Chapter Forty-Two: Silence
“…”
As it turned out, sleeping in a relatively intact house with only slightly lice-filled beds was a whole lot better than a creepy hospital-turned-murder house filled with psychotic Miss Nanny robots wanting to ‘heal’ you.
Who knew?
Still, it was an itchy awakening when my PipBuck’s alarm finally went off. I had been rather generous when setting the time to wake us, given that it had been a such a tiring day previously. Not to mention how late it had been when we’d finally settled in for the night, or early by the technicality of being past midnight.
Now the sun would be high in the sky, and every moment spent in the house was probably just a waste of that daylight. We still had to get back to our Sky Bandit and make our journey back to the Equestrian Hive. It would probably be late when we finally got back there, or else really early in the morning tomorrow. We could probably get some sleep either on the way there, at least those of in the back.
Ugh, here I am thinking about sleep when I’ve only just woken up.
Maybe that’s a testament to how sore my everything was feeling.
Still, I’ve had worse mornings than waking up in the master bedroom of a pre-war home with Xena at my side. Much worse.
The mattress was bare and without covers, those having probably long rotted away. The rest of the room was a bit of a wreck, either from other visitors or its previous owners leaving in a hurry. But it was enough for the night, so there wasn’t too much to complain about.
Cobalt and Altrix had taken the guest room, which had contained two single beds. Moon Blossom had called ‘dibs’ on the sofa downstairs and had pretty much gone out like a light the moment she flopped down onto the chair.
Not that the rest of us were awake for long after we’d also laid down on our respective beds.
Groaning as some of my joints popped and clicked, I dragged myself up from the mattress and onto my hooves. Xena was already doing the same, swiftly securing her saddlebags and rifle as she did. I took a moment to myself, just trying to get my body to wake up with my brain by stretching myself out.
“Are you well?” my marefriend asked.
“Sore and itchy. I wonder if Altrix has anything for lice?”
She chuckled. “I’m sure she has. Though I am not certain chitin itches the way our fur and skin does.”
“What are you, a changeling expert?” I quipped, shooting her a smirk which she returned with a deadpan glare. “Well, we’ll have to wake her first. If they’re not up already, anyway.”
“We should be swift. I do not like the thought of us delaying further.”
I hummed in response as I picked up my own gear, starting with my barding. It had felt nice to be without it for a while, I think the last time I’d taken it off was back in Stable 84. Back when I’d finally learned Xena’s name, and we had taken that next step and made love for the first time.
Goddesses, it already felt like decades ago.
With my barding back on, along with my saddlebags and my two favoured guns, I turned to give Xena a smile while nodding towards the door.
“Well, let’s go see if the kids are awake.”
Xena just rolled her eyes as she made her way out of the bedroom.
I followed her out, taking a peek into the guest room as we passed. I spotted Cobalt inside, seemingly doing checks on his combat armour and rifling through his saddlebags. I couldn’t see Altrix, however, so she had to already be downstairs.
Moving down the staircase and into the home’s living room, I saw Altrix munching quietly on some Dandy Colt Apples while Moon Blossom snored heavily away to herself on the sofa, one hind leg in the air and twitching ever so often with the rest of her limbs splayed in whatever direction.
“Morning,” Altrix greeted quietly. “Um, I was wondering if I should wake Moon Blossom, but I didn’t want to be rude.”
Fortunately, Xena had no such stipulations.
“Wake up,” Xena commanded as she prodded the pegasus in the side, eliciting a loud snort as she was yanked back into the world of the living. “Lest you bring the wasteland upon us with that snoring.”
“Awwww,” our friend complained as she remained laid out in the seat, her eyes glued to the ceiling. “I was comfy!”
“We can get comfy when we get back to the hive,” Cobalt remarked as he trotted down the stairs, his saddlebags held up in the air with his magic while it simultaneously latched all of his armour’s pieces into place. “I don’t understand how you can be so comfortable on that thing anyway.”
“Beds are for pussies.”
I frowned. “You seemed to enjoy the ones in the stable.”
“And in Crossroads,” Altrix added sheepishly.
