//------------------------------//
// Roadside Attractions 
// Story: Salvage 
// by Rollem Bones 
//------------------------------//

Roadside Attractions

“What we wouldn’t give for just a little foresight.”
 
 
“Next place worth a damn we see, we try to salvage a radio.” I made my point loud on a particularly quiet day of walking the long and lonesome road our quartet wandered. According to Fizzy’s maps, we were walking was called the Broncton Postal Trail on our way to the soda delivery that never made it to its destination. A dull road made worse by splitting away from the beachfront we had been on since leaving Manehattan. Now we had a sparse covering of trees, desiccated and dying from the long lean years since the war. Daisy had shown herself to be a better than average horticulturist, but neither her nor Two-Shot could dredge up anything that wasn’t an ashy tasting culinary metaphor for sadness.
 
I pulled the hospital cart. The cheery yellow with pink butterflies motif was, in my opinion, one of the few moral bright spots in our well armed little caravan. At the very least it was the only one of us that hadn’t taken a life in the past few days. It was even roomy enough to carry two ponies, or one pony and the items we managed to save from rotting away forever in the back end of some hospital.
 
I had offered to use the shotgun we recovered, but when I suggested that I preferred its application as a bludgeon more than a firearm, I was outvoted three to one. We ended up attaching the gun to Daisy’s battle saddle opposite her machine gun for when she could get back on her hooves.
 
Daisy was still riding in the medicart, there since we left the beach. The supplies we secured from the hospital did wonders for all of us, put us back at full force I figured, except for Daisy. She was fine and dandy, but we weren’t taking any chances we didn’t have to. We all knew a few wasteland idiots that got themselves killed pushing more than they had to give. That kind of stupidity wasn’t going to fly in this caravan. Also, it was her idea, and even wounded, we were all wary of how capable the mare was. Never doubting an earth pony’s endurance was something I knew from first hoof experience.
 
Two-Shot had taken up residence at the rear of the caravan in order to cover our trail. We could not rule out Scorched Earth coming up from behind. After all, we never saw him die, and I doubted he stayed inside the Hotel Haflinger once he sussed out the explosive contingency plan. Given his track record for insane overreaction, the lot of us agreed that he would probably be sending out feelers to keep an eye on us, no matter how far we had run. Two-Shot’s approach to the threat was a simple one; kill them before they could report our movements. It was a good plan.
 
Fizzy handled the mapwork. She walked alongside the cart, floating the map before her to keep track of our movements. That is, she handled the mapwork when she wasn’t trying to squeeze herself into the medicart to check on Daisy. For our resident not-a-medic she threw herself at the job with eagerness. Chalk the excitability up as a chance to experiment with the formulae Cherry had passed on. Fizzy was whipping up new combinations of Sparkle-Cola and wildflower alchemical mixture here, a healing bandage with additional reagent there, and trying them out on every cut and bruise we managed to pick up on the road.
 
We needed to find that mare something to blow up. Fast.
 
“Hey, hey Call. Curtain Call,” Daisy’s voice came from the medicart. It had the prodding insistence that usually only accompanied a request or a correction. “We’ll find a radio when we can, but you have to tell me why you’re wearing that tail weapon around your neck.”
 
I was right. It was a correction. I looked down to Sharp Retort. It had a part to hold in my teeth, and a strap around my neck. It was custom. It was also proving a little useless when I didn’t have an ambush. I also never did ask the pony that made it how it was supposed to be used, I just took the design from another I’d seen and guessed the details. Now I felt like a foal. I went to my mind’s excuse drawer. “It’s a fashion statement.”
 
“If it’s a tail weapon, wouldn’t that statement be that you’re head is where your ass should be?” Fizzy peered at me over her map.
 
“Fuck me,” I muttered, stopping the medicart. “If you guys know a better way to use it, why not stop me instead of letting me look like an ass?”
 
“Because we’d be stopping a lot.” Two-Shot’s two cents for the conversation.
 
The others laughed. Okay, I laughed too, but I still wanted to get some use out of Sharp Retort. “Alright, alright, I walked into that one. But come on; give me a hoof with this thing.”
 
Daisy pulled herself out of the back of the medicart. She moved with a list to her gait, trying to hide the discomfort that she was living with. I lifted my head so she could slip Sharp Retort off my neck more easily. She was still nickering when Two-Shot came around to lend his magic at threading the straps into my hair.
 
Sharp Retort tied into its new place, my tail curled around the bar, I lashed the weapon back and forth to try it out. Out and back, around one side to the other, I found I could strike like a radscorpion. Sure, I couldn’t get it all the way around my body, too big for that, but with a little more motion I was a stabbing machine.
 
“There,” Daisy told me with a grin, tapping my flank with a hoof. There were bags under her eyes, she had lost weight, but she was still going strong.
 
“Thank you for your quick response to my idiocy, Daisy. Glad you’re kind enough to point that out, unlike some other ponies,” I pointedly said to Daisy as she climbed back into the rear of the cart. My glare directed at Two-Shot.
 
“Never used one of those before,” our diminutive sniper responded, magically floating a dash inhaler he was inspecting with sudden casualness. “Never had much of a reason to pick up on hoof to hoof weapons. Corpses don’t get close.”
 
I shook my head and pressed onward when I saw Daisy’s head pop up over the side of the medicart. We walked on down the road for a ways longer, reading the road signs that still survived through the centuries. The giant smiling face of the pink mare that claimed to be watching forever was a running theme. So was the yellow mare that accompanied every Sparkle-Cola advertisement. Each one pockmarked by age and frequent use as target practice. The further we walked, I noticed the same BASTARDS graffiti appearing on the signs we passed.
 
“Country living with city style. A High Rise Enterprise!” I read the new sign aloud. It was smaller than the other billboards, with a picture of a tower that wouldn’t look out of place alongside Tenpony back in Manehattan. A white, blue maned unicorn stallion dressed to the nines smiled in a benevolently patronizing way. Visual shorthand for what the builders expected their tenants to desire and emulate. The bottom of the sign invited us to reserve our place at Equestrian Lane Towers today. Somehow, I doubted they were still taking renters.
 
“Looks like it has potential,” I told the others, “Could be good salvage in a place like that.”
 
“Those Bastards nearly cleared out the hospital,” Two-Shot spoke up, coming around the medicart.
 
“Still found enough to help me,” Daisy’s head popped up, resting on the side of the cart.
 
“Even scrap parts would give us something to work with,” Fizzy joined in.
 
I nodded, “Three to one, we’re going in. I’m getting me a new radio.”
 
“I wasn’t saying no, just warning. Besides, I’d like to get a chance at the high ground. See what’s going on around us.”
 
“Four to zero, then. So let’s get our flanks in gear, I want a change of scenery.”
 
 
Equestrian Lane Towers left something to be desired as far as scenery goes. A skeleton of steel just starting to stretch upwards was all the ponies of the past managed to construct before their world ended. Materials lay scattered about the construction site on the hill. A series of trailers gathered in a small herd around the far corner from our approach. The rusting hulk of a crane stood stock still, frozen in time so long ago. Below it, a beam speared into the ground. The snapped cable coiled about the base like a snake. In the distance, a bird cried out. The only sound, its echo filled the site on the hill.
 
