//------------------------------//
// Chapter 3: Hopeville 
// Story: Fallout Equestria - The Code of Honor 
// by FireStorm2247 
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Chapter 3: Hopeville



“I’m willing to work with any kind of hope I can take.”




It was grey when I awoke, the cloud cover that I had beheld as one of my first sights of the wasteland having remained unchanged. It still stretched out in all directions like a forbidding curtain, preventing anypony from seeing the sun or the sky above. I didn’t know how long I had slept, but the simple knowledge that this sky was what I had slept under was a knife against my already dieing faith. Though sleeping was necessary, waking up left me darkened and feeling empty. I stared forward, unable to think outside of my own little dark corner, inside of which lingered a single question. How was a mare who just lost half of her family supposed to rise up and take on post-war Equestria? The teachings of the Stable had done many things for us and it had mostly fulfilled one of its greatest purposes, which was to provide us with some sort of advantage should we ever step outside. It taught us that life out in the wasteland would be hard and merciless. Those virtues that we held dear, the Elements of Harmony, would constantly be assaulted by the malice of the wasteland and its inhabitants. We would be put to the test again and again, always close to being chewed up by the teeth of the wasteland before being spit back out as a shell of our former selves. Our teachers never sugarcoated anything in their lessons for older ponies. The Stable knew that the wasteland was a dangerous place, despite how little anypony set hoof in it. Now it was our turn to face it all, together as the band of survivors that we were. But despite the Stable’s thorough lessons, it could never fully prepare us for a life in the wasteland. There was something missing in its lessons that I and perhaps several others were experiencing now. How would you survive in the wasteland when the greatest of losses is weighing you down? Not one thing that the Stable had taught could help brace a pony against that kind of tragedy. Perhaps it was something that was overlooked or maybe the idea was regarded as something that was highly unlikely. Either way, all of the Stable’s words about drawing strength from each other and following your heart couldn’t help ease the wounds caused by the loss of a family member… or two. It sure as hell didn’t help me. 

Pulling away from the claws of my own thoughts, I looked down at my brother. He was still sound asleep under my wing, and I was glad for it. Yesterday hit him just as hard as it hit me, and the only way that he had managed to fall asleep was by crying himself into exhaustion. Grimly, I knew that sleep was sleep, no matter how it was found, and he needed to keep up his strength for the traveling we’d be doing. We were very far away from the Equestrian heartland and the chances of finding settlements out this way seemed very slim. Even if we managed to reach one, I was certain that no pony in the wasteland thought it a good idea to be bringing a group of two hundred ponies into a major settlement. Chances were that we would end up doubling the population of most settlements out there, wherever they might exist, and I don’t think any trust would come from that; more likely than not, we’d be turned away. 

“Nova.” I heard a voice call, a mare. When I looked, I saw a bright red-colored unicorn approaching me; Grace was coming, wearing her medical saddlebags. Her coat was darker in places, showing where she had been spattered with blood from the wounded she had been caring for; she looked very tired.

I didn’t speak, not even to say hello. I just wasn’t in the mood for talking. “The camp is getting ready to move. We’ll be leaving in about an hour.” Grace explained. “I wanted to stop by and check you over before we move out. Last I saw of you I think you had taken some injuries.” 

“Yeah…” I agreed mechanically, finding it hard to get out of my dark cloud even to look at my left side, seeing the dried streamers of blood that had run down my Stable barding. My barding was not in terrible shape, but it had its fair share of holes from where shrapnel from the explosion had cut through it. Normally, I think I would’ve been treated the last time I was awake. “How long was I asleep for?”

“About twelve hours.” Grace answered from her place about three pony-lengths away from me. “It’s middle morning right now, so Captain Saber wants to get us up and moving soon.” Now that I looked again with a fresh set of eyes, focused on the present instead of the past, I noticed that despite how dark and grey the sky was, it was brighter out. Even if the clouds blocked the sun, some light would still filter through to at least show that it was day. When the sun passed, the transition from day to night would still be very clear. “So if you’ll let me, I’d like to move you to the clinic so I can patch up those wounds before we move on.”

“I’m not leaving my brother.” I declared right away, my voice carrying an intentional edge to it. The declaration was already written in stone right when I said it. 

Grace paused, having begun to take a step forward as if expecting an affirmative answer. To this, she only cocked her head over in a shrug. “Okay.” But though I thought she was going to leave me be, I was greatly mistaken. Oh no, she had dealt with stubborn patients before. Instead, she levitated her saddlebags off of her back and down onto the ground next to me, whereupon she settled down and begun looking through them. “Then I’ll just have to treat you here.” she said decidedly as she removed the first item of her choice, a clean rag, dampened with water.

“I thought you said that you’d treat me if I let you.” I said, bitter. I didn’t want her here right now.

“I changed my mind.” Grace explained, sounding a bit irritated. “If you think that I’m going to let you walk around out there in the wasteland all day, torn up like you are, then you’ve got another thing coming, Nova.” By now, she had removed other items from her saddlebags, including a shiny metal tray, a small blade, a pair of tweezers, a roll of healing bandages, and a small bottle that held a dose of the healing liquid that I remembered drinking before in the Stable. “Besides,” she added, looking over her two metal tools. “if you don’t let me pull out any bits of metal you might have in you right now, you’re going to get an infection and then you’ll wish that I had treated you, anyway.”

“Well…” I began, trying to think of something to bypass that perfectly valid prediction; nothing came to mind.

“Well, nothing.” Grace interrupted as she finished inspecting her tools. “Now hush and don’t fidget. I have to concentrate here.” 

Even before I looked, I felt as Gracie’s magic focused on a small hole in my barding and pulled up the fabric. Then I watched the small blade as it hovered in towards the fabric and cut the barding open. A short cut, Grace only cut it open to give herself more room to work around the small shrapnel wound that was revealed against my grey coat. I couldn’t see the wound, but I felt with a sting as Grace used her magic to insert the tweezers into the wound. I felt the tips of the medical tool scrape against a small bit of metal, and a trickle of blood begun to ooze down my side. And then, she pulled the metal out with a quick yank. “Ow!” 

“See?” Grace asked expectantly, holding the shiny reddish metal bit up to my face with her magic for me to see. It wasn’t very large, but it was a slender bit of iron and I could tell that it had pierced through my flesh from the dagger-like point at one end. “If these things stay inside you, that’s going to make some nasty problems for you later. If that’s what you want, then I’ll stop.” At her words, I cast another uncomfortable glance at the metal bit before laying my head between my forelegs with a huff. And with that she continued to work while I frowned, stifling an “ow” every time she removed a bit of metal from my body. There had been three other pieces of metal that had sunk into the skin on my left side alone. After removing those, Grace found two others on my left shoulder, another piece in my left flank (dangerously close to my cutie mark) and another embedded in my chest. Eventually, to my further annoyance, I had to get up and leave my brother to resituated myself so that she could inspect my belly and my right side. She removed two more bits of metal from me before she finally stepped back and declared me metal-free. Then she quickly applied bandages to the small wounds after cleaning the fresh and dried blood from my coat. “There. All done now.” she said, rising as the glow from her horn faded. “I’ll leave you with that small healing potion, just in case you might need it somewhere along our traveling for the next couple days. But try not to get hurt anymore.”

“Um… thanks.” I grumbled. But despite my weariness, I felt that a little more was owed to her than that pathetic excuse for a thank you. So I expressed my thanks again, more heart-felt this time. 

The fact that she smiled at my revised gratitude caught me entirely off-guard. So much crap had happened in the past day that I didn’t think smiling was possible. But she did it, and it got me to thinking once again. I was still in mourning for the loss of my parents, and it wouldn’t be something that I could just shrug off on a whim. But I began to wonder if this is what my parents would’ve really wanted me to be doing right now, crying and trapping myself in self-pity and misery. What would they have wanted me to do? What should I be doing right now?

Let me go Nova, and help the ponies here. They need you. 

I remembered my mother’s words, the last she spoke to me. I had been too engulfed in my sea of sorrow to have really listened fully to those words when they were actually spoken. I suppose that my friends would’ve said that that was understandable. It really was a terrible loss, but now that I heard my mother’s voice again from my own memory I begun to think that now would be the best time to focus on the present. We were going to be covering a lot of ground within the next couple of days, and every pony who wasn’t incapacitated was going to be needed to work. Whatever job I would be assigned, I needed to be at my best to help the survivors move on safely. 

I turned to face where my baby brother was still sleeping, looking at peace as he usually did when he slept. We had been resting with other families who had settled beside us in a line, making one of the edges of our camp. Ahead, I saw a security mare trotting down the line, gently waking up those who were still sleeping. She continued down the line and stopped by my brother, about to nudge him with a hoof before I gently cleared my throat. It caught her attention, and when she looked, I gave my best smile. “I’ll get him up.” 

“As you wish, Nova.” the mare said with a dip of her head, and walked past me before stopping again. “By the way, Captain Saber wanted a couple of us to look for you while we woke up the camp. He wants to see you to assign you a task for when we get moving today. When you get a moment, go and see him. He’s at the center of the camp.” She moved on right away to wake up the next sleeping pony.

Following the security pony’s example, I stepped up to my brother and nudged him with a hoof. “Come on baby brother.” I encouraged, nudging him again. “Time to wake up.” His eyes opened after a breath and he looked up at me. “We’re getting ready for a long trip.”

Yawning, Blake rose up and stretched. “A trip to where?” he asked tiredly. His voice showed that he still remembered yesterday too, and I felt obliged to embrace him.

Pulling him against me with a foreleg, I explained, “Well, we’re going to try and find a new home out here somewhere. But before we find it, we have some walking we’re going to have to do. It’ll be a long trip, but I’m thinking that as long as this group stays together, we’ll find something.” Those were big words, entirely based on faith. And it was less than a day before now that I felt I had hardly any faith left. It was kind of ironic, but if I was going to honor my mother’s last words, then I would have to get that faith back and keep it close. 

My brother nodded. “I’m hungry.” I didn’t envy him for that at all; I had no appetite of my own. Technically, I should’ve been wanting to eat a small snack for the road, but I didn’t even have room for that. Eventually I would have to eat and drink again, but for now I was content with just helping my brother find something to sate his own appetite. 

“Let’s go find something for you to eat then.” Turning, I found my saddlebags laying in the dead grass where I had left them. I picked them up and set them over my back behind my wings before I nudged my brother along into the camp. By now, the awakened ponies were beginning to gather up their families for the long journey ahead, most of them eating a light breakfast. 

Security was rallied at the center of the camp as the captain gave orders to his subordinates. One after another, they were departing for their posts to carry out their assignments. I approached the gathering of security ponies, and waited outside of the circle. I had intended to wait my turn, to wait until the others had received their orders first so they could get to work. But apparently, this wasn’t an option, because the next thing I knew, the captain had made his way through his guards and stepped up before me. “Glad you could make it.” Captain Saber said. “Come with me please.” 

“What exactly do you need me for?” I asked, following after him with my brother. 