Moon Blossom went to retort, but something caught her tongue as she bit her lip. She seemed to think on what to say for a good long moment, before finally making up her mind.
“Shut up.”
I snorted as the pegasus forced herself off of the sofa and into a standing position, brushing herself quickly down and ruffling her wings. She gladly took an apple when Altrix offered one to her, proceeding to bite into the ridiculously preserved snack. I just grabbed the Sparkle-Cola I’d snagged from the MAS hub for the perfect little pick-me-up, who needs food when you’ve got this little mix of carroty perfection?
Everyone else, judging by the bemused glances I got. But who cares, Sparkle-Cola!
Okay, I may have also had a snack cake just to be safe, but eh.
Once we were all equally fed and hydrated, we made our way out of the house and back out into the Vanhoover streets. Now that it was light outside, I could get a better look at the area we had found ourselves in last night. It seemed like a mostly residential street, two rows of houses akin to the one we’d spent the night in flanked each side of the street. Looking to the left, down at the end of the road, there looked to be a corner shop with a recently deceased animal carcass being pecked on by some crows.
We definitely weren’t where we were meant to be, however.
“So, did we take a wrong turn in the night or what?” Moon Blossom asked.
“Clearly,” I dryly said as I trotted over to some street signs by the shop I’d spotted, the crows fleeing quickly as I got close. “Well, there’s nothing said about that park. Just directions for some other streets and the closest highway.”
“Perhaps Altrix and Moon Blossom can get a better view?” Xena suggested.
“Oh, that might be a good idea,” Altrix happily agreed.
“Got it. Let’s just try not to get too high, I doubt Stripe is the only fucker with a sniper rifle in this city,” Moon Blossom pointed out in warning, flapping her wings and kicking off the ground. “So, we’re looking for a park, right?”
“Yes, we stored the Sky Bandit a street away from it if you remember,” Cobalt confirmed.
The pegasus nodded, being joined by Altrix as they made their way into the air and just over the buildings around us. We waited patiently, and with slightly bated breath, as they did a quick aerial scout of the local area. The lack of gunshots was a good sign, however, and soon enough the two of them descended back down towards us and landed nearby on the pavement.
“So?” I asked them.
“Yeah, we saw it,” Moon Blossom confirmed. “Quite a few blocks away, but I could just about make out a fuck ton of dead plants.”
“Well, at least it’s not too far,” Cobalt said in relief.
“Um, not exactly…” Altrix muttered.
“Huh? What?”
“Got a raider camp a short ways away for one. Looks like they’ve just moved in,” Moon Blossom reported. “That, and there’s also more than a few more collapses blocking some of the streets. It would help if you all could fly like us, but since you can’t, we’ll have to go back the way we came and around it all.”
Damn. I’m slightly wishing we had gone back the right way to begin with. Stupid blown up cities and their confusing layouts…
“That will take some hours,” Xena mused. “But more so to try and go through the debris and raiders. I agree, we should definitely go around.”
“And it would be more dangerous,” Altrix pointed out.
“Well, that’s that then,” I stated begrudgingly. “At least it’s easier during the day. We’ll be back in no time, and then we can finally ditch this place.”
I was done with cities for a while. The countryside just seemed less… cluttered.
“Then let us go,” Xena said as we started to move off down the street. “Before we become trapped here for yet another night.”
Celestia forbid.
Moving back the way we came was easy enough, passing by the defunct clinic and all its now thankfully demolished robotic staff. There wasn’t any sign of our friend from last night, though. I hadn’t really expected there to be, but it was still a little frustrating.
The way was also clear, unlike the more direct route that Moon Blossom had seen. Compared to a lot of the city that we had seen, the buildings around here were in relatively good shape. I couldn’t really say if any were getting close to collapse, but for the moment they were all standing with only a few dents and scrapes in their walls. Anything that could and would threaten us had already been dealt with previously, so that also gave us some time to breathe as we walked back through.
Eventually, we moved far enough away from the demolished area between us and the Sky Bandit that we were able to make a turn and start to move back in the right direction. Another quick scout by our resident fliers seemed to confirm it, and soon enough I think I started to recognise some of the buildings and streets we were passing through.
So, confident that we were finally back on track, we pressed forward towards our destination.