“You going to be alright here, Daisy?” I asked, ducking out from under the medicart hitch. I looked behind myself to see the mare bracing her machine gun on a bipod and perching it on the edge of the cart. She stabilized the heavy gun with a foreleg. Her attention focused on the construction site.
 
“I’m good here. I could hold this position for a while,” she explained with only a brief look to see my curious glance. “Can fire from a tap button underneath; don’t need a bit to shoot this with. I can just sit tight in my little nest here.”
 
“Got it, you watch over us, oh guardian gunner of the wastes. I’m going to hit the trailers, see if there’s anything left in there.” I trotted off, splitting up from the rest of the caravan.
 
“Keep in eyesight, or keep an ear out,” Two-Shot instructed as I left. “Stay in contact. Heading to the scaffold, see what’s what around here.”
 
“I’ll, uh, I think there are enough tools lying around here to fill a few boxes. Going to stock up, but you guys find anything interesting, tell me. Okay?” Fizzy’s shout got mirrored wordless shouts of acknowledgement from Two-Shot and I. In my mind, she muttered something about stallions behind our backs.
 
I hit the first trailer I came across. The door was stuck, though not so stuck a swift kick couldn’t open it up. Inside was a small office, holding little more than a file cabinet and a desk. All the same, I dug around for anything of interest. Several clipboards with notations and numbers on them that I couldn’t have cared less about. The bottom drawer of the desk had a small case of pistol ammunition, but no pistol. I stashed the ammunition in my bags and hopped outside.
 
Daisy shouted, asking if I found anything. I reported my lack of luck with the first trailer on my way to the second. This time the door opened with a push. It was cramped, more so than the first. Inventory papers and big rolls filled every available space of the trailer, with only a small amount of room for a table that held a large blueprint tacked onto it. Out of curiosity, I stopped rifling through rotting time sheets and decaying inventory logs to look over the old blueprint. I don’t know what I expected to find other than a carefully drawn picture not dissimilar from the skeleton of the building that stood outside. That, and the numbers and equations scribbled all around the picture. Two ponies if the changes in writing style were any indication. For a moment, I wondered why one had written so extensively over the other. Visions of arguments over design and work followed up with a drink at the nearest watering hole filled my head. Even if the ponies of the past did wreck their world, I still bet they had it better than I did.
 
The next trailer I forced my way into stood separate from the others. I guessed it was to give the occupant better line of sight to the construction site since the door directly faced the skeletal framework. I tried my hoof at the door, but this time it refused to budge at all. I tried again, but still locked tight. I turned and bucked. It did not even budge. Refusing to lose to a door, I backed up, backed way up, and charged the door. This time the door open, it opened more than I expected.
 
I picked myself up from the far side of the trailer, certain to make note of the dent I left in the wall for later headache reference. This trailer was not much different from the first one I had entered. It had a desk, and a filing cabinet, and a big brown splotch on the wall. That was different. I didn’t need to inspect the splotch to tell what it was, I had seen similar stains many times before. Maybe that argument I had pictured earlier didn’t end in drinks between colleagues.
 
Though I had expected one, there was no sign of a body in the trailer. Papers lay strewn about the desk and filing cabinet, rifled through by a pony long ago. Whoever did the job was in a rush, however. The bottom two drawers of the filing cabinet remained locked. Now I was no master with a lock, never really could get the hang of the picks. What I did get the hang of, though, was kicking things until they opened for me.
 
A swift pounding and the cabinet began to warp, but in a manner quite unexpected. The bottom two drawers buckled as one. I studied the bend and changed up my kicking game. This time, the pair of drawers swung open like a door, revealing a hidden compartment with a large case. My attention angled down toward a piece of paper that had also fluttered from the compartment. It had a ragged torn edge, pulled from a ledger or journal. It had writing on it. Drawn by curiosity, I dropped on my haunches to read.
 
We have been made foals of! High Rise has been using us as pawns to service his own greed. I should never have been so accepting of a pony’s generosity. All my life I have lived in Equestria, all my life I have given to this nation that now loathes me. I wished to believe in the goodness that I knew so many years ago. I wanted to believe High Rise at his word. He and I had worked together in the past. We were friends. This request, this structure would prove to the world that zebras and ponies could still work and create as one. All of it, I wanted to believe. I did believe. No more and no longer will I play patsy to his schemes.
 
To think that he would change my calculation behind my flank is a knife in my heart. To change them, to sabotage his own structure and his own dream was beyond me. I refused to believe it at first. I kept my tone deferent. I kept my head down. He was still willing to hire zebra employees. He was still willing to employ me as head architect, allowing me to take the helm of a project when so many of my kin are looked upon as traitors or worse. High Rise was a beacon of hope, a light in the darkness that blights this land. I see now that the fire was a spark in the powder shed. To think I called him my friend.
 
I cannot let this happen. I will bring it all down, I have recovered an old friend. I will keep it safe and hidden and sabotage the infernal structure by night. So long as I am alive, this trap will not be sprung. I will not allow it.
 
I stopped reading and looked to the splotch on the wall. He may not have been alive, but the tower wasn’t completed. He won, but it felt like an awful high cost. Looking down at the note, I read the last portion. Hastily written, the writing was not as neat and precise as the rest of the journal.
 
If you are reading this, High Rise, then you have killed me. Do not feel you have won, my friend. I may be a zebra, but I still have allies. Your bank books, your insurance claims, the adjustments that you and your agents made to my designs, all of them have been sent to reputable sources. I suspect that before my body grows cold that your schemes will be brought to light. Your plans, your business, your life is ruined. You will never profit from hatred.
 
Your friend,
Haki.
 
The paper fluttered to the ground. Consider my rosy little image thoroughly dashed. I tapped a hoof on the ground for a moment, looking at the blood spatter on the wall. These things always felt different when I knew the why. I wondered how that was, when I had walked past so many before. I had even killed before, even if it was always in self-defense I had still taken lives. I knew a lot about what made pony’s tick, and however much more I would learn, I don’t think I’d ever be able to explain why it felt so different.
 
I turned to the case in the cabinet to escape the philosophical pitfall. “Well, Haki,” I spoke to the ghosts of the past, “Let’s see just who your friend is.” I dragged the case out, let it fall on its side. It was dirty with age, the polish long gone, but I could see the gleam the case once had. HH Tool and Engineering, the logo on the box proclaimed. I flipped the little clasps with a flick of the hoof and the case lifted open.
 
It was some kind of machine. It was long, roughly the entire length of my forearm, and painted with yellow and black striping. “Crack the planet!” was written on it in white paint. I pulled the machine from the case and sat it on the floor. There were a number of straps and buckles, and some thick padding on one end. Down at the other was a heavy chisel. I may not have known what this thing was, but a lifetime of salvage work had left me with numerous skills and techniques at my disposal.
 
“Fizzy! I got something here!”
 
“It’s a steel driver,” Fizzy explained. The machine spun as Fizzy levitated it in front of us. “Used like a big drill. Heavy stuff, probably have to be an earth pony to use it properly. The custom casing is a bit lighter than I’ve seen back home, though.” She turned the straps toward me to explain further. “See the straps and pads? It’s been designed to sit against your chest and shoulder, sort of like an industrial yoke.”
 
I nodded, listening even if I was imagining a zebra destroying his own creation with the tool. “So, if I’m hearing you right, I’d wear it on my fore leg? And that bit that looks like a battle saddle trigger, that runs it?”
 