He did not answer me until we stopped farther away from the rest of the security team. And turning about, he faced me to say, “Well Nova, I’ll get right to it. You’re the only Pegasus pony that we’ve got. I’m sure that whoever found you told you that I had an assignment for you, and they were right. You’re an important part of this group, and we really could use your abilities to help us through this trip. But I do know what you’ve been through, so I don’t ask this lightly. If you’re willing, I’d like you to fly recon above us and make sure that we don’t step into anything we don’t want to step in. It’ll be good to have eyes in the sky, and it’ll save us a lot of trouble if we run into something out there.”

I could see the advantages in that. The terrain wasn’t exactly abundant with obstacles or hiding places (at least that’s what I assumed about a great field of dead grass and dry dirt) and this meant that I would be able to see very far in every direction. Also, threats would be easy to spot, whereupon we could steer clear of them. But aside from this, it was going to be the greatest opportunity to fly! I would be free to fly wherever I wanted to, without steel walls and ceilings to get in my way. It was, in all honesty, the one thing that I hadn’t liked about that Stable. Even rooms as large as the atrium or the apple orchard were not large enough for me to fly around in, or at least not without getting bored very quickly. I would exercise my wings at times by flying laps around the atrium. Sometimes I would trade rooms and weave between the orchard’s apple trees while my parents walked the paths. Most of the time when I flew, I would get asked to stop, especially by maintenance ponies. Sure I had gotten into an accident or two, but it was all in good fun… except the maintenance department hadn’t really thought so. But out here, outside, it was completely open and free. I would definitely take this assignment, not only to be able to help, but to experience truly free flying for the first time in my life. “Yes.” I said, unfurling my wings with a determined snap, hearing the feathers gently rustle. “I’ll do that for you.”

“Good. I’m glad you’ll help us.” the captain said, looking immediately relieved. “Come with me. I have some equipment I want to give you. It’s by the clinic.” We walked then, through the groups of ponies getting ready to move. None of them looked at all enthused about the journey, let alone moving at all. Some of them were scared, and I couldn’t blame them.

We continued through the crowd until we found what was left of the clinic. Grace was gathering volunteers to pack up the clinic and ready the wounded for travel. My guess was that these same ponies would be carrying the wounded on their backs as well. They would be the slowest, and would thus be the ponies that would set our pace. With at least fifty wounded, over half of our train would be occupied with the wounded and those ponies who carried them. The others who weren’t security would be carrying our supplies. Even the little ones had to be put to work, I came to realize, as I saw an occasional colt or filly with saddlebags over their backs, adjusted to fit their smaller size. It would be a tough slog for all of us. 

Up ahead of us, the captain stopped before a pile of extra equipment, laying in a heap without any effort applied to sorting it. Amongst the items in the pile was extra barding, battle saddle harnessing, and saddlebags. There was miscellaneous equipment, little bits and pieces of things lying about the pile, and there was even an occasional firearm that had been tossed in. Even as I looked over the extra gear, a unicorn mare wearing security armor lifted a rifle from the pile with her magic and carried it off. “This is the gear we salvaged from the dead and the injured.” the captain explained. “I want to get you geared up with the essentials so that you’ll be better armed in the sky. I’m not counting on running into any trouble out there, but I’m not taking chances either. Find yourself a battle saddle. You’ll need to be maneuverable up there, so don’t wear any security armor. It’s heavy, take my word for it. Also, I’ve already picked out weapons for you, so I’ll go get those and be right back.” With that, he left me with the pile of gear. I could see right away that most of the equipment had been freshly cleaned and repaired to restore the items to useable condition. Some of the security wear still remained damaged, holes torn through the padding where bullets had either gone through or had been embedded into the armor. My first thought was to take the equipment that was in the worst condition so as to save the better gear for another more experienced security pony, or perhaps a wounded survivor. But then I decided that the captain was right about my new post. This was my first assignment as a security member, or at least this is what I thought of it as, and for a job that required me to be flying for most, if not all of the next couple of days, I would need to be equipped with the best I could get. 

I shrugged off my saddlebags which my brother proceeded to drag away from me to give me room to change. I had nothing else on me besides my Stable barding, lightweight and easy to carry. I would return it to the pile for somepony else to use, perhaps as clothing, or perhaps even a blanket. Either way, I had no use for it now, not while wearing a battle saddle. My Stable issued resident’s barding covered my shoulders, chest, and roughly a third of my back, sides, and belly; my saddlebags generally made the armoring for the rest of me. My forelegs fit through holes in the front of it which acted as its sleeves, and the barding connected together at the chest with clip buttons that ran from the bottom of my chest up to the bottom of my neck where the collar was situated. With a hoof, I could get the buttons undone, and when I did so, I wriggled each foreleg from its sleeve. This let the barding come fully loose and I shook it off onto the ground. Turning back to the pile of gear, I traded the Stable barding for a set of thick leather straps that made a battle saddle. This was a heavier saddle, and I could tell because of the series of protective armored plates and pads that adorned it, making it as much a battle saddle as security armor. I set that aside and tried another, finding a second saddle that was much lighter. It was a simple design, composed of one heavy strap (that I imagined was secured around the wearer’s middle) and two iron plates, spaced evenly on the strap. I realized right after I saw them that these plates were housings for a rifle or other weapon to be fastened and secured to so that the wearer would have weapons to fire. The plates had a series of slots and tabs to make this possible and it looked to be able to accommodate various weapon combinations. “Find what you need?” I heard from behind me as the captain returned. Gunny was with him, and his horn was glowing as he levitated two weapons next to him. One was a carbine rifle of sorts, black and silver, sleek and durable, and looking quite deadly. On its left side was an iron plate fastened into the body, identical to the plates on the saddle I chose. Attached to the same plate and built around the rest of the body of the carbine was a leather and iron box which wasn’t as wide as it was tall. The bottom of it ended under the body of the weapon, and I could hear a jingling noise inside. That device must’ve be used as the storage for the ammunition. 

The second weapon that Gunny was levitating by him made me freeze. It was a pistol, shined up so that the steel glinted, even in the cloud cover of the Equestrian dawn. I recognized it right away because of the blue designs etched into the grip, a blue rose wrapped within the outline of a blue flame. It was the Fire Rose, my mother’s pistol. The firing bit that had been attached to it before had been removed and a small plate had been attached to its right side. Setting the two weapons down and floating the pistol over to me, Gunny said, “This belongs to you, friend.”

Damn right it does! “Thank you.” I said, pulling it too me with a foreleg without discussion. I was getting over the tears of my loss, now only its memory weighing on me, and a discussion about where and how it was found, and by whom, wouldn’t make the doing of my job any easier. 

“Alright.” Captain Saber said, having looked over my choice of a battle saddle and approved. “Gunny’s going to get you geared up and explain how this saddle works. I know you’ve only had some experience with a sidearm, so this’ll be completely new to you. Like I said, I’m not expecting to run into any trouble, but this is Equestria after all. When you’re done here, come back and find me at the center of camp. I’ll have one more item to give you.”

He left us then, Gunny giving him a salute with a hoof before he turned his attention to my chosen battle saddle. Commanding me to fan out my wings, Gunny used his magic to levitate the saddle up and drape the strap over my middle back. The strap rested comfortably against my coat, even as Gunny pulled the two ends of the strap together and secured them with the iron clamp that rested against my belly. The strap was situated just behind my wing joints, and this caused no discomfort when I closed my wings again. Next, Gunny walked around to my right side, whereupon he picked up the assembled carbine and lowered it into place against the iron plate on my right side. With a series of clicks, the rifle was secured to the saddle. When I looked, I saw that the barrel ended just past my shoulder, and the weapon didn’t move about when I experimentally moved about. As Gunny walked back around to my left side, he said, “I believe this is your first time around a battle saddle of any kind, so I’ll explain what I can. This is a lightweight battle saddle, used for small firearms and rifle weapons only. None of the big stuff can be put on this thing, like LMGs or heavy caliber rifles. This is the best choice for your job because it wont take away anything from your agility or speed. The weapon you have on your right side is a markspony carbine. It’s a semi-automatic, gas-operated rifle that fires five point fifty-six millimeter rounds. Right now, it’s just got the standard ammunition type in it. It was all we could get for it, and it would have had an optic scope on it, but that was removed for the present purpose. This weapon is lightweight, about six or seven pounds, so this rifle wont hinder your flight capability.”

“What’s the other thing that’s attached to the body of the weapon?” I inquired., looking back at the  box of iron and leather secured to the weapon.

“That’s pre-war tech.” Gunny explained. “Pre-war unicorns made this device, calling it the auto loader. Basically, it uses magic to sense when the weapon is out of ammo in its clip and then it fully reloads your weapon for you. They made variants for most every type of weapon on the field because as you know, it’s hard for ponies to reload without magic. The only catch was that each weapon that used an auto loader had to be worn as part of a battle saddle.” Levitating up my mother’s pistol, Fire Rose, up off the ground, another object that looked nearly identical to the auto loader of my new carbine floated up to the pistol. Gunny attached the slightly smaller auto loader to the pistol by fitting the grip of the pistol into the device. Then, repeating the process that he used to attach my markspony carbine to my battle saddle, he secured the pistol to the saddle by securing the two iron plates together. “Normally, I wouldn’t use a forty-five caliber pistol on a battle saddle. Hell, I wouldn’t use any pistol on a battle saddle. But we’ve got the know-how, and it’s valuable to you, so I wont argue.” 

“Thanks Gunny.” I said, looking myself over with satisfaction. Although I had never used a battle saddle before, and I was certain that my carbine was a bit advanced for my measly firearms skill, I liked being armed like this. 

“I can only make educated guesses,” Gunny added, looking over my battle saddle again. “but if we run into trouble and you have to swoop in, I would say that you’d have to line yourself up with a target, fly right for it, and then fire. And speaking of that, I’ve got one more piece I need to put on.” He paused long enough for his horn to glow again and he levitated out a strange piece of metal. I immediately recognized the firing bit, a metal rod with a trigger that I could pull with my tongue to fire my weapons. The rod was attached to two long wires of metal that snaked back and away from it, and as Gunny begun to attach it to my saddle, I saw that each of the wires connected to the two weapons I carried. The end of each wire had a mechanism, an arm of sorts that snapped backward when the trigger was pulled on the firing bit. Gunny explained this as he worked, saying, “This device is what earth-ponies and pegasi use when they wear common battle saddles. When you bite down on the firing bit and pull that trigger with your tongue, it moves the little arms on the ends of the wires which strike the triggers of the weapons, making them fire. There’s also a safety on the underside of the firing bit. Just lower your head down and pull that little lever down to engage the safety. It serves as a security measure in case you have to sleep with your gear on.” The firing mechanism was installed now, and I was ready to fight. Briefly, an urge to go and find the invaders washed over me, allowing me to picture a scene in my mind of me taking the head off of an invader pony with my new carbine. But I shook my head. It was silly to think of, because I knew better than to ask for trouble like that. Instead, I looked over myself one more time. Gunny was adjusting the height of the firing bit with his magic, lowering it until it was level with my lower neck. He asked me to look forward, making another adjustment and repeating the process when I wanted the firing bit a little lower. When I was satisfied that the device wouldn’t bother me by being in front of my eyes all of the time, I fanned out my wings and checked their position in relation to the battle saddle, now fully ready for use. My wings had to rest a bit higher on my sides than normal, but I could deal with that. Other than that the fit was perfect for me, as I could flap my wings and not have them beat against the weapons I carried. Overall, I liked wearing it, and I liked the way it looked on me. Best of all, it didn’t cover my cutie mark either, which I admired with a sense of pride that I swear I hadn’t ever felt before towards my blue fire. “You’re ready to fly.” Gunny declared, taking a few steps back to analyze his handiwork. “We’ll be leaving soon. Go find Captain Saber and get anything else you’ll need. Then pay your respects to the dead. After that, we’re moving.”

