"So, what's your story? and more importantly, how did you manage to get behind those security doors?"

Des, an emaciated olive green unicorn buck, asked me, fixing what little of his mustard yellow mane was left on his head as best he could; from what i learned, one of the raiders who attacked their trading caravan had set fire to it with a flamer, but he managed to extinguish it before any serious damage was done. Well, not counting the fact his mane now looked like a ridiculous tupee made of burnt hair and awkward.

I had regained conciousness a couple minutes earlier thanks to a little electric shock administered by one of my implants -an emergency warning to remind me of the critical status on my energy reserves- and had been discreetely eavesdropping until somepony noticed my half open eye. Rain was falling heavily all around the entrance of the cave I had been carried into to hide from any associates of the three i had killed earlier. Well, two and a half, since the unicorn mare, Spark, had blown the last one's head while i was distracting him -and by that i mean 'about to get my hind end kicked so hard it would have become my front end'- and had given the last rites to the chainsaw-wielding psycho in the form of eleven bullets evenly spread between chest, neck and face. Judging by the way she was now standing in a dark corner softly crying and trying to suppress her sobs, the poor mare had probably never killed anything before that.

"Easy with the interrogation, Inspector Dumbass. If this gentlecolt hadn't decided to appear out of nowhere and single-hoofedly take on all three of those brutes we'd all be dead by now."

The buck flinched at the scolding tone of his companion, a tan mare with a long silver mane, sitting in the centre of the cave busying herself with setting up a campfire and, at the same time, giving all the attention she could to the teal filly hugging her, who hadn't taken her eyes off me for as long as I had been awake.

"Don't mind my traveling companion's manners, he's still on edge after the events of this evening." the mare said, turning her attention to me and locking two amazingly beautiful eyes of the deepest emerald green on mine "I'm Silver Skip, and this" she looked down on the filly and ruffled her blonde mane, making her giggle adorably "is Sunflower."

That laughter, bright and joyful, brought the first genuine smile in weeks to my lips -ok, technically two hundred years plus weeks, but eh, semanthics-

"Name's Blaze. It's a pleasure to meet you." I raised my head from the little nod i greeted the polite mare with to address my 'interrogator'.

I took one more moment to ponder what I could have said, and somehow 'I'm an Equestrian Military officer cyberpony battlemage who is also apparently a time traveler' didn't seem a really good idea, so I went for the next best thing.

"Answering your question, I am what you might call a vagrant soul. I happened to pass through the area, found the entrance, much like you did, and hacked into the door terminal to take a peek inside."

Eh, good enough. at least you didn't go for the clichèd 'I don't know' and faked an amnesia or something.

Thanks, just went for the first thing going through my head.

I would have taken a minute to think about how profoundly weird having a conversation with a part of my mind sounding like a minotaur speaking from the bottom of a well made of stone, darkness and creepy was, if I wasn't busy having a real conversation with a flesh and blood partner who could prove himself my best source of information on questions like 'is there any town around here?', 'where can i find a decent lunch with some complimentary gemstones?' and most importantly 'are psychotic mares with just a hooffull of working brain cells and armed with chainsaws a common thing?'.

"So, you found an unmarked, underground military bunker..."

Des crossed his forehooves, looking me straight in the eye.

"Yes..."

I raised my eyebrow, wearing an expression that did nothing short of yelling 'DUH', stalling to see what he was aiming at and thinking of a more reasonable explaination.

"... coming from Goddesses know where and crossing on raider-infested territory and thought it would be fun to explore just for the sake of it..."

"Yes... ?"

Raiders; that must have been what lil' miss psycho back there was.

"...hacked into one of the most ridiculously complicated systems I've ever seen, and believe me, I've seen a few..."

His face nothing short of broadcasted his disbelief as his voice grew slightly louder.

"Y-yes ?"

"...and, to top it all, you hear some strangers in trouble and just teleport in and whack three raiders completely unarmed as if you were some bloody professional hitpony or something?"

"W-well... I..."

That was it. Game -fucking- Over, I may as well just roll over and... wait, did he say 'hitpony'?

I drew a heavy and as dramatic as possible sigh while putting on my best bullshitting face and mentally preparing myself to have my bluff called off.

"Dammit. Alright, you got me. I was hired to look for a certain something which was rumored to be here. Rumor proved wrong. I was on my way out when I heard you guys panicking and those three breaking in and just... you know... acted."