Fizzy’s smile was proud. “You can be taught,” she laughed, “You’re right, that’s the gist of it. It’s a big bucking tool though, this thing’ll split stone and steel. Get on the wrong end and-,” Fizzy paused. She looked at me. She was grinning.
 
“I want to run an experiment.”
 
 
“I don’t really see how this counts as an experiment.” I looked down at the piece of industrial equipment that engulfed my left foreleg. The fit was a little snug, and I wasn’t used to the slight weight it put against my shoulder. Neither issue was nearly as bad as I had expected. The relative comfort didn’t change my reluctance to try out a piece of centuries old demolitions equipment. I tended to put my trust in my own hooves for a reason, and now I was putting my hooves in the trust of a big metal punch.
 
“We’re testing something, which makes it an experiment. Don’t argue my logic, Curtain Call,” Fizzy shouted from beside the Medicart, using Two-Shot’s binoculars to watch me. Daisy lounged near Fizzy, using her machine gun like other ponies would a sofa.
 
“If I die, it’s your ass I’m haunting, Fizz!” I called back only half joking. I bit down on the small starter and pulled. The starter cable was on a spool, retracted into the shoulder case when I didn’t have the starter in my teeth. Once it was explained to me, the way it worked wasn’t that difficult to understand. The bulk of the object was handled with minor levitation enchantments, which needed a bit of an arcane spark to trigger it, but Fizzy handled that easily enough. A bite on the trigger should start the chisel. Not hard at all, so it was obvious that I wasn’t totally stalling or anything.
 
I set my hoof on the rock. My leg was tense from uncertainty and readiness for the kick of the machine. I bit down. The rejuvenated spark roared to life after its 200 year sleep. The chisel punched back and forth, a blur of dull steel. Dust and chips of stone flew up in a fine powdery mist. The pressure was shocking, but mitigated by the tight squeeze of the padding at my shoulder and chest.
 
My leg slipped. I carved a sharp line through the stone, my body bucking behind it. Flying bits of stone stung my face. Dust and smoke filled my eyes and lungs. I hit the ground encased in a gray cloud, coughing and sputtering. I had held myself too rigid, too inflexible and too afraid to keep control. I dropped the bit from my mouth, killing the power. Despite that, the arcane drill continued to work out its energy, chugging on mercilessly until its dying sigh.
 
Fresh taste of dirt, dust, and debris coated my tongue. I looked up at the upside down world through watering eyes. Everything had sort of a jaunty tilt thanks to the interesting way my body twisted about from the kick of the steel driver. I could even see Fizzy running over from a fresh and new angle. Her manic grin said she considered this little test a success and the glint in her eye said I was going to be testing this machine a whole lot more.
 
“Are you hurt?” At least she was considerate. “Is the drill damaged?” Make that as considerate as could be expected from her.
 
I responded while remaining inverted. “I’d say only my dignity, but that implies I had any to begin with.”
 
Fizzy rolled her eyes but helped me untangle myself and get back on my hooves. “That was a start,” she said diplomatically, “Any idea what caused it to slip from your control?”
 
I didn’t answer right away. I was busy moving my foreleg, bending it up and setting it down in constant repetition. My attention occupied by figuring out how the auto-drill felt to move around. It felt light, and I could get enough range of motion with it. With some time and practice, I figured, I could make use of the powerful drill. That’s when the realization of Fizzy’s intent hit me.
 
“It’s worth it as a weapon. In the right hooves, this thing would be worth a fortune. I think I could get it down with some practice. Or, just getting used to it. I think I was too stiff. It broke from me and I lost it because I couldn’t work with it. I was too busy being against it.”
 
“Knew you’d get it sooner or later!” Fizzy’s smile practically squeaked, or my ears were still ringing. “Sooner was the preference, but later was workable. What I’m saying is that I fully expected you would eventually have figured out my concept for the drill without instruction.”
 
I couldn’t bring myself to tell Fizzy she should have stopped at the first sentence. There was no correcting the enthusiasm. “Yeah, thanks, Fizzy,” I dug for words to fill the quickly growing gap of awkwardness. “Are you going to stick around here while I embarrass myself some more, or is there something you want to go tinker with?” I sincerely hoped the latter. I didn’t want an audience for this performance.
 
Having no such luck in the matter, Fizzy and Daisy stayed on as my audience. I practiced for a better part of an hour or two by my best guess. It was a blur, though not in the sense that the time passed particularly quickly. It felt like damn near eternity. Rather it was that I spent the better part of that time being shaken like a cocktail. It still worked, though. I managed to learn how to stand the right way, strong enough to keep it straight, loose enough that I could guide it without ending up carving wild grooves into everything else. It was a painful lesson my shoulder wouldn’t soon forget.
 
Time ticked on like it does, and though I considered myself the victor in the war against rocks and inanimate junk, there were things to do. With Fizzy’s help, I got the jackhammer off my foreleg. She took it aside with Daisy to see if either of them could figure out any way of improving the design. I was just glad to have my freedom again, so I took off to see what else I could dig up.
 
I found Two-Shot on top of the crane. He was simply sitting in the breeze, looking out at the surroundings through his riflescope. His bright red mane and brighter white hide made the sniper less than stealthy. I figured he knew that, moreover I figured he didn’t mind. “Are you planning on giving us a report?” I shouted as I approached the side of the rusted out hulk, “Or are you just going to keep enjoying the sights?”
 
“Looked busy with your power tool.” Two-Shot didn’t break from his scope to look at me, continuing on with his self appointed mission. “Didn’t want to ruin your fun. Not that there is anything to ruin it with.”
 
“Nothing out there?”
 
“Just a radio tower to the east with a mostly intact building under it. Probably an old station. Not far away so I suggest we try and hold up there for tonight. Not exactly pressing news.”
 
“Point taken,” I thumped my hoof off the side of the crane. “Did you find anything while you were cloudbathing?”
 
“Not a lot on ground level. Then again, didn’t look for anything that wasn’t going to kill me.”
 
I shook my head, grinning all the while. He had his priorities. “So you already scored any deserted drugs?” I cracked the jock as I turned to sweep the area.
 
“That’s what I said.” There was no humor in Two-Shot’s voice.
 
I stopped long enough to look back to Two-Shot. He was looking out into the distance, his face devoid of emotion. A white haze obscured his eyes from my view. Magic for purposes I could only guess. I turned from him and left him to his own devices.
 
Two-Shot hadn’t looked for much, but there wasn’t much to look for anyways. A few bottles lay here and there. I took the caps and left the glass. Dirt, rotting lumber, a redundant toolbox, and the assorted useless junk that even I couldn’t sell. I wandered the perimeter of the building, and stopped to look out from the highest point. There, in the distance, I could just barely make out the shattered struggling tips of the city of Manhattan far in the distance. Destroyed and difficult to see, the sight still made me smile bittersweet. It looked like the sign was right, a view of Manhattan from the top of a hill. If the building had been finished, the view would have been breathtaking.
 
My hoof struck a bone. It clattered against other bones. Looking down, I saw a small pile. A pony, earth pony, by my guess, lay on the ground. It still wore a rotted, tattered collar around its neck. The collar coupled with an equally rotted, tattered noose just above it. On instinct, I looked up. A frayed length of rope dangled from the beams high above. Pieces began to fall into place, and I looked down at the bones. The pony died looking out on Manehattan. At least he took a good view with him. That was when I noticed the glinting circlet around the skull.
 
