“Okay, so that’s probably enough of an encore for today,” announced Sonata as she helped Lex back toward the camp.
“There’s still more that needs to be done,” he muttered obstinately. He’d meant for the rebuke to come out sharper, but hadn’t been able to muster up the energy. That was little surprise, considering that he was once again leaning heavily on Sonata just to walk.
“Oh come on, Lex. You already led a bunch of ponies back into Vanhoover, got a motherlode of supplies which this place needed super badly, and rescued a bunch of ponies that were still there! Plus, you know, buying all the food on that big honkin’ train. Which, FYI, is the first time we’ve had anything to do with a train that didn’t come back to bite us. Now, I’ll be the first to admit that all that’s no ‘fight off an army of ghouls,’ but it’s still, like, more than enough for one day. Getting everypony to start working on a new project, even if it is just digging a big hole, is a teensy bit overkill, don’cha think?”
Lex’s only response was to sigh.
After covertly observing the suspicious figures he’d seen outside the bank and discovering that they were another band of survivors, apparently drawn by the spectacle of so many ponies openly walking the streets of the city, Lex had elected to send a small contingent of his band out to meet them while he watched from concealment. Given how poorly Aisle, Cloudbank, and Cozy had reacted when they’d caught sight of his shadow-form in their first meeting, Lex knew better than to introduce himself to another group of survivors that way. It had proven to be a wise decision, as the half-dead ponies had been suspicious of the news that the blockade around the city had been lifted, to say nothing of their disbelief that the ghouls had all been wiped out.
In the end, it had been the news that an entire train’s worth of food had been delivered, and was being passed out to everypony even as they spoke, that had convinced the survivors to take a chance on them. But rather than the small group of three that had come to investigate what was going on, they had admitted that they were scouting for a band of almost three dozen ponies hidden in a nearby mattress store. The large number of survivors all in one place had surprised Lex when he’d heard it, but only until he saw the store in question.
The place had been converted into a fortress. Every door was not only boarded up, but locked with the keyholes deliberately jammed (and, as he’d seen later, barricaded from the inside). The windows had been in much the same condition. Anything that could possibly be used to climb the building – drainpipes, gutters, and even most of the windowsills – had been torn off the sides, and the roof access door had been given the same treatment as all the other doors, but also with what looked like glue poured between the door and the frame. The only way in or out had been via a single window on the third floor, which had its glass broken out but had been subsequently sealed by having a mattress far too large for the window frame shoved through it. It had taken significant effort on the part of three ponies to dislodge that mattress from the window before lowering a ladder when the scouting team came back, silently signaling their presence to some unseen watcher in the building. Despite himself, Lex had been mildly impressed; for anyone without his level of magical capability, getting in there would have been extremely difficult.
His appreciation for the fortifications had fallen away when he’d seen the state of the ponies inside, however.
Sprawled across filthy mattresses, huddled in dark corners, or simply sitting and staring blankly at the walls, most of the building’s occupants had looked more dead than alive. All of them had been painfully thin, several to the point of looking more like ghouls than living ponies. In fact, there had been a few that could very nearly have passed for being undead; only the lack of obviously-fatal wounds and the slow rise and fall of their chests had shown them to still be among the living…barely. Others were more active; from a dark corner in the ceiling, Lex had observed several coughing and hacking so heavily that it seemed like they were trying to expel their lungs, burying their faces in their hooves to try and stay quiet, doubtless to avoid attracting attention from any nearby monsters. The rest simply stayed still or shuffled about, listless and glassy-eyed. Even the return of the scouting party had attracted little attention except for a few inquisitive stares.
It had been at that point that Lex had realized the true nature of the building these ponies were in. They might have set it up as a fortress, but it had long since become their prison, and it wouldn’t be much longer before it became their tomb. Action needed to be taken immediately.
Fortunately, the members of his expedition that he’d sent had been admitted into the building shortly thereafter, explaining again that the city had been rescued. Lex had chosen that point to reveal himself, knowing that he’d need to soon, since his dark magic was already running out. To his mild surprise, his shadowy-form hadn’t been met with widespread panic; illness, injury, and apathy had left most of the ponies incapable of that level of activity. Most had simply whimpered or wept quietly, shaking in fear but otherwise unable to take action. Only the scouts – apparently the healthiest of the bunch – had needed to be talked down.
After that, it had been a matter of getting everypony out of there and bringing them back to the camp with them. Knocking down one of the sealed doors had been easy thanks to his magic, but only the fact that they’d acquired so many hospital beds earlier in the day had made it possible to transport everyone; over a third of the ponies there hadn’t been able to move under their own power. A few had become hysterical at the thought of going outside and needed to be forcefully taken. The others had trudged out willingly, albeit fearfully.