His features suddenly relaxed, his lips parting in a victorious grin as he stood up, triumphantly exclaiming "HAH! I knew it! No friggin 'tourist just passing by' could have pulled off something like that! So, what 'something' are you after, and how many caps are in for..." Des started trotting closer to me, eager to know all the details and hoping to get his hooves on whatever fortune my 'revelation' promised, when Silver Skip interrupted both his train of thought and his trot by tugging at his tail.

"Des, the rain stopped. It may be a good idea to check if the coast is clear and get back to Overlook, especially since Spark looks to be still in shock and our only able-bodied fighter doesn't look very much on the 'able' side of things."

Des tried coming up with an argument to keep asking me all kinds of questions about the 'job' and how he could be involved in it, but there was no escaping the tan mare's rock-solid logic, and so, sighing and complaining heavily, he made for the exit.

I was about to close my eyes and rest my head on my forehooves when i heard Silver whispering in a conspiratory tone.

"Don't worry, I won't tell him."

The mare's words, tone of voice and wink gave me a sudden jolt of panic as I thought about how to patch my lie up as best and as quickly as possible, but all that came out was a lame "W-what? You think I... N-no, I really...". With each stammered word her smirk grew wider and her eyebrow raised a bit, until I finally gave up and, lowering my head in defeat, muttered "I'm that bad a liar, huh?"

She smiled and gave me a weird look, halfway between knowing and patronizing, while gently stroking the mane of the filly resting in her forelegs.

"You could use some pointers, but no, I'm just harder to fool than the average pony. The way you talk and move says something, but your looks, the way you handled those raiders and that scar tell a totally different story. If I were to guess, I'd say you're fresh from a Stable or something. The weirdest, most combat-centric Stable I've ever heard of, but the point stands."

"Let's settle for 'or something', but yeah, I don't have much in the way of experience out of where I come from." I didn't want to disclose more than necessary, but at the moment I judged honesty the best policy to be kept if I hoped to gather any kind of information.

And speaking of information, there was a little detail nagging at my mind.

"Forgive me for asking, but... what did Des mean exactly when he talked about 'caps'?"

The mare's face turned to an expression of pure disbelief as she raised an eyebrow, commenting my question with a soft "... oh dear... "

"So, let me get this straight: cities are pretty much warzones with small settlements scattered around, raiders, bandits and random psychos pretty much everywhere preying on the defenseless and weak, mutated and murderous wildlife, pockets of radiation and a mysterious undetectable mutagen called 'taint', undead ponies who can either be perfectly sane individuals or bloodthirsty killing machines... and bottlecaps are money. I mean, I get the whole 'post apocalyptic dystopia' thingy, but really? Bottlecaps?"

Silver spent almost half an hour educating me on the various dangers and intricacies of the new Equestria. After a while we were joined by a still very distressed Spark, who was trying to cope with having taken lives hours earlier and felt the need for some company. She was looking a bit better after crying her troubles out and being reassured that she only did what was necessary to defend herself and her friends, and she actually laughed at my little freak-out about the wastelend's currency.

"Oh Goddesses, that's why I love Stable ponies. You can tell them about the dangers of the wasteland all day long, but THE thing that makes them freak out is the bottlecaps. ALWAYS the bottlecaps."

"Hey, in my defense, I'm not really freaking out that much; it's just that I can't really imagine who came out with that idea. A crazy pony with a magnet, fishing bottlecaps as a hobby? A half-blind mare confusing bottlecaps for bits? A Sparkle-Cola fetishist?" each ridiculous possibility made everyone laugh harder, and even I had a good chuckle at the last one while keeping an eye on my ESF. Last thing we needed right now was to have raiders surprise us in a place with only one exit and no viable cover.

I was also wondering what would the pink mare do about my identity, but before i could voice my concerns, the tan earth pony saved me again.

"So, Spark, about all that 'professional hitpony' story..."

"Don't worry about it, I don't mind pulling his leg for a while, but eventually you'll have to tell him. If anything, just to prevent him from spreading the rumor you're some sort of Stalliongrad super hitpony quad-wielding miniguns and farting Balefire." she said half jokingly, rolling her eyes before taking a more serious tone "I'm sure you have your reasons for not sharing your story yet, and in other circumstances I'd be suspicious about it, but you saved the four of us from those monsters when you could have just waited and left once they were gone, and in my book that's enough to give you a degree of trust."