I had seen one of those things before, simple ring with a set stone called a black opal. A recollector. The black opal was more versatile than a memory orb, primarily since any pony could use them and not just unicorns. Just put on the piece and you were whisked away to memories of the past. They could be worth a lot and not just in caps. The recollector was stuck on the skull, however. It just didn’t want to budge. A swift kick and I caved the skull in enough to get the ring free. I’m not entirely cold, I apologized before I robbed the bones. It was not like he needed the device anyways.
 
Once freed, I spun the recollector around my foreleg, sitting on my haunches and thinking to myself. What was on it, I wondered, and why did this pony record before taking in their last view of the Manehattan skyline? I had my ideas, given everything I’d seen today. I removed and set aside my hardhat. There was only one way to find out.
 



 
It was dark. Night had fallen. A genuine night, with stars, but my host was in too much of a hurry to enjoy the gift that it was. His heart pounded.  His breath came in a hurried, haggard rhythm. I could feel it in his chest just as I watched through his eyes. My host was approaching a small house, unassuming but tasteful. He stopped long enough to fixate on some fresh paint that covered only a small section of wall by the front door. My host was hesitating; something about that paint was the reason for his pause. I didn’t have time to think of an answer. My host was on the move again. At full gallop he hit the door, rising up and pounding at the entrance with a dirt brown forehoof.
 
The door opened, at first just a crack, and a deep green eye looked out at my host. After a moment of scrutiny, the door closed. My host’s heart sank. A click sounded on the other side. In a split second, my host bit back his breath and brushed stray black mane that had fallen in front of his eyes.
 
The door opened to reveal a statuesque zebra mare that stared eye to eye with my earth pony host. The two stood still for a moment, simply staring at one another. She wore a set of bangles around one fetlock, and a pair of large hoops in her ears. Her mane reminded me of Fizzy’s, though far more monochromatic. She carried a look of worried puzzlement but my host broke first. He down and away and I could feel the blood rush to his face. His heart pounded even heavier.
 
“High Rise?” The name confirmed my suspicion and made my heart sink. the mare spoke in a quiet tone weighed with uncertainty. “It is strange for you to be here. Come inside, come before you are noticed.”
 
My host obliged, nearly falling into the simple house in his haste. He looked around at the zebra home. For its simple façade, the inside teemed with personality. Intricately carved masks adorned this wall. A tapestry covered that one. Blueprints, their intricate pencil work displayed as art from utility held prominent place to display their designer’s craft. Photographs of friends and family filled the empty spaces as a reminder of what was important. It was cluttered, but cluttered with heart and my host took to looking at everything and all to avoid eye contact with the mare.
 
“Zera,” my host spoke, swallowing the feeling of sick he had in his stomach that I now had to contend with. “I need you to do something for me and I need you to do it quickly.”
 
The mare, Zera, was taken aback. High Rise looked to her long just enough to gauge her reaction. “What is wrong, High Rise? Where is Haki? He was supposed to be with you at the site.”
 
My host shook his head. “It’s all gone to pot. It’s all ruined.” His words were choked, spat out and meant more for himself than the zebra. He looked back to her. “I just need you to listen to me, Zera. I have friends. Friends in very important places.”
 
Zera was swiftly growing a stone face. She shifted, placing herself between High Rise and the door. “I am aware. It is why you no longer visit. So what brings you here tonight? What happened?”
 
Once more, High Rise sought refuge in the scenery. He looked at one of the large blueprints on the wall. His attention focused on the pair of signatures in the corner. I tried to read them, but they swiftly became blurry and High Rise closed his eyes. “Mistakes, Zera, terrible mistakes.”
 
“What kind of-,” Zera was cut off by High Rise drawing a parcel from a side bag and dropping it on the floor.
 
“Let me make this better. Let me help you,” High Rise said, urgency rising his voice. “You have been through so much, and things will only grow worse. Take this, there are names in there, and proof of my word. Go to them. Take your children and go. They will keep you safe and what is in that box will keep you secure.”
 
Zera opened the package and her jaw went agape. “This is-,”
 
“I know what it is!”
 
Zera fluttered between astonishment and suspicious ire. She looked from box to High Rise and I could feel the tension in his body like a coiled spring ready to burst. I was ready for her to shout, at least to needle, but all she did was ask in a soft voice, “Where is my husband?”
 
Another look down for High Rise, and the world grew blurred again. His voice cracked plaintively. “Let me do this, let me help you so I can fix it.”
 
“Where is my husband, High Rise?”
 
“Please let me help you, Zera.” His voice was needy and begging now as he looked back to the stern face of the zebra.
 
“Where. Is. My. Husband.”
 
“Just let me fucking help you!”
 
The levee broke. I felt the hot tears on High Rise’s face, the physical pain he felt as his chest tightened. He had roared at Zera; ran up to her, screaming in her face his pain and need. She only looked back in sudden shock. I felt High Rise breathing heavily, quavering as he stood eye to eye with the mare. Her mouth hanging open, I felt her own nervous exhalation.
 
This time, she broke first. Her eyes closed with silent realization. Her body lost its tense fear. She stepped around my host and pushed the box shut with her hoof. “Leave this place,” her words cut like the softest and most painful knife I’d ever heard, “I do not wish to know more.”
 
High Rise looked down, his head was pounding, my own reflected the pain. His chest was tight. “Please,” he croaked, looking up to Zera’s backside. “I’m so sorry.”
 
“Go, High Rise,” Zera words were velvet covered iron. “Others will think you’re a traitor when they see you’ve helped us.”
 
High Rise laughed. I was too engrossed to consider the whys or the absurdity of the quietly despondent chuckle. “But I am.”
 
Zera looked back at High Rise. She didn’t look at him with anger, or disgust, or fury. Nor did she look at him with forgiveness, kindness, or a shred of thanks. She looked at him with sad sympathy and regret. “Good bye, High Rise.”
 
“Good bye, Zera.”
 
My host turned, left, and shut the door quietly behind him. He never looked back as he walked down the lane. Riding, I could only feel his body, not read his mind, but I didn’t have to. I knew full well that he couldn’t bring himself to look back at the zebra home. Even more, I knew exactly where he was heading when the memory poured me out of the past and back into my own body.
 




 

I was still alone when I came out of my recollector-induced coma. I slipped the enchanted device from my head and replaced it with my hardhat. For a moment, I thought about leaving it behind. The last testament of a long dead pony was something that should probably stay with the body. I took it anyways, and I made a note to grab Haki’s letter later. I had an itching feeling in the back of my mind that they could prove helpful.
 
“You’re moving, so you’re not dead.”
 
I jumped to my hooves at the sound of Two-Shot’s voice. Spinning around to confront the approaching unicorn, I saw the white glow of his magic fade from his eyes. “Yeah, just, found a recollector. Figured I had you looking out for me so it wouldn’t hurt to try it out.” I wasn’t exactly lying, but it was stretching the truth. I had been operating on emotional interest trumps rational thought logic at the time.
 
Two-Shot stopped at my choice of words. He chewed on his tongue a moment before nodding at whatever his internal decision was. “Good,” he said, whether to me, what I said, the situation, or a bit of breakfast plucked from his teeth I don’t know. Whichever the answer, he started to look at the recollector and its former owner.
 
