worried about, or at least so I thought.

It was much harder to maintain that thought when bullets started flying around me, and a few ricocheted off of my reinforced barding. Every impact felt like a hammer hitting me in my already-battered chest. I ignored the mare with the gun, instead taking aim at the one with the machete. Once she was within a dozen feet, and I was sure that I wouldn’t miss, I pulled the trigger.

Her chest exploded in a fountain of gore as the revolver round slammed home. Her face barely registered her shock at being shot before she tumbled to the ground, her momentum carrying her another five feet before coming to rest, dead, in a bloody heap.

I turned my head slightly towards the buck, who was now significantly closer, and fired again. Since I didn’t have as much time to line up the shot, my bullet only grazed off of his shoulder, rather than hitting him the same way it had the first mare.

The shot made the buck stumble, but he kept coming, swinging the board once he was in range.

I twisted around, taking the blow on my barding, rather than in the neck as the buck had planned. The nail punched through the metal plates, but got stuck in the leather of the barding underneath. He started the wrench the board back and forth, trying to work it free, as I turned my head and took aim.

My shot caught him square between the eyes and sent a large portion of his brains splattering out onto the dirt as his head snapped back from the impact and he fell to the ground, blood quickly pooling around the corpse.

The back of my neck prickled, and I snapped my head up in time to see the mare with the 9mm taking careful aim at me. I knew I didn’t have time to dodge out of the way.

Fate hadn’t quite decided that it was my time to die yet as a shot thundered through the wasteland, completely decapitating the mare and sending a geyser of her blood a foot into the air. Autumn had just saved my life.

I turned away from the three corpses and ran as fast as I was able to the perimeter of the camp. As luck would have it there were no more landmines between me and the wall, so, with a little assistance from Autumn in the form of sniper cover, I made it to the wall without incident and slipped out back into the wasteland.

Once out of the base, I stuck to the rocks and bushes, using them to hide my movements as best as possible, and hoping that the gangers would give up hunting me now that I was no longer in their home. Several sounds of gunfire followed my progress, though none of the shots came anywhere near me. Most must have been firing out of frustration, rather than having any sort of knowledge about where I was.

Even so, I moved only slowly, only leaving cover when I was sure that nopony knew where I was. It took me almost twenty minutes to make it back to Autumn in this fashion. The dark mare had long since ceased firing and was waiting for me atop the hill we had used to scope out the base earlier. She was up on her feet, seemingly ready to leave, except for the fact that her rifle was out floating next to her, aimed down at the base.

“Autumn, I got the packs. Let’s get the fuck out of here!” I announced as I rejoined her.

“Took you damn long enough,” the sniper answered, firing one last round that shook my teeth before lowering her rifle and turning to look at me, “You got most of that gang really riled up. Getting back isn’t going to be as easy as getting here was. They want blood now, and are working hard to find us. We’ll need to be careful.”

“Fine by me, let’s just get out of here before they catch up to us,” I retorted, “I want to get these blood packs back to Suture and Crosswire before it’s too late for us to do anything.”

Autumn nodded gravely, then started moving, heading back the way we came. I fell into step behind her. Getting out of a situation like this without drawing attention was her specialty, not mine, so I was going to let her lead.

It felt odd, trusting so completely in a pony who had been trying to kill me not a few hours ago, but fate hadn’t left me much of a choice in the matter, so I went along with it, trusting to her promise that she wouldn’t kill me without good reason.

We traveled mostly in silence, Autumn focused on the job at hoof, and me simply following along and doing my best to keep up with the uninjured mare. My leg was beginning to hurt badly, but I shoved the pain to the back of my mind and kept walking. Any delay could easily result in our capture, or worse, our deaths.

Much to my surprise, Autumn didn’t lead us straight back to the office building. Instead, she led us all over the wasteland, going from cover to cover, never letting us stay in one place for long. She kept saying that it was to keep the gangers from following us; that the more convoluted and confusing our trail was, the more likely they were to give up.

We also covered up our trail as much as we could, which wasn’t hard to do in the light rain that had started up since our flight from their base. Judging by the utter lack of preparation that the gangers had had in fighting me off, I doubted that they had anypony with any kind of tracking skills, so we should have lost them quickly, but Autumn was having none of it.

“Look, Evergreen, if we haven’t shaken them, then we’ll simply be leading them straight back to Suture and Crosswire. Now, I know from experience that the sort of treatment that Crosswire needs is going to take all night, so we need to be absolutely sure that we won’t be bothered while we’re there, and that is factoring in that we will be keeping watch,” she stated after my third time asking if we should head back.

I sighed, “That’s what you said when I asked an hour ago. There is no way they could still be following us! Hell, I barely even know where we are!”

“Good, then I’m doing my job right. We’ll be back within the hour, just so you know, but I’m not taking any risks. You’re right, we probably have lost them, but I haven’t survived this long based on what might be. I don’t do anything by halves.”