At those words I couldn't help but feel horrible for actually considering not getting involved and letting all of them die, and now I was glad I managed to take the right decision in the end.

I scratched my scar with a hoof, pondering about everything we discussed until that point. Ponies killing and stealing from others because they could, and torturing them because it was fun. Pony-eating wildlife. This new world indubitably had an incredible amount of dangers for the average pony, dangers I couldn't do anything about.

Or could I?

As long as it concerned me, my oath to protect and serve Equestria was still valid, and even tho my Equestria was dead, it's citizens -or rather, their descendants- were still alive and in need of protection nopony else seemed able or willing to provide.

" Warning. Energy reserves critical. Immediate capacitor recharge required."

EMPATH's soft synthetic voice came like a thunder in a cloudless sky, giving me a jolt of panic and prompting me to check my PipBuck for my energy level, which was now critically low, the digital needle hovering in the red section of the bar. I smacked my forehead with a hoof, grunting in annoyance while searching for one of the juicy sapphires I had stored in my saddlebag. Which wasn't on my person.

With a hint of panic in my eyes, I turned to my new friends and asked "Erm... do you gals happen to know where my saddlebag is, by any chance?" I strained myself to keep control, but my voice still showed all of my worry and just a hint of poorly suppressed fear. The pink mare pondered my question for a moment before answering, a mix of concern and curiosity dancing on her face "I'm sorry, but I don't remember ever seeing you wearing a saddlebag." Not really the answer I was hoping for.

I definitely remembered carrying it up to the security doors just before teleporting, and the thought made me facehoof again out of frustration. I needed to get my bag -and the delicious mineral goodness stored within- back before my capacitor ran dry and my life suport implants shut down, or I'd be the shortest lived wannabe hero ever; not that I planned to die of old age or anything, but if I could choose between death by bullets and death by cardiac and respiratory arrest I'd go for bullets any time.

"Awesome. I must have left it right behind the security doors or someplace close."

"Well, I'm afraid it's gone then. No way we're going back there, at least for a couple days." Spark said quite matter-of-factly. They clearly didn't want to have any more business with those raiders, and I wouldn't ask them to come and risk their lives anyway, not when the only thing at stake was my continued existence.

I stood up and took a step towards the entrance, only to have Silver block my path. "You're not thinking of going back there now, are you? There are still raiders around, and I bet you don't have a clue as to where the closest town is." She had a point, and her reasoning would have convinced me to desist if I didn't have an extremely limited time left before turning into a corpse.

"In order: yes, i know, no I don't. A single pony won't be easy to spot, and believe me when I tell you, I know my way around. As for the problem of getting back to you guys" I lifted my left foreleg, bringing up the PipBuck's map interface "all I need is a general direction and an approximate distance, and the auto-mapper should do the rest."

"I'm not going to dissuade you from doing this, am I?" she showed real concern about me, something I wouldn't have expected from somepony who had known me so little. Then again, if she had known me I wouldn't have expected her to care for me anyway.
"No, you're not. I need to get my bag back, it's kind of a matter of life or death." I gave her an apologizing look before adding "my life or death, so don't even think about putting your lives at risk to help me."

"And what if they do find you? You're still unarmed, weak and wearing very little protection."

"Unarmored? Yeah. Weak? Maybe." A smug smile crept on my face as I stared at the wood pile of the still unlit campfire "Unarmed?" magic surged through my horn, instantly focusing at its tip and bringing my spell in existence; a small, concentrated stream of flames erupted from my horn and engulfed the firewood, setting it ablaze. "Hardly."

I left the small cave where three pairs of eyes followed me filled with incredulity, the respective three mouths still agape. I had barely taken a dozen steps towards my destination when I suddenly stopped, turned 180 degrees and rushed back to the small rock formation housing the three mares -and the now lit campfire-. Sticking my head, neck and half my chest through the door I hurriedly asked "Uh, Silver? Where's Overlook again?"

The trip back to the bunker was a surprisingly uneventful ten minutes of sneaking in the dim light without spotting nothing but decaying vegetation and weird winged things that looked like a cross between a small, round bug and an abstract painting. An almost solid ceiling of clouds loomed overhead, blocking the view of the night sky and showering me with a constant, annoying drizzle, sign that somepony was being sloppy with weather management, or simply nopony cared anymore.

I accidentally crept too close to one of the ugly winged critters, which reacted to my intrusion by turning and shoting a dart at me, buzzing closer. I levitated two rocks at it's sides and used them to squish it before more of its brethren decided to show up, revealing my position. The EFS was clear, but I knew for a fact it had a limited range, and I didn't feel like taking chances.

