Twilight threw her greasy mane back against the concrete. Gloomy basement. Dim light from a single bulb on the ground floor. Shotgun to her side. Strange monster carcass torned asunder a few feet from that. The shotgun was an Itala Es Om. Human Italian design. Twilight thought it was efficient, she liked because of that...
She was pressured into wearing the tac-suit. She hated how heavy it was. After every dusky walk out with that thing, it made her back ache. But Applejack could not and would not compromise.
Did not help this time. Now she was afraid. If only she had asked them to come. If only she had said something. Now she was crying. She threw her head back again. She could barely feel the pain. Too much in her stomach or what was left of it.
She did have her sidearm.
No, no way.
BANG
Arid and hot. The feeling of the edge of the canyon. The kids were exploring the rock formations behind them. Applejack had got hooked on those “cigarette” things. So she had one between her lips, its cloud from the ember's end drifting above. “Did you think this place would be like this?” Twilight asked.
Applejack also liked those shades “No, not really.” She spoke in her twang “I always thought it would be brighter, more colorful, grass greener.”
It was true. The place had been fairly drab and hot. But it had a good day once in awhile. “Do you think the landscape is stimulating?”
“You mean interesting?”
“Yeah, Sorry.”
“Oh no, no reason to be sorry. I at first, hated the place. Kept it hid alright. But it was the way the sun beat me down. Into submission, I guess.”
“Feel the same.”
“The kids are so good.” AJ regarded them with obvious affection.
Twilight felt a little awkward about her feelings. She couldn't be certain yet.
BANG
Twilight heaved and her breath started to get harsh again. Over and over, she felt sick. It came on so sudden. The pain. She took her remaining breaths through her nose. It felt kinda easy. Murmuring from above through the door. “Here!” She called and her voice scratched.
AJ opened the thin sheet metal shack door. “Oh shit, Twi!” The floor before her was crumbled and broken. “Kids, stay back!” Applejack turned and thrust her hoof a little too strongly in their direction.
Twilight's head beat like a drum. She didn’t notice AJ hop down the precarious incline. Nearly falling, AJ maintained her hooves. She rushed up with teary eyes to Twi’s side. “Let’s get you up, what the buck happened?”
“Calm that mouth, AJ, there are children.” Twilight looked austere, the piece of rebar had made a great hole in her gut.
“Oh god, Twilight,” AJ spoke and blood welled in Twi’s abdomen. She passed out.
AJ place a hoof behind Twilight shoulder blade. She wanted to tear Twilight off the thing. Probably just make things worse. She brought her head close to her’s. She pressed her forehead against her’s. Twilight’s head surged headbutting AJ. “Shoot.” AJ rubbed her aching noggin.
Twilight’s eyes were open and rolling about the room, mindlessly. Applejack tried to dissuade her feelings, she heaved with tears. Soon her movements grew slow and sluggish, then they ceased altogether. Her eyes were open forever in death watching Applejack.
`
The radio hummed to her. Jason let her rest her head on his lap. It was a nocturnal journey. The lights of the apartments like stars in space. Several story tall business buildings full of ponies and humans. There were some disputes between the two species, but that was not what she wanted to think about.
She hummed along with the radio. Jason held the wheel a little uneasy. He spoke interrupting her crooning melody “Do you remember Samantha?”
She pondered the memory, a beach and the water welling up into the seaweed and washing over a young mare’s corpse. Her heart sank, he was thinking of her again. “Yeah… Why?”
“Just you leaving and the night and all this.”
“I’ll be gone for just a while.”
“I know, I know. It’s just I can’t stop seeing her there.”
Jason was running towards the waves that kept her from him. They were stealing her blood drained body into the rolling whitecaps. Sprays of acidic white salt water. He retreated onto the wet sand and collapsed onto his knees. She could only watch him splinter.
“I wish I could tear the heart out of that damn sea.” He grasped the wheel and his hands turned red.
There was nothing she could say. Nothing she could feel for him, but put her head on his lap to keep him warm and try to sleep.
Her dreams played a dissonance like a cacophony of screeching synthesizers. The only image was her trotting over a staticky city. Ignore the cries of the ponies in the buildings, stand at the side of a mystery man.
It was new year’s night. Snow began to fall on the car. Turning to liquid when pressing against the windshield. The man at the wheel reached for a cigarette pack in the center console. He jammed one between his lips and had to look for his lighter. He peeked to the right over her and around her. He spotted the plastic thing and snatched it from between the seats. He opened the lighter’s end and lit the thing. His eyes were a little red, and wet.
They were maybe a moment from the spaceport. He pushed on her side a few times. She stirred “We, uh, th-there?”
“Yeah.” They pulled up in front of the harshly bright terminal front. Fluorescent lights above the door so white it could not be tolerated. It made the midnight sky black in contrast. He looked weakly over to his partner.
“Only a year, Jason. I’ll be back soon enough” She leaned over and pretended to kiss him passionately.
Their lips parted and he shuddered and curled up on the inside. She spoke “Ok?”
