Chapter 8 Red River

As I lay there, getting better slowly, Rimfire, the ghoul, and Starburst stood in front of me. This was the first time I really got a good look at the ghoul. He was in the middle, height wise; he was taller than Rimfire, and just a hair shorter than Starburst. His skin was mostly gone, exposing the grey and green muscle mass beneath. I could see where the doctor had mades cuts and injections on the ghoul. Some of his body was hanging down in flaps, some of it was bloated with a dark coloring under the skin. All of his mane and tail were gone.

“Feeling better?” he asked me. I tried to sit up, but my legs just wouldn’t support me, even though I felt back to normal. I settled to just nod. “That’s excellent. He hit you with some sort of ghoul toxin he was trying to make. An elixir to turn perfectly healthy ponies into ghouls.”

Starburst looked amused. “Some doctor, huh? Doesn’t he know that only very few ponies can become ghouls?”

“Who knows,” the ghoul said, “maybe he was onto something.”

“What’s your name?” I asked him.

“Call me... Ghoul,” Ghoul said.

“Just Ghoul?” Rimfire asked. He nodded.

“I lost my name long ago, it doesn’t matter now.”

“What happened here?” I asked Ghoul.

“I don’t know. I came here because I heard of the ghouls and I was hoping there would be some who were intelligent. Just ferals, but they were different, savage. Not just aggressive like normal, but these seemed to love killing.” He turned his eyes downwards. “Eventually I was able to communicate with the ghouls and they saw me as some sort of a leader. They still do. I found the tunnels and then the Doctor. He chained me up about... two days ago and experimented on me.”

“That’s awful,” Starburst murmured.

“At least I kept my sanity,” Ghoul said. “What brought you three here?”

“We’re going to New Pegasus,” I said.

Ghoul’s ears perked. “Oh? Why?”

“No reason really,” I told him. “Just kind of going with the flow.”

“Flow, huh? Well... you got room for one more?” For the second time, Ghoul surprised me. I could tell from their expressions that Rimfire and Starburst were surprised as well.

“Why would you want to come with us?” Rimfire asked.

Ghoul shrugged. “Not much to do here, not much to do anywhere actually.”

“What about the Doctor?” I asked. “Don’t you have him to take care of?”

A smile crept onto Ghoul’s face. “The feral’s will make short work of him. Maybe bullets didn’t work, but tearing him apart probably will.” The mental of image of the ghouls and the doctor make me a little queasy.

“Can you take care of yourself in a fight?” Starburst asked.

“Sure I can, I just need to find me a new knife.”

“Where’d the old one go?”

“I stuck it where the sun don’t shine on the Doctor before he chained me up,” Ghoul said, “Damn it was worth it.” He seemed like quite the pony, and we couldn’t just leave him here on his own. And I owed him for my life.

“Yeah, there’s room for one more,” I told him.

“That’s great news. Now... I should probably get all your names,” he said.

“Oh, right,” I said flustered. “I’m Short. This is Rimfire and this is Starburst.” I gestured to the ponies on my sides.

“It’s a real pleasure to meet ya’,” Ghoul said.

“Now is there any way to get out of here?” I asked him.

“Yeah, any of the tunnels should take us to the surface in one way or another,” he explained. “But I wouldn’t take the tunnel the ferals went down. Might be a bit messy.”

“We just need a place to sleep,” Rimfire said, “We were interrupted by ghouls before and were corralled down here.”

“I’ll take you to a surface house,” Ghoul offered. He turned to face down a tunnel opposite the one we entered with. “And the ferals won’t attack while I’m with you.”

Ghoul led us down one of the tunnels. The toll of what we’d been doing in here started to take effect, at least it did to me. Our path was slightly curvier than the one we’d taken in, and it was also a great deal steeper. That meant we found the hole out much quicker. This house was in much rougher shape than the one we’d broken into. I was the last one to pile out of the hole and I collapsed onto the floor. A look around before I shut my eyes told me that Rimfire and Starburst were falling quickly asleep too.

I awoke to rays of sunlight striking my eyelids through the slates in the windows. I groaned and sat up. Starburst and Rimfire were both still snoring softly. I saw Ghoul had taken to lying on a chair that had been in the room. The pain in my back was telling me that the chair would have been a million times better. He was watching me wake up.

“Good morning,” he said softly, trying not to wake up the other two.

“Good morning,” I responded in kind.

“Hungry?” he asked. I shook my head, dinner last night had been plenty and I probably wouldn’t be hungry until we hit New Pegasus. “Then I bet you’re keen to ask me how I came to be here then.”

“You told us last night. You came looking for other smart ghouls.”

“Yeah, that’s the upshot of it,” he said. “But I lived a life before that I’ll have you know.”

“Since before the war happened?”

Ghoul looked thoughtful for a moment. “I was born a few years before the war started. I was just getting into a university when the threat of balefire bombs became real.” He chuckled a little. “Mom was always trying to get us to move into the countryside. ‘We’d be less of a target if we did that,’ she said.”

“Did you do it?” I asked.

“Hah.” He shook his head and grinned. “Naw, we didn’t do that. New Pegasus didn’t even get hit with a big balefire anyways. I’m not sure the exact missiles we got hit with, but they were small. The bigwigs in charge of the main strip had a shield set up, like Canterlot, and that stopped most of the damage, to the Strip at least. You saw what was around it.”

“Where were you when it happened?”

“We were ‘evacuated’,” he couldn’t hold his sarcasm in. “That basically left us in the sewers. Safest part of the city if you didn’t have the money to get into the shield. The bombs were mostly for a big bang, but they had a little radiation, but it was enough to ghoulify a good amount of us down there.”

“That’s awful,” I said. Rimfire and Starburst were getting up now, each of them stretching the kinks from their bones.

“Mornin’,” we said in near unison. Rimfire only grumbled in response. Since I’d known her she hadn’t been a morning pony.

“How’s it looking?” Starburst asked.

“Weather’s... nice,” Ghoul said. I looked out the window. The sun was shining as always, clouds never really filled the desert sky here. I saw one cloud in the sky, it was dark grey and appeared to be over the east side of New Pegasus. A single cloud wasn’t something to raise an eyebrow at, but it looked like rain cloud, and that was something new. “It’s a clear path to New Pegasus from here. We can take route 5 and hit the Gutters in a couple hours.”

“Then what?” Rimfire asked between bites of a nutrient bar she’d take from her pack. “Do we want to go to the casinos or are we just going to fuck around?”

“We could see Brass,” I offered.

“Brass?” Starburst asked.

“He’s my good friend,” Rimfire said, “he sells guns and ammo.” I saw Starburst eyeing my armor.

“Where can Short get some new armor?” Starburst asked.

“Brass can find some,” she said. “He did offer it last time,” he reminded me.

“I know, I know. It wasn’t as bad last time,” I rebutted. She waved it off.

Ghoul spoke up. “I’d suggest we get a move on. The ferals will have finished with the dear Doctor by now.” The three of us gather our packs.

“So?” Rimfire asked. “Will they attack us now?”

“Probably not,” Ghoul said, “but there might be a small gas explosion soon.” The three of us had our bags on and guns packed.

“What?” Starburst demanded.

“I’m pretty sure there will be a poisonous gas leak now that the Doctor is dead.”

“Why the fuck did you let us sleep here then?” Rimfire asked.

“For one thing, he wouldn’t be dead until right around now. The ferals would have wanted to take it slowly. Second, the Doctor would have something like that. He talked a lot of himself while he tortured me.” We didn’t stand still enough to talk more after that. Our hooves hit the road and we beat it out of Neyope.Sure enough, not ten minutes after we got onto route 5 there was a small rumble under our hooves. We didn’t hear any explosion or see any flames, but we knew we’d made the right decision to leave.

“Let’s see what that radio stallion has to say about that,” Ghoul chuckled.

“Who? Pon3?” I asked.

“Who else? That stallion knows everything that happens in Equestria these days. You can get the station on your PipBuck,” Ghoul said, he was looking at me. I used my PipBuck, I was getting quite good at it now, and navigated to the radio menus. Sure enough Galaxy News was listed. I’d never really set much stock to Pon3, but I’d listened to it whenever it was on if I didn’t have anywhere to be. As soon as I hit play sweet music began to play through the surprisingly high quality speakers. It was just our luck that the song ended soon after and we could hear Pon3’s voice.

“Greetings, Equestrian wastelanders! It’s me, Pon3! It looks like I’ve got a bit of news out of New Pegasus. Seems that the ghoul-town of Neyope has been, well, cleaned. Sources can’t say who did it, but the ghouls have been quiet. Now it only happened last night, but I’m told that everything’s settling down. But now, some music.” Pon3’s voice faded and a soft piano music started playing. I turned off the radio.