Eliminating the occasional Bloatsprite, as my PipBuck had tagged them, I reached the entrance to the underground complex where I had worked for the last three weeks before the "day of the bombs". The downpour had partially covered the four sets of hoofprints heading in the direction I was coming from, and almost completely erased other tracks coming to the bunker from an unspecified location: the site of the raider ambush, I presumed.

The atrium was exactly as I left it before passing out: barely lit and filled with debris from the few collapsed sections of the ceiling, a unicorn mare wearing spiky armor riddled with bullet holes and missing a leg on my left, a massive headless stallion laying on his side between me and the security door and a stallion pinned to the floor by a chainsaw on my right. Inspecting the bodies rewarded me with a few 10mm bullets, a small healing potion and a small bag of bottlecaps, all of which was quickly stored in my few pockets, along with a miraculously still-functional chainsaw.

The identification terminal had suffered damage from time and frustrated would-be hackers, but still worked perfectly, and after a short booting sequence, the screen displayed a 'Welcome to Delta Labs' message in green letters. Credit where it's due, StableTec hardware was built to last, and from what I learned from Silver, the Stables themselves where the greatest example of that.

As Des had pointed out, the security system was indeed one of the toughest ever designed, but having an access authorization made things definitely easier, and after an identity check and retinal scan, the heavy circular door unsealed, it's top and bottom halves retracting into the ceiling and floor, revealing the access corridor to the research facility. A few steps ahead on the left was the door to the security checkpoint, and on the ground right in front of it layed my saddlebag and an empty Rage injector, which was the reason I could barely think coherently during the fight in the atrium. Tying the bag to my back, I telekinetically rifled through it until I found the gem pouch and drew a ruby out of it, placing it in my mouth, where the assimilation implants turned it into a delicious, spicy jelly that, after reaching my synthetic stomach, would provide power to the cybernetics replacing my digestive and respiratory systems as well as my heart and my spine. I was bothered by where did I get the chem from or why I didn't remember using it, but I chalked it up as a side effect of the chem itself or just my attitude to act without thinking during emergencies.

With my energy reserves replenished and enough gems to last for a while, I was ready to make my way to Overlook and catch up with the rest of the gang, but I didn't exactly have any schedule, and that gun locker I could barely see from where I was standing looked just so inviting, so I decided to take a little detour and walked in the security checkpoint just as the heavy metal doors slid closed again.

The room was completely empty, save for the gun locker and a terminal on a desk facing the atrium. Enchanted glass allowed to see everything on the other side while hiding the presence of the windows to anyone walking in. The floor was littered with scattered papers and trash from the wastebasket somepony overturned during their hurried escape. The gun locker proved disappointing, as somepony had already emptied it two centuries earlier, so I trotted to the armory door hoping my luck would turn, only to find out it had no handle and was operated by a small terminal beside its frame; tapping it only caused a deep, loud BEEP to fill the air, followed by a bellowing 'ACCESS. DENIED.' spoken by a synthetic stallion's deep voice.

"Good old VOX system, charming as always." I commented sarcastically. The terminal proved more cooperating, requiring just a couple minutes of hacking before it let go of it's secrets. Which consisted mostly of unimportant reports and internal messages. I had almost given up and turned it off when I noticed a 'Security Override' option, which did some things I didn't understand to some security systems and -AW YEAH- unlocked the armory door!

Inside was a small fortune in firearms, mostly pistols and shotguns, and even a couple assault rifles. All of them were in dire need of maintenance after such a long time, and I used what little I knew of firearm maintenance to take care of that by disassembling the firearms and replacing worn-out pieces with functional ones from other guns, my efforts being repaid with a perfectly functional 10mm pistol and combat shotgun and a decent enough IF-36C short-barreled assault rifle. The nearby boxes provided much needed nourishment for my three new friends, along with a couple complimentary flashbangs and a multipouch tactical vest. Still not much in terms of armor, but the extra pockets were definitely a nice addition.

After storing a half dozen extra pistols in my bag to sell for caps, I was ready to leave. Coming out of the checkpoint I took one last look down the corridor leading off to the research areas and turned to the exit, when VOX's voice boomed again.

"ALERT. SECTOR. C. CONTAINMENT. FAILURE. DETECTED. ALL. SCIENTIFIC. PERSONNEL. EVACUATE. LAB AREAS."