I grumbled a little more to myself, but fell silent. So long as she appeared to be helping us, there wasn’t much I could say against her.

We slogged on through the strengthening rain, every step becoming a challenge as the rain muddied up the dirt trails and our hooves began to be sucked into the mire. We pressed on, and even I noticed as our path straightened out. It seemed that even Autumn Mist had her limits.

It was well past sundown when the ruins finally came into view. Both of us picked up our pace at the thought of shelter and warmth, however imagined that warmth might be. The rain had a way of setting a chill deep in a pony’s bones that almost nothing could chase away.

We pushed our way into the office building as soon as we arrived, after loudly announcing that we were coming in, to keep Suture from mistakenly shooting at us, not that I expected her to have even touched her pistol all day.

“What took the two of you so long?” the maroon pony demanded as we entered, “I thought you were both dead!”

“Far closer than I would have liked,” I admitted, “But we got the blood packs. We were simply being careful on the way back, making sure that we weren’t followed. How’s Crosswire?”

“Alive, but deteriorating. He lost a lot of blood. It’s a good thing you went to get those packs, they could well be the difference between his survival and his death,” Suture explained.

I nodded somberly, then reached into my saddlebags for the blood packs, which I handed carefully to the medical pony. “You have everything you need to make these work?” I asked.

“As well as I can in the field,” Suture answered, already barely paying me any attention as she moved back to Crosswire’s side. She started pulling out various lengths of tubing, which she used to rig up an IV from the blood pack to the ragged grey buck.

He didn’t look good. His face was really pale, and his breathing was quick and shallow. Even worse, his chest was still swaddled in stark white bandages, several of which had obvious tints of red to them.

“He looks bad, and didn’t we stop the bleeding before we left?” I asked, moving up beside her.

“He is bad. He’s running a fever, and the wound was never completely closed. He made it worse while he was thrashing around earlier, crying out for somepony he called ‘Morning Song’. Know anypony by that name?” Suture asked me.

I shook my head, then realized that the medical pony was focused entirely on Crosswire and hadn’t seen the gesture. “No,” I vocalized, “Never heard of them. Must be somepony from his past. Raiders tend to not share a whole lot about their history.”

“I should have guessed,” Suture muttered, then fell silent.

I remained at her side while she tended to Crosswire, neither of us saying a word. When she had finally done all that she could, she hung her head in exhaustion, sighing extravagantly.

“Please don’t leave us again like that, Evergreen,” she whispered, her voice barely audible, “I’ve never been so terrified in my entire life.”

“Not even when you were in my base that day?” I asked, “Because you seemed pretty scared then.”

“Well, of course I was. I was stuck in a raider base and had no clue what was going to happen to me, but at least I had your protection, no matter how long you intended to keep me alive. But today, you left me behind with nothing except a single pistol that I barely even tolerate carrying. Had somepony shown up, I wouldn’t have stood a chance, and there was nopony here to help me,” Suture protested.

I remained silent. There was nothing else I could do. She was right, and she knew I knew that. I felt bad about it, but it had been the right choice. I just hoped that Suture could realize that.

“I’m sorry,” she said a while later, “you don’t deserve this. You risked your life to save Crosswire’s, and here I am telling you off for doing what you needed to do to accomplish that.”

“That doesn’t make you any less right,” I said, “I left you behind with barely a thought to your safety because my mind was entire set on helping Crosswire. I forgot that I’m responsible for your life as well. I’ll do my best to keep that in mind in the future.”

Suture nodded in acknowledgement and sighed. “How are you, Evergreen? The things you’ve had to face today can’t be easy to deal with.”

“I don’t know,” I admitted after a long silence, “Being faced first with my first and closest friend almost dying, then finding out that the pony who shot him has been hunting me for years for an act I can’t even bring myself to remember… It’s a lot of shit to deal with. I guess I’m just going day by day right now, treating every situation independently how I think it’s right. It isn’t a perfect solution, but it’s better than what I’ve been doing to this point.”

Suture nodded understandingly. “I think I can understand that. We’ve all been faced with some big changes in our lives and you’re never prepared for those, you know? All we can do is take things as they come. Now, is there anything you need me take a look at? You were limping pretty badly when you showed up here.”

“Yeah, my leg got pretty messed up. I stepped on a landmine. Only reason I’m on my feet is because I had a healing potion with me that stitched the worst of the damage back together,” I answered, lifting my injured leg up so she could get a better look at it.

The medical pony looked critically down at my leg, taking in all of the damage, then slowly shook her head. “You truly are incapable of going a single day without hurting yourself, aren’t you?” she asked, cocking an eyebrow at me. I simply shrugged in response. “No matter, there isn’t a whole lot for me to fix. About all I can do is wrap it up.”

She took out one of our few medical bandages that hadn’t been used on Crosswire and wrapped it tightly around the small wound that remained in my leg. It hurt for a few moments, but after that, the magic in the bandages soothed away the pain. I placed my leg on the ground and tested it. It felt like it wasn’t hurt at all.