Ghoul laughed. “Isn’t that something?”

“What?” Rimfire asked.

“He always knows... always. There’s been no one here but us, guys. He had to have been here!”

“Eh,” I said warily, “I don’t think he was.”

“What? How else could he have known?”

“I think it’s what he didn’t know,” Starburst said. “He didn’t mention the explosion, if that’s what it was. He obviously wasn’t close enough to feel it.”

“Watching the clouds?”

“You’re saying he’s a pegasus now?” I asked.

“I’m just saying it’s suspicious.” We dropped the topic and got back to walking.

We were two hours out of Neyope when we heard a cry for help. Off the road among some small desert shrubs was a mare’s upper half, the rest of her was obscured. She had a golden brown coat with some blue mane. Her left leg was wrapped in white linen and stained red. She saw us turn towards her and started screaming again. I started to run towards her but Starburst stopped me.

“I’ll cover you three,” he said. I nodded and the three of us headed down to see the mare. She had stopped screaming as we got closer. I could see now that she was an earth pony, and she wasn’t well off. No noticeable armor or weapon made guessing how she got the way she was easy to guess. We stopped about ten paces away, just before the shrubs started popping up. From the corner of my eye I could see Starburst getting a good line of fire on us.

“What’s the problem?” I asked her. I tried to mask my wariness, but I wasn’t the bullshitter I used to be.

“I was attacked by raiders,” she said hurriedly, “I-I can’t move my legs. Please, you have to help me!” I took a step closer.

“Raiders?” I asked. She looked like something raiders would have their way with, but why the wrapped foreleg? She nodded. On my E.F.S she was green, which meant good. “Alright.” I turned to the others. “Keep an eye out,” I told them, “in case they come back.” I walked the rest of the way to the mare. I stopped right before her when I felt the unfamiliar pinch of metal under my hoof.

“Th-they made me do it,” she squeaked. I ignored the mare and looked down. Around my hoof I could make out circular disk of a landmine. There was rustling in the shrubs ahead of us. Legs. heads, and weapons started to pop out from them. There must have been at least ten raiders, but judging from the barding they wore, they looked like slavers. I could see a few hanging horns and cut-off sections of skin bearing cutie marks. I’d seen slavers do such things before.

The lead slaver had a smile filled with yellowed, broken teeth. “Drop yer guns,” he said. I took in the lot of them. Only two of them had guns. One held a small pistol in his mouth, the other had an assault rifle on a jerry-rigged battle saddle; it looked like an AK, but I wasn’t sure. It was pretty beat up. The rest of them had a varying array of melee weapons held in their mouths. The lead slaver didn’t have anything like that, instead he had a switchblade strapped to each of his forehooves. “You gonna make me ask twice?” I saw Starburst again and tried to stop him from shooting, I wanted to see if I could get the mare away, but I couldn’t do anything. He didn’t use his machine guns, instead a plume of smoke erupted from his back as a black cylinder shot towards us. The missile exploded in the midst of the slavers. I saw five of them obliterated in the blast and shrapnel. Smoke and debris blew past the rest of us. I’d have dodge in the moment of confusion, but the landmine would have killed me in a second.

I’d heard of other unicorns using their magic to cheat around with explosives. I hadn’t used my magic for much more than a pair of hands. I took a deep breath and quickly formed a small telekinetic disk under my hoof. In front of me, the lead slaver had dealt with the debris and was staring at me lividly. He struck out with a hoof and the switchblade extended, threatening to slit my throat. I ducked back and tried to backflip away.

I landed on my back three feet from the landmine, far, maybe far enough. The slaver with the blades was stalking towards me. I removed the magic disk and the landmine exploded into his gut. He stood for a moment before blood and a black liquid poured from his mouth and he dropped. I looked around, Rimfire and Ghoul had managed to deal with the rest of the slavers. The mare was still lying behind the bush; she was cowering in the fetal position. I got off my back and trotted over to her. Stepping around the bush I got a look at her back legs. They’d have spikes driven through them at the joint.

“Holy shit,” I murmured. The scared mare unfurled and looked at me, tears in her eyes.

“Help me,” she begged quietly.

“I don’t know if I can,” I said honestly. She wasn’t well off, her back legs were caked with blood and grime. If the blood loss didn’t kill her, a disease surely would. There was no way for us to carry her. I felt Rimfire and Ghoul at my side, and I could hear that Starburst wasn’t far off.

“Hydra... potion... something... please,” she begged again. I could tell she was trying to talk louder, but her voice was shaky and scared.

“They wouldn’t work,” Starburst said, he was standing next to the mare. He knelt beside her. She stared at him, her eyes beginning to tear up. She must have not been here long, she was dying. “It’s too far along now. The rods look like they’re in the middle of an artery, you’d bleed out if we removed them.” Starburst put an arm over her as she started shivering.

“B-but,” she started to say, but he stopped her.

“The pain will go away,” he said. Starburst took a syringe out of one of the small pouches he had. He took off the cap and administered it to the mare. I knew it was Med-X, but would it matter? “Do you understand what’s happening?” he asked. She nodded slowly. “I’m sorry.” Starburst embraced the mare and held her tight. She laid her head on his shoulder, and I could droplets run down his armor.

A minute later, she was gone, and we buried her under the loose gravel and sand. Starburst looked like he wanted to say something, but he didn’t. No one did. Ghoul grabbed the switchblades from the leader and strapped them on. He looked at the three of us.

“To New Pegasus, eh?” he asked.

“Yeah, New Pegasus,” Rimfire agreed. Her voice didn’t waiver, she was stronger that I was.

“Let’s go,” Starburst said. His voice was also back to normal, it was like he hadn’t felt the mare die in front of us. Maybe I was just different.

“I think,” I began, pausing, “that I need to go back to the bunker.”

Starburst turned to me. “The key?” he asked. I nodded. “Why the sudden decision?”

I looked away from the three of them. “I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t want this weight on my shoulders right now. The Rangers, the NER, and that gang. All of them want the key, and so many ponies are going to die like this mare. If I can do something that will stop even one of them dying, I’m going to do it.”

“Why the Rangers?” he asked. I could tell that he was genuinely curious.

“The NER want a weapon, I don’t think Soap does.” I looked right at Starburst. “And if she’s anything like you, she’s the right choice.”

“Just be sure,” he said. Rimfire turned to him.

“What’s that supposed to mean? Don’t you trust your leader?” she asked.

“Hell, of course I trust her. It’s everyone out east that I don’t. The Steel Ranger modus operandi is to acquire technology. It’s only by sheer force of intelligence that Soap isn’t like that.”

“She’s a good change?” I asked.

He rolled his eyes. “The best goddamn elder in twenty years. Well, we had two others in that time. Rigged and Daylight, both of them had no problem with killing wastelanders for any shiny laser they might have.”

“And Soap wouldn’t?” Rimfire asked.

Starburst shook his head. “Never, at most she’d ask for them politely. If there was a dangerous thing somewhere, we’d do our best to make sure any regular pony doesn’t hurt himself. Under her our morale increased and normal ponies didn’t shoot us on sight. It’s been a good two years.”

“Then I’ve made my choice,” I said. All of them understood, except for Ghoul.

“So we’re not going to New Pegasus?” he asked. I shook my head. “Then I guess I’ll catch you on the flipside.”

“You’re not coming with us now?” Rimfire asked.

“Nope, I’m not a ghoul for the bigger picture, at least not anymore. Sorry, kid.” Ghoul spat on the ground, turned, and walked off. Over his shoulder he yelled, “Maybe we’ll see each other again!”

“One day,” I said, and I meant it.

We walked all day and into the night. It took longer than expected due to the wide berth we gave Neyope. After Balefire Point, Starburst took the lead. I didn’t have the geographic sense to find the bunker in the early hours. With Starburst leading, the guards didn’t give us any trouble and let us right in. Blaze was standing with the door guards, his expression nearly unchanged from when I’d last seen him. His eyes stuck on me, stagnant yet depthless. Starburst led Rimfire and I towards the Elder’s room once again.

Once we were inside he said, “she wouldn’t appreciate us barging into her room, I’m sure she’ll have been told you’re back though.” He was right. Not more than five minutes later she walked in. She looked as though she hadn’t been sleeping; her mane was well-kept, her coat smooth, and dress perfect.

“Welcome back,” she said with a sly smile.

“I had something to give you,” I said. She nodded. I placed the key on her desk.

“Are you sure?” she asked. Had it been any other pony, I’d have been sure it wasn’t sincere, but she was.

“Mostly,” I told her truthfully. “Starburst said a lot of kind words about you. It helped my decision.”

Her smile widened. “Thank you both. Now I invite you all to spend the night here. Refresh and reload before you head out again. If you decide to...” She placed the key in one of the drawers. “Starburst, I take it you can show them some quarters?”