“Coward’s way out,” he surmised. His statement salted with the usual acid he saved for discussing his morning sobriety.
 
I looked down at the bones. Two-Shot’s tone was clear he wasn’t looking for enlightenment to the reality of the situation. He had his opinion and was quite comfortable with it. “Maybe,” I tried the diplomatic approach.
 
Diplomacy proved only partially fruitful. “Not maybe. Whatever was going on, he had a chance, he blew it. He ran away where he wouldn’t have to deal with his problems. Cowardly prick,” Two-Shot spat at the bones. He didn’t stop talking to me, truth was, he never was addressing me to begin with.
 
I didn’t bother to reply. I simply tucked the circlet into a bag and started on my way back to the mares.
 
The silent approach was as effective as the diplomatic one. “Running like that. Doesn’t matter what he did. You can’t kill yourself. No matter how much you may hate living. Just doesn’t work. Going out like a selfish coward. That kind of thinking is just another part of the shit piling up on ponies. The bad ones are greedy, the ones who grow a conscience off themselves.”
 
“Anyone ever tell you that when you’re sober, you’re painfully sober?” I ventured, my concern fought with annoyance over determining just how I felt about Two-Shot’s ramblings.
 
Two-Shot’s chuckle was as disdainful as it was amused. “Happens when you’ve smoked, shot, and shorted everything you could get your hooves on. Takes a lot to fly and when you aren’t it gives you a lot of time to think about shit. And how shitty that shit is.”
 
“How are you not dead? I haven’t seen you actually take anything since Manehattan? Every junkie I’ve ever known would be foaming at the mouth by now.”
 
“Might be because I’m not a junkie.” Two-Shot’s reply was terse, but without anger.
 
“Go on.”
 
“Not much to go on. I just don’t get addicted.” He shrugged his shoulder to take attention away from the uncomfortable look in his eyes. “Not for lack of trying, and I like the rush chems give me, but I bounce back better than any pony I’ve ever known. Just how it goes.”
 
I snorted in disbelief, but most of what I’d seen so far confirmed the unicorn’s statement. “Lucky you,” I told him, lacking any other kind of remark.
 
“Depends on what you want to get out it,” Two-Shot’s cryptic tone came with a look that told me to derail this train of thought fast.
 
“What do you mean by that?” I asked in complete disregard for Two-Shot’s silent request.
 
“I mean exactly what I mean by it. Nothing more.”
 
That time I took the hint and didn’t press any further. We had gotten within earshot of Fizzy and Daisy anyways and I had them pegged for better conversation anyway.
 
“As an industrial tool it needs the reinforced framework, but as a weapon it needs to be more maneuverable than it is.” Daisy still sat in her medicart turned machinegun nest, but she was now leaned over the side pointing a hoof down at Haki’s “Old Friend”. The more I thought of it, the more I liked that name.
 
Fizzy’s magic enveloped Old Friend. What was left of it. Pieces and parts lay scattered about the unicorn in a fan pattern of mechanical components. The main bulk of the machine was still intact. It was missing large portions of the protective heavy plating, exposing the seemingly simple cords and cables that made it all work. What appeared to be several of those cords and cables lay among the bric-a-brac about Fizzy.
 
“Ayuh, but I know a more complex spark spell than what’s been powering it already. With some higher yield spark batteries, we could get more for less. Cutting down on weight needed for power supply can let us preserve protective plating,” Fizzy rattled back to Daisy, spinning various parts in a low orbit about her great blue mohawk.
 
“Wouldn’t overcharging the spark battery capacity like that make it dangerously unstable?” Two-Shot broke his silent to spin out that happy thought.
 
Daisy greeted us, but the words had already put Fizzy into thought. She tapped a hoof against her nose. “It would technically increase the volatility of the cell,” she nodded before amending, “However; the chances of catastrophic thermal runaway are still relatively low.”
 
Two-Shot shrugged. “You’re the explosives lady.”
 
“Wait, wait, wait,” I felt compelled to interject since I would be, in theory, strapping that thing onto my foreleg. It meant I had just a little bit of a stake in the situation. “Relatively low in what sense there, miss Tonic?”
 
“Quite a few things, really,” Fizzy’s wide eyed innocent spoke volumes, “Active grenades, a cleaning product cocktail, baby unicorns. Little things like that.” She followed that line up with a too-wide anxious grin.
 
“Not exactly filling me with confidence, Fizzy.”
 
The silver unicorn sighed and averted her eyes. She adjusted her glasses, setting down all the assorted mechanical parts she had been floating about her. “Trust me on this one, Call,” she told me, “Please?”
 
I had heard those words before and they panned out then. I broke into a smile. “Alright, do what you got to do,” I told them, “Whatever you two have planned; it’s out of my area of expertise. I doubt either of you would be trying to sabotage me anyways.”
 
Fizzy looked like a filly on her birthday. Magic flared around her horn and back around Old Friend. “Okay, now Daisy, what do you think about a composite casing modification, rather than relying on heavier metals?” She was already launching into her happy science place over my new toy.
 
I am not mechanically inclined. I can generally guess and fake my way through things, and I have an eye for ideas, but the implementation is something beyond me. What Fizzy and Daisy did to the Old Friend in the few hours that followed I have no real clue. Once fitted back onto me the chisel felt a little lighter, and it moved about with me rather than despite me. I gave another shot at cracking the planet as suggested and low and behold, there was not flailing failure. Successful test behind us, we all agreed to get moving again. Our target: the distant building Two-Shot had sighted.
 
And I still hadn’t gotten my radio.
 
 
A few hours back on the Postal Trail and the day was growing increasingly gray and wearing. An impressive feat when one considers the general dreariness of the wastelands. The Broncton Postal Trail snaked on behind us, less a ribbon and more a hard packed binding of the ground beneath our hooves. A dipping, lowland binding at that. The hilltops that the ill-fated Equestrian Lane Towers perched upon were behind us. Now we found ourselves in something of a valley.
 
I still pulled the medicart, though it was lighter with air occupying the space Daisy had taken up. Old Friend, a name I still liked, had gotten comfortable as we put the miles behind us. It did seem to be semi under its own power thanks to Fizzy’s experimental tinkering. Daisy’s efforts to lighten the load did further wonders. With the two mare’s help, I was beginning to think that the impressive looking machine really could give me an edge. I wouldn’t always have the advantage in wit, so some admittedly scary looking brute force was a welcome comfort.
 
“So there we are, weeks of work trying to find and break into this stable and what do we find in it? Puppets, row after row of puppets. All over the place, just staring at us. Creepy as fuck, but kinda funny looking back on it.,” Daisy wrapped up an anecdote from her and Two-Shot’s earlier mercenary work. “But boy did I want to find that ghoul and give him a ride on the end of my side gun.” Her words were harsh but she was laughing all the same.
 
“So what did you do about the stuff down there?” Fizzy asked.
 
“Oh, we did what everypony before us did. Signed our names in a little book by the door, locked it right back up and started talking loudly in every bar and watering hole in the west,” Daisy barked out laughing. “If the names in that book were telling the truth, we weren’t the first, and we damn well weren’t going to be the last to get duped into going down there.”
 