I looked back at the intersection behind me, my eyes wide. Nopony really knew what other sections or, sometimes, even the labs next door were working on, but as far as I recalled, Sector C was the most heavily guarded one, and I didn't like that 'containment failure' part one bit. For the second time in a day I had to choose between preserving the integrity of my hide and do something extremely stupid and potentially lethal. Delta Labs specialized in energy and applied arcane sciences military projects, which meant whatever was escaping containment could perform a variety of things to a pony, ranging from ripping them to shreds to disintegrating them, which made my choice extremely easy: I moved as swiftly and cautiously as I could along the corridors, assault rifle levitated on one side, shotgun on the other, ready to give anything escaping any kind of containment an intracranial injection of lead supplements.

Minutes later I finally got to the infamous Sector C and spotted a door marked 'Specimen Containment' just as a red dot appeared on my EFS and EMPATH's soft voice announced "Hostiles detected.". I telekinetically tapped the door control switch, both barrels leveled. The door slid open, retracting sideways into the wall, and I took a few steps inside, searching for anything that qualified as an escaped specimen, when EMPATH spoke again.

" WARNING. Extreme heat signature detected."

Extreme heat signature? That didn't make any sense, unless the specimen was a dragon.

Or a phoenix.

A huge phoenix, easily one and a half times my size, made of what looked like living, blood red and black flames broke out of one of the stasis pods on the opposite wall and hovered in the middle of the room. Its bright orange eyes focused on me, and I could physically feel the anger in them. Anger that became very physical in the form of a torrent of flames coming straight at my face. Without thinking, I jumped to the side and rolled behind the cover of a lab table with a very thick base on my right.

Lifting my guns, I got ready to jump out of cover and give the overgrown bird a faceful of lead when I noticed the rifle hovering in front of me was half melted; as in, 'melted for half its lenght', obviously. The shotgun hadn't fared any better, the barrel had melted all the way to the magazine receiver.

Tossing the once beautiful lead-spewing works of art, I couldn't help but express my frustration, and yelled "OH, COME ON! I SPENT AN HOUR REPAIRING THEM AND I DIDN'T GET TO FIRE THEM ONCE!"
The avian-shaped inferno's response was much more concise, another fire breath aimed at my cover. The intense heat washed all around and over me, but it didn't pose much of a problem thanks to my augmentations. Besides, when your special talent is fire a little heat doesn't come as a problem.

I felt a familiar battle frenzy rising as my spinal augmentation released a drug cocktail in my bloodstream, barely registering EMPATH's "Combat stimulants administered" message, and leapt out of cover, the red glow on my horn mirrored by a similar glow enveloping the heavy table I had hidden behind. "You wanna play rough, you chicken-brained Bunsen burner? FINE!"

The table ripped free from the floor, flying straight at the phoenix at a high enough speed to severely wound anything short of a minotaur. The giant bird dodged to the side, but not fast enough, managing to avoid being crushed between the flying metal table and the wall, but not to completely avoid being hit and knocked on another nearby table.

As strong as that hit was, all it managed to do was to daze my opponent for less than a half second, after which it rose up and launched itself at me, but I was prepared and immediately kicked up SATS and entered my attack queue as everything froze around me. A single line appeared right below the phoenix's highlighted head:

> Empowered Maximized Telekinetic Bullet

My horn flared as time resumed flowing, and the air distorted as a cone of pure telekinetic force hit the phoenix between the eyes, making it spin in the air and land a few steps from where I was standing, as blood red flames rose to the ceiling from the point of impact.

Unable to suppress a smug smirk, I looked down on the downed phoenix, whispering to myself "Boom. Headshot."

My triumph was, however, very short lived. As I turned and started making my way to the door I felt an intense heat wave on my back and heard a crackling of fire. The phoenix was consumed by flames before my eyes and I couldn't help but stare in awe as its body turned to ashes, which rose to the air as if carried by a gentle wind. The ashes spun in mid air, forming a cloud which kept getting smaller and smaller until it started glowing, and finally burst in a great flame, revealing the phoenix in all its smoldering majesty: a pony-sized, brightly colored bird, radiating a gentle warmth from its outstretched wings. At a first look it seemed like an ordinary, larger than usual phoenix, but there were little details that hinted it was anything but ordinary: its plumage wasn't just brightly colored, but glowed slightly, reds and oranges and yellows dancing on every feather as if they were made of fire, while the tail feathers constantly weaved and shifted, like flames in the wind.