Pay my respects to the dead… that wasn’t good to hear. “How many more died overnight?” I dared the question. 

“Three more. Two guards, one resident.” Gunny answered grimly. “Died from their wounds, blood loss, things like that. I’m going to get back to my other duties. See you out on the trail.” With that, he hastily departed and I sighed. If I remembered the captain’s numbers correctly, that would have put us down to two hundred and six survivors. This saddened me yet again, but at the same time, it put a little more oil onto that tiny fire that was my effort to win back my determination and faith. With those three dead, it reminded me of my wish to help and empowered it. 

With battle saddle on and weapons ready, I trotted forward to find my brother waiting for me. He was sitting beside two pairs of saddlebags, one that I recognized as my own, and another that was filled with items. He was munching on an apple and there was an open canteen leaning against one of the saddlebags. Waving a free hoof to me, he supported his apple with the other before calling to me, “I found mother’s saddlebags. The captain said I could carry them and that the food and water that mother had packed was all still there.” 

“Oh.” I said, realizing that I had completely forgotten about mother’s saddlebags… for several reasons. “I’m glad you found those. If you are okay with carrying mother’s saddlebags then please do so.” As I looked at the stuffed saddlebags that my mother had carried, I noticed that my own saddlebags were quite empty. The only items I had was the healing potion that Gracie had given to me, and then the two pictures I had taken from my room in the Stable. I had a feeling that carrying my saddlebags with this battle saddle would be quite awkward. 

I emptied my saddlebags as Blake continued to eat, and looked over my three possessions. I could tell already that the healing potion would fit in mother’s… Blake’s saddlebags, and I pushed it inside. My two pictures, however, looked like they wouldn’t fit unless I did a lot of reorganizing. Trying once anyway, I managed to fit one picture inside the saddlebags. The other picture was our family photo… a prized possession of mine… and I knew what to do with it. “Wait for me here for a minute, okay?” I asked my brother, who nodded with a mouth full of apple. 

I left him there for a moment, scooping up my framed family photo in my teeth and making my way back to the center of the camp where I was supposed to meet Captain Saber. The captain was there, speaking with a group of six ponies, all wearing security armor. He dismissed them just before I stopped by him, and seeing me, he stepped back and nudged a device across the dead grass towards me with a hoof. The device was a Pipbuck, looking quite new. The bulk of the body resembled a small terminal screen with a much slimmer screen stretching out below it, all framed by metal. This was the center of a metal cuff that clasped around the wearer’s foreleg. “This is for you.” Captain Saber said, pressing a button on the top of the terminal’s metal frame. The cuff came open, making it so that I could put it on. “You’ll be needing it up there so that you can maintain contact with us here on the ground. Only a few other ponies have these besides myself. Our six security sergeants are wearing their own, Rosemary Grace has one, and now you. The Stable didn’t issue these out to everypony, so nine is all we have left. If you spot anything while we’re traveling, you can use the Pipbuck’s radio to contact us through our newly made security channel. You can thank Shore for that. There’s a couple other features that I should go over with you real quick before I turn you loose. Go ahead and put it on.” 

At his word, I set my picture on the ground and I raised my right foreleg as Saber picked up the device, situating it so that the Stable 181 Pipbuck emblazoned on the bottom of the frame in white letters was facing me correctly; I wouldn’t want to be reading an upside down terminal. Then, the captain brought it to rest slightly higher on my foreleg, just above my hoof, before he pressed the button on the top of the terminal’s frame, and the cuff closed around my foreleg, tight, but not constricting. Stepping up beside me, he begun to guide me through the Pipbuck’s functions. He flipped a small lever on the right side of the frame and it flickered to life, the screen buzzing momentarily before it showed a sort of loading screen, a green bar slowly moving from left to right. “This is a strange device.” I commented, raising my foreleg for the both of us to see the screen.

“Well believe me, it’s one that’ll do you a lot of good.” came Saber’s reply. “This computer has a lot of useful functions and options for you to use. It can give you a lot of advantages out there that other ponies without one wouldn’t get. To begin with,” He paused here, waiting for the loading screen to finish, and when it did, I was faced with a computerized outline of a Pegasus pony. It was a full outline with a distinguished head, torso, legs, outspread wings, and the outline was entirely green. “this first screen shows your physical condition.” Drawing a hoof along the screen, he continued to explain, “This entire outline is entirely solid. But say for example, that this foreleg’s outline becomes a dashed line… that means that you’ve been wounded there to the point where that limb is crippled. It’ll also flash medical alerts to let you know if you’ve sustained an injury that isn‘t crippling.” 

Pointing then to the bottom of the frame, where a set of four buttons were built between the two display screens, he said, “Each of these buttons will bring up a different screen. The medical screen will appear on its own if you get wounded, so there’s no button for it. Now because its medical related, I should also point out that on the left side of the frame is a sensor. That’s your geiger counter. It’ll tell you how much radiation you’ve absorbed when you’re out there. If you hear it ticking, that means that you’re stepping into an irradiated area. The spell behind your medical screen is designed to show your radiation level after you’ve stepped out of an irradiated area. So keep an eye on that sensor too when you’re out and about.” Next, he pressed a hoof down on the far left button, and a blank screen replaced the medical screen. On it was a list of five items, the first being named Fire Rose, my mother’s .45 pistol. The second of the five items listed was named 5.56mm Markspony Carbine. The third item was listed as Light Combat Battle Saddle. The last two items on the display screen were the respective ammunition types for my two weapons. According to the screen, I had one hundred and forty-four shots for my carbine as well as forty-nine bullets for Fire Rose. I shook my head, quite alarmed… and amazed at the same time. “Magic’s a wonderful thing ain’t it?“ Saber asked expectantly, pausing before continuing with, “This is your inventory screen. If you’re wearing saddlebags and carrying supplies, the magic behind this device will sense it and weigh it out, showing you how much your carrying. It’ll also show you the items you’re carrying as well as the conditions of weapons and armor.” I noticed now that there was a green bar next to the names of both of my weapons and my battle saddle. All three of the bars were full. “If any of those bars start to empty, that means that your equipment is deteriorating. So that’s something else you’ll need to keep an eye on.” Then, he pressed his hoof down on the next button over and a screen looking similar to the inventory screen appeared. However, the list was blank. “This is your terminal notes or records screen.” Captain Saber explained. “This was a feature that was added to allow the Pipbuck to interact with computers and similar machines. Though I don’t think it very likely, you may find terminals or other machines in which this Pipbuck can connect to. If that’s the case, then you can use this menu to view computer files that you’ve downloaded, whether they be audio or not.” Bringing his hoof down on the third button over, the terminal notes screen was replaced by a new display. In the upper right corner was a large L and at the top left was another small list where the words Stable 181 Security Channel shown in green letters. “This is your radio screen.” the captain explained. “This L will light up with activity when you turn your radio to this channel or any other channel that might be out there in the wasteland. It measures radio waves to show you if you’re in range of a radio broadcast. You turn to a channel by pressing this black button on the lower right side of the terminal’s frame. You turn the radio on and off with the red power button below that. When you get up into the air, you’ll need to turn your radio to the security channel so that we can talk to you and vice versa. Shore specially programmed the channel to serve as a communications channel and not just a one-way radio signal, so you can contact us from your Pipbuck’s speaker at the top left of the frame. It’s right above the geiger counter.”

That was a lot of information to try and remember all at once, and though I relayed that concern to him, his response was not the response I was looking for. “Well we’re not done yet. I’ve got a few more things I need to show you.” Pressing the far right button, a screen came up, showing a large map that occupied the entire screen. “This is the map screen. The screen will show a map of a wide area and pinpoint any location you discover onto that map. For example, you can see where it shows Stable 181.” Indeed it was true, as there was a small box with letters under it, stating that that was the location of Stable 181. On the map was a small dot, which I assumed must’ve been me, and all around me on the map was nothing but a birds-eye view of the landscape, or at least a very convincing version of it. “So that’s your map. Now you can press the map button again to bring up a smaller local map. And then every time you press it, it’ll change from a larger map to a smaller map. It’ll show every place you find so it is quite handy to have around.” Saber said. “Also on a quick side note, this button on the left side of the frame will activate your lamp. We hardly have use for it, but it’s there and it’s bright.” 

Nodding my understanding, Saber continued, saying, “I’ve got one more thing I need to explain, and then the Pipbuck is yours.” Drawing a hoof over the slimmer display screen below the larger one, he showed a compass which occupied the left of the display screen, and a long green bar that occupied the right. “This last screen is your E.F.S. and S.A.T.S. screen. It always stays on because it’s the computer display for the device’s primary spells. E.F.S. stands for Eyes Forward Sparkle and its primary function is to distinguish friendly and hostile contacts you may come across. For example, if you face me, I should appear on your compass as a green dash. Try it.” I did as I was told and when I faced him, sure enough, there was a green dash on the E.F.S. compass, along with several others that must’ve represented the ponies behind him, still making ready for the journey. “Remember, green is friendly, and red is hostile. If you see red on your E.F.S. compass, then be on your guard. The last thing I need to explain is S.A.T.S. or Stable-Tec Arcane Targeting Spell. This spell is given to you by the device and it gives you the ability to engage a target more accurately by allowing you to target specific limbs or areas of the target. The spell has limited uses before it has to recharge, so use it wisely.”

“How is S.A.T.S. activated?” I asked.

“Simply by engaging the target.” Saber answered. “Like I said, it gives you the chance to specifically target a limb, but you don’t have to.” And with a pause to look over the camp, Saber said, “And that’s it. Use it however you want to, but the Pipbuck is yours to keep. Now, we need to get moving.”

The typhoon of information that had been sent at me made my head hurt, but it still didn’t wash away the memory of that thing I needed to do before we left. “I have something I need to take care of first.” I said quickly. “Gunny told me that I should pay my respects to the dead, and I want to do that real quick.” 

The captain looked at me, a little concerned it seemed. “Alright Nova.” he said, raising a hoof to point behind me. “We buried the dead on that hill behind you. Do what you have to do, and then meet up with the rest of us down here.” 