“I know what it feels like,” Suture said, echoing my thoughts, “So don’t get any ideas in your head. These bandages don’t perform miracles. You’re still hurt and need time to heal. Try not to strain the leg too much.”

I nodded and turned towards Crosswire, “Sure thing. I’ll do my best.” I started walking towards the buck, but Autumn Mist intercepted me.

“Evergreen, we need to post a watch tonight, and you and I are the only ones capable of doing it properly. I get that you want to stay by your friend’s side, but you have a responsibility to all our lives, and I need some rest after that fight. I need you to take first watch.”

“And you think I’m not exhausted?” I snapped back, “I had to face down a brute of a buck in hoof-to-hoof combat and then had to run my ass out of the base while you sat up on a hill holding a rifle. If anything, you should take first watch. I’m hurt, sore, and tired.”

The dark mare stared me down for a few moments, as if trying to decide how to respond. “Fine, I’ll take first watch. I’ll wake you when I can’t stay awake any longer. Just be ready,” she finally growled, then wandered off towards the door.

I shook my head as I continued on my way to the buck’s side. He was unconscious, but his pelt had a little more color in it and his breathing seemed to be getting slowly stronger.

I sighed and hung me head. “I’m sorry, Crosswire. I shouldn’t have let it come to this. You’re not going to be happy with my choice, I already know that, but I don’t have a lot of options. When you’re up, I hope you’ll be able to see that.”

I stayed awake by his side for as long as I could, but it wasn’t long before the ordeals of the day caught up with me, and I passed out into a dreamless sleep.

Autumn woke me a few hours later to take over the watch. It took a lot of effort for me to get back up on my hooves, but I could see that it was all she could do to get me up, so I forced myself up and over to the doors. Thankfully, by the time I got there I was awake enough to not risk falling asleep while on watch.

All the same, I stepped outside to at least get a bit of the brisk night breeze to help me stay alert. While the days could be scorching hot, the nights often saw a drastic drop in temperature. I liked it, though. It gave me a feeling that as bad as the days may be, the nights offered a fresh outlook.

For most of the night, I sat completely silently, simply letting my gaze sweep over the wasteland before me, taking in all the sights. For all of the obvious destruction, I could pick out some well-hidden examples of life beginning to slowly creep back into the world.

At the base of some of the tumbled-down walls, I could spot some hardy grasses and weeds beginning to take hold in the blasted soil. With luck, those grasses would continue to grow unmolested, and would be the beginning of a fresh new world where grass and trees weren’t rare and weren’t trying to kill anypony who came to close to them.

In my travels, I had once found myself in one of the few remaining forests on this continent. At first, I had been joyful. It had been my dream to be able to walk beneath the canopy of a forest, to be able to hear the rustle of wind through the boughs of the overhanging trees, but that dream was short-lived.

I was quickly reminded how the wartime Ministries and their various research sub-companies had held nothing as sacred and had played with, tinkered with, and twisted anything they could get their hooves on to make a more effective weapon against the zebras. I had been in that forest for less than half an hour before the trees themselves had tried to kill me. I wasted no time in getting out of there.

I tore my thoughts away from those depressing memories and returned to the present. The night was clear, or at least as clear as it could be given the constant cloud cover, and I would call it a peaceful one. The only sounds came from the wind passing through the blasted-out husks of the buildings, generating a low whistling sound that made everything seem that much more empty.

The horizon was just beginning to brighten as the sun rose behind the cloud cover when I heard somepony come out of the building behind me. I ignored the sound and kept my eyes focused on the horizon. I felt an ache in my heart at the repeated disappointment of not being able to see the sun, followed by a searing anger at the Pegasi.

What right did they think they had to seal us all off from its gifts? Had the Princesses still been among the living, they would not have stood for this behavior. What fueled my anger even more was the knowledge that there were ponies up there that had never had to experience a morning without feeling the warmth of the sun or seeing its glow as it crested the horizon.

“How are you feeling this morning, Evergreen?” a soft voice asked from behind me.

I turned my head slightly to see Suture standing beside me, her gaze following mine to the lightening horizon. She still looked tired, but I wasn’t surprised. It was how everypony felt on the road. You never slept well, and your waking hours were spent on the edge, listening for any possible threat.

“Angry,” I answered shortly, then turned my gaze back to the clouds. I didn’t feel a need to elaborate. Hopefully, Suture would understand my feelings. If I were lucky, she would agree with me. It would be the only thing we saw eye-to-eye on.

“Angry at what?” she asked a few minutes later, a confused and slightly worried tone in her voice.

I sighed, trying to decide how to respond. “At nothing, and everything,” I finally said, “Nothing that I can control or change, and everything that matters.” I fell silent after that, letting the maroon pony think it over for herself.

