“So what you are saying is that this...” I nudged the bottle cap I had removed from the Sparkle-Cola that was now on the ground. “Is money? And this...” I nudged the yellow coin lying next to the bottle cap, which Spitfire had identified as something called ‘a bit’. “Is not?”
Dust, who so far throughout wandering had been eyeing me suspiciously when he thought I didn’t notice, clearly still not trusting me, snorted. Precious glared at him before she turned to me with a patient smile. I had taken up her offer on asking her about anything. This had to be the hundredth question I had asked since we had started walking.
“Exactly. Although the gold coins still have some value, since you can’t buy anything from these,” – she tapped her hoof against the vending machine with the Sparkle-Cola symbol, which we had found standing by the road in the middle of nowhere – “with bottle caps.”
I took another sip from the Sparkle-Cola bottle I had in front of me as I eyed the bottle cap suspiciously. The carrot tasting soda was, surprisingly, not warm. I couldn’t for my mind phantom how a bottle cap, a grey, boring piece of metal that had been stuck on a Sparkle-Cola bottle until I had removed it, was used as a currency while the gold coin was… junk really. It was something that bugged me about it. And it bugged me that it bugged me. I sighed. “It is bloody weird. It just feels… wrong.”
I brought up the bottle to take a sip from it, but froze in the middle of the motion, part of the soda spilling down over my coat. Spitfire, I thought, as I brought the bottle closer and eyed the label at the side of the bottle. How did I know that this soda tasted like carrots?
“Cogwheel! You spilled on yourself. Here, let me help,” Precious said, rising from where she sat.
“You… knew that?” Spitfire asked, hesitating slightly. “It might be a subconscious memory that made you know, or remember, the taste of a carrot.”
I didn’t move at, only dully noting that Precious floated out a towel from her bag and started to rub the soda out of my coat with it. So I can remember trivial things, like how a carrot tastes, but nothing of my life? I can’t even remember how a carrot looks like! I only know that this tastes like a carrot.
“While you don’t have the memory left of tasting a carrot, or otherwise encountered one, maybe your body remembers and makes you remember parts of it.” Spitfire went silent for a moment. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know. That is the only thing I can guess. I wasn’t created with injuries around memories in thought, so I only know the basics.”
“Bloody weird.”
“Excuse me?” Precious said, looking away from the towel and up at me.
“No…nothing,” I stuttered as I pushed the towel away, first now fully realizing that she was cleaning me with it. “Thank you.”
She looked surprised at me for a moment, before she packed down the towel again. “You’re welcome,” she said with a smile.
Dust, who had looked at us with disgust in his face, spoke up. “It’s not the only thing that’s weird here.” He took the last sip from his bottle, eyeing me over it.
“Dust,” Precious said sharply.
“Oh, you can’t deny it, sis.” He sat down the bottle on the ground behind himself. “He shows up from nowhere, kicks the ass of a bloody raider that tries to kill us and even has healing potions with him!”
“Dust!”
“But do you know what the best part is?” the buck continued, ignoring his sister’s protests. “He had food with him, which was exactly what we needed, and he just gave it to us!”
“That is enough, Dust!” Precious said as she rose. “He saved our lives, especially yours. Maybe you should be a little grateful instead of complaining all the time?”
“But—“
“No. Listen to me, this has to end, Dust. Right now!”
This time it was Dust who rose, glaring down at his sister. “No, you listen to me! Don’t you get the feeling that all this is a bit off? How many questions has he asked since we started traveling together? Ten? Fifty? It doesn’t matter, because he hasn’t needed to ask. He knows more than he tells us.”
“That’s absurd,” Precious said, taking a step back from her brother. “Listen to yourself!”
“I am. Maybe you should try it sometime!” he said as he turned around and started to walk quickly, muttering under his breath.
Precious looked apologizing at me as she rose from beside me and threw her own bag over her back. Without a word she started galloping to catch up with her brother. I looked after her as I picked up my own bag. Although I only had travelled with them for a short while, I felt lonely as I started to walk after them. Precious had caught up with her brother, and they stood now eye to eye arguing with each other, too low for me to hear more than a few words. Dust pointed at me multiple times, each time with more anger.
Maybe it would be best if I just leave them, I thought. If they just walked on without me. I looked around me. The barren wasteland spread out around the small path we walked on, without any other change than the cliffs, stones and trees that stood alone or in small clusters. Looking up, I could see the clouds covering the sky, the sun only shining weakly through it -- not seen, always with a layer of clouds in the way. I could leave, but how far would I get? How long would I survive?