“I sure can,” he answered. “Follow me.” Our room had the nicest beds I’d ever slept in, and one for each of us. I didn’t wake up until noon, at least that’s what my PipBuck said. There weren’t any windows or clocks in the bunker as far as I’d seen. Starburst wasn’t in the room, and Rimfire was sitting on her bed, cleaning her gun.

“Where’s Starburst?” I asked.

Rimfire didn’t look up, she was busy inspecting the barrel of her rifle. “He said something about getting food for us. He left a couple minutes ago.” I rolled onto my stomach and stretched a little. It would probably do me a lot of good to think about our next move. It felt like a huge load had been taken off my back once I’d put my trust in Elder Soap and her Rangers. There were so many other things to deal with. The bullets, Churchane, and the NER probably wouldn’t be too happy if they saw me. There sure wasn’t a hell of a lot I could do about the NER right now, not unless Soap gave me all her paladins, and that didn’t seem likely. I checked my PipBuck for messages, I hadn’t gotten one about the bullets either, so that was out. That just left dealing with Church. I knew there was no way I could get the caps to pay him back; we’d spent most of them on guns and ammo.

Rimfire must have seen me looking troubled. “We’re not going to New Pegasus at all are we?” It barely sounded like a question.

“I’m not,” I said, “I don’t know what you or Starburst want to do.”

“You think we’d leave you hanging this far along? Well, I sure wouldn’t, I don’t know about Starburst but I think he’d stick with us.” I nodded along, of course he would, if he was allowed.

“For sure,” I said, pausing.

“Where are you thinking of going?” she asked.

“Manehattan,” I told her. When she raised an eyebrow I continued, “Churchane. He’ll keep trying to kill you or me until we deal with him first.”

“I see,” she said. “You know it’s on the other side of Equestria right?”

“Yeah, but there’s a few stops on the way, shouldn’t be all that terrible.” She didn’t look convinced. “If we go to New Appleloosa, follow the rail to Baltimare, and then it’s just north along the coast to Manehattan.” I was lucky I’d had the PipBuck’s map to give me a quick guide. Just then the door swung open and Starburst walked in. On his back he was balancing a tray with a few assorted muffins.

“I got breakfast,” he said. He placed the tray on one of the beds and we each took a few muffins. Rimfire filled him in on the plan as we ate. “Hmph,” was all he said.

“You don’t like it?” I asked. He looked at me.

“I never said I didn’t like it,” he said quickly.

“You’re coming right?” Rimfire asked.

“I wouldn’t leave you now,” he said. “Besides, I couldn’t let you two got out there alone, it’s dangerous.”

“When can we leave?” I asked.

“After we get your armor repaired,” Starburst said, and I knew it wasn’t a suggestion. I sighed lightly and took off the armor, I held it aloft with my magic. “Let’s go to the armory, the mare will do it for free.” Starburst led the two of us to the bunker armory, it wasn’t that far away from the room. It was a long, grey room that was seperated into two sections. The first section, which was smaller, was what we stood in. The other section was cut off from us by a u-shaped wall. Beyond the opening a mare sat tinkering with a small plasma pistol.

“Hey Starburst,” she said without looking up. “I knew you’d be back.” Starburst smiled.

“Well I did say I would, so here I am.” He gestured to me. I placed my battered armored onto the table in front of the mare. She looked at it with slight disgust.

“What’d you do to this poor armor?” she asked. “You are all monsters.” She faked a sniffle.

“Can you make it better?” he asked.

The mare laughed. “As if you even needed to ask! I’ll have it mended in five minutes, I can give it a strong backing in ten more.”

“Then please,” I said, speaking up, “fix my armor.” She looked up me.

“Sure thing.” She took the armor with her as she took it behind the wall. I heard something turn on and a loud, reverberating thrumming filled the room. Starburst took us out into the entryway.

“Hey,” he said, “I’m going to get my chems filled up. Do you know how to get back outside?” I nodded. “Then I’ll see you outside, don’t leave without me.” He took off down the hall.

Rimfire and I waited until the Armory Mare called us in. She looked surprised when Starburst wasn’t with us. The armor was folded nicely on the counter. I reached to get some caps and she stopped me.

“No charge for you, I owed something to Starburst. A long time debt finally paid, I suppose.” I took the armor and started to pull it on. It was a much tighter fit, I had to suck my gut in to get it on fully; and I could feel whatever strengthening she had done to it. When I had gotten it on, I felt a lot safer already.

“Thanks,” I said. She gave a small curtsy and turned back to the plasma pistol. Rimfire and I exited to the main hallway, it was mostly empty at this point.

“You’re probably not used to the extra weight,” Rimfire said. I could tell she was talking about the new barding. “You won’t be able to dodge as well with that on.” She paused, and added quietly, “not that you could do all that much before.” I gave her a fake laugh, but didn’t respond after that. The two of us walked to the entrance of the bunker. We weren’t both one hundred percent sure how to get, but a few of the initiates were willing to give us a quick point to the right direction. Eventually we found ourselves in front of the door that would lead outside. The usual two guards were there, and so was Blaze. I wondered if he ever left the spot. We were about to leave through the door when Blaze appeared in front of me, I don’t think I even saw him move.

“You need to be careful,” he said. His voice was surprisingly soft and sweet for his appearance. I hadn’t looked at him closely before, but around his neck were hints of burns that extended down into his armor.

“We always are,” I told him. He shook his head violently.

“No, be more careful, or you’ll die.”

“Is that a threat?” Rimfire asked. She had moved up beside me. He shook his head again.

“I... see things,” Blaze said. “And there aren’t a lot of ponies who believe me, but I know they’re true.” He was practically begging us to trust him now.

“Alright, what did you see?” I asked.

His eyes dropped a little as he responded. “I saw a terrible, green fire, burning you and everyone around you,” he said.

“Rimfire and Starburst?” I asked, my voice choking a little as I spoke.

“No, you and some other pony. I don’t see any other ponies with you two.”

“What does the other pony look like?” Rimfire asked.

“His mane was purple, and I think his coat was ashen, it didn’t look natural.” I knew in a heartbeat who that was.

“It’s Church,” I said slowly. “Did we both die?” I asked.

“I didn’t see you dying,” he said, “I only-” He was cut off by Starburst walking into the room. He had a smile on his face and walked with a sense of pride. It looked like he’d also had his armor touched up, it was a lot cleaner than it had been before.

“Are we ready?” he asked. We were. We left the bunker just a little while after noon. The three of us headed directly south, taking a trail that lead between Balefire Point and Goodsprings. By dusk the highway that lead east out of New Pegasus was nearing the horizon. We broke for the night in the cave I found Crescent’s journal and started this whole crazy adventure. The body wasn’t there anymore, but that wasn’t cause for much alarm; not in the wasteland, anyway.

The next day we left the cave at dawn, hoping to be halfway to Old Appleloosa by nightfall. I’d never had a problem with the slave trade, so long as they never looked at me like they looked at the slaves. I didn’t like it, but what could one pony do? There wasn’t a way to free every pony that was ever captured, not unless you had an army of thousands.

The road wasn’t terrible, that’s why we took it to New Pegasus in the first place. In a hundred miles it took a turn to the north, which would take us to Canterlot, but that would be a death sentence. If we took the direction that the road would take us, we’d find a broken, end-of-the-line train station. That railroad would take us through Old Appleloosa in four days, five if we were going slow for some reason.

We made the station in good time; it had only taken two days to get there, we arrived the night of the second day. The station was an old, decrepit wooden building. It was two stories tall with boarded up windows every ten feet. Whoever had first decided to occupy the building must have been no good with a lockpick because instead of using the front door he’d blasted a hole in the side. It wasn’t the largest station I’d seen in my travels, not that I’d seen many, but it was decent. Currently, the place was a trading post of sorts; ponies used it was a watering hole on the way to New Pegasus if they came this way. When we walked in, the owner looked relieved to see Rimfire and I. She was a black-coated unicorn with a caramel mane. She had inherited the place from her mother, who had opened both it and the hole in the wall.

“Thank Celestia you’re here,” she said.

“What’s the matter, River?” I asked. She leaned on the counter. The placed was set up like an old general store. You told River what you wanted and she got it from the back room.

“Jade went missing last night,” River said. Jade was River’s earth pony assistant, and the pony she sent to get any supplies she needed from Ditzy in Appleloosa, at least when Ditzy had been around.

“What happened?” Rimfire asked, her voice concerned.. During the night we’d stayed here, Rimfire and Jade had become surprisingly good friends.

“The other night I went to bed after closing, Jade said he saw a caravan headed to Old Appleloosa and he was going to see if they needed a trade really quick. I thought nothing of it, but when I woke up, he hadn’t returned.”

“You think that is was a caravan or...,” I didn’t say anything else.