“Yeah, I love you.” His words felt genuine.
“See you.” She used her magic to open the door, and after she trotted to the doorway.
A mare stood at the door to the terminal in standard blue uniform. A little voice rose from her throat “Are you perhaps, Plonka?”
Plonka sighed and nodded.
“Alright, come along, your flight is almost ready.” The flight guide guided.
`
The simple, but elegant, velvet-jacketed stallion with a spicy black eye mask. He outwitted his foe with a clever trap and the announcer announced emphatically “The Gold Stallion, bravely outwits and makes a fool of the bad guys!” The flattering cartoon took to the air “Watch the way he flies!”
The real Golden Stallion was tilting his glass of scotch back and letting the hot alcohol fall down his throat, hollering “I remember hating this show, now it seems like pure gold.” The cartoon caricature toppled over some big troll looking bad guys. The real stallion cackled at the vulgar display of power.
The pink ribboned mare sat nearly nude on the futon. She was looking into a hand mirror, reapplying her favorite shade of lipstick. Her body ached, but she ignored it. She cleaned between her legs and stood.
“Hey, hey.” He floated out of his chair and grabbed at her legs to stop her. “Where ya goin’, Sugarpie?”
“Another disgusting client to satisfy just like you.” She looked into his eyes with malice.
Those words cut him to the core. He was speechless, but still stuttering. He settled back in his wooden seat. He turned it to his mirror. The mirror had been dusted over after a box of powdery makeup had fell an hour ago.
“You’re on in six, Mr. Stallion” A voice squeaked from through the door.
“Got it.” He called over his shoulder.
Six passed.
“Welcome to, Today Now Right Now, Your favorite morning news program, Be happy to join us with our special guest. Who will be coming down right now, The Golden Stallion!” Everyone in the studio audience clapped their hands or hooves. Some cheered, Woo!
The Golden Stallion walked to the stage in full costume. Vintage velvet colonel’s jacket, white long cuffs reaching above the cuffs. His eye mask firmly tied around his head. And Last but not least, his white ten-gallon hat with a pin on it. The pin a depiction of a raven with its wings tied. He sat down in the blue seat next to the cast of news anchors. The claps all settled once he was in his seat for a good few seconds. He spoke in his charming twang “Happy to be here.”
The host anchor, Jewel, spoke. “Yes, and it seems like the people love you.”
“Yeah, seems like it.” A myriad of woos erupted from the crowd.
A different anchor spoke up “Now, not every watcher knows where you came from, so maybe you can tell us a little about that.”
“I was born a farm’s hand and scraped my way by on the planet Masu Kama, but knowing I needed something more I went to the border worlds and found a job in local defense.”
“How was working with a badge?” A brown stallion asked from the panel.
“Noble work, dangerous, but I like it that way.”
The panel chuckled and another one asked a question. “So when did you discover your powers?”
“I was in a middle of an operation and when I was capturing a bad guy, I flew out the damned window,” Everybody and everypony laughed.
“Now, most know you were a part of the Super Team, but most don’t know any details of the team chemistry. Could you maybe enlighten us? Who were you closest to?”
Her face was pale, but her hair was black as midnight and bright as twilight. “That Bonhomme, French fella.”
That woman with purple eyes looked at him “I was wondering about, Lilian? There were some rumors...” The voice went to blahs. He scrunched up his hooves and his brow sweat, he felt sick.
“Well, what about it?” She smiled at him with perfect white teeth.
“Lilian was sweet.” He barely could look in that woman’s eyes. He barely could feel his legs.
“Ok, I see…”
The lights went down on the set. Fade to black. He storms off in the darkness to his dressing room. He throws open the door and reaches for his drink. He downs the last of it and looks unhappily into the mirror. A grimace he was too used to seeing.
He put his head down onto the envelope. He lifted his head and looked at the thing. A manilla envelope. The envelope felt smooth, he undid it and looked over the papers. He honestly smiled a single time during that reading.
He found the nearest spaceport the next day.
`
Applejack felt the dust below her hooves, it was weird. The kids had settled into their bunks for the night. Most of them. She listened to a few skulk around the foodshed. It kept a smile on her face. Only a single electric sconce on the shed. She had stamped out a cigarette a minute ago.
“Do you feel loved?” The young mare asked in a hushed whisper.
Applejack’s ears perked.
“Do you want to?” The stallion spoke up.
Applejack just about burst into the room when their lips had met. “Teens, this ain't why you are here. Out!”
Their faces both went red and they stuttered like kids. The young mare picked herself up, and left. The stallion stood looking a bit stand offish. “This is not fair, we’re allowed to do what we want!”
“Sorry, but that’s a no. If you're with the camp, you gotta be with the camp. Sorry.”
He huffed and almost looked like he was going to hit his head.
But he departed in the direction of his cabin. AJ spoke up “To the Mess the both of you, we’re going to have to have a talk.”
AJ cleared her head for a minute. “Super Camp, what a dumb name.”
… counselor(')s end.