She was silent for a while as well as she considered my words. The quiet dragged on and I was content to let it do just that. “You’re one of those ponies who hates the Pegasi for sealing off the sky, aren’t you?” she finally asked me. I could hear the clear note of disapproval in her voice.

Again, I sighed. “Hate isn’t the right word. I think disappointed covers it better. My parents raised me to believe in the Princesses, no matter the reality of their deaths. It was their belief that the spirits of Celestia and Luna live on in the sun and the moon, so even though they are no longer physically among us, they still watch over us from above. I’m disappointed because the Pegasi have essentially cut us surfacers off from them, forcing us to have to survive without their guidance. Just once in my life, I want to see both the sun and the moon with my own eyes, and not some picture in a book.”

“Do you share your parents’ belief?” Suture asked a few moments later.

“I don’t know. In a broad respect, yeah, I think I do,” I answered hesitantly, “But I see so much down here that I know the Princesses wouldn’t approve of. Things that they would step in to stop with any power that they have left, regardless of the obstacles in their path.”

“Thank you for sharing, Evergreen,” Suture said eventually, “I didn’t take you for the religious type, and it’s good to know that there’s at least one group of ponies out there that most hate that you don’t.”

“Don’t get me wrong, Suture,” I protested, “I’m not religious, not even close. It’s just thoughts that fill the empty hours for me. And while I may not hate Pegasi in general, I would kill most Enclave soldiers that cross my path. It’s their fault the sky is sealed up after all. But the Dashites, most of them have my respect. They at least understand the wrongness of what their government is doing.”

“That’s still a better outlook than most,” the medical pony stated. I heard her stand and head towards the door to go back inside. “We should make ready to move soon. I think Crosswire will be awake before long, and we should get to Millberry as soon as we can so he can get some proper rest. He’s going to be very weak for a few days.”

I nodded in acknowledgment and said, “Sure thing. I’ll be inside in a little bit. Get Autumn Mist up and ready. We still have a fair way to go before we reach the town.”

“Of course,” I heard Suture answer as she walked through the door.

I sighed heavily. What was it about that pony that got me to think about things that I had never considered before, even in passing? This one simple conversation had started me thinking on my beliefs. The belief that my parents had taught me had a wonderful draw to it. I liked to think that the Princesses were still watching over us, but I couldn’t get over the fact that they wouldn’t intervene if they could.

I stayed out in the open air for a while longer, letting the slowly warming air soothe me and drive away at least some of my pent-up anger at the Enclave. When I felt that I had waited long enough, I stood and headed back inside.

Autumn Mist was up and cleaning her rifle and Suture was crouched over Crosswire, who was protesting against her ministrations. I grinned broadly as I trotted over to the two of them.

“It’s good to finally see you awake, Crosswire. You had us really worried for a while there,” I announced jovially.

Crosswire looked up at me, his expression completely not amused. “Get her off of me, Evergreen. None of this is necessary!”

“Wrong! We had to give you a full blood transfusion because of how much you lost! I am not letting you up until I know you can handle it!” Suture argued heatedly, renewing her struggle against the unhappy buck.

“Listen to her, Crosswire. We risked a lot to get you that treatment, so we need to make sure it worked,” I argued.

“Hrrmph. Fine. Just make it quick. By the way, you get the fucker that shot me?” he grumbled, shooting an angry look in my direction.

I swallowed heavily, trying to decide what to tell him. “Uh, well, I found out who it was,” I started.

“It was me,” Autumn announced from where she was lying. Her rifle was partially disassembled and she was cleaning out the barrel, “I was trying to kill Evergreen, and you were fighting for her, so I figured you were a fair target as well.”

Crosswire looked over at her in shock, then glared up at me. “Mind explaining why she’s here, and not a corpse?” he asked slowly, every word dripping with anger.

“Autumn… has put herself in an interesting position, and has a peculiar connection to me,” I answered, “I killed her parents some years back, and she vowed to kill me. Only reason she hasn’t is because I’m not a raider any more, and she can’t bring herself to murder me.”

“So I’m going to be tagging along, and the first second she lapses even so much back to those raidering ways…” Autumn added, letting her statement trail off so we could use our imaginations to fill in the blank.

Crosswire’s glare didn’t budge an inch. “You better know what you’re doing, Evergreen. This mare could be a powder keg waiting to go off, and you’re trusting her with our lives.”

“Hey! I said I would keep her alive because I want to be the one to put a bullet in her head. I just need a good excuse to pull the trigger. Consider me her conscience,” Autumn protested.

“And what about the rest of us?” Crosswire demanded, turning his head to glare at the dark mare, “’Cause I’ll tell you right now that I was a raider in Evergreen’s gang. Does that mean you’ll kill me too?”

“Depends. You have a hoof in killing my family?” Autumn asked pointedly.

“Nope. That must have been before I joined up,” Crosswire shot back, “But why am I any different than her?”