She shut her eyes and sighed heavily. “That’s an idea I didn’t want to have, Short.”

“Any idea what could have happened?” Rimfire asked.

“It’s been so long, I’m afraid they may have taken him to Appleloosa, I heard that there was a ruckus there.” I could tell River was close to tears. “I just don’t know, Rimfire.”

“Tell you what,” I said, “we’re on our way to Appleloosa as it is. If we see Jade, we’ll send him along this way. Okay?”

“That’d be great, Short.” We spent the night there.

As we left I couldn’t help the feeling that River wasn’t too happy with Starburst having been there. Though, with the state of the Steel Rangers around here, that wasn’t much of a shocker. Before the New Pegasus branch of Rangers, I hadn’t met one I’d liked. We still had a long way to go to Appleloosa, another two days at the least.

I had forgotten how much more temperate this region was. I wasn’t much on meteorology but if I had to guess, it would be the increase of hills and mountains that brought down the temperature. The fact that the skies were permanetly filled with clouds couldn’t hurt either. Starburst seemed the most disconcerted by that fact. I’d never met a pony who thought that much on the clouds. We didn’t bother him about it, although it was slightly tempting.

Noon of the second day Old Appleloosa. I’d been here once or twice, but only ever in passing, and it had never looked like it did now. I didn’t recall a sturdy chainlink fence encompassing nearly the entire town, nor had there been guard patrols, each withfour well armed ponies comprising the groups. Bonfires had been lit all through the town. It looked close to daylight in the town itself. As we got closer, two of the patrols noticed us and converged to meet us. The lead pony that trotted up to meet us looked like he’d seen troubles. Half of his face was missing its coat and was riddled with deep scars. On that same side his ear was missing, only a small hole remained. His cutie-mark looked like a pair of manacles.

“You pals with that bitch?” he asked.

“Who?” I asked. He narrowed his eyes.

“If you don’t know the bitch, and you’re not a slaver, then you don’t have any business here,” he declared.

“Who’s the bitch?” I asked again.

“Little fuckin’ mare that came into town and fucked our shit and let the slaves go, but we got a plane to get her back.”

“Oh,” I said, trying to be nonchalant. “Plan?”

His eyes narrowed and he growled. “None of your damn business.”

“That’s great,” Rimfire spoke up, “but we’re looking for a pony.”

“Haven’t seen any,” the slaver said.

“Maybe you just forgot,” I said, “I heard caps are good for memory.”

His mouth turned into a greasy, sneering smile. “Now that’s something I can remember.” I used my magic to pass him forty caps. A few of the ponies looked nervous when they saw the butt of my revolver. I knew they wouldn’t directly attack, not right now. Nobody wants to start a fight with a pony who’s friends with a Steel Ranger.

“Have you seen a stallion with a deep green coat? He should have been near the railroad station about two days east of here,” Rimfire explained.

“I might have seen a slave like that,” he said. “But I don’t really-”

I cut him off. “If you say you don’t remember, I’ll blow a hole in your head.” He looked taken off guard. The ponies behind him decided to ready their guns regardless of the Steel Ranger present.

“That’s a lot of lip,” he said. “And to think, only a few more feet and you’d be my slave.”

“Is he here, or is he not?” I asked. He and I knew what would happen if he chose not to answer.

“He was,” he admitted. “But he got sent off to Manehattan.”

“When?” Rimfire asked.

“Fuck you,” he said. I took a look at the ponies behind him. Most of them had assault rifles of varying types, one had a small automatic pistol. I didn’t even have to look too hard into town to see that fighting now wouldn’t be anywhere close to a smart idea. One the roofs of several of the buildings I could glints of light, probably scopes of rifles. We weren’t going to get anything more from talking, and even less from a fight, so we had no choice but to move on. New Appleloosa wasn’t more than two hours away with a good pace, but we made it in three.

It was a ghost town. As we entered through the back with the train tracks, the only pony I could see that I instantly recognized was Crane, and he didn’t look like he was all that happy to be here. The three of us trotted up to him. He perked up as we approached.

“Crane, where is everyone?” I asked.

“They left, and for good reason,” he said.

“Why?” Rimfire asked.

“LilPip happened, but that’s old news now.”

“LilPip?” Starburst asked. The name was new to me as well.

“Stable dwelling unicorn,” Crane said. “She ran through Old Appleloosa and rolled a few heads. Now there’s just no business coming through. Everypony left because there aren’t any caps coming now. Frankly, I’m getting ready to go east.” Suddenly the increased security at Old Appleloosa made sense, and I knew who the ‘bitch’ was.

“I’m sorry to hear that, Crane,” I told him, and I was. “But when was the last slave train to come through here?”

He looked at me like I had three heads. “There hasn’t been a good slave train for about a week, Short.”

“What? But they...,” I stopped. If there was one thing I hated, it was being run-around. “Those motherfuckers,” I muttered. “Thanks for the help,” I said to Crane. The three of us walked off a bit from Crane and we huddled for a quick chat.

“Well, they got the best of us,” Starburst said.

“They sure did, Short,” Rimfire said, emphasizing my name.

“I don’t like that,” I told them.

“Duh,” Rimfire said, rolling her eyes. “The thing is, what are we going to do about it? There’s five times as many of them as us, and that’s just those patrolling it, not to mention anybody in it.” She had a point, which I hated to admit, but we weren’t going to be able to get in there in a fight.

“Any ideas?” I asked. Neither pony spoke up. “Then... we leave him?”

“I wouldn’t feel right just leaving him,” Starburst said.

“Then we definetly need a plan,” I said. The two nodded at that.

“A diversion,” Starburst said suddenly. “I can use a few of my rockets to make them chase and shoot at me. You two can use that oppurtunity to get in, get Jade, and get out.”

“You know, Starburst,” I said, “that’s almost like you plan to take on a whole town of slavers by yourself.”

“I’m pretty glad that what it sounds like,” Starburst retorted, “because that’s what it is.”

“Whoa,” Rimfire exclaimed. “Did you really think we’d let you do that?”

Starburst looked away from us. He started to rustle through his bags. “I wasn’t sure we had another plan.” From his bags he pulled out his helmet and put it on. “Unless either of you came up with one.” Neither of us had.

“Let’s just give ourselves a little but before we do that,” I said. Luckily neither of them could argue with giving it a little thinking time. On a brief walk through town, I recognized Ditzy’s shop, and it was open. I told Rimfire and Starburst I’d be right back and headed into the store. The store was just as I remembered, and it couldn’t have felt any better seeing Ditzy again. Only the fact that hugging her would consist of me wrapping myself around dead flesh stopped me. She gave a small smile when she saw me.

“Hey Ditzy,” I said as I walked through the door. “How’s things?”

She picked up her chalkboard and scribbled a little note. ‘Could be better’.

“Yeah, I heard from Crane. It’s real shitty that everybody’s leaving.” She shrugged.

‘Slavers are bad’, she wrote.

“I can agree with that,” I said.

Ditzy wrote more. ‘How’s the caravan?’

“It was a success,” I said truthfully. She didn’t have to know about the assassins and the illegal drug trafficking. Ditzy smiled, or at least did what was close to a smile for a ghoul. “Hey, did you know a ghoul who went by Ghoul?” She stopped smiling.

‘Yes.’ When she didn’t write anything else I tried to egg her on. She changed it to just ‘No.’ I dropped the topic entirely.

“Well I got a new piece,” I said, putting my revolver on the counter in front of her. From her eyes alone I could tell she thought it was nice. Raising what remained of her eyebrows, she wrote a quick message.

‘You like revolvers don’t you?’ she asked. I grinned, she should have known. I practically begged her to let me buy my first .32 from her. She went below the counter and pulled up a large revolver. It wasn’t much longer than a snub nose, but it was wider and taller. I picked it up with my magic and inspected it. Pulling out the cylinder revealed that is used some sort of shotgun shell instead of bullets. I put it back down.

“How much?” I asked. It looked like a great piece. I’d be proud to place it along my Luna.

She scribbled, ‘On the house for succ. caravan.’ I could feel my cheeks flush.

“You don’t have to do that,” I said. Although it looked like she wasn’t going to take no for an answer, but I was too proud to take something for free, especially from Ditzy. I reached into my bag, and pulled the last of the caps I had. Even as I pulled it out I could tell it probably didn’t have enough caps to pay any price for the gun. Ditzy ignored the caps and pushed the gun closer to me with her hoof. “No way I’m just going to pay for this then?”

‘Nope,’ she wrote.