“Thank you captain.” I said, and when he departed, I bent down and picked up my family photo in my teeth before winging away towards the hill that Saber had identified. Even before I landed, I could see the four patches of land where dirt had been upturned, dug out and then patted back down to make the graves. Each of the graves had a small flag, made from sticks and white cloth, unmoving because of the lack of a wind. Two of the graves were marked by pistols, placed on top of the dirt with their triggers removed so that they would not operate. A third grave was decorated by a pearl necklace and a white flower, gifts from the family that the dead pony had left behind. But the fourth was untouched by memorial gifts, and when I landed, I saw that the flag had my mother’s name written on it. I paused by the grave, breathing in and out slowly to keep myself from shedding anymore tears. The time for that, I decided, was gone now. Now I had to focus on surviving and helping my friends survive. But despite my resolve to keep myself from crying anymore, I found myself talking aloud, as if speaking to my mother again. I set the picture on the ground and stared at my mother’s final resting place. “Well mom,” I began, fanning out my wings. “look at me. I’m all geared up and ready to help like I wanted to… like you wanted me to. I’m glad that I get to play my part in all this now. We’re leaving here and setting out to find a new home… somewhere out there. So that means that we’ll be leaving the Stable for good.” I paused here, sighing again. “I’m going to miss that place… everypony is… but I think that you and dad were right when you told me that when friends stick together, there is nothing that can’t be done.” Oh how sentimental… but it was true… and it made me smile. I guess Crystal Sunset had been rubbing off on me a bit, her and her poetics. “This is me trying to get my faith back from the wasteland.” I said, now feeling strong. “But in honor of you and dad, I wont let it take my faith away. I’ll find some way to keep that from happening. This is for you, this way we’ll always be together. I just wanted to give this photo to you before I left here… because I don’t think I’ll be visiting this spot again.” With that, I took the framed picture in my mouth and set it over my mother’s bed. The picture was facing me and I took in its details one last time. In front of a grey background, my baby brother and I sat down on our haunches beside one another, looking forward towards the camera with smiles on our faces while our mother and father stood proudly behind us. Mother was behind me, a foreleg on my shoulder, and my father was behind my baby brother, resting a hoof on my little brother’s neck. Now my mother would always have us close by…

I stepped away and looked back toward the camp. The captain was rallying the survivors to relay the instructions for the day’s trip; we would be covering as much ground today as we could. “If there’s a place up there,” I said to mom. “where Celestia and Luna watch over us and shelter the spirits of our dead, then I hope that they’re treating you alright.” Despite everything, despite how much I tried to steel myself against crying, I felt a tear snake down my face from my left eye. “Goodbye mom…” I flapped my wings and rose into the air. “I won’t let you down.” 

***				***				***

Flying made me feel unstoppable, the wind catching under my wings, blowing past my mane, refreshing along my coat, and guiding me along my path. My path of course was ever changing, as I always wove about and turned, coiled and looped and rolled, making a game out of trying to find some sort of invisible wall that was waiting to forbid me from flying to some area of the wasteland. That was the effect of a Stable on a Pegasus pony and it was good to finally have a remedy. I loved the air, I loved the freedom of the skies, and it even helped me unwind a bit, helping to ease my mind. Earlier in our journey, I had contemplated the idea of flying above the cloud cover, and if I wasn’t an unofficial member of Stable 181 security, then perhaps I would’ve done just that. But despite the magnificence of flying, there was, of course, a catch. There was nothing around, no structures, no settlements, no ponies. The train of survivors far below me, a little worm inching forward across the endless expanse of grey and yellow and brown, walked… toward… NOTHING. We had been traveling due northeast, and the entire first day went without and kind of event as we walked all day through a silent and barren landscape. Occasionally, the only sound for me that broke the deadness of the wasteland was the whistle of the wind against my ears. If I flew fast enough, I could hear it against me as it rose and fell in volume. But I suppose that this uneventfulness was a luxury as well as a curse. On the bright side of things, we were not attacked by anypony, invaders or otherwise. I was glad for it, because only a hoof full of our survivors could fight, the majority of them having to help carry the wounded and our supplies. But by Celestia if I found one of those invaders…

“Nova. This is Saber.” a voice, slightly roughened by static, called through my Pipbuck. 

Raising my right foreleg as I stopped to a hover, I spoke back into my Pipbuck’s speaker. “Yes captain. What do you need?” 

“Go ahead and come down here to get some food and water.” the captain ordered. “You’ve been up there all day with only one break so far and I intend to push us through another hour or two of travel before we’ll have to set up camp for the night.”

It was evening by now, and I could tell because it was darkening. While I didn’t know much about the outside and its weather, I could safely assume that it would be darker, sooner, because of the cloud cover. That would cut into our travel time, because I was certain that the captain wouldn’t want us traveling in the dark and…

My stomach growled at me, demanding attention…… nope, time to eat, no more thinking. 

Giving the captain my acknowledgement of the order, I tucked in my wings against my sides and straightened out my body in a dive. The dead earth below came racing up to meet me, briefly exhilarating before I snapped my wings out and angled away from the surface to fly over the back of the train. I slowed as I searched for my brother, and found him walking next to Grace while he carried our saddlebags. He looked quite funny carrying the bags, nearly as big as his torso, because only his little hooves and his head and tail poked out from them. It was like watching the pair of saddlebags, and not my brother, scoot along on the ground. But he didn’t look weighed down or tired at all. In fact, he was talking to Grace who was carrying her stock of medical supplies which I had assumed must have consisted primarily of potions, bandages, and the other more vital medical supplies. 

Angling in, I flew in beside my brother and backflapped my wings to land beside him, now walking with him at his pace. I felt, with a blink of surprise, as my wing joints loudly popped as I closed my wings against my side. “That sounded good…” Rosemary Grace observed with sarcastic concern. 

“Yeah… well this whole expedition will get my wings into tip-top shape before too long.” I said with a small laugh. In truth, I had used my wings more today than I had used them during half of my life in the Stable. 

“How was flying?” my brother inquired curiously as I opened up one of the saddlebags, taking out a carrot in my teeth. 

“I’ll be perfectly honest, it’s a real treat.” I answered. “I love it up there.”

“The air must feel a little better up there than it does down here.” Grace thought aloud. “It feels kind of musty to me.”

“I don’t feel much of a difference.” I replied before taking a bite of my carrot. “It’s just the flying itself that makes me feel good.” In only two more bites, I had finished my carrot and looked around the same saddlebag until I found the water canteen that had been packed along with the food. It was easy to open, with a extended tab on the cap that could flip open and closed with the edge of a hoof. Opening the cap, I picked up the canteen in my teeth and tilted it back to drink a couple swallows of water before I set it back down, closed it, and dropped it off into the saddlebag where I found it. “Good job today little brother.” I said, feeling it necessary to say so. For a young pony like Blake, this wasn’t work he would be doing on a natural basis. He shared the same boat with a few other foals as well, and he seemed to be fairing the best. 

“Oh no problem.” he piped up confidently. “This is easy stuff. I could carry more if I wasn’t so small.” Rosemary Grace and I smiled at one another. I had told my brother to stay with Gracie just for safety’s sake, and he had stuck with her throughout the entire trip, even helping her at points when she was checking up on patients. His help mostly consisted of talking to the patients and encouraging conversation as Grace cleaned wounds or changed bandages, but I was still proud of him regardless. 

“Thanks for keeping an eye on him.” I said to Gracie who smiled back at me.

“Not a problem.” she said back. “Thanks for keeping an eye on us.”

I had to laugh. “You make me sound like I’m some kind of hero or something.” I exaggerated. 

“No.” Gracie shook her head. “You’re doing your job, and that’s why I‘m thanking you. Besides, we haven’t run into any trouble. No attacks, no misfortunes, and my patients are getting better. I even had a security mare get back on her hooves today. Maybe things will start to shape up to the better for us.”

That was good to hear. Even one day into our predicted four days of survival, ponies were getting tired and discouraged, so every bit of good news that we could get was most welcome. Now all we had to do was find something out there that we could claim as our own. We needed to set a strong hoof into the new world and we needed to do it fast. 

“Maybe.” I agreed politely. “We’re still going to need more help to secure ourselves in the wasteland… well, back into the air with me.” I gave my brother a bump on the neck with my nose before I fanned out my wings. “See you in a couple of hours.” And with that, I launched off of the ground and back into the air to continue my patrol. 

***				***				***

Day two… early evening. Oh how tired everypony was. There was no talk in the survivor train, everypony moving forward robotically and the security ponies looking to be the only ones on alert as they scouted the ground for trouble. Even for me, I was growing bored and quite tired of seeing nothing but brown and yellow hills. All through the second day, the cloud cover had remained thick and grey, allowing for the sun to be completely hidden from our eyes. Gradually, as we continued, the rolling hills became no more, only leaving a flat canvas of grey and brown. Apparently, the yellow and dead grass had been confined to those hills, because now the survivor train was passing over nothing but dust and dirt with occasional patches of dried grass that was already looking to be in the process of being turned to dust by the gentle breeze. Now the Equestrian wasteland was looking even more like a wasteland, and I imagined the effects it would have on what faith and courage our survivor train had left. 

Worst of all, as I came to find out on my last break, supplies were running low. Even the supplies in Blake’s saddlebags had been running low. Between the two of us, even though we only ate one apple or carrot and drank no more than three gulps of water per meal, we only had three apples and four carrots left, and our canteen was just over half empty. No matter how well supplies were rationed, most everypony was beginning to fret over just how long their dwindling food and water would last them. With nothing but dirt and rocks, there was no sort of food that we could scavenge from the ground, and the only landmark we passed that showed that water even existed was the dry remains of what had once been some kind of lake. It had been bone dry and we had only been able to tell that it was a lake because of the depression in the ground, looking like a crater of sorts. If the first day of the trip had been decent, then today was just awful, and the third day would be brutal. I had a feeling that that day was going to prove to be the most difficult in keeping our train together in one piece. 

What little faith I had from yesterday was huddled in a dark corner of my mind, and I found no solace from my place in the sky. No matter where I looked, the ground was still barren, devoid of any sort of unique object besides the occasional tree stump. As I banked back around, climbing in altitude, I thought about the possibilities of what this place might’ve looked like before the end of the world. A great sprawling field of green grass and tall trees, providing shade to provide ponies with a place to rest and relax. My guess was that even before the end, not many ponies would’ve lived here, but surely it still had to be a sight better than what it was right now. Oh Goddesses… I shouldn’t be thinking about that right now. But I had done it before, several times during our second day on the move. Thinking about what the landscape may have looked like before the Great War was only peaceful for about three seconds. Then, all that the mental images brought was a strong sense of nostalgia and weariness that I didn’t need or want while I was up in the air. But worst of all, oh DEFINITELY worst of all, flying was becoming boring! Just yesterday, I had thought that flying was the greatest thing ever, to fly freely with no walls or doors to bar my way. But now that I had been flying high above a barren landscape for hours on end, with no changes in scenery, flying was becoming nothing more than a chore. It was a chore that also hurt my wings which also helped to put me in lower spirits. Even though I had slept relatively well last night, that still wasn’t enough to let my wings fully recover. I felt stronger and more physically capable when flying, but it was still annoying that my wing joints ached. It was still even more annoying that the thrill I had experienced while flying only lasted for one day. 