Autumn fell silent at the question, then looked down at her rifle. “Because all I want is to know that my parents didn’t die for nothing,” she whispered, a completely unexpected reaction. I had expected her to respond with anger and biting words, not something that heartfelt. I guess her attitude made it easy to forget how young she still was.

The words struck a chord deep inside me. I had been facing that same problem ever since Just Law had pointed out how disappointed my parents would have been to see me. “Sometimes it depends on what we choose to do that decides whether or not our parents died for something,” I said, almost as quietly as Autumn, “I know mine died to protect me from raiders, yet that was exactly what I became. Until a few days ago, my parents did die for nothing. I’m trying to change that now.”

Autumn looked up at me, a glimmer of sadness in her eyes. “So what does that mean for me? Did mine die for nothing since I’m with you now?” she demanded of me, tears beginning to form in her eyes.

“No,” I answered, “Because you are here to make sure I never do the same thing to somepony else. If anything, that is exactly what your parents would have wanted from you. They would be proud to see you now, I think.”

The dark mare remained silent for a few moments. “Never thought I’d be taking emotional advice from you, Evergreen. None of this has turned out the way I thought it would,” she finally said, dropping her head back down to her gun.

“Fuck! Isn’t this just perfect!” Crosswire snapped, “I have to fight beside the fucking mare that put a damn bullet in my chest! Just fucking perfect! Let me up, Suture! I need to go outside.”

Suture struggled to keep the buck down until I touched her shoulder and shook my head at her. “Let him up. He needs to work this off. He’ll be okay.”

Hesitantly, the medical pony let him stand. He was unsteady on his hooves at first, but quickly regained his balance and marched out of the building, floating his SMG into its holster on his barding as he went.

The rest of us stood in silence as he went, Autumn wincing as he slammed the door behind him.

“Is he going to be a problem?” the sniper asked.

“Well, you shot him, so he’s completely justified in being angry, I think,” I answered, “But no, he’ll come around. He always does. His biggest issue is going to be with me.”

“If you say so,” Autumn muttered, sliding the barrel of her rifle back into its housing and swiftly reassembling the rifle. “Well, since he’s standing, we should probably be getting a move on. Like you said, we have a lot of ground to cover. Where are we headed anyway?”

“Millberry,” I answered, “We were contracted by the mayor of Metro to go out there for a job.” I was hesitant about sharing everything with her just now. Maybe after we got there, and I had a bit of a better idea of who she was.

“So you’re a merc?” Autumn asked.

“Basically. I’m trying to improve ties with the town, to the point where they accept me for who I’m choosing to be, instead of who I was. Metro is a good place to use as a hub. It’s got everything we need to stay on our hooves,” I said.

“Works for me. Let’s move!” Autumn punctuated the statement by chambering a round in her rifle before sliding it onto the loops on her barding.

I nodded and gathered up the few of my belongings that weren’t already stored in my saddlebags, most of which were medical supplies. Suture took the longest of all of us to pack up, as most of the supplies we had used to heal Crosswire were hers. It took us nearly ten minutes to prepare, something I was happy with, since it gave Crosswire that much time to cool off.

When we finally stepped outside, Crosswire was standing in the shadow of the building, looking out into the wasteland. “We leaving?” he asked without any emotional inflection in his voice.

“Yeah. Figured that since you got onto your hooves without a problem that you were good to travel. We didn’t want to stay in one place for too long,” I answered, picking his saddlebags up off my back and offering them over to the buck.

“So you’re serious about having this mare tag along?” he asked me, staring daggers at Autumn Mist.

“Yeah, I am. She’s more than skilled with that rifle, and her telekinetic abilities are rather impressive. Not to mention that she’ll keep me honest,” I said, completely seriously.

“Did she answer my question?” the buck asked, still glaring at the mare.

“About whether or not I’ll kill you?” Autumn asked for confirmation. When Crosswire nodded, she sighed. “Give me a good enough reason to, then yes, I would kill you without hesitating, as I would with anypony. I don’t have any particular issue with you, so I won’t be watching you as closely as I’m watching her.” She turned her head so she was looking at me.

“Well, now that we know what it’ll take for us to kill each other, can we please move on? We have a lot of ground to cover, and I know for a fact that you won’t be able to do it all in one go, Crosswire. As tough as you are, you were very close to dying yesterday,” I announced.

Crosswire shrugged. “Fine by me. Let’s go.”

As I had predicted, the remaining portion of our journey to Millberry was long, slow, and arduous. We had to stop every hour or so for Crosswire to rest. Every single time, he insisted that he didn’t need it, and every single time he was the last to struggle back to his hooves. The journey was taking a toll on him, but the tough buck pushed through it, as though he understood that he would get the chance to rest when we arrived at Millberry.

As a result, a journey that should only have taken a few hours took us the better part of the day, and the walls of Millberry didn’t become visible on the horizon until the sky began to darken with the setting sun. We approached the front gates cautiously, not knowing how we would be received, especially since three of us were very visibly armed. Some of these towns took their security to incredible levels, much like Metro did.