“Then how about a holster and some ammo?” I asked. Finally she conceded and put a leg holster on the counter with some shells. I’d always been partial to the side holster, but the leg holsters did fascinate me. It was essentially a band of leather with a buckle that secured itself above the hoof. The holster for the gun lay on the inside of the step, and around the rest of the strap were loops for ammo. I could tell that the revolver was made for this because the loops had been enlarged for shells. I took the holster, put it on my leg and then slid the revolver and shells in. It was a little strange having a couple pounds resting on my leg, but it wasn’t terrible, and I’d get used to it. When I looked back on the counter, the caps were gone. “What do you call this thing?”

She wrote, ‘Cloudsdale.’

“Why? Remembrance?” Ditzy nodded. As much as I loved chatting with her, I knew it couldn’t. I had business to attend to. Rimfire and Starburst were waiting for me outside. “Are we ready?” I asked.

“For lack of a better plan, yeah,” Rimfire said, I could hear total disappointment in her voice. I was worried about it too. She looked at my new holster and gun. “Eh?” she asked, gesturing towards it.

“It’s the Cloudsdale, a new revolver. I got it from Ditzy.”

“Ahem,” Starburst grunted, “but the sun’s going to set soon. We should get a move on.” He had been right, and when we got within a hundred yards of Old Appaloosa dusk had arrived. Starburst kept walking when we stopped. Neither Rimfire nor I liked this plan, but it was all we had. He turned back to us quickly, I wish I could see his eyes now more than ever, but he’d put his helmet on. “Relax, this armor’s good.”

When he was only fifty yards from the fence, patrols were converging on him, and I could see, with the help of the bonfires, the scopes of the snipers aiming towards him. One of the slavers approached him cautiously. I tried to make out if it was the same one as before, but I wasn’t able to. Starburst didn’t wait to be talked to, he let loose with both of his machine guns. A few of the slaver who had held back were able to dodge or jump out of the way, but a majority of them were quickly riddled with bullets. The slaver who had approached him was the most unfortunate. A fine red mist was gushing from his as Starburst shot, splattering his friends with splashes of blood. The stunned snipers started to fire, but their shots weren’t strong enough to pierce through the power armor. Starburst shot two missiles, one at a cluster of snipers on the roofs, and another at the gate in fence. The roof exploded sending bodies flying. The gate was blown open. Starburst took off to the side, shooting randomly into the town. Ponies were streaming out of the buildings and taking chase.

Rimfire and I started to creep up towards the hole in fence. Nobody paid us any mind as we passed through. There was screaming and explosions creating a din where I knew trying to talk to Rimfire would be useless. Around us were small, wooden and metal buildings. In the middle of the town we could see a larger building. I tapped Rimfire on the back and pointed towards the building. She nodded and took off towards it in a run.

When we got closer I could make out more of the details. It looked like it had been a large saloon, maybe three stories tall. It was mostly wood, but some of it had been patch with scrap metal. The front of the building had four sets of double doors. On either side were two guards. They looked incredibly uncomfortable to be there. We scouted the all around but there were only the four doors. Rimfire drew her assault rifle, I took out the Cloudsdale. It only had five shells, but I could easily swap for the Luna if I didn’t have time to reload. The Cloudsdale was a good pound heavier than my other revolver, so I couldn’t be as agile with it. But then again, if I shot first I wouldn’t need to dodge. Rimfire and I were standing around the corner from the two guards. They were on a small patio that extended from the front of the saloon. I leapt onto the steps, gun raised. The guard closest to me saw me first. They were both mares.

The first guard swung the barrel of her shotgun at me, but I was ready for her. My first blast caught her in the chest, throwing her back a few inches and taking her off her legs. The second guard had taken notice and was pulling around with the pistol gripped tightly in her mouth. I took a shot at her but it glanced the side of her face, taking some ear with it. She fired a burst of three shots at me, two getting me on the side of my chest, knocking the wind right out of me, the third missed. I shot again at her, this time she fell back and didn’t get up. I looked down, the two bullets were embedded on the metal inserts of my new armor. Rimfire stepped onto the patio after me. She pushed one of the doors open and it swung in easily.

The room looked like it’s seen happier days. Broken tables and chairs occupied the sides of the rooms. In the center there were large, metal spikes which had been jammed into the ground and ponies were chained to the spikes. In the back of the room, on a stage, were a pile of explosives the likes of which I’d never seen before. I looked at the dirty and chained ponies.

“Do you see Jade?” I asked Rimfire, it was quiet enough on the inside to hear each other. In fact, it had become awfully quiet even during the quick shootout.

She must have noticed it too. “Starburst must be in danger!”

“Look for Jade first,” I said quickly. The two of us took to the slaves. Most of them shied away from our glances, some just laid there.

“Here he is!” Rimfire exclaimed. I hurried around to her and looked at the stallion she’d found. There we was, plain as day. His coat was dirty, nearly unrecognizable from a distance. Rimfire was fiddling with the lock to the chain around his neck. “I can’t get it off,” she said. Neither of us were particularly good at picking locks.

“Can we blow off the chain?” I asked her. She shook her head.

“There’s not enough chain. We’d likely blow his head off.” I cursed sourly. There wasn’t anything to cut it with, and as Rimfire said, using a bomb was right out. Our meddling must have roused him from his stupor. He started to freak out even as Rimfire tried to help.

“What the fuck! What the fuck!” he yelled. The other ponies started to move around as well.

“Shut it!” I yelled, firing the Cloudsdale upwards towards the ceiling. “Where’s the key?” I asked. Nobody spoke up. I rubbed my temple, wishing we’d picked up a laser pistol or something. “Fucking A,” I cursed again. I heard a clattering and a manacle fell to the ground. Rimfire had succeeded at the lock.

“I didn’t think I could do that,” she said happily. Jade got up, his breathing heavy, nearly a wheeze.

“Rimfire?” he asked, looking at her frantically. She nodded.

“I’m really glad to see you,” he said.

I butted in. “We need to get out of here.”

“But what about the rest of them?” Jade asked. “They deserve life too!”

“We don’t have time, Jade! If we don’t go now,” I said angrily.

“You’ll die the same,” A voice came from the stage. I looked up to see a gaunt, white-coated mare standing on top of the pile of explosives. “Hmm, you’re not that horrible, nasty mare.”

“Who are you?” I asked. Rimfire and Jade were backing up towards the entrance. The mare eyed them cautiously.

“I’m no one, a slaver. A slave. Who are you? You are not her.” I’d had just about enough of her mystic nonsense. I drew my revolver and took aim, but she spoke up. “Kill me and we all die. For we are all linked.”

“Well you seem to be standing between us and going home,” I said cooly. The mare smiled.

“I don’t care who you are, you are not her. The slave isn’t her either. Go.” The three of us turned tail and ran.

New Appleloosa was in chaos. Slavers were screaming, running to and fro, putting out fires, trying to set up fire lines. We ran out of the town. Our only cover was hoping that no one would bother with us. Luckily they didn’t.

We sent Jade off on his way halfway to Appleloosa. We hadn’t met up with Starburst yet, but we’d prepared for that. Rimfire and I would stay in town until noon of tomorrow waiting for him. If he hadn’t returned by then, well, he’d know the risks, and so had we.

Ditzy was happy to let us stay the night. She put us up in her guest room. There was a small mare in the room when we walked in. She ran out of the room when she saw us. I wondered if Ditzy knew she had a squatter. I shrugged it off, she was probably looking at it for someone. Rimfire and I shared the sole bed as we went to sleep.

We were awoken by knocking at the door. I stumbled out of bed and opened it. Starburst stood on the other side of the threshold. It looked like he’d seen better days. His armor looked chewed up, and some dents still had fragments of bullets in them. Even the visor on his helmet was cracked, the impact set right between where his eyes would be.

“Morning, Short,” he said to me. “I take it you slept well. Is he okay?”

“Howdy, Starburst. Jade is fine, we sent him on his way. He’ll probably think twice about chasing ‘caravans’.” I let Starburst into the room and he made a beeline for the bed. On arrival he hefted himself onto it and laid back. The metal frame creaked under the massive weight, but didn’t break. He took off his helmet and let it fall to the side. A few shards of glass came loose when it hit the floor.

“Did you figure out what they were doing?” he asked us. Both Rimfire and I said no. Rimfire said it with more a grunt, she was still trying to hold onto sleep. “They were setting a trap for some mare. Apparently she made a huge mess over there.”

“Why would they bother so much for one mare?” I asked. He shrugged.

“Couldn’t tell you, Short. All I know is I wouldn’t want to be her if she came back.”

“Where di’ you hear tha’?” Rimfire asked groggily. She had taken her head out from under the pillows.

“While I was hiding for the night, I heard a little. They thought I was with her or her. It wasn’t really clear.”

“We should see if we can hitch a train out of here. Otherwise it’s a long walk to Baltimare,” I said.