With a sigh, I turned to face forward again, diving down a bit before leveling out as I made another pass through the right-side airspace of the survivor train. As I flew, I begun to climb again, as if hoping to catch something hiding over the horizon that might at least bring a change of scenery. But I stopped myself and leveled out as something caught my eye. From this high up, it was somewhat difficult to distinguish the silhouettes of ponies on the ground. But I still saw that there was a small group of dots that was not a part of the survivor train. It was moving too… heading for the train from the northeast. Banking in a dive, I winged down towards the unknown group and brought up my E.F.S. compass. Even as it came on, it labeled the group on the compass with a series of five red dashes. Great. Stopping to hover, I raised my Pipbuck and pressed a hoof down on the button that brought up my radio and audio screen. And then I spoke into the speaker. “Captain Saber, this is Nova. I see an unknown group of five hostiles moving towards you from the northeast. I checked my E.F.S. and it labeled them as red, so they’re hostiles of some kind.” 

“I see them… and I think they see us too.” Saber replied. “They’re armed… and wearing armor.” 

“They’re watching us… scoping us out sir.” I heard a third voice, probably a security sergeant, suggest with suspicion. 

After a pause, and a nervous moment of looking back down at the small group, I asked, “What should we do? Should we take them out?”

“I don’t want to fire on them unless they fire on us.” Saber’s reply came from my speaker. “I’ve got my guards on alert, so we’ll keep moving forward. Keep an eye on them.”

I looked back down at the group of five. They still appeared red on my Eyes Forward Sparkle, and this confused me a bit. I slowly hovered in lower over them, trying to get a closer look at them to see who exactly was looking towards the train of survivors. There were two unicorns and three earth-ponies in the group, and they looked quite intimidating. Their manes and their tails were frazzled and stringy, unclean, and their coats were mangy, dirty, and grimy, making disgustingly darkened colors of their original colors. The first earth pony was a mare, her mane done up in spikes, and her coat a dark violet stained with grime. The second earth pony was a deep red stallion with a grey and black mane that was also done up in alarming spikes. The third earth pony was another stallion, missing most of his mane and his tail and wearing a rather demented grin as he made a remark to his two unicorn partners that I could not hear. The first unicorn was a dark green stallion with a similarly colored mane and tail. And his comrade next to him was a lighter green mare, streaked with black. All of them were wearing similar armor, painted dark crimson and black, not looking too well kept. All five of them were also armed with various rifles and small firearms that were strapped to their armor.

Cautiously, I drew in even closer and stopped once I was certain that the flapping of my wings would give away my position. Now I could hear them, dimly, as they spoke, and I overheard as the dark green unicorn said, “Looks like they’re headin to that town we took out.”

“Let em.” the unicorn mare replied with a smirk. “We can head back and get a gang together, make up a camp in the ruins and give em a surprise welcome.”

“Look at em though.” the nearly bald stallion remarked, that same twisted look on his face. “I swear they look like they don’t belong here. They’re way too clean. They must’ve come from that Stable.” 

Stable… they knew??

“Yeah.” the violet mare agreed with a sickening laugh. “That bunch we sent there sure did a number on that place. Got a lot of shit from it too. Hit the jackpot with that raid.” 

THEY DID IT!

“I heard that we lost a lot of rookies down there. Ah well, they were all assholes anyway. We still got the good shit.” the nearly bald stallion said with a grin.

“Food, water, weapons, munitions. Our group picked up a lot of good stuff. They’re bringing it back now.” the unicorn mare stated.

“That’s good and all, but can’t we do anything with them down there?” the violet earth-pony asked. “Why can’t we just pick off a couple for fun?”

“I wonder what they’d look like with their heads on spikes?” the red stallion spoke up, his voice ominously eager. “That old town could use more decorating.”

“We took out half of them in their fuckin fortress.” the dark green unicorn stallion remarked with confidence. “We can take out more of them in that town, show em how the wasteland really works.”

I had heard enough, and I was mad. My heart rate was quickening, my teeth gritting together, and my eyes glaring daggers down on them as my blood begun to burn with the lust for revenge. I didn’t care about orders, revenge the only thing on my mind now, and this was the perfect chance to get back at the invaders that took my family and my home from me. But just as I was about to take matters into my own hooves, one of the invaders chanced a look upward, and his eyes found me. The nearly bald stallion’s momentary surprise immediately flared to a burning rage, and he yelled up at me, “Oh you’re dead meat sack!!” As his comrades turned to find me as well, I launched myself forward just as the two unicorns brought their weapons up and fired. As I raced toward the train, I saw that the gunshots had drawn the attention of the survivors and I saw a detachment of five guards race out into the field towards the invaders. Gunny and Shore were two of the ponies among the detachment and as I flew past them and angled around, I saw as they engaged the invaders who were firing back. I flew on past the detachment and activated my targeting spell as I leveled out and chose my first target, the mostly bald stallion who had threatened me. Targeting his head, I bit down on the firing bit and pulled the trigger twice. Both the carbine and Fire Rose roared off their anger and to my surprise, all four shots found home and the invader’s head turned to mush as I flew past them. I angled back around, seeing as the unicorn mare glowed bright red before turning to ash, being hit by Shore’s advanced laser rifle. I leveled out again, choosing the earth-pony mare as my next target. I activated my targeting spell again, but saw on my Pipbuck that it was charging. This forced me to aim with my body as I flew in directly towards her. And biting down on the firing bit again, I pulled the trigger and the two weapons fired another pair of shots together. But this time, the shots missed, raising dust from the ground where they struck just behind the mare. I flew by again, seeing as the guards spread out in an attempt to evade enemy fire, compensating for the lack of cover. 

I repeated myself again, angling back around above the survivor train and making another dive. The three remaining invaders were retreating now, the two earth-ponies running while the unicorn stallion covered them, levitating some sort of assault rifle beside him. There was no way I was going to let those villains escape, not after what they did. I beat my wings faster, trying to gain more speed before I suddenly saw short lines of light race by me. The unicorn invader was firing up at me even as I shot past him, and I jerked as I felt a slashing pain on my right side. I knew I had been hit, but I didn’t have time to stop and look. I kept my pacing, staying in the air as I closed the distance between myself and the retreating earth ponies, and I angled in, diving straight for the earth-pony mare. I aimed with S.A.T.S., the spell recharged enough for me to get some use out of it again, and I fired once, the pair of shots hitting the invader in the back and bringing her down to the dirt. I made a sharp left turn, climbing in altitude at the same time as I heard the red stallion below take shots at me with his own weapon. I kept beating my wings, making my turn a bit slower now before I angled down hard and dove once more. The red stallion was in my sight. He had stopped firing for the moment to try and get some more distance between us.

His mistake.

I lined myself up for the shot, and without using S.A.T.S., I pulled the trigger of my firing bit and one of the shots hit the stallion in the back of his hind leg, bringing him down. And with plenty of room between myself and the ground, I fired once more, a shot from Fire Rose hitting dead on in the neck while the second shot from my carbine struck the dirt next to him. I slowed in the air, eventually coming to a halt over the invader stallion. He was coughing and gurgling as he bled out onto the dirt, and as I watched the now helpless invader, I nodded. This was what he deserved… the things I heard him say along with the others… I wasn’t killing some innocent pony. No, this stallion was a cold-hearted killer, and now he knew what it was like to be on the other end of the stick. “That’s for the Stable.” I said to the stallion as I winged back to land a few paces away from him.

BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!

I jumped at the sound of a five rapid consecutive shots behind me and I shook, suddenly fearing that I had been shot. But… no… Gunny stepped up next to me, having approached from my left. “Yes it was.” he said, glaring at the now dead invader whom he had killed with one of his battle saddle’s assault rifles. 

“Are the others dead?” I managed to ask after regaining enough of my composure to look at him. I saw that his armor had taken several hits, but it looked like it had done its job. Gunny looked uninjured.

“The other invaders wont bother anypony again.” Gunny said with finality. “Why? Did you need to give them something?” 

“No.” I answered, rolling my eyes. “It’s just that I managed to hear them talking while they were looking out at our survivor train. I heard one of them talking about some kind of town. It has to be around here somewhere.” 

“Really?” 

“Yes. I swear I heard them talk about it.” I asserted, adding emphasis by stomping my right fore hoof onto the ground. I regretted that immediately, feeling the pain in my side flare back up. “Oh, ow. I forgot about that.” I said with a wince.

“Where are you hit at?” Gunny asked, a bit of a demanding edge on his tongue. 

“Right side.” I answered with another wince as I tried to see where I was hit. “I think I was grazed.” Upon receiving Gunny’s “yep” as confirmation, I said, “I’ll be back down in a second. I just want to check something.” Quickly, I flapped my wings and beat up into the air. If what the invader pony had said about a town was true, then surely I would be able to see it on the horizon. There was the possibility of course that the group of five invaders had done some traveling on their own, but what would drive any pony to travel this far out into the middle of nowhere? Wouldn’t they have just stayed closer to their homes? I climbed higher and higher, beating my wings furiously to climb faster, and when I was at my patrol height, I leveled out and hovered to search the horizon. It was darkening, but I could still make out small details quite well… still nothing but grey. Dust and rock spanned out in every direction, always looking the same even as I looked a full three hundred and sixty degrees… twice. I couldn’t help but growl in frustration at that, even as I tried looking again, turning this way and that and scanning the horizon with narrowed eyes. But then… something else… To the northeast, the horizon looked as flat as the rest, but I swear I saw something. Yes, there was definitely something there, making a bump in the line of the horizon. And then next to it, another something made a second mark in the horizon, and another… and another… YES!

I never thought that hope would feel so good, but oh Goddesses it felt great! Ignoring the medical alert on my Pipbuck, warning me that I had been injured, I turned on my radio, and I called triumphantly. “Captain Saber, this is Nova. I found something.” 

***				***				***

Hopeville. That was the name etched into the crumbling stone welcome sign which sat on the left side of the road that lead into the pre-war ruins. Even though it was dark, we could see the patches of concrete in the ground that had once made a pre-war road and while one end led into the pre-war town, the other end snaked off to the east. Curiously, I raised a foreleg to check my Pipbuck, and to my approval, I saw that the name of the town was already placed on my device’s display screen. Hopeville was very far away from Stable 181, according to my larger map, and I was quite pleased that we had covered so much distance in just over two days. Normally, we would’ve set up camp about an hour ago. But words can travel like wildfire, and by the time I had returned to the survivors to be looked over by Gracie, everypony was talking about it. I remembered that moment, how everypony looked like they had never left the Stable at all, smiling and talking and breathing sighs of relief at the possibility that we would find someplace to call our new home. And with that kind of newfound energy, what choice did Captain Saber have but to press on?