It had only been then – barely able to carry all the hardware, medicine, money, and injured ponies – that Lex had led everyone back to camp.
The first order of business had been to immediately hand the newly-found survivors and the medical supplies over to the doctors. The second had been to deposit the money they’d acquired on the train platform and tell Coal Hopper to figure out how much she was owed. The third had been to pass out the shovels that they’d acquired and start working on the mass grave for the ghouls.
Sonata had protested that last one, seeing that he was exhausted and telling him that it could wait until tomorrow, but Lex had refused. “It needs to happen today,” he’d insisted, “and it needs oversight to be sure it’s done properly.” He’d started to explain to her that excavation was a meticulous process, one with issues that ranged from where the displaced earth was put to methods of access for holes that were too deep to easily climb into and out of, when he’d immediately stopped himself, realizing to his shock that he was quoting his father. It had been unnerving enough, so soon after encountering those phantoms from his nightmares last night, that he’d allowed Sonata to lead him away from the dig site, letting the volunteers get to work on their own with Severance to guard them.
I’ll coordinate them tomorrow, he decided wearily. The initial stages of a dig were the easiest anyway. In the meantime… “Head for the train station,” he directed Sonata.
“Right-o!” she cheered as she turned toward the building. “We’ll find a nice spot in there, far away from Aria, and get you all tucked in nice and snug. I’ll get you some real food, and after you’ve eaten and slept, you’ll feel like a whole new pony!”
She continued on like that as they walked, but Lex wasn’t listening. Or rather, he wasn’t paying attention to the words she was using, instead focusing on the sound of her voice. It was the most beautiful part of her; more than her face, more than her mane, more than the curves of her body, just hearing her sent a warm feeling through him. Even when the content of her speech was asinine or flat-out nonsensical, the simple fact that he got to listen to her was pleasant in and of itself, especially when she said his name. He knew there was more that needed to be done, further tasks that required his attention, but just for right now, for this short walk back, he didn’t want to think about anything except her. Just her, and not old memories that he hated recalling…
They got back to the train station far too quickly, but he still felt a little better by the time they did.
“Okay!” announced Coal Hopper as they climbed onto the platform. “Now this’ll do it! You even had some extra here!” She pointed to a few sacks of bits that she’d set apart from the rest. “I stuck a copy of the manifest in one of the bags, and all of the food has been unloaded, so you’re all set.” She was moving as she spoke, turning and picking up one of the sacks of bits from the much larger pile in her telekinesis, levitating it over to another member of the train crew, who grabbed it and carried it inside the locomotive. “We’re gonna head out just as soon as we get this on board. If we keep the boiler going hot and go past the smaller towns without stopping, we can get to Canterlot in three days, and from there it’s just a hop, skip, and a jump back to the Crystal Empire!”
“Have a safe trip,” replied Sonata with a wave, already maneuvering Lex towards the station doors. “Here’s hoping you don’t run into any broken tracks or anythi-”
“No,” announced Lex suddenly, stopping in place before turning to look at Coal Hopper. “You can’t leave yet.”
The declaration was enough to make Coal Hopper freeze in place, a bag of bits held aloft in her aura. “What?”
“What she said,” interjected Sonata. “Why can’t they leave?”
“We just recovered a group of survivors from Vanhoover.” Lex kept his eyes on Coal Hopper as he spoke. “Several of them were in extremely poor health.” Certainly, using the weak healing spell that the Night Mare had given him hadn’t done anything for the two ponies he’d used it on. But then again, it was solely meant to deal with actual wounds, and those seemed to be less of an issue than disease and malnourishment. Even so, it was enough to make Lex wish that he’d had access to greater healing magic, or even that he’d bothered to study medicine in his youth instead of more conceptual disciplines. But while he was no doctor, he still knew enough to be confident in what he said next. “If the doctors say they’re well enough for transport, then I’ll need you to take them to Canterlot for treatment.”
Coal Hopper’s eyes widened. “Wait, hold on…”
But Lex had already turned to Sonata, his earlier romanticism gone now that he was back to problem-solving. “I need you to go find Garden Gate for me.”
One of Sonata’s eyebrows went up. “Her? How come? Oh, and she’s still going by Fencer, by the way.”
“I don’t care. Bring her and her friends here.”
“Fine, but can I tell them why?”
Lex hesitated just for a moment before answering. “I want them to be on board in case any of the ponies we brought back don’t survive the trip to Canterlot, and turn into ghouls.”