“You two get that set up,” Starburst said. “I need to get some metal for my armor.” I nodded and proceeded to rouse Rimfire. After only a few moments of her holding her hoof to my face she got up. The two of us saddled up and walked downstairs to see Ditzy trying to communicate with the little mare. Again when she saw us she bolted.

“What’s up with that?” I asked Ditzy.

‘Adopted,’ she scribbled.

“Congratulations,” I said to her. Rimfire was nonchalant. “We’re going to see if we can’t take a train to Baltimare. Thank you so much for letting us stay.” She just smiled. “Oh, and Starburst is upstairs, he’s a big Steel Ranger. If you wouldn’t mind could you just rustle up some scrap metal so he can fix his armor?”

‘Of course,’ she wrote.

“Thanks Ditzy.” Rimfire and I exited the building and walked into the bright day.

“She adopted?” Rimfire asked as we walked towards the train tracks.

“I guess so. Don’t know where she found an earth pony kid though.” I had never heard much about adopting in the wastes, but then again, Ditzy was pretty special. When he came into view, Crane was busy loading cargo into a train cart.

“Hey,” he called over to us.

“How much to Baltimare?” Rimfire asked before I could.

“Baltimare? Eh, for you, hundred caps a head.”

“That’s a lot,” I said.

He shrugged. “You could walk.” It was a couple days to Baltimare and then to Manehattan.

“We’ll pay,” I assured him. “But how much to Manehattan after that?”

Crane laughed. “No price, Short. That you will have to walk. I’m in a big enough risk just letting you to Baltimare.” Starburst joined us at this point. His armor wasn’t quite slick or shining, but it was repaired at least. It was settled. That fastest way to Baltimare was the train, and that’d just under four hours.

“We’re in,” I said.

The train wasn’t fancy, and it sure wasn’t comfortable. The three of us had been loaded in with the cargo, which seemed to be all the train was loaded with. There were seven of the train carts, and we were in the second last. The ride wasn’t smooth and there wasn’t anything to hold on to except for the crates of ‘merchandise’. Crane had been very specific in telling us not to open them.

“Are we almost there yet?” Rimfire asked.

“Soon,” Starburst told her. He was laying against a couple of burlap sacks. Black powder was leaking out of the poorly secured tops. None of us could make out what it was.

“How soon?” she asked insistently.

I looked out the side of the train cart. It had window-like slits every couple of feet. The difference in scenery was startling. Instead of long, rolling hills and expanses of sand and dirt there was a city.

“We might be there,” I said. I was right, I could feel the breaks engaging and the massive train coming to a slow.

I’d never been to Baltimare, and there wasn’t much I knew about it besides stories and tales I’d heard from other travellers. Word had it that before the Balefire bombs dropped Baltimare was a center of peace protests, ponies trying to stop the war. All that’s really known now is that didn’t stop the explosions. The city was built in a large circle. The tallest buildings in the center, all of which grew shorter and shorter the further you got out. Nearly a quarter of the city ended at the coast and the docks here were used to mass produce navy ships.

The bombs had left it an entirely different city. Ponies from all around tell the dangers of Baltimare. The underground was filled to the brim with ghouls. There hadn’t been nearly enough Stable space in or around the city, so the subways had been the only chance of safety. The first bomb had detonated in the center of the city. Whole buildings had crumbled, creating a domino effect that left many streets closed. Trying to take paths through buildings would lead to potential cave-ins. There was only one stable settlement in Baltimare, Avacyn. Avacyn was full of ponies who just wanted to keep everyone safe. The group based themselves in one of the hotels that had stood through the war. At night, the lights from Avacyn could be seen throughout the city. Every pony was welcome within the walls, as long as you didn’t make trouble.

The train station we arrived at was halfway between the center and the suburbs of Baltimare. The air itself whipped through the city, as if it there was always a storm brewing. The door on the cargo hold was opened and we were greeted by a dark, blonde mare. One of her eyes was covered by a band of leather that wrapped around her head. She motioned with a hoof for us to get moving.

As we left I said, “Thanks for the ride.” The mare only grunted at us. The platform we stood on was made of cracked brick and rotted wood. The ponies that worked for Crane, I assumed, were too busy unloading the carriage to deal with us. It looked like we were on our own now.

I took a good look of the surroundings. Behind us the train tracks disappeared down into some tunnels. The platform was on the side of a long road that I guess stretched through the city itself. It went towards the center of the city for two blocks before the road was block from a collapsed skyscraper. Only the top of the building had fallen, the rest of it was leaning precariously though. It wouldn’t last more than a couple years. Every other street that could have branched off was blocked by a menagerie of debris.

“Well Short, now what?” Rimfire asked.

“We need to go north,” I said.

“Any plan on how to do that?” Starburst asked.

“Not really, the tracks from here on out look to be broken.”

“We could try and just forge ahead,” Rimfire suggested.

“We’ll have to be careful,” Starburst said. “This place looks like it will fall over if the wind gets any stronger.” He wasn’t wrong. The sound of creaking metal and falling bricks dominated the environment.

The three of us took the only open street. It only lasted two blocks in one direction before we had to take a right down ‘10th avenue’. This road lasted only a single block before it ended. There weren’t anymore paths available.

“What the hell?” Rimfire asked. “Where do we go?” She groaned before Starburst or I could tell her. We were going into the sewers. The closest grate lay next to a fire hydrant in front of an old saddle store. The three of us walked over and I inspected the grate. Nothing looked out of the ordinary so I used my magic to try it up. As I placed it to the side the metal on concrete sent echoes of scraping through the immediate area. The now clear hole in the ground was covered on every side with metal plating. Occupying a fraction of the tunnel were metal rungs that appeared to go all the way down. Starburst went first. He took a few of the rungs and glanced down, then he jumped. A splash accompanied the sound of his armored hooves hitting the floor. Rimfire climbed down next, she took every rung one at a time. Then it was time for me to go. I eased up to the side of the ladder and put my back legs securely onto rungs. Next I carefully hooked my free hoof onto the top rung, my PipBuck made it nearly impossible to slide between the metals. My descension wasn’t quick but it did the trick, and I soon felt the water around my legs. The water wasn’t high, only two inches at the most.

We were in the sewer system, and 200 years with no maintenance hadn’t left it a pretty sight. The water looked fetid and stagnant and stalactites were beginning to form on the ceilings. My E.F.S was showing red dots, but I guessed they were just radroaches. The tunnel stretched on for who knows how long, we couldn’t even see that far. The only available lights were those on Starburst’s armor, the one I’d dutifully kept on Luna and a small flashlight Rimfire had picked up. Even then we couldn’t see more than 100 feet ahead of us. What we could was that every block on the upper level coincided with a split in the sewer system.

“We’re not staying down here are we?” Rimfire asked.

“I don’t see a better way,” I said.

“I doubt the entire subsystem down here is intact, you two,” Starburst said. “We’ll probably find collapses down here; you know, blocked passages, and open ways to the tunnels below and street above.”

“Yeah?” I asked.

He nodded. “I can only assume they’d have put the sewers and subways near each other.” He was probably right.

“Have you been here before?” I asked them both, even though I was pretty sure Rimfire hadn’t.

“I’d never even been halfway to Appleloosa from New Pegasus until I met you, Short,” Starburst said.

“What about you, Short?” Rimfire asked. “How did you even meet Church unless you’d been to Manehattan?”

“I never actually meet Church, just one of his lackeys looking for somebody.”

“Then how the hell are we supposed to find him?” she asked, her voice rising with anger.

“We’ll figure it out when we get there,” I said adamantly.

“Holy shit, Short! You just took us all the way across Equestria and we’re just ‘going with it’?” I shrugged. “Fuck,” she muttered.

Starburst didn’t have anything to add so we started down the tunnel. While we walked down through the tunnel, our only really guide was my E.F.S which we used to find north. Red marks passed around us, but we never saw anything that looked particularly nasty.

“You two ever fought a hellhound?” Starburst asked after several minutes of walking.

“Not really,” I said, Rimfire was silent.

Starburst carefully avoided a skeletal rib cage that protruded from the water before responding. “They live on this coast. Terrible things.” Rimfire and I exchanged glances.

“Yeah,” she said. “Any reason in particular?”

“Of course there’s a reason. One’s been following us since we came down here.” I froze and grabbed for both my guns, Rimfire grabbed her rifle. Starburst didn’t seem to mind.

“Why didn’t you mention something?” I asked, tension in my voice barely contained. I drew both revolvers. I didn’t know many unicorns who could handle two guns, and I wasn’t sure I could do it either. But if there was a Hellhound around, I’d need them both. I swept around looking at every dot on my compass.

“Didn’t seem that important,” he said noncommittally.

“Are you out of your mind?” Rimfire asked, practically screaming at the stallion. Her voice echoed through the tunnels.

“Nope, it didn’t attack when we entered, and it still hasn’t.”