We all laughed, but I couldn’t blame her. Being fooled into descending into a Stable that could hold who knew what with the promise of wealth and only finding puppets. I had to take stock of the creative method of revenge. I liked that idea and figured I could steal it in the future.
 
We were so wrapped up in our trading stories and poking fun at one another that we almost missed it when Two-Shot finally spoke up from behind. “Two coming up from behind,” he told us. He hit the dirt, his horn glowed and a white haze clouded his eyes while his rifle swung in the air, pointing to the hill behind us. A stray tendril of telekinetic force slid an inhaler made out of a bottle and some straws out of his bag. He bit the end and inhaled sharply.
 
“Confirmed as threat?” Daisy asked in a steeled tone, sidling against the medicart and looking to the hilltop.
 
“Scorch's gang. Have the mark I saw at the hotel,” Two-Shot’s response was immediate and steadied for speaking around an inhaler.
 
“Waste them,” Daisy said. Not a beat skipped.
 
“I can’t even see them,” I muttered, trying to pick out what Two-Shot was seeing. “Wait, wait!” I threw myself into the situation. “This doesn’t smell right. Why send ponies in obvious armor?”
 
Daisy looked at me and shook her head. “They’re raiders. They’re stupid. You know that. Best we put them down from a distance.”
 
“She’s got a point, Call,” Fizzy sounded distracted. Looking over, I could see why. She was already working on one of those sack bombs she had made back at the hotel.
 
Two-Shot started muttering to himself. “Two little ponies, sighted by my gun.”
 
“I know, I know. They’re stupid, but Scorch isn’t. This is just too easy. I don’t give a fuck about those two, just think they might be being used, not actually working for Scorched Earth.”
 
“One stuck his out.” Two-Shot’s gun boomed. “Then there was one.”
 
“Even if they are, any pawn of his is a danger to us,” Daisy said. She hadn’t flinched or seemed to care about the shot. Odd enough, none of us did. We just kept on talking around it. “Do you think he’d just waste supplies like armor? Come on, Call, think.”
 
“One little pony, turning tail to run.”
 
“It really does make more sense,” I admitted. “Hadn’t thought about it like that. Fuck them.”
 
A little beep and Fizzy trotted from the side of the road. “Bomb set. Any other pony tries to follow us up here they’re in for a nasty surprise.”
 
“He didn’t flee fast enough.” Bang. “And then there was none.”
 
Fizzy frowned. “I’ll go disarm the charge.” She sounded disappointed at the whole course of events.
 
Two-Shot stood back on his hooves. “Nice poem,” I told him, turning to get the medicart moving again.
 
“I paraphrased a little,” the sniper quipped, looking amused. He tossed the spent inhaler to the side of the road and smiled in a way that didn’t make him look just a little unhinged at all. “Let’s go, anything within a mile can be in my sights. Let’s go. Chop-chop. We’re wasting time when we could be sitting pretty in a new building.”
 
Daisy and I exchanged glances. We shrugged, synchronized. “He’s better to have around like this,” she told me like a parent trying to make excuses for an excitable colt.
 
“I’m not about to argue with you on that one, Daisy. I’m more worried about what happens when we run out.”
 
“He doesn’t have the same reactions most other ponies do. I don’t get it, but I’ve seen him mainline stampede like a fiend and come out of it like it was nothing, He just gets a little depressed.”
 
I nodded, walking along and speaking quietly to Daisy as to keep Two-Shot from overhearing. I caught Fizzy’s ear twitch, she was listening in, but she seemed to prefer remaining mum for now. “That’s what I’m talking about. I’ll overlook it all, just want to keep him in chems if it’ll keep us from having to deal with morose the wonder sniper.”
 
“Then we agree,” Daisy spoke with a sly glint in her eye. It faded to a distantly sorrowful smile. “I just don’t want him to hurt more than he already does. I don’t care what I have to do to make that happen.”
 
The look in Daisy’s eyes as she spoke, a look of pure iron, spoke volumes on how serious she was about Two-Shot. I looked over to the small white unicorn. He was walking backwards, keeping an eye on the horizon behind us. It struck me just how easy it was to confuse Two-Shot for a mare. I told Daisy as much. She laughed and agreed. I knew then just how much he meant to her.
 
“How’s he feel about you?” I asked after a pang of concern rippled up my spine.
 
“Why do think I love him so much?” She answered my question with her own, and raised me a coy eyebrow.
 
“That’s what I thought.” I looked didn’t crane my neck to see Two-Shot again. I was right earlier, he would look out for us. I was probably insane for trusting a pony like that, but then again, I talk to my radio. Who am I to judge?
 



 
There was a town in front of the radio station. Emphasis on “was”. It wasn’t the usual scene I’ve seen a dozen times before, either. Foundations with rotted or burnt timber that tried to hold up walls that fell long ago. Boarded up death traps that waited for a stiff breeze or a bad winter to come along and collapse them. Tombs and monuments to a dead world of dead inhabitants that served as our daily reminder of the class of fucking we were enduring because of them. That’s the kind of town we all usually see.
 
This was different. This was alive. Again, key word being was. A general store left unlocked, a smattering of the unappetizing old world food left on the shelves. Scraps of paper marked prices in caps. We called for anypony left around. No answer and no bodies either. We took what we needed for dinner, cleaned out the till, and left.
 
The store was just the beginning of the ghost town. We swiftly moved on to the other businesses. The expected bar was easy to find, since it seems that ponies everywhere will establish some place to wet their tongues. It was empty, scraped cleaner than the store. Somehow, that didn’t surprise me. Two-Shot was upset. We all were. Even though we still had some liquor from the Hotel Haflinger left, no doubt that we could’ve used more.
 
A few homes rounded out the settlement, at one time businesses by my guess, but converted to bunkhouse style lodging. It made sense to keep everything localized for safety. Safety was probably the reason given the increased number of graffiti tags proclaiming ownership by the Bastards. First thoughts were either the Bastards had the most direct real estate marketing scheme in the wasteland, or they may have had some influence on the ponies here. I doubted they were the reason for the sudden vanishing. The hospital pharmacy suggested that, as a group, the Bastards were none too concerned with tidying up after a visit.
 
“This is incredibly suspicious,” Fizzy spoke in hush tones, like she were in a crypt. In a sense, we all felt that way.
 
“I didn’t know a place could be aggressively deserted,” I voiced my own growing disdain and unease.
 
“Fuck this place and fuck whatever ghost story it comes from,” Two-Shot verbally spat on the fear the ghost town tried so hard to cultivate. He had broken into and nearly sucked down one of the final bottles of his finest. The nearly pure grain alcohol was quick to serve its master. “We’ve been walking all day and I want to get on dinner. I’m thinking soaking that old can of beans in whiskey, and tossing in some dried radhog. No garnish but we ain’t exactly eating fancy.”
 
I struggled to decide what I liked best about having Two-Shot around. Being a talented shot and an experienced gunman made him great to have around in a firefight. However, that he really could cook counted in many tasty ways.
 
Let it be known that food is a great motivator. Creepiness, wonder, and mystery of a town with a population that packed up and left with nary a note mattered little to begin with and we were losing concern quickly.
 
The broadcast building was easy to find. The big antenna was hard to miss. I was expecting the building to be as deserted as the rest of the town. The street outside did not disappoint. It was a squat building with few features. Only a sign, part of one, decorated the building. A big red letter W, a big red letter O, and a similar letter L remained of the façade.
 