As we neared the gates, I could easily see the outline of the town. It matched the map I had found perfectly. Whoever had drawn it had certainly been careful in making sure that they missed absolutely no details, which meant that the resources this Seahawk had were considerable.

“Stop right there!” one of the guards announced as we approached, swinging a laser rifle around to take careful aim at us, “State your business!”

“We’re travelers, from Metro. The mayor there has contracted us to bring an offer to the leaders of this town. One of us was badly injured on the way here, so we could use some lodging and medical attention as well,” I answered.

The guard didn’t answer immediately, but I could feel him sizing us up, watching for any kind of deception. “All right, I’m going to let you in. Don’t try anything stupid, you’re being watched. The governor is in his office in the town hall at the center of the town. You can’t miss it. For lodging, talk to Pearlescent at the Drunken Mare. She has the best rooms in town, but you’ll be paying for what you get.”

“We wouldn’t have it any other way,” I said.

The gates slowly creaked open, revealing a flattened dirt road that led directly through the center of the town. Lining the road were the facades of many different buildings, ranging from what looked to be homes and shops towards the center of town to seedier establishments, such as drug dens and brothels, along the perimeter.

We made our way down the central avenue, figuring it would be best to get the talk with the governor over with first, especially considering that it was our original purpose in coming here. There weren’t many ponies in the streets, but the few that we did see gave us all odd looks, some even bordering on open hostility. This town did not give me a welcoming feeling. Then again, I rarely felt welcomed by any place that I visited.

Before long, the town hall loomed over us, its construction obviously pre-war. It was probably the largest building I had ever seen that had survived the apocalypse outside of downtown Seaddle, as it towered three stories over the surrounding landscape. The building itself was circular, with the outer edge defined by a walkway raised slightly over the ground and covered by a wooden roof that was obviously of more recent construction.

The roof of the structure came together in a large dome whose color had long since given way to the constant rain and wind of the wasteland and was now a pale wooden color. I found myself wondering what color it had been back in the old days.

We marched into the building, not quite sure what to expect. Out of the corner of my eye, I could spot Autumn glancing about nervously. Her stance showed a lot of tension and her gaze kept drifting back to her rifle, which was still nestled securely on her back. She obviously wasn’t comfortable in heavily populated places.

Inside, I was surprised to see that the building was nearly completely empty. Back in Metro, the mayor’s office and the waiting area outside it was always packed with various ponies waiting to do business with him. Here, there were only two official-looking ponies, and they didn’t even look like they were waiting on anything. Rather, they were simply standing off to one side, conversing with each other in quiet voices.

I walked up to them and asked in as kind a voice as I could manage, “Would either of you bucks be kind enough to point me towards the governor’s office? We need to speak with him on a very urgent matter.”

One of the two bucks steadfastly ignored me, and the other looked imperiously down his nose at me. “Well, what do we have here,” he stated, adopting a lofty expression, not to mention accent, “A wastelander, asking me for directions.” Somehow, he managed to sound insulted, as though the air I was breathing was a personal offense to him.

“Yeah, I’m asking because I’m not from here and was contracted by the mayor of Metro to come here and speak with whoever is in charge. Now, if you would just point me in the right direction, I can be on my way and get out of your mane,” I stated angrily. I wasn’t going to be pushed around by this self-important, pompous ass.

The buck looked down on me for a few more moments, then waved his hoof dismissively towards one of the corridors. “His office is that way, last door on the left, though I will be very surprised if he agrees to see you. He only sees the most important of visitors. I don’t think a mercenary from the wastes will rank very highly on his list of priorities.”

“Well, then he better bump me up a few notches if he wants to stay in charge of this dump,” I snapped, “Because if he doesn’t listen to me, I guarantee that most everypony here will be dead before the year is out.”

That comment finally succeeded in getting the buck’s attention. He took a step back in surprise and even straightened his head so that he was no longer looking down his nose at me. “What?” he asked incredulously, “Is that a threat?”

“Not from me, no,” I snapped, “And that is exactly why I’m here. I think you had better take us to the governor, right away.”

The buck looked from me to his friend and back again, as though trying to weigh hoe serious as I was being. He was obviously not used to handling these kind of situations, no matter how important he made himself seem. “Yes, of course,” he finally stammered, then started towards the corridor, “Right this way.”

He led us down the corridor to the governor’s office, which was denoted by a large, dark mahogany door that had a plaque hung in front of it that read ‘Governor’ in large block letters. The buck gestured for us to wait, then stepped inside the office.

We stood outside in silence for several minutes, waiting for the self-important buck to reappear. As the minutes dragged on, my patience steadily eroded. I was just about to kick open the door and barge in when the door finally opened and the buck reappeared.

“The governor will see you know, but please be quick. We are cutting you all ahead of several very important ponies,” he said, waving us inside.

“I’ll take as much time as I need. Those others can wait,” I snapped as I pushed my way past the buck.