“So?” I asked. He scoffed at me. “Maybe it’s waiting for help.”

“Even a single Hellhound could have taken us out and would be well on his way by now, and he wouldn't think twice.” Starburst stopped in the middle of a junction. “He probably doesn’t want a fight.” something rumbled under our hooves, sending ripples through the water. Between Rimfire and I, a crack opened and water began to drain incredibly slowly. I looked at the crack. My compass showed a red dot in that direction. I suppose that was the problem with E.F.S, it only said a direction, not how close, not whether it’s above or below you.

“What do you think it wants?” I asked. There was another rumble around us, the crack lengthened and more water began to drain.

“Couldn’t tell you,” Starburst said. The ground rumbled once more and the crack began to expand as if a lightning strike, growing to the length of the block above us. Tiny fractures started to blossom from the main line, spreading to the sides and up the walls. Before the ground even gave way I leapt at the wall hoping for purchase, but when my back legs found nothing below them I tumbled down. My armor blunted most of the damage from falling on the crumbled rock.

I got off my back and looked around. Water from above was gushing into the new hole, causing a downpour on my head. I ducked to the side and looked for the other two. Rimfire was already rousing and getting onto her hoof. Starburst was a bit further ahead, from his head down he looked fine, until I got to his midsection- everything past that was covered in rock.

“Starburst!” I yelled and bounded over. I used my magic and grabbed a hold of any chunk of rock that I could, trying my best to get them off the Steel Ranger. I felt a large paw on my shoulder, and could see the wicked tips of claws out of the corner of my eye.

“Let me get him,” a gruff voice said. I stepped back breathing lightly and quick. A lumbering Hellhound strode past and started to dig into the rock. I was worried his claws would decimate Starburst, but the stallion was soon free and unscathed. When the Hellhound stepped away, I heard a burst come from Rimfire’s gun. Before even I could react, the hound had one of it’s long arms in front of its head, blocking the bullets which seemed to reflect harmlessly off its coat.

“Rimfire stop!” Starburst admonished the mare. She lowered her gun but I could see her trembling in a mixture of fear and rage. The Hellhound lowered his forearm. Its back so bent that its arms dragged on the ground. I’d never seen another Hellhound, at least up close, so I wasn’t sure it this was common. I spotted a small shine in the rubble and investigated. My two revolvers had fallen side by side. I picked up and holstered them both.

“What are you doing?” I asked the beast. He snarled but didn’t move to attack.

“I was watching,” he said.

“Why did you bring us down here?” Rimfire asked.

“These tunnels are better.”

“What?” I asked. I took my eyes off the Hellhound and looked around. We were in the subway system. There were two sets of tracks, each on the flat ground. The ceiling was constructed like a half-pipe. Along the apex of the arch, thick pylons of cables ran down the tunnel. The hole the Hellhound had made for us was just off the cable strip.

“Upper tunnels blocked. Lower tunnels not blocked,” was all the Hellhound said. I looked forward from us, the tunnel went north for a few dozen yards, but veered to the east soon after that. Off in the distance the low moan of ghouls could be heard.

“Do you even know where we’re going?” I asked without turning to the hound. He didn’t say anything so I turned to him. He was gone, in his place was a deep, dark hole. “Well then,” I muttered.

“That was reckless, Starburst,” Rimfire said.

“I know, but we’re not dead, so I figure it was an okay assumption.”

“Still pretty dangerous, Starburst,” Rimfire told him. He turned to her, his eyes narrowed in anger.

“Yeah it was dangerous, so is fighting the damn thing! You think we were in any shape to fight that thing? We were underground in it’s fucking territory Rimfire!” I’d never heard Starburst so angry. “It would have killed us in a moment, even before we came down the sewers, but it didn’t. And if we tried to fight back? There wasn’t any room for us to get a line of sight or a line of fire. My rockets would have killed us before they killed him!”

“Starburst, relax!” I said, raising my voice.

It didn’t stop him. “Did you even think what the pressure wave of rockets exploding would have done to us let alone it?” Rimfire turned away from him and closed her eyes. I walked up to Starburst and tried to knock him off. His armor felt like it was made of lead and he didn’t budge. “Damn it!” He screamed. “Do either of you think that maybe it’s best not to just shoot things? Is that all you wastelanders do?”

“Hellhounds kill, Starburst,” Rimfire said barely audibly. “We didn’t want to die.”

“I’m sure as hell that it wouldn’t want to die either, in fact, I couldn’t tell you the name of anypony that I met that wanted to die,” he said.

“Everyone shut up!” I screamed. My words echoed deep through the tunnels, over the sound of the rushing waters from above. “We didn’t come here to fight. Now I’m not sure that keeping the fact that there was a hellhound silent was the best idea, but it worked. Now lay the fuck off Rimfire.”

Starburst looked at me darkly, but his eyes softened after I finished speaking. He let out a heavy breath. “I’m... sorry,” he said. I could tell he meant. He stood still for another moment, his only movement were his eyes. After only a couple seconds he let out a completely relieved sigh. “I think I’m having a bit of a chem problem.”

“But you just got them filled up,” Rimfire said slowly.

“Yes, I did. And I’m already half out of Mint-als. I think I’m addicted.” No one said anything, we’d all heard the dangers of addiction and withdrawal. Anger, hallucinations, and in the end, death.

“How long can you go on what you have?” I asked.

“Won’t be able to get out of Baltimare at this rate. We need to get Fixer, now.” A pit opened in the bottom of my stomach. Fixer had been rare enough before the war, and getting it now would take hundreds of caps. Even then it wouldn’t do the same as a doctor could.

“How did it happen?” Rimfire asked.

“During the fight at Old Appleloosa something must have hit my chem manager, or maybe some magic. I didn’t see. Whatever happened it just went haywire and started giving me doses of Mint-al. I thought it was normal, at first. But when morning came, it had kept though the night. I tried to turn it off, I did, and I made it for a few hours. But I could barely walk Short. When I made it back to the room, I felt like I was dying. I turned back on the pump and here we are.”

“I’m sorry, Starburst. We’ll find some fixer,” I told him. There was only problem, I had no idea where to find fixer. Avacyn could possibly have some, but I doubted they’d just give it out to strangers. There wasn’t any other option. I dove into the map on my PipBuck and started to search.

“What are you doing, Short?” Rimfire asked.

“Looking for Avacyn,” I told her.

“I wouldn’t be on there,” Starburst said. His voice had become normal again. “That map’s pre-war. Avacyn came long after that.” I exited out of the map and put my hoof down. He had a good point.

“Then how do we find it?” I asked. It was too late to ask the Hellhound, as if he’d even know.

“Shouldn’t it be nearer to the center of the city?” Rimfire asked. “We just need to head that way. There might be signs.” That was our plan. Rimfire shouldered her gun and we started to walk down the tracks that bent towards the east; walking towards the heart of Baltimare.

The sub tunnels were mostly intact, more so than the sewers had been from what we’d seen. It was a uniform design. Long, stretching tunnels in the darkness, two sets of tracks at all times. Long strands of cables ran along the ceiling at the apex. At some points there were lights, a few of them flickered with life, but most of them were black. It was pitch black for the most part. Luckily we each had some form of flashlight with us, so it wasn’t all that bad. Every so often we’d be deterred from walking between the tracks by the wreckages or broken husk of old subway cars. I made a point to look into a few of them, who knows what might be in them.

It was only a certain one that caught my eye. In one car, no real distinguishing features, I saw a small glowing sphere near the hooves of a skeletal pony.

“Guys,” I said, “there’s a memory orb in there.” Only Starburst seemed interested in the orb, Rimfire didn’t react much. I lifted myself through the window of the car. The glass had long since broken and it posed little risk to me, still, I was careful not to get cut if I could manage it.

The car itself had no other connections, it was all alone of the track. It was thirty feet long with benches on both sides. Skeletons lay on the seats and on the flooring. The covers of the seats looked like they’d been burned away a long time ago. The skeleton with the orb lay on the ground next to a smaller set of bones, probably a foal. I rolled the orb with my hoof and it moved a little ways away, coming to a rest on the ribcage of the larger pony. I took a deep breath and reached for the orb with my magic. It felt like I’d thrown myself into a tub of ice-cold water.

***

I knew what a memory orb did, but I’d never been in on. I was in the subway car, but it still wasn’t moving. Around me, ponies were screaming and cry. I was laying on the ground looking intently at a small male foal. He had his head buried into my chest.

“It’s okay, Radiant,” I said to the foal. My voice was soft and feminine, yet I could detect wavering. Above us I could hear the thumping of explosions and the subway car rattled with the shockwaves.

“What’s going to happen, mom?” he asked, his voice timid and muffled through my coat.