“Our fortress awaits,” I waved an overacted hoof towards the doors, bidding the others ahead of me. I still had to get out of the medicart harness. Daisy helped while Fizzy and Two-Shot went inside to secure the lobby. Deserted town or not, we needed to be cautious.
 
Two-Shot’s sudden peals of laughter caught my attention mid way through unhitching. “Hey, remember to watch out for Fluffikins. There’s a note up here giving us fair warning.”
 
A larger sigh could not have been heaved. “Watch out, Two-Shot. That’s a sign of a pony who thinks they’re funny. I bet you ten caps that Fluffikins is some sort of battle robot or psychotic radgator.”
 
“Sucker’s bet!” the unicorn shouted back to me. His revolver glowed white and floated out of the holster. He spun it in the air and laughed. “Anyways, now I’m counting on it.”
 
Two-Shot gave the door a heavy push, sending the doors wide open. He shot Fizzy a grin that encroached on mania. “Let’s go have some fun, boom-girl,” he said, leading her into the darkened lobby.
Daisy and I were inside shortly behind Fizzy and Two-Shot. I was already wearing Old Friend, and Daisy was so familiar with her battle saddle, remounting the gun was foal’s play. The sniper and the mad bomber had the good grace to wait for us. The office was, not to put to fine a point on it, boring. Seats and cushions sitting and waiting for ponies to sit and wait upon them lined drab yellow walls. A secretarial desk sat at the far end of the room. It wasn’t an impressive or ostentatious desk, just a desk that was content to fit the description and duty of a desk without seeking to improve upon being a desk. A non-working terminal sat on the desk, doing nothing.
 
There was, however, a sound. “Do you hear that?” Two-Shot asked, leaned against the wall near the only door that wasn’t the way we came or marked RESTROOM. “Sounds like somepony talking in there.”
 
The rest of us responded with a trio of nods. We craned our necks, piled close to one another and strained our ears to listen. The words were indistinct, but we could tell it was a voice speaking in a set pattern. A voice that seemed to be repeating himself.
 
“Sounds like a loop,” ventured Fizzy. “This is a broadcast station. Maybe somepony rigged a recording to play over the radio.”
 
 We all took a moment to realize the obvious and just how silly we were being. Sheepish looks passed around and Two-Shot took first move to push the door open.
 
The door opened without a sound. The old radio station bullpen confronted us. The rearranged desks lay on their sides, stacked into a makeshift barricade. The entire wall served was bait, making me wonder what was so important the residents needed to keep us out. A look to the left gave us stairs going upwards. Since right just lead to a wall, our options appeared limited.
 
Do you grow weary of the harshness of the world? Tired of the violence? Of starvation? Of suffering? Do you long for a better day?
 
All of us alerted to the words coming from the stairs. The speaker’s voice was soft and slow, but inviting. The kind of voice a well-worn pillow has. It couldn’t force you to listen, but it was damned enticing.
 
If you do, then I humbly ask you to come to Dancer, a place where the world as it was, as it should be, lives again. Walk grounds without raiders, without slavers, without fear. Grounds filled only with the smiling faces of your friends and family. Work and play amongst your fellow ponies without heartache and without sorrow. Live, and love freely, knowing that all is well. It is what I wish to give you, to give Equestria.
 
It was a good line, but none of us were buying it. At least I hoped not. I wasn’t. I had to admit, though, it did sound good, just impossible.
 
You might ask yourself, “Who is this pony that offers the impossible?” My name is Stardust. I have founded Dancer in order to bring a little of the civility, the honor, and the love of old Equestria back to this land. Dancer is open to any pony who seeks refuge and a better life. If you wish for more, even if you simply wonder how it could be, come to Dancer. Taste old Equestria and live anew.
 
The track ended and picked up from the beginning. After a moment we all snapped out of the dull stupor we wandered into. Fizzy and I shared a look and a nod. “We’re going to check on that sound. You guys good with checking down here?” I asked Daisy and Two-Shot.
 
The pair nodded. Together they were a well-oiled machine. Fizzy was at a disadvantage in close quarters, provided she didn’t want to detonate herself with her target. I, meanwhile, was in my element. Not that I was itching to test out Old Friend in the field, but I was more comfortable in a place where I could out think danger and keep it close at hoof.
 
I took the lead, Fizzy at my back. We rounded the top of the stairs. The short hallway was in better condition than many places in the waste. Not clean and shiny, not by a long shot, but it was maintained. No signs of life, though, and we kept on moving.
 
There was a door to our right. Next to the door was a large window. I peered inside. Radio equipment lined the wall, a large soundboard blinked, still receiving power from nearby cache of spark batteries hot-wired to the broadcaster.
 
“Think you could tear that apart for supplies?” I looked back to Fizzy. She responded with a simple nod and a face that seemed to ask me if I’d forgotten who she was.
 
She split off from me, going inside the sound room. For a moment, I watched her get to work stripping the equipment for parts. Then I went back to searching the floor. There was only one other door I could see up hear in this sort of broadcast nest. Shouldn’t take long at all.
 
I was right, it didn’t take long. The tiny studio room housed little more than the equipment needed for the DJ to do his job.
 
There was also the matter of the body of a unicorn. She was against the wall, propped in an awkward sitting position. She stared straight ahead with only one eye, the other reduced to a pulpy hole. A pistol lay by her side along with several spent syringes and, more interestingly, a note. I stepped over her, with respect, to see what she had to say.
 
Echoes and gaps, the note read, I see echoes of the gap. Are they in the gaps or because of them? I can’t tell. I was taught. I know the lesson. I can’t remember the point. Faith in danger. I can’t live by it. Life just bugs me.
 
That note got me nowhere. I let the paper fall to the ground and looked over to a curious looking device on the floor. It was a battle saddle. Not like others, though. Mostly because it wasn’t being used as a gun mount. Instead, it had what looked like a ham radio on one side, and a cut down transmitter complete with antenna on the other. Most notable, though, was that it was the source of Stardust’s voice. My love affair with radios paid off.  I could recognize broadcast equipment when I saw it. The bastard may be shilling a hill of beans with his old Equestria pitch, but he had radio transceivers. He had a portable broadcast station.
 
Correction: I had a portable broadcast station.
 
I did a happy dance at this pot of gold. No mean feat given that I was wearing Old Friend. It may have been a little disrespectful to the dead mare in the room but I thought she had more pressing issues on her mind.
 
First thing I did after the dance was take Stardust off the airwaves. A tap of the hoof and the frequency was all mine. Cramped as it was, I wriggled my way into the saddle and hoisted it onto my back. Then I took it off, learned to breathe again and adjusted the fitting for a pony larger than a mid-sized mare.
 
“Fizzy! Look what I got!” I called out with giddy anticipation that travels with discovery.
 
It was a massacre. Pieces and parts everywhere. Wires, connectors, arcane charge fuses strewn about the room in like piles. A cataloging system that seemed to take cues more from predation than politeness. My new radio wept for its kin.
 
“What’s that?” Fizzy asked. A stray cable draped over her nose in front of her glasses. She paid it no heed. “Oh!” She noticed, eyes widening as she cooed in interest.
 