With the architecture becoming more and more familiar to my mind as we went, it was only a matter of time before we were finally able to find a sign for the park in question. Despite the relatively lengthy detour it took, we were finally making progress!
And then, at the end of the street, we found it. It wasn’t the same gate we’d seen before when we had first arrived, this one sitting at the opposite end of the park, though it had pretty much the same design. We slowed up a bit as we got closer to the black arch, considering the last time we were here we had to bypass it altogether due to the fighting between the Zebra Remnant and the Steel Rangers. I kept an eye out for any red bars coming from either the park itself or the buildings around it. I wasn’t expecting any zebras to be inside, not after what we had done to them, though I could see a couple of Steel Rangers still milling about.
Or raiders, since Moon Blossom had already seen one group who’d recently moved into the general area.
Still, there was nothing.
We moved through the gate and into the park, most of the plant life long since dead while others had mutated in various strange ways from two centuries of radiation exposure. It had also been blackened by the remains of many battles, ones numbering far beyond the skirmish we’d seen in this place days ago.
“I bet this was a pretty place once,” Altrix murmured sadly as we passed on through.
“You could say that about a lot of places,” Cobalt replied.
Equestria in general, for one.
We didn’t stop, moving down the tattered path until we reached the other gate from which we’d seen the Remnant retreat out of. I spared a glance for the rooftop where we’d been spying on the whole affair.
From there, we moved around the building and cut through the back alleyway until we reached the street beyond. Some random junk blew past my hooves in the breeze as I stopped just before the road, looking down at another alley nearby where we had stored the Sky Bandit.
“Finally,” Moon Blossom commented. “Let’s bail, yeah?”
“Your wings up to it?” I asked her as I crossed the road and trotted back down the street with my friends.
“Pfft, easy,” she claimed. “It’s easier than it would be to try and lug your fat asses around.”
“It wouldn’t be if the skywagon wasn’t enchanted,” Cobalt retorted.
“Details details…”
“And Altrix?” Xena added.
She nodded. “I just want to get home. I’ll be fine.”
“That is good to hear.”
We reached the alley, turning the corner to find the Sky Bandit exactly where we had left it. That in itself was an immense relief, I think we’d all been slightly fearful that it had been either stolen or scrapped in our absence. But on first glance, it seemed to be intact.
The red bars did give me momentary pause, though. However, the tell-tale sound of a radroach calmed my alarm somewhat.
“Look like we have guests,” I noted as I drew my pistol. “I’ll quickly clear them out. Cobalt, think you can check that the thing still actually works?”
“On it,” he confirmed, trotting up to the Sky Bandit and flicking open a panel to show some of the inside talismans.
With the others patiently standing aside, I made my way to the slightly ajar door and opened it fully. I could still hear the roaches inside, though couldn’t immediately see them. I figured that they were hiding out among the seats somewhere, so I started to move between the rows towards the red bars.
One of them moved, and out came a roach from behind one of the back seats. Its antennae twitched, and it turned to look right at me.
I Pulled the trigger, blowing the mutated bug apart.
Four more bars started to shift, another one diving right at me from beneath the seats. The little bugger tried to nibble on my leg, but my heavy leather barding was easily stronger than its bite. I brought up my hoof and stamped into the creature, seeing the third climbing the walls and onto one of the cracked windows.
My bullet blew it out of said window. Though I should probably have waited until it was on something sturdier before I put a bullet through it. Oh well.
I levitated up the two dead bugs and shoved them out of the window after their buddy, moving through the seat to the last bug and putting the mutant out of its misery. I then discarded the last carcass before moving back out of the bus and towards my friends.
“Welp, no more roaches,” I announced to the group. “It’s safe to board, assuming we’re ready to fly.”
“Everything seems to check out,” Cobalt reported, closing up the hatch with a satisfied whinny. “The talismans are how I left them, it doesn’t seem like anypony came across this thing while we were gone. Lucky.”
I will take that luck wholeheartedly.
“Alright then, I see no reason to stick around. Moon Blossom, Altrix, hitch yourselves up and-”
“Scrap Heap! Ponies! Altrix! Do you hear me!?” Insidiis’ voice suddenly and wholly unexpectedly blared out of my saddlebag. “Answer me at once!”