Once past the large door, we found ourselves in a foyer that held several ponies waiting around the perimeter of the room; some were sitting on benches, others were simply standing off to the side. All of them were wearing some sort of official looking attire, meaning that it provided no practical use whatsoever. They all also had very annoyed expressions.

The most annoyed of all was a mid-sized orange buck standing in an open door. He had a carefully styled red mane and was wearing a pair of wire-rim glasses. “I trust this won’t take long? I have many important meetings to get to,” he complained.

“Trust me, you’re going to want to hear what I have to say, but I refuse to speak out in the open. Let’s step into your office so we can have some privacy,” I growled as I walked up to the buck.

He tried to stand his ground for a few moments, but quickly decided that simply agreeing with me would be the quickest way to get me out of his life. He turned around and stepped into the office. We followed after and Autumn telekinetically pulled the door shut behind us.

As soon as we were alone, I pulled out the letter that the mayor of Metro had given to me to hand off to this buck. “Here, this is from the mayor of Metro. He is making an offer of allegiance, and it is my recommendation that you accept.”

The governor remained silent as he perused the letter. By the time he finally answered, he must have read it at least three times. “This is all very interesting, but not once does he mention why,” the governor finally said, lifting his eyes from the document to fix me in a disapproving glare, “and I am not about to start sharing power with somepony whose motivations I don’t know.”

“He doesn’t want to share power,” I argued, “He wants an agreement between these two settlements, that you will come to each other’s aid should the need arise. You’ll still be in charge out here, and he will still be in charge of Metro. Nothing will change except that your two settlements will help each other in the instance of raider attack or supply shortages.”

“Again, that is interesting. But my question is why,” the buck insisted, “I see absolutely no reasons for this offer.”

I sighed and reached into my saddlebags again, pulling out the map of Millberry. “I found this a few days ago, at a dead drop in an Ironshod Factory outside of Grovedale, to the east. It came with this.” I played the recording next, while the governor looked over the map, a contemplative look on his face.

As the mayor of Metro had done, the governor listened to the recording carefully, going so far as to have me play the message again. As it wound down to an end, he sat back in his chair. “This is disturbing news, miss?”

“Evergreen,” I finished for him, “And I thought that would get your attention. The mayor of Metro thinks that a coalition of settlements would be the best defense against this Seahawk, and frankly, I agree with him. We came here first because it was the settlement mentioned in the message. So what do you say?”

The governor fell silent and his expression became thoughtful. He took a few minutes to mull over the situation. I gave him the time he needed. This wasn’t a simple situation, after all.

“I wish I could accept,” he finally said, “Millberry needs this, if we want to be sure of our survival, but we don’t have the resources to spare should Metro require our assistance. We have a militia, should they need martial help, but all of our food and water is being used. We don’t have anything extra, excepting an emergency supply, which is for just that, emergencies.”

“Understandable,” I said, “What would it take for you to agree?”

“What we need, more than anything else, is a steady supply of water. If we could get a Stable-Tec quality water purifier or recycler, I would be confident enough in our future to agree to this allegiance. Anything else, and we won’t be able to pull our weight,” he explained, gazing out of a window to look out at the town.”

“I’ll bring the information back to Metro. In the meantime, can I tell the mayor yes, with conditions? It makes a large difference on what my next move is going to be,” I asked.

“Getting a bonus for our agreement?” the governor asked shrewdly, turning his gaze back to me.

“A significant one. The kind that can be a difference between survival and thriving. The farther I can get ahead, the happier I will be,” I responded.

“In that case, yes. Tell him we have an agreement. But also tell him that I expect his help should we require anything. This is not going to be one-sided. Now then, Evergreen, if you don’t mind, I have several more important ponies to meet with. Pearlescent runs the best inn in town down at the Drunken Mare. Prices are a little steep, but you won’t have to worry about getting robbed. It’s near the center of town, north down the main road. Tell her I sent you,” the governor offered, waving a hoof towards the door.

“Thank you,” I said, backing out. We made our way straight to the inn, all of us weary after a long day of travel.

The façade was bright and gaudy, with various bits from different neon signs cannibalized together to spell out ‘Drunken Mare’ in various colors, styles, and sizes. Inside, the common room was dense and smoke filled, and also reeked of alcohol. There were a lot of ponies clustered around several tables, most of which didn’t look like the most reputable kind of patrons.

I pushed my way past several drunken ponies until I was standing at the main counter, trying to get the attention of the white mare that was waiting on everypony. I smacked my hoof on the table several times and finally managed to get her to turn her head.

“Trying to hurry me up ain’t gonna get you served any faster, got it?” she snapped at me, then returned to her conversation with the buck across the bar from her.

“I don’t want a damn drink! My friends and I have been on the road since daybreak and we want a room to sleep. The governor said we should come down here,” I snapped back.