I explained what I had already figured out from the DJ booth. She would have known that had she bothered to look further than gutting electronics for parts but she had worked fast and what she claimed was good for use or barter. So a bit of ignoring the big glass wall could be excused. Her best estimate was that my new gadget didn’t have fantastic range, or else Stardust wouldn’t be using this station to pump his advertising. I didn’t care as long as it was any range. I was just happy to have it.
 
“Guys!” A shout from below, a shout from Two-Shot, cut the conversation short. “We found Fluffikins!”
 
A staccato racket of bursting gunfire sounded off below. Fizzy and I ran for the stairs. I saw a can grenade hover beside my friend. I took Old Friend’s starter in my mouth.
 
I hit the landing and stopped in my tracks. For one thing, the broadcaster was heavy. Unlike Old Friend, it was dead weight, unpowered and far from lightened. I stopped to slough it off, not seeing as Fizzy pinged her grenade off the wall and down at the formerly walled off bullpen. I stopped, realizing the difference, and looked where the desks were.
 
The now splintered wall of desks was meant to keep something in, not keep us out. That something was the biggest and strangest looking radscorpion I had ever seen. A was big, bigger than our medicart big and its carapace was a sickly yellow-white color. The way the thing moved was far from sickly. Massive claws snapped, lashing out at the lobby door. It couldn’t fit through the pony sized doorway. The way the claws were cracking and snapping at the wall made me doubt the hole would remain pony sized for very long.
 
Gunfire whipped like infernal hail through the doorway. The steady bass chug of Daisy’s machinegun played high-speed metronome to the slower but higher pitched crack of Two-Shot’s heavy revolver. The shots all punctuated with the inclusion of Fizzy’s grenade.
 
Yet little of it seemed to be having much effect on Fluffikins. Several of the shots rebounded off the armored hide of the behemoth, only a few struck the soft spots. It was enough to hold the beast at bay, but how long their ammunition would last was another story.
 
Fluffikin’s claw, the one nearest to Fizzy and I, finally jammed purchase in the wall. Its vice like claw cracked the wood and plaster. The door began to creak and crumble. The massive tail struck out, embedding itself in the wall. The creature struggled for a moment, trying to pull its tail free.
 
I took the opportunity and leapt for the claw. My teeth bit down on the starter and Old Friend woke from its slumber. I landed, no, I stomped my forehooves down on the claw. It took my weight as though I were nothing. It didn’t take Old Friend the same way. The industrial tool was made for demolition and demolish it did. The chisel punched in and out, cutting and pounding away at the thick carapace. Pale green ichor flew from the increasingly larger hole I cut into the creature. I pulled my hoof up to stop again and again, drilling holes in the giant scorpion.
 
A shudder rippled through the radscorpion. The claw stopped moving and for a moment, so did the rest of Fluffikins. Gunfire still rampaged from the lobby, thudding heavily against the carapace. I don’t know if it’s possible for a scorpion to scream, but I swear that this one did. We had it on the ropes.
 
Then it freed its tail. I looked up at the wickedly curved stinger. Tipped with a poison that would kill any pony if the impalement didn’t do the job first. It was coming for me and I knew that it would. I was the only target, and here I was right next to its recently obliterated claw. I was a sitting duck.
 
“Call!” I heard a shout. I looked. Fizzy had a funny looking bundle of wires and spark batteries whipping wildly above her head. She let the thing fly for the scorpion. It spun in the air, spreading out as the cluster of batteries all tried to fly in separate directions. The tail lashed out, catching the bundle in mid flight. The bundle wrapped around the tail and made a shrill beeping sound.
 
What happened next made me note that I should ask Fizzy about just what she did to power the thing on my arm. I had never seen an explosion as colorfully pretty and incredibly frightening as this one before. One went off first, blowing into a great sphere of crackling green magic. This set off the others. White, purple, gold, all flares of magic stored for nothing but power being expending in a fiery rainbow of death. The force and energy glittered and reflected in the air for only a moment, sending a tangible ripple of power cascading over the station. Then it all died out, fading to a silence made greater by the prior cacophony.
 
I rolled over to find Fizzy. The force of the explosion and my surprise had sent me tumbling back to the stairs. She looked placid, smiling to herself in a deeply satisfied way. Turning her head to look at me, she knocked her glasses back on kilter.
 
“You okay?” I ventured.
 
“Ayuh,” she said, nodding. She looked to the smoking crater that was once Fluffikins and she gave a happy little sigh.
 
I lay on my back a little longer, watching Fizzy. I thought she was humming. Either that or my ears were buzzing. Scrambling, I managed to get back to my hooves and left Fizzy to contemplate destruction while I checked on Daisy and Two-Shot.
 
“Hey guys, did I call it or what?” I stopped in the doorway. Two-Shot was nuzzling Daisy. She was on her side, but I couldn’t see much her with Two-Shot in the way. My heart sank for a moment, until I saw her leg move. She hissed. In pain but alive was better than dead.
 
I stepped into the lobby and knocked aside Two-Shot’s revolver. I looked at the gun for a moment, and his similarly discarded sniper rifle. The sight gave me pause. Two-Shot was still with Daisy, engrossed with her. Looking closer, I saw the faint edge of a magic barrier bubble that surrounded the pair.
 
I left them, let them have their moment and went back out to the bullpen. Fizzy had gotten over her distraction and greeted me at the bottom of the stairs.
 
“They need a little time,” I told her. She gave me a puzzled look so I corrected myself, “Personal stuff. They should get some alone time.” Fizzy nodded at the clarification and gave me some help getting the radio saddle back on.
 
We gave Two-Shot and Daisy a few minutes before growing bored enough that it outweighed our politeness. Daisy had moved to some of the old lobby seats, propped up on her side. Two-Shot was not far off, looking over their guns.
 
“Thanks guys,” Daisy thanked us with a grin. The grin turned into a grimacing wince. “You saved our asses there,” she spoke through gritted teeth.
 
“What’s hurt?” Fizzy asked, already half way to the door for the medicart and our supplies. “I’ll get your something for it.”
 
“Nothing new,” Daisy claimed while hissing through a sigh. “My gun just has a lot of kick to it, that’s all. Nothing to worry about. It’s not going to keep me down.”
 
Fizzy paused briefly at the words but decided better on it and went outside for the medical supplies anyways.
 
The next hour or so was not so much a blur of activity as a slow, trudging smear. Two-Shot managed to construct dinner from detritus yet again, making me more than a little jealous of the drunkard’s ability to fill our stomachs. Daisy rested for the most part, I suspect the force of her gun’s recoil did a number on her already punched up insides. It made me nervous, it made most of us nervous, but none of us wanted to voice it out of fear. Fizzy and I spent the time tinkering with the radio and eventually found a working configuration.
 
In that time, night fell outside, our only light the small fire we made from the remains of shattered desk and old paper. I sat away from the others, mussing about with the various switches on the radio. Behind me, Fizzy quietly snored in the dancing light of the flames. Two-Shot and Daisy were together among their amassed cushion supply. Me, I was ostensibly on fire-duty. There were other things on my mind though.
 
I looked at the recollector that spun around my forehoof, thinking to myself. I looked at the transceiver. The tiny click as I hit the switch was a melodic twinkle in my ear. I pulled the swivel-mounted microphone around to me.
 
“Hello wasteland, this is Curtain Call speaking.”
 
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