I took a step closer, stunned by the beauty of the creature in front of me. The warmth radiating from it penetrated all the way to my core, and for a moment I didn't feel all the pain that accompanied me in every moment of the last years. I wanted to stay there like that forever, and felt on the brink of tears while at the same time feeling the greatest joy I ever experienced. Nothing mattered at that moment: the war, the horrors of the wasteland, the faces of every pony and zebra I killed haunting my dreams, none of it even felt real. After all of that hatred, blood and horror, for a moment I felt at peace, one single moment that somehow, as inexplicable as it was, justified all of it.

Suddenly, the phoenix opened its eyes, and in a moment the image of purity was replaced by the bird shaped inferno that broke out of the stasis pod. It looked straight in my eyes as it hovered at barely a few steps from me, the orange pits of rage replaced by magnificent golden eyes, bright and soulful. No longer I felt anger in them, but sorrow; I outstretched a hoof, but the phoenix inched away from it. Then, suddenly, it raised its head to the sky and let out an ear-piercing screech as a pillar of flames rose from its entire form, blinding me. When sight returned to me all that was left of the firebird were scorchmarks on the ground, and a phoenix-sized hole running through the metal ceiling and several meters of rock above it.

"Welp, that certainly was something. Didn't really expect it to actually burn through a couple dozen meters of rock like that. And I'm talking to myself all over again. Yay me, way to go."

My face suddenly let go of all the wonder and curiosity it had showed in the previous seconds to leave room for annoyance and that little depressing feeling you get when you realize you're slowly descending the path to insanity, while my head stopped pointing skyward and leveled with my shoulders. It also helped that I was standing right underneath the freshly opened shaft, which meant I was getting drenched in the renewed downpour. Yup, that was me. Perfect image of happiness and mental sanity, right there.

Shaking my head to free my mane of excess water and my mind of excess craziness, I began searching the lab for anything useful. Right after double checking to have double checked the remaining stasis pods and the state of the containment system.
My radiation levels were high, but not worrisome, and the RadAway pouch I found in a nearby medical box helped keep the needle away from the yellow area of the meter, but as interesting the research conducted there was, I didn't have time to read on it extensively, so I just copied all the files in the surviving terminals to my PipBuck -what do you know, StableTec hadn't thought of direct exposure to mutated phoenixes' fire breath when they designed them- and, after double checking to have double checked the double check of the containment, made my way to the atrium without further stops.

Except for the cafeteria, I mean. Synthetic or not, my stomach demanded attention in the form of mildly irradiated two centuries old junk food, which, according to my wasteland survival mentor, were still perfectly edible, if just a little stale.

Happily munching on a hooffull of Sugar Apple Bombs, and with all the snacks that were left in the cafeteria safely stored in my bag, I trotted back to the exit. I had to exert all of my willpower to prevent me from wandering around and poke my head in the various labs -or, more specifically, their researches-, postponing an in-depth, and certainly very time-consuming exploration to a non specified point in time when I would have ample enough supplies of Rad-X and RadAway to walk out of the door on my legs, wearing all of my skin and fur and without bleeding from every orifice.

It's funny how these things work. Just a few hours earlier I was ready and willing to throw in the towel and let myself die, and now there I was, thrilled by the thought of exploring this new Equestria and actually making plans for an unspecified future involving perpetuating violence on raiders and slavers and exploring radioactive ruins potentially filled with other stuff like that phoenix.

I couldn't help get a feeling of déjà vu when a number of red bars appeared on my EFS and EMPATH warned me about them while I was lost in thought, making me almost hit the same spot on the ceiling I missed by inches hours earlier.

There were a couple substantial differences this time, though: first, the red bars were five, instead of the two that appeared the last time; second, this time I had an impressive collection of firearms, ammo to spare, a fully charged capacitor and a reason to perform egregious acts of violence upon them. And, more importantly, I had a chainsaw.

Footnote: Level Up (5)

New Perk Added: You talkin' to me? : Apparently you have voices in your head, and I'm not talking about your PipBuck. You have a very high chance to look ridiculous and a moderate chance to look insane if you actually start discussing with them in public. On the plus side, you're never truely alone.

New Perk Added: Multicaster : Your training (or perhaps your schizofrenia?) allows you to focus on multiple spells at once. The effectiveness of each is reduced based on how many and what spells you're maintaining at the same time.