That comment, at last, got her attention. “Oh, you want rooms! Why didn’t you just say so!” she exclaimed, sidling over to where we were waiting, “So you said the governor sent you? You come to our town on business, honey?”

“Yeah, from Metro. We ran into some problems on the way down and need a good room. I’ve got the caps,” I explained, pulling out the pouch I kept my money in.

“Wonderful! I’ve got a room for four for three hundred caps for the night! It’s up on the second floor, fourth door on your right, though I can drop the price for the right incentive,” she said, batting her eyes at me.

I never understood why so many mares tried to persuade me to sleep with them. I thought I made it painfully obvious where my preferences lay. “I think I’d prefer to pay normal price,” I stated as emotionlessly as I could, counting out the caps and setting them on the counter.

“Ah, you’re no fun, dear,” the mare sighed, reaching out a hoof to sweep in the caps, then setting a worn key on the counter, “Have a good night, now. Breakfast will be served at eight!”

I nodded my head in thanks then proceeded to lead my sorry group of followers up to our room. When we finally arrived, everypony simply dropped their saddlebags on the nearest horizontal surface. Crosswire basically collapsed on the floor, and Suture was instantly at his side, making sure he was okay.

I wandered over to the bed, sat down, and fished out my bottle of Apple Whiskey. Those ponies downstairs had looked like they were having fun, and I could use a few drinks myself after the last couple days.

I had just taken a couple swigs when Autumn came up beside me. “So that’s what Metro is looking for, huh? A way to reach out to the other towns around the area? Clever way to do it, make them think that somepony else is trying to take over the whole region. What’s he paying you to lie for him?”

I shook my head at her. “I’m not lying. Everything I said is the complete truth. Crosswire and I found the message and the map in an Ironshod factory. We’re pretty sure that Greymane is hunting for us now, since we took everything in the dead drop.”

“And this Seahawk guy? Where does he fit in?” Autumn asked, “And what’s your role in all this?”

“I haven’t got a damn clue who Seahawk is. All I know is that the kind of change he is offering to the way things are running around here won’t be good. If I’m proven wrong, and this Seahawk is some sort of savior, then I’ll be more than happy to admit it, but for now, I can’t see anything good coming from him coming around,” I explained, “My role is that I’m helping Metro organize the region enough so that we can find out exactly what this Seahawk intends to do before just letting him steamroll over all of us. I don’t know about you, but I don’t find the concept of a totalitarian regime that inviting. Not to mention the fact that ponies with my reputation tend to be the first ones to die during power changes.”

The sniper remained silent as she considered my words. “Fuck, this is a mess. Here I thought Metro was just doing a power grab. Something like that, I can easily understand. But this, this is something else! What are we going to do?”

“Exactly what we are doing. This is how much I’ve changed, Autumn. I have a cause now. I’m not just hoofing it for caps; I’m actually trying to do something worthwhile now. I don’t blame you for taking that shot at me. Hell, if I were in your hooves, I would have done the same, but the world is rarely as simple as it appears.”

“Yeah, sure seems that way,” the dark mare muttered, then stood and started towards the corner farthest away from me, “Fuck, I hate this complicated shit. Give me black and white any day. Grey… I don’t know what to do with grey.”

I watched Autumn settle herself down on the far side of the room and sighed to myself. I’d like to think that we were starting to patch up some of our differences, but there was such a void between us, and she had spent so many years completely devoted to hating me and everything I stood for that it would probably take a long time before we were even close to being on friendly terms. As it was, I could tell that she barely tolerated my presence.

I turned my gaze to where Suture and Crosswire were quietly conversing, mostly about Crosswire’s state, but also about more general things. His change was still one I was trying to understand. Much as he was having trouble figuring out the new me, I was struggling to figure out who he was now. So much about both of us had changed so much and we were both still trying to find our hooves in this new reality.

I rolled over onto my side and tried to make myself relax. The whiskey burning pleasantly in my stomach helped considerably, but there was so much going on in my head that I doubted I would get any sleep tonight. My mind was racing from my thoughts on trying to get this deal done for Metro, to trying to work out my problems with Autumn. I sighed heavily and resigned myself to a sleepless night. It wouldn’t be the first of my life.

Level up!
Perk Gained – Intense Training: Endurance has been raised by 1 for all the hits you’ve been taking!
Skill Note: Melee (50)

{Woo… here we are, at the end of another chapter… Sorry for the delay everyone, but school work has been picking me up, and grades do need to be my priority. This doesn’t mean at all that I’m stopping! I’m still working on the story in what free time I have; it just isn’t as much as I’ve had in the last month and a half. Please bear with me! For anyone who cares as well, there is a link to the hub page I set up for the story here. Please feel free to enjoy the story from there (there are some extra goodies that aren’t being posted to Fimfic). As always, thanks go to Kkat for creating Fallout: Equestria. Also, thanks to my editors, Cody and MUCKSTER (his request to change to this mode of address instead). I put both of you through hell, but you make this what it is.}