“We’re just going to sit down here for a little while, and then we're going back up to go home.” He took his head out of my fur and looked at me. His eyes were the deepest blue I’d ever seen.

“What are you doing, mom? You’re horn is glowing.”

I could feel myself smile. “I’m taking a little memory for Daddy when we see him, Radiant. Won’t he be happy to see you?” I asked. Radiant smiled.

A mare in the front of the car started to scream, and it began to be echoed by every pony down the cart. In the distance a great glowing fireball was racing towards us. The mare I was in pulled her kid close to her.

“Don’t look, baby,” was all I could manage before the tickle of heat reached me.

***

I opened my eyes to see myself staring into the empty sockets of the mother’s skull. I almost sobbed at the memory I’d just shared. Rimfire was looking at me, concern on her face. Starburst was lying next to me, his cool armor felt really good now. I got to my legs, Starburst followed suit.

“What was it?” he asked me. I had to get my thoughts straight before I answered him. My head was spinning, I wasn’t even sure I was myself.

“It was, uh, a mare and her child, huddling in this car from something,” I said finally.

“Rough,” was all he said. I crawled back out of the carriage’s window and fell to my feet on the stone and rock floor of the cave. The sounds of my hooves hitting and pushing rock against each other echoed through the car. There was a low growl in response somewhere deep in front of us.

We didn’t have a real map of the place, but my PipBuck told us what we could expect, if only a short distance away. The closest thing to us looked to be some sort of room off to the side of the tracks. The map feature only gave general shapes, and nothing had labels of any sort. We left the carriage and moved on.

There was nothing of note until we reached the room that PipBuck had shown. Instead of some storage or electronic room it was a station. The platform wasn’t large, it could have fit maybe fifty ponies if they were all acting friendly. The stairs up to the back left were barricaded with metal benches and trash cans. It looked like they had all melted together from a large blast of heat. There were skeletons of a couple ponies next to the barricade.

The three of us bounded into the elevated platform and had a look around. There were a couple bodies here and there, each of their bones were charred and surrounded by thin layers of dust or ash. Anything that looked to be of value was burnt or rusted beyond belief. There was a hole in the barricade big enough for a pony to crawl through if he sucked his gut in. Rimfire and I would have next to no problem getting by, but Starburst would have to strip or stay back.

“Want to try for it? See where we’re at?” Rimfire asked. She was mostly looking at me.

“Just me? You two down here?” I asked. She nodded.

“You have the PipBuck, just get up there and see if you can see Avacyn. It was built into a large hotel.”

“Did it keep the same name?” Starburst asked. His voice sounded a little weak, like he was getting a cold or something. Rimfire and I shrugged. I gritted my teeth, the plan was set. I tightened my belt, took off my saddlebags, and started to pull myself into the crevice. Outcroppings of metal clawed at my armor and I could feel the spikes digging into my fur and flesh.

I dropped to the ground on the other side of the barrier mostly unscathed. My armor had a few superficial tears but otherwise I was completely fine. My armor inspection was cut short by the sound of laughter above me. I twisted my head forward. I was still underground technically. I was on the staircase that lead below the surface. Above me was the clouded sky of the wastes. I took the stairs two at a time. My E.F.S showed nothing red so I was a little reckless.

Around me was an open park. Smiling ponies and brown trees thick with leaves. Laughter carried on the wind from all around. There were sky carriages in the air being pulled by pegasi. No rubble, no skeletons, no decay anywhere in sight. I saw foals playing the jungle gyms. Mothers and fathers were giving their children ice cream, balloons, whatever they wanted to their hearts content. There wasn’t a single sad face in the crown. I felt myself catching a cry for my friends to come on up.

I cleared my eyes, blinking furiously and taking my foreleg to wipe them. When I opened my eyes it was gone, all of it. It was a bleak, black, burnt opening. There weren’t any skeletons here, just ash and debris of things long since gone. Shriveled stalks of trees dotted the brown landscape. I took a few cautious steps off the sidewalk onto the ground. It felt a lot better than the sand, dirt, or rough grass that grew in the wastes.

The buildings had grown several stories taller in general since we’d gone underground. We must be getting closer to the center of Baltimare. I scanned the horizons, looking for any sort of sign. My PipBuck hadn’t said anything of a hotel called Avacyn or something of the like. A shining light caught my eye. In the distance towards the east, where the buildings were taller still, a searchlight scanned the clouds. It travelled the sky in a lazy circle, sometimes revealing and holding onto a dark patch in the sky before continuing its circuit. I looked at the building, trying to find any discernable features. I thought I saw a little of the letter ‘A’ on it, but I wasn’t sure. I turned back to get down into the subway but a large, dark pony stood in front of me.

It stood twice as tall as me with a dark blue coat. The first thing that caught my eye was the long horn, twice as long as its head and ending in a sharp point. Its deep black eyes locked on to me. Something rustled along its side, wings, I saw. A terrible though rushed through my head, alicorn.

I’d heard rumors of alicorns appearing in the wastes before, but I’d never seen one. What I knew was that they were dangerous and not afraid to kill. In fact, they were pretty good at killing. Some ponies said they could teleport, others say they could turn invisible. Some even said they had shields powerful enough to stop Balefire. All those rumors told me I was in a world of trouble.

The mare, it looked like a mare at least, didn’t say anything was it looked at me. It was standing directly between me and the way to my friends. I knew I only had one chance, and I needed to make it count.

I grabbed for the Cloudsdale, it was closest to hand, and rolled to my left. The mare kept its gaze on me as I brought the gun forward and pulled the hammer back. Nothing. It didn’t move and neither did I. “Why wasn’t it doing anything?” I thought quickly, but I knew it was no time to delay if I wanted to live. After all, there was a reason these things were only rumored about. I took a shot and rolled to my left again before I saw what the shot did. When I found my ground I stood up and jerked back to the alicorn. It was gone.

I lowered my gun, E.F.S had nothing in front of me. That, of course, didn’t stop a rather large rock hitting me on my midsection and throwing me to the ground. As best I could, I wheeled around to look for an attacker. None could be seen. “Must be invisible,” I thought. I only looked up with just enough to be able to dodge another rock, this one coming straight down in my head. The tip of my ear got caught under and I could feel the tearing flesh as I moved my head. I got off my back and strafed the park at a run. No matter where I turned E.F.S said nothing to me.

More projectiles were thrown at me as I ran. I dodged most, but I got bludgeoned a few time, never seriously. A hit on my hind leg told me I couldn’t keep this up, I had to do something. I thought back, anything I could do to make this thing visible. I wasn’t sure I had anything like that, but I did have dynamite!

I nearly kicked myself when I remembered it was back in my pack in the station. I had to have something on me, anything. I ran and gave myself a telekinetic pat-down. Strapped under my gun belt along my back I felt a small case. I pulled it out and looked at it. It was a nearly empty case of mint-als. I wasn’t sure how it had gotten there but I wasn’t about to ask. I popped a few of the chalky tabs in my mouth and swallowed hard.

A calm, soothing feeling hit my mind like a tidal wave. This alicorn wasn’t a death sentence, instead it was a chance to learn. Invisibility didn’t stop it from making sounds or impressions. Since it had disappeared the only sounds had come from me and the sound of rocks hitting me and around me, so it wasn’t flying. I scanned the brittle grass for indents. I saw four a little ways in front of me. Luckily I’d been strafing around the alicorn in the first place. I readied my Cloudsdale for when I got closer.

A piece of steel from some rubble was coming right for me, but I wasn’t about to let that hit me now, I had plenty of time to dodge, and I did. I turned my attention to the alicorn, she was probably trying to find something to hit me with, but she’d be too late. I got within ten paces and let loose with three shells. The first one seemed to stop in mid air and send a ripple through the surrounding area. Slowly, the body of the alicorn appeared around the pellets. Then the other two shells connected in the same area. Twice I’d hit her in the chest and once in the upper leg. A thick, black fluid dripped to the floor.

The alicorn didn’t make any reaction, but her horn began to glow again. Instead of her finding another object to hit me with I felt my hooves leave the ground. This wasn’t good, I knew, but I also knew that this was a piece of cake. Chems are a crazy thing.

I took another shot with the Cloudsdale and this time the pellets sparked against her horn, but didn’t stop the magic. I dropped the revolver and grabbed the Luna. This gun, being a double action, meant I could just go crazy on the alicorn. And I did.

Six .44 rounds I put to her head. Two of them only grazed, but that had been close enough for me. I felt her telekinesis on me falter and I fell back onto the ground with a thud. I leapt off the ground as soon as I knew my legs would support me. But the alicorn was gone, and I had a feeling she’d stay gone this time.

End of Chapter 8!

Level up!

Guns 60 Explosives 25

Perk Gained: Twice the Fun!(You can now wield two handguns using magic. Accuracy slightly reduced when doing so.)