We had continued to push northeast once we had taken the weapons and ammunition off of the bodies of the invaders. Shore, Gunny, and the three guards that had fought at my side had all taken hits, but Shore and I were the only ones that hadn’t been wearing security barding and thus we both had to drink a healing potion. The wound on my right side had been a long gash where the bullet had slashed across my skin but had not entered. Thus it had made a rather charming (and I say that sarcastically) red line along my side. Shore had taken two direct hits however, and he had needed some help getting back to camp. He claimed that the weapons had been in a state of poor condition and that that was the reason why the bullets had only dug into him so far without reaching vital organs. His wounds were cured easily enough as well, after Gracie removed the lead from his chest. In the end, Shore and I still ended up clacking our healing potions together in a toast to new hope in the wasteland before we drank up. Now we were looking at this new hope in all its crumbling glory. 

The pre-war town was still a very welcome sight, but it was definitely a ruin. The main road led into the town but forked, one fork continuing straight while another branched off to the left at a ninety degree angle to pass before one side of a long two story building. Like most of the buildings that I could see, it was very old and beaten down over the years, the stone cracked, chipping, and even falling off in chunks. Several gaps in the buildings wall showed where windows used to be. Some were boarded up with deteriorating planks of wood, and others still were covered with weak plastic or torn blankets. On my far left, I could see other buildings, husks of their former selves. They were, more likely than not, pre-war houses and I could tell because of the identical placement of the windows and doors on each building that I could see. “You said that you heard them talking about this place? You said that you heard one of them saying that it was their territory?” Saber asked me. 

“That’s what I heard.” I confirmed. “They said something about trying to turn back and make a camp in some old ruin.”

“Well, they may or may not have been talking about this town, but I’m not in the mood for taking chances like that.” Saber said, staring ahead at the road. 

“It looks empty sir.” I heard Gunny state from my right.

“I’m sure they all look like that, Gunny.” Saber replied, low. The way he was looking forward, his eyes narrowed and focused, showed that he was strategizing. “Gunny how many ponies do we have on guard duty?”

“We’ve got thirty two of us,” he explained. “but fifteen are still incapacitated. Then we’ve got other’s who’ve packed their own weapons, but that ain’t too many. We would’ve gotten more weapons from the Stable’s armory but…” 

“That doesn’t matter.” Saber interrupted. “I need you to take Daisy and Joker and move the survivors down the road and away from the town. The rest of you security ponies, follow me! Let’s move!” 

Even through the past two days of agonizing walking across a barren wasteland, the discipline of the security ponies still held up as strong as ever. With a collective “hooah” of confirmation from the security team, Gunny collected Daisy and Joker from within the crowd and the three of them trotted back to the survivors to begin giving orders to move. At the same time, the other fourteen guards ran together after the captain and begun to rally before the old pre-war Hopeville welcome sign, gathering close to listen to their superior officer. On instinct, I ran after them to catch up, and I came to a halt behind the group of security ponies just as I heard Saber begin speaking. “Alright. This place is empty, or so it looks, but our recent encounter with those invaders has given me the wisdom to know that we can’t make that kind of an assumption. We don’t want to lead our ponies into some kind of a death trap. We’ve come too far and suffered too much to let ourselves die off because of a dumb mistake.”

“What’s your plan captain?” one guard in the right side of the crowd asked. 

“If we’re going to take up residence here, we’re going to have to make sure that the entire town is clear. It looked like there were two main roads inside two rows of buildings. I’m thinking that I can send three teams into the town, one to go through each side and then a larger team to hit the middle. We go from building to building, enter, check for baddies, and then move on to the next. If there’s any invaders in this town, we take them out without mercy and then we wrap up. Then my friends, we’ve got a place to stay.”

“Sounds good captain.” another guard spoke up enthusiastically. 

“I want two teams of four and one team of six. Each team of four will be led by a sergeant. One team of four goes down the western road and checks the buildings. The other goes down the east and checks those areas. I’ll take the larger team and secure this building up here and anything else that might be in between those roads. Nova,” he added, forcing me to gasp slightly at being addressed. I snapped my attention to him. “I want you to fly up and patrol the roads to provide over-watch. As each team moves, I want you to talk to them if you find any threats hiding around buildings or in the streets. We have to assume that there could be invaders anywhere.” With that, he chose the teams and designated them with the numbers one, two, and three. Then he gave the final order, “When you reach your first target buildings, get to work and be as quick and thorough as you can. Disperse, you know what to do.” With that, the three teams split off, and the task began. 

I took off into the sky again, feeling a knot in my stomach as I climbed upward. In just two days, I had gone from a resident in a Stable to a full-blown aerial scout. Yesterday, and earlier today, I had been flying to make myself useful as another pair of eyes that watched for threats. But out in the wasteland, there really wasn’t anything out there. The invaders really made no difference to that because they had been dealt with rather quickly and without major injuries to anypony. But this was different. I felt that I already had a heavy responsibility for the safety of my friends when I was up in the air. But that weight now bore down on me like an anvil, and I felt nervous. Now, instead of just watching, I was literally trying to prevent anypony from getting shot and possibly killed down there as they cleared the town. I felt like I should’ve had way more experience at this than I did right now, but then again, I was the only Pegasus out of our entire group, and so I understood that the captain would have to make do with the best he had. 

Turning on my Pipbuck’s radio, I stopped in my climb to hover. Now I could see all of Hopeville. Even in the dark, my eyes could see the details of the crumbling houses and structures and I could see clearly along the small framework of roads. The town was one large square, with houses and a few other buildings, probably pre-war shops and the like, making the perimeter of Hopeville with an occasional house or pile of rubble showing where other houses were built beyond that. The main road at the entrance continued vertical into the town, branching left a total of three times and dividing the center of the town into two squares. One of these squares housed the largest building of the town, while the other was an open area of dirt and rock. In all, the town was divided into two sectors, with the housing making a three-sided box around it. The east and the west sides of town were lined with a total of five buildings and to the north, two other buildings stood in front of a graveyard of foundations and rubble where several houses used to stand. There was nothing there but wreckage. “Team two in position. Nova, can you see us?” a voice came through my Pipbuck. I turned away from my thoughts, looking down as I focused on the job at hoof. Scouting the terrain quickly, I saw one team of four ponies waiting outside the closed wooden door of the first building they were making ready to clear. One of the four ponies was turning the light of his weapon’s flashlight on and off to catch my attention. 

“I see you.” I replied, waving on instinct. 

“When any team is outside, have at least one flashlight on to help Nova track your position.” Captain Saber ordered. “Is there any enemies on the north side of the large building, Nova?” I blinked, suddenly feeling a bit overwhelmed. I would have to work hard and fly fast to keep an eye on all three teams at once. 

Zipping forward, I looked down over the large building, checking along its northern wall; nopony was there. “It’s clear.” I answered as I flew over team two’s position. “Team two, your clear.” I added through my speaker after looking around them for any other signs of movement. “Go get em.” 

“Alright, breach and clear.” a voice ordered through my radio, and I saw as one of the four ponies of the second team spun around and bucked open the door with a strong hit before stepping back behind the wall as his comrades entered the building. 

“Team three’s ready to move. Nova are we clear?” another voice came through the speaker of my Pipbuck. With a sigh, I turned back around and passed over the east side of the town, looking between the buildings for any trouble. At the sight of no hostile ponies, I gave them the all clear, and they entered their first building. 

“We’re breaching our target building.” I heard Saber, and I whirled in the air to look as his team stacked up along the wall. “This is a big building. So Nova, we won’t be needing your eyes for awhile. Keep your focus on the other two teams.” 

With that, I watched as the captain bucked down the door and his squad filed in. I stayed there in a hover, looking back and forth along the roads and in between the buildings, looking for any sign of invaders or other hostiles. “This is team two, first building is clear. We’re moving on to the next. How are things looking out there Nova?” 

At the question, I raced back to Hopeville’s west side. I looked back down, flying in slow circles around the area as I waited for the team to emerge. The area was still clear, and I could see nothing waiting around the next building for the team, so I gave them the all clear and they proceeded to enter their second building. At that time, team three was moving from their first building and to their second. I returned to the east side of town and flew over to make sure the area was clear. “Hold on.” a voice spoke through my Pipbuck’s speaker. “This door’s boarded up… and whoever did it didn’t want anypony getting in or out. Nova how does it look from up there?” 

The door was boarded up? That was odd. But I winged away to hover over the building… and I guess it didn’t matter anyways. The roof of the building had collapsed a long time ago, and there was nothing but rubble inside, laying in a heap on the ground floor of the building. I couldn’t see the door, which meant it must’ve been blocked by the rubble, a pile of stone, wood, toppled furniture, and even destroyed books; it was just an open box. “The building collapsed on itself.” I reported to them. “It’s empty.” 

“Alright, then we’re moving on.” the team three leader replied, and I followed above the squad as they moved, checking the area for hostiles. Unlike the previous structure, this building was still intact and the metal door was not boarded up. At the all clear, the team entered, and I had to fly back to the second team as they finished clearing their second building. 

They kept close together as they approached the third building down the west side of town. I had given them the all clear, and so they gathered before the entrance, ready to kick down the door. But they stopped, gathered around the door and looking at something that hung off of its handle; a padlock. “Well damn… yeah, we’ve got a locked door.” the team leader said after I asked if what I saw was true. “Don’t worry. We’ll try and get it open with a lock pick. Go ahead and head back to the other team. I’ll let you know when we’re in.” 

I circled back and winged over to the east side. Things were running smoothly so far, and I hoped it would stay that way because we were about halfway done securing the town, and soon we’d all be able to rest with a roof over our heads. “Third building’s clear. We’re coming out.” the team three leader announced through my Pipbuck, and as I looked down, I saw them leave, a unicorn guard shutting the door behind them. 

They proceeded towards the fourth building as I kept an eye out for trouble. But as I banked lower to check the far side of the next building, I stopped and hovered. Beyond the fifth and final building on the east side, there was a shadow… the shadow of a pony. It was moving too, bobbing just slightly as it walked. “Wait, wait.” I said, swooping down to hover just above the squad. “There’s a shadow on the fifth building. Can you see it?” They looked where I had raised my foreleg to point… but it wasn’t a shadow anymore. It was a pony… or what was left of one! A pony had stepped out into the street, and even from where I hovered, I could hear the raspy breathing it emitted from its open mouth. The pony’s coat had lost all color and was now nothing but deteriorating and dead flesh that was hanging from its body. It was rotting and old and the pony’s ribcage was visible, its skin pressed up against the bones, showing that it had not eaten in days or weeks. Along the back of its neck were patches of dry and scraggly hair that had perhaps once been a mane, and its tail was almost entirely gone. It was more a corpse than a pony… caused by something out there in the wasteland…

“By the Goddesses.” one of the guards whispered below me. 

“Is that pony even… alive?” asked another. 