There was a single moment of every single one of us just standing there, doing nothing. I have to admit to being blindsided by both the Changeling Queen’s sudden entrance and the sheer desperation I could hear in her voice.
The latter part kicked me into gear and saw me levitating out the orb as quickly as I could.
“Right! Right! Here!”
“Princess, what’s wrong?” Altrix whimpered fearfully.
“We are under attack!” A chill ran through our entire group, and I’m sure all of our blood felt like ice. “I cannot dally, there is fierce fighting in the hive, and I must join them. We are pulling my changelings back into the stable while security holds them in the upper levels, and then we’re sealing ourselves in!”
“Mother…” I heard Altrix mutter under her breath.
If they were retreating back to the stable, then it had to be bad.
“Who is it?” I asked the Princess, though I could hazard a guess or two. “What’s happening down there?”
“It’s-” Something interrupted the Princess, and I saw her look away from her own orb with a look of both question and alarm on her face.
“Gas…?” she said to herself.
And then she dropped the orb, the changeling vanishing from view as I heard her hooves rapidly moving away.
And then the connection was cut.
And we knew that we were too late.
I had such a terrible twist in my gut, it was like being struck with a .50 caliber round. How could this had happened now of all times!? Was there any sign? Something we could have done? It was like some cruel joke, going through all of this only to find out that we were too late to do anything at the last moment. I had no idea if the changelings could actually hold against their attackers, but a terrible part of me didn't like the odds.
Dammit!
“We need to go back!” Altrix screeched, the changeling shaking heavily where we stood. “Right. Now! We need to go! Please!”
“We are,” Xena assured her. “Kronos has many changelings to subdue. And a Changeling Queen. We may yet reinforce them.”
“They could have brought alicorns to pursue that problem,” Cobalt pointed out.
“Would they even know about her?” I questioned.
He grimaced. “They knew about changelings. They definitely knew about Chrysalis given the recording we got from one of Red Eye’s Talons. I would say they knew the possibility of encountering a Changeling Queen was high.”
Damn. I could definitely see them bringing in some of their mutant alicorns then. How many would Insidiis be able to take on?
“Am I the only one concerned about the whole ‘gas’ thing we heard?” Moon Blossom enquired, holding up her hoof.
“One thing at a time,” I responded. “Get your asses onto that Sky Bandit. We are leaving, now!”
There was no more talk about the matter. Not right now. Moon Blossom and Altrix rushed to the front as the changeling, in particular, was clearly trying very hard to keep herself together. But she could do it, I knew she could.
With them getting ready, the rest of us quickly boarded the Sky Bandit and took our seats. It felt like an eternity but, eventually, the two out front were hitched up to the skywagon and pulling it free from the alleyway. The changeling and pegasus dragged us down the street, gaining some speed before they opened their respective pairs of wings and brought us back into the air.
The rooftops passed us, the Sky Bandit making a slight bank before it started to speed away from the street and Vanhoover in its entirety.
I watched it pass by. Looking out the window, towards the city centre, I could just imagine what was going on in there. Spring Haze and Ruby keeping everyone’s spirits up in Crossroads as they finished patching up the town and putting the Remnant far behind them. Star Paladin McRoar and Scribe Roll In establishing an outpost in the MAS hub, secretly preparing for the day that the tensions within the Steel Rangers finally boiled over. A plaza full of ghouls and corpses, Xena’s past finally left in the dust with the death of her brother.
And so, the city of Vanhoover was left behind, the open Equestrian Wasteland spanning out before us, the large and greatly empty countryside of Equestria’s north.
And somewhere in that mass, the people we had promised to save were currently suffering and dying because we hadn’t been fast enough.
Xena placed her hoof on mine as if she could sense what I was thinking. But I could see it in her eyes, the guilt and worry was affecting her too. I only had to hope that she was right and that we would arrive in time to help repel Kronos’ attempt against the hive.
I pulled the orb back out, holding it in my magic as I attempted to form a connection. I just had to hear or see something. Anything.
But there was nothing.
Only silence.
Footnote: Max Level