I raised my foreleg to look down at my Pipbuck. My E.F.S. had registered the creature as a friendly contact, a green vertical dash on the compass. But then a second one appeared nearby it. Two? “This is Saber.” I flinched, my attention breaking from the sight on the road as I heard the captain. “Our first building is fully secure. It isn’t pretty up here though. There’s a lot of pony corpses on the second floor, and whoever’s responsible did a lot of butchering. I swear it almost makes me think that ponies might have lived here not too long ago. What’s the situation out there? Are we about done?” 

I didn’t answer him, my attention turning back to my compass. I was getting nervous, my heart beating faster as I now saw four green dashes on my compass. “Captain, we’re about halfway done, but we found somepony… something… out here.” I heard team three’s sergeant answer below me. 

“I see it too.” I heard team two’s leader speak. “That isn’t like any pony I’ve seen before. What the hell is it?”

“Sergeant.” another pony said, and I looked to see one of the guards nudge the sergeant. When I saw where the guard was pointing, I saw that there were now three of the creatures shambling about on the road, all in various states of decomposition. 

“Make that three somethings.” the sergeant corrected himself. 

No, that wasn’t even right, because when I glanced down at my E.F.S. compass again, my jaw dropped. My compass was full of green dashes, and more and more of the zombieish  ponies were appearing from the darkness beyond Hopeville’s north side. There must’ve been dozens of them… but then there was so much red. My compass lit up with solid red just as I heard a gurgling howl from down the road followed by a whole round of hissing, growling, and roaring. Oh damn…

“Captain we’ve got a problem down here.” the sergeant said, backing up as he took aim with his battle saddle, his guards following his example with saddle or magic. “I think it’s…” he didn’t even get to finish before he had to fire a shot from the two shotguns that made his battle saddle. With a disgusting explosion of blood and gore and limbs, the zombie pony that had charged toward the sergeant was no more. But the entire horde was following now, and the air around us erupted in gunfire as the four guard ponies opened fire. I had no choice but to add my own attacks, and I bit down on the firing bit and pulled the trigger, my carbine and Fire Rose firing simultaneously. With so many of the zombie ponies clustered together, it was impossible to miss, even with my limited firearms skill. I felt my pistol’s auto loader working, the magic kicking in to eject the empty magazine before loading in a fresh one, and the slide action snapped closed, the pistol ready to use again. 

The zombie ponies were dieing away rapidly, bodies piling up and blood and gore flying everywhere from the nonstop fire put up by the four guards. But there were so many! For every zombie pony that was killed, three more trampled over it. “Run, damn it run!!” the sergeant ordered, as he and his team wheeled to fall back. But as I turned to fly, I heard a scream, and I spun back around in shock to see that one of the guards had been caught by the tail and pulled back by one of the zombie ponies. I couldn’t even act before more of them piled onto her, tearing the security mare apart with their teeth. They bit, twisted, and pulled, and I saw with instant fear as one pony literally swallowed a chunk of the security mare, a bit of her security barding still attached to the meat. Oh Goddesses… they ate ponies! I couldn’t help her now, her body disappearing and her screams muffled by the dozen or so ponies all crowded around her to get a bite. Down below me, some of the zombie ponies were trying to bite at me even though they couldn’t reach me, while others still chased after the three retreating guards. I flew higher up and past the large building that the captain and his team had just cleared, and I saw gun barrels sticking through open windows as they added their own fire against the horde. I sped over the building’s roof and angled back down again to rejoin the three guards as they turned back and fired again, nearly shoulder to shoulder. I took out another zombie pony without aiming, and I fired a second pair of shots to take out another that was dangerously close to one of the guards. Still more came, even as our kill count skyrocketed, and we had to fall back once again. We were being pushed dangerously close to the survivor train, I realized with fearful understanding. We couldn’t let them get to our survivors, and I could tell that the sergeant and his two guards were thinking the same thing. They were cutting across the dirt and the rocks, heading southeast and away from the survivor train with the mindless zombie ponies chasing after them; the diversion was working perfectly. 

Winging away after them, I could see that we were actually beginning to get the upper hoof. The zombie horde had been drastically cut down within Hopeville, and some of them still branched off to go after team two on the town’s west side. It was fortunate that they were so easy to kill, their bodies weak and fragile from their rotting state. I swung back around, facing what was left of the zombie ponies and fired again, killing another. There were perhaps twenty in front of us now, cut down from thirty in a matter of seconds as they mindlessly charged for the blazing guns of the three guards below me, dead-set on getting their meal. It was only because we were still outnumbered five to one that we had to keep moving back, the guards occasionally having to resort to their own hooves to beat back the hungry creatures to buy themselves more room to fire. As I fired again, missing (damn it!), I saw another guard as he was tackled by a gnashing zombie pony, and the two were locked together in a wrestling mass. Just after him the sergeant was similarly bowled over, having run out of ammo and unable to reload fast enough. The three of them were being overwhelmed by the zombie ponies that remained. I heard their cries for help, but I was shaking with nerves, fear gradually returning to me throughout the course of our encounter. I squeaked in terror, shutting my eyes tight as I hovered there. I wasn’t ready for this! Back when we had encountered the five invaders, I had fought purely on a revenge basis, wanting to kill those that had killed so many of my friends and acquaintances. That fight was fueled by something in me, but I wasn’t ready here. This was different… this was survival, fighting to make a way of life out in Equestria. And these frightening abominations were our next test, perhaps our first real test… my first real test. 

I saw red through the darkness of my closed eyes, and I snapped back to alertness. Shore and Gunny, along with two security ponies that must’ve been Daisy and Joker, were approaching from the main road, laying into the dwindling horde with a full barrage of fire from their own weaponry. I had realized that my panic had made me miss a good portion of the fight, and the sergeant was back on his hooves with his two guards. The other guard that had been brought down was also back up, but he was bleeding from bite wounds on his neck and forelegs. With the other ponies joining our ranks, confidence returned to me, and I angled back down over the squad and fired, adding to the noise with three pairs of shots before the last of the zombie ponies finally went down under the storm of bullets. Through the rather sudden quiet, I heard my pistol’s auto loader as it ejected my pistol’s empty magazine and replaced it with a series of clicks. 

The sergeant and his two guards were breathing heavily, their sides heaving as they got their breath back. But as I hovered there, my wings catching against the wind with a sound like a flapping cloth, I noticed with alarm that the injured guard pony was glaring up at me. His eyes had fire in them, and they followed me as I returned to ground, still staring angrily into my own eyes. I shrunk down under that stare, my ears flattening back against my head. Against that kind of anger, coming from a bleeding and fierce-looking guard, I couldn’t even find the courage to stand up. And worst of all I knew why he glared daggers at me. My panic had taken over the time that I could’ve used to help him. I could’ve dived in and got that zombie pony off of him before it had taken  bites into the guard’s neck and forelegs. If it hadn’t been for Gunny and Shore and Joker and Daisy, he probably would’ve died. 

“Is everypony alright?” a voice called from behind us, relieving me of having to look back at that glare. Captain Saber and his team of six were trotting over towards us, maneuvering around the bodies of the dead zombie ponies. 

“We’re clear here.” the sergeant answered back. “We lost one though, and we’ve got one wounded.”

I rose back up as the captain and his team arrived. “We lost one on the west side too. When the horde split off, they divided pretty much right in half.” the captain explained lowly. 

“Where’d they all come from though?” one of the captain’s team asked, shaking slightly himself. “Why didn’t we see them when we arrived?” 

“They must’ve come from the outside.” a security mare answered him. 

“Yeah.” the unicorn stallion next to her agreed. “There’s no way they could’ve come from those buildings. There must’ve been a hundred of them or more.”

“So what do we do captain?” Gunny asked from farther back. 

“We carry on with the plan. Let’s finish checking the buildings and then we’ll get the survivors inside City Hall’s bottom floor.” City Hall must’ve been the large building, which made sense. Looking at the injured guard, Saber also added, “You need to go see Rosemary Grace about those bites. Get them cleaned and dressed and then get some rest. You’ve done your part.”

I cast a nervous glance at the wounded guard, Shore volunteering to walk with him as the guard limped forward, doing his best to keep his full weight off of his bleeding forelegs. “Yeah… unlike certain ponies.” I heard him grumble; that struck me like another gunshot wound. 

“Is there a problem?” I heard the captain ask. 

“No sir.” the guard answered, looking back at me. “I just don’t want Nova covering my hide anymore.” 

“Back off!” I heard Gunny snap. “I’m sure she did her best.” 

“Oh sure, if you consider panicking in the middle of a fight to be the best.” the guard said hotly. 

“I’m sorry!!” I shouted desperately. “I was scared!” In all honesty, even I felt like that was a lame excuse. But what else could I say?

The guard looked like he wanted to say something nasty to me again, but the captain speedily interceded. “ENOUGH! Nova, you’re with me. The rest of you, follow your fucking orders!” I felt as the captain guided me around, and I followed him and his team, instantly feeling wretched. 

This wasn’t helped by the fact that I was now treading over the dozens of corpses of the zombie ponies. There was a whole mess of blood and gore and limbs, all making the road slick with blackish gunk, and it made my stomach turn. Corpses were everywhere, littering the east side of the town, specking the west, from where the first shot was fired to where the fight had finally ended. There were so many, all raising a fragrant stink into the air that even the captain had the decency to cough at. I had been meaning to keep my eyes straight, to avoid seeing as much of the carnage as I could. But that didn’t stop my eyes from catching a patch of bright red amidst the disgusting tan and black. That bright red was what was left of the security mare that had been snagged from our team on the east side. She had been torn open at the belly by the zombies, her blood and her guts spilling out onto the earth. I could see bones… and I could see where the zombie ponies had eaten into her… oh that did it. Even though I tried to turn away and clear that awful sight from my head, it was far too late. I stopped and pitched forward, vomiting my dinner onto the ground with a sickening series of splashes. I stood over it, breathing heavily and shaking as I tried to get my bearings, and I felt a hoof on my back. I spat and sighed a shaky sigh before turning to see Saber, not speaking but only patiently waiting for me, giving a slim smile when I begun to walk again. 

The stench guided us along the open dirt field at the center of town. Here, at last, the corpses were behind me, and I felt a bit better. The large patch of earth that made the town center was littered with small pieces of rubble, from planks of wood to bent and twisted steel frames. At the very center of it was what was left of some sort of small stone structure. It was a circular stone pool, large in diameter with a stone pillar rising out of its center. The pool was empty and the pillar was not as tall as it had once been, this being distinguished by the rough and jagged stone at the top and the pile of crumbled and dusty rubble that had fallen into the empty pool. It must’ve been a fountain of some kind that was used to decorate the patch of land it sat upon.

Past the dirt and back onto the road, we were coming up to two single story buildings, longer but more slender than the houses and shops I had seen before. Amidst the cracks in the stone structures, I could see old pre-war signs that still showed what these buildings were. The left-hoof building had a white signpost built into the stone above the door. Though spider-webbing with cracks, I could still read the fading black letters. 

Hopeville Press.

Saber and his team assembled on either side of the building’s metal door. “Nova. Stay out here and watch for any other signs of trouble. Can you do that?” Saber asked. The question added weight to my low self-esteem, and it made me feel like he didn’t trust me anymore than that injured security stallion did. But I obeyed the order and backed away from the wall. Focusing back on the objective, he gave the word, and an earth pony stallion approached the door, spun, and bucked it open with a crash. One by one they filed in, leaving me by myself. 

With a sad little sigh, I sat down on the cold stone and looked out into the town, careful to avoid the massive litter of corpses scattered along the east road. I realized that I was still trembling, but I couldn’t tell from what anymore. Within the past three days, I had experienced more death than I had ever thought I’d experience in my entire life. I had also killed more ponies in the past three days than I had ever even dared to imagine. I had killed five ponies in the Stable, five villains… those were kills I could live with because it ever-so-slightly made up for the two hundred dead residents now rotting within Stable 181. Earlier today I had killed two other invaders, and the drive behind those killings was revenge for the loss of my parents… plain, simple, bittersweet revenge. Here… we had been attacked by creatures that I was certain had once been living ponies. There had been at least one hundred of them in that herd, and they were all dead now along with two of our own survivors. But they really weren’t ponies. They were just shells, vessels of former ponies who had once been alive and well. I could only curse the cruelty of the wasteland again and again, sadly shaking my head. I was just tired now, weak and weary, and I wanted to sleep. 

Captain Saber emerged from the door of the press building, his team of security ponies following him out. “This one’s all clear Nova. Let’s check the next one and then our part’s done. I’ll have you wait outside again to keep an eye out for anything.” he said, pressing a hoof against my foreleg as he trotted by. Rising, I followed him as we approached our last building. Roughly the same shape as the Hopeville Press, I looked for a sign to tell me what building this was. At the top of the building, I could see the iron rods jutting from the stone which would’ve once held some sort of poster sign. Without it, the building was entirely grey with the same signs of age as the other Hopeville buildings. But then my eyes caught something by the door. Even as Saber and his team breached the building and entered, I saw the faded square of a poster stuck up against the wall on the left side of the door. On it was a mare with a gentle yellow coat and a rather beautiful pink mane, a lock of grey breaking the happy color to show signs of age. The mare was looking right at me with deeply concerned blue eyes, a pained expression across her face, making me feel rather sorry for her. I didn’t know what troubled the mare, but I just wanted to reach up and hug her… if she wasn’t a poster. She was flanked on both sides by two rather sinister looking striped ponies, eyes red and fore hooves raised. At the top of the poster, above where three Pegasus ponies flew, was a series of words, still legible. War? Fear? Death?Below these single-word questions was a phrase, emphasized with italics and an exclamation mark. We must do better! I slowly brought my eyes down the length of the poster, seeing the large black letters that spelled out Ministry of Peace at the bottom, with a pink butterfly on each side of the word Peace, putting that extra touch of importance and meaning on the word. 

The Ministry of Peace. Back in the Stable I had been taught a bit about six ministries of the pre-war world, all of which had been run by six very important and influential mares. According to our teacher, the titles of these ministries included technology, peace, morale, arcane sciences, image, and… awesome. I always giggled at that. Seemed to me that the other ministry mares had put some thought behind the names of their own ministries, but for Rainbow Dash, there was no need for thought; it was just awesome. Either way, the six of them had been the greatest of friends for the majority of their lives and they had gone on many adventures together in the times of peace before the war. They were very special, and hell, in the Stable, they were quite revered for their role in harnessing the Elements of Harmony that we had always done our best to live by. We were taught also that they may have very well been the most important ponies of their time, just under the Goddesses themselves. Ponies like the ministry mares were role models for Stable 181 and I particularly looked up to Fluttershy. She was always so kind-hearted, caring, gentle, and nurturing. She respected everypony and always did her best to be there for her friends. She was passionate about life, about seeking out peace, and about always helping those she loved whether they were forest animals or not. While I was certain that I wasn’t nearly as shy as my classroom had made Fluttershy out to be, I felt quite akin to her in the sense that I was always willing to help my friends, or anypony who asked for my help. I called it a quirk, but others called it a gift of heart, and I appreciated that.

“It’s a recruiting center for the Ministry of Peace.” I heard from behind me. Though I was certain that I would’ve jumped naturally, I had been too tired and too lost within this pre-war poster to really be scared at all. Captain Saber and his team had left the building, apparently looking very relieved. If that was the last building, then Hopeville was finally secured. “They had a lot of honorable intention in their mission.” Captain Saber continued. “But from what I learned when I was in the classroom, peace was something that had become quite impossible once the tensions came to a boil. Conflict was becoming nature… and it’s damn hard to change the nature of ponies. I guess that’s kind of what the Ministry of Peace was trying to do. It was trying to change nature, to get them to just stop fighting. It’s a noble thought, but nature wasn’t and still isn’t easy to change. The war was the only exception. Ponies had to fight or they would’ve been destroyed.”

“She tried so hard to do the right thing, but the war was against her.” I said, looking back up at Fluttershy, drooping to even lower spirits at seeing her so pained. I had quoted my teacher just then, saying that the war was against Fluttershy. But really, it was against everypony. Fluttershy just wanted to see Equestria return to the old ways of peace and friendship. She would be so disappointed in us if she could see how far Equestria had fallen now.

“I’m not striking against the ministry mare.” Saber elaborated. “I’m just stating the facts. It’s pretty much impossible to change the nature of a species… But on a much brighter note,” he added with a thin smile “Hopeville is secured. I’ve already ordered for my guards to get our survivors inside the City Hall. It’ll be good to have a roof over us for the night and a secure building to clean up and fortify tomorrow morning. Come, walk with me.” 

I gave the poster one final look, saying a silent goodbye before I turned and followed after the captain. Even as we walked, I could see guards herding in our survivor train. They had intentionally brought the train in from the west to avoid the majority of the bodies from our battle. But despite this precaution, they still had to see what happened as they made their way around the building and towards the entrance. I could see the majority of the survivors looking down to avoid the sight. For now, the bodies would stay, but if we were going to be staying here for any extended period of time, then the mess would have to be cleaned up… that wouldn’t be fun. 

I could hear as the guards gave the others specific instructions, calling out their orders as they moved. “Please move into the building in an orderly fashion! Do not push or shove, and please make room for one another! You are not allowed to enter the second floor of this building! The wounded must be allowed a section of the main lobby, so plan accordingly where you and your family will be staying for the night!” Some of those orders seemed rather unnecessary. I just think that everypony was happy to have secured a place to live and rest in for the night. It had been a long two days for all of us, but now we were pulling ourselves back together. 

“So Nova, what happened during that fighting?” I heard Captain Saber ask, and I winced. I remembered the guard all too well. 

“I… um… I-I panicked… I lost myself.” I stammered, trying to find the right words. I already felt like I was in a lot of trouble and I wanted to ice that burn as much as I could. 

“I see.” 

“I haven’t done this kind of thing before.” I continued, trying to stack more words in my defense. “This is the rough survival kind of thing that’s going on now. I wasn’t ready for it… just the way things happened. I fought, and I tried to help, but two ponies died tonight and another got hurt. He probably hates my guts by now.” At the captain’s silence and our continued walking, I added, “I’m sorry captain. I didn’t do the good job I could’ve done… I’m sorry… that’s all I can think of.” 

“No. I'm sorry Nova.” he replied, startling me. “You shouldn’t be the one that’s sorry about anything.” he explained at my questioning look. “You’re not the only one that’s scared, Nova. We all are, and some of us just can’t admit it. That’s what we security ponies do. We play the bravery role so that every single one of us can pull through this mess together. I put a lot of responsibility on your shoulders over the past two days, took advantage of your uniqueness as a Pegasus. But I was in the wrong to do that, so that’s why I’m sorry.” 

“But I liked being able to do my part. I promised my mom after all.” I pointed out tentatively. 

“So that’s how you paid your respects to the dead.” Saber said, nodding in apparent approval. “I think your parents would’ve been proud of you for this day.” Hearing that was like a bandage on a wound. I had been wondering just that, whether or not my parents would’ve been proud of me for what had happened in the past two days. “You did your part, Nova. Go and get some rest tonight, and we’ll talk more in the morning.” Saber’s invite didn’t need to be repeated. 

Despite everything, I still felt very tired from today. Between the nearly non-stop flying, the bitter fighting, and the revealing of some of the wasteland’s horrors (and throwing up my dinner hadn’t helped), I was ready to sleep and recover as best as I could. “I’m glad I did okay then.” I said. 

“You did good.” Saber agreed. “Now go on. I’ll wrap things up here.” And with this official dismissal, we parted ways. 

A ceiling. It had been the first time I had seen one in two days, and a most welcome sense of security swept over me as I entered the main lobby of the City Hall. Aside from a half-circle desk that made the receptionist’s desk and a stack of ancient wooden chairs piled up in the far corner, the room was one big carpeted floor. It had been a deep red before, but now it was stained and matted with dirt and grime. Some areas of the carpet had been ripped up to reveal the wood floor beneath, and other parts still were burned. As I walked deeper into the building, I saw a set of stairs leading up to the second floor. It looked to be the only way up to the top floor and two guards, one of them I recognized as Gunny, were keeping watch. Beyond the base of the stairs were two entrances which led deeper into the City Hall’s first floor, and I could see the shadows of ponies moving about as the survivors found places to sleep for the night. 

“Nova!” I heard the familiar voice of my baby brother, and I turned to look, finding him resting just down the room right next to the established perimeter of Gracie’s new clinic where the wounded were being laid out to rest. With everything that had been going on for the day, I had never realized how much I missed my brother. Now, as I closed the distance between us, I just wanted to lay down beside him and sleep. He reached up with his nose and bumped me on the side of my face, and I gratefully returned the loving gesture. “We heard the fighting from all the way down the road. We were worried about you weren’t we Grace?” he piped up. 

“We most certainly were. I’m glad you’re okay Nova.” I heard Grace agree wholeheartedly from within her clinic as she organized her supplies. 

“Well,” I said, plopping down onto the carpet with no ceremony. I was too tired to remove my gear, and so I simply pulled the tiny safety trigger on my firing bit with my tongue, engaging the safety so that there would be no misfire. “there’s nothing to worry about anymore. We’ve finally secured our own place to rest… and that’s a victory all on its own.” I found myself yawning in between the sentence and as I set my head down, I felt myself already drifting to sleep. I really was exhausted. 

“Are you okay big sister?” Blake asked me as my vision begun to go black, sleep taking me over. 

“Big sister’s just tired…” I answered sleepily, and I felt then as Blake snuggled up against my side. I gratefully draped a wing over him as my eyes finally came closed.

As sleep took me, I heard a voice that cut through the chatter. After a series of creaks coming from nearby, a stallion suddenly called out, “Mother Celestia… look at all this food!” 



Footnote: Level Up!

New Perk: Scout Flyer - Your wings are your greatest asset! While in the air, you gain an additional +1 to perception and agility.