“We still don’t know about all the dangers out there. We have a bigger chance of survival than we had this morning, so I believe it is better if we stay with those two,” Spitfire said.
I looked at the two arguing siblings. For my survival, maybe, but Dust clearly doesn’t want me to be here--
“Fine, just go then!” Precious shouted, interrupting my train of thought. Dust stood there, his mouth open and his eyes wide. “If you can’t see that not everypony out here is a threat, then leave!”
Dust shrank back some and looked wide-eyed at his sister. He looked over at me and suddenly he seemed more confident again, whispering something I couldn’t hear to Precious as he turned around and galloped away. The mare looked after her brother.
“Go to her,” Spitfire urged me. “I can nearly promise you that you are the reason for that.”
Thank you, for making me feel better, I thought as I sighed and walked up to her. She looked sternly at me, as if all this was my fault. I could see tears in her eyes, but if they were from anger or sadness, I couldn’t tell.
“Not a word,” she hissed at me before she started to walk in the same direction as her brother just had. I looked after her as she walked, a lump in my throat. Maybe I should just leave now. I thought as I turned around. She should be able to catch up with her brother before the sun sets.
“Are you sure about this?” Spitfire asked. “To just—“
Yes, I am. I took a deep breath to clear my head. There is a crossing down this road, I can take another way there.
I hadn’t even taken a step before I could hear Precious behind me. “And where do you think you’re going?” she asked.
“Away,” I said as I turned around to face her.
She glared at me, her eyes hard as stone. “Away?” she repeated angrily. “Away? You wouldn’t last for a day out there without me! Stop being such an idiot and come here.”
“It’d be better if you traveled with your brother, he—“
“He’ll come back,” the unicorn growled, taking a step closer. “Besides, he will survive out there. He might seem really stupid, but he knows how to take care of himself.”
“But—“
“Not a word,” Precious snapped, punctuating her words by jabbing her hoof into my chest. “You’re coming with me. We’re not going after him. He’ll come crawling back once he’s stopped sulking.”
I opened my mouth, but quickly closed it again as she raised an eyebrow, silently daring me to say another word. Her raised eyebrow changed to a thin smile as she turned around without a word and started to walk towards the same way her brother had disappeared.
“Like a dog after its master,” Spitfire mused as I took a step after the unicorn.
I took a deep breath, the dirty smell of the world around me filling my nostrils. What else can I do? I thought bitterly as I breathed out again. I can’t just leave her after causing her brother to storm of.
“And you enjoy the company.”
I won’t deny that it’s nice to have company, and she has taught me a lot already.
“Will you hurry up? We have to find a place to sleep before it gets dark.”
Realizing that Precious was far ahead of me, I started trotting to catch up.
{^-^}
“Stop it, now.”
I looked up from the skeleton my eyes had lingered on. I can’t help it, I thought bitterly. The question is there all the time, in the back of my head. The sight around me wasn’t encouraging. The dead grass spreading out from the dirty road we walked on. Hollow, decaying trees stood or lay in the grass.
How can I be sure that I didn’t do anything that caused this?
“Stop it, Cogwheel. Why poison your mind with questions you cannot answer?”
But what if I did do something? What if I made this the future?
“Then you will know when you get your memories back. And if you were the prime reason for all this to happen, what should you do?”
I didn’t answer her as I continued to trot after Precious, who had barely spoken a word since we started to walk after her brother for what felt like hours ago. I knew that Spitfire was right, and the logical part of my mind wanted to listen to her. But I couldn’t get the question completely out of my head.
“Cogwheel, this isn’t the future. If you actually did something back then, that was two hundred years ago. This is now, this is the reality.”
Precious looked back at me with a worried frown, but quickly looked back again as she saw that I had seen her. It wasn’t the first time she had done that since we started walking, looking at me when she thought that I wouldn’t notice. Or maybe she didn’t care that I noticed. The first time she had looked back at me had it been with a smile, but the smile had quickly vanished, turning into the worried frown she wore now.
I sighed. You’re right. I can’t do anything about it now, I thought as I pushed the thoughts of what I might have done into a dark corner of my mind. At least not before I get my memories back. “So, where are we going?” I asked, trying to get my mind off the questions that were already coming back to me.
“Somewhere we can sleep tonight,” Precious said absently, focusing on the T-intersection we just had stopped at. Hesitating, she looked side to side before she shrugged and started to trot down the left way. “And hopefully find some food as well.”
“Any plans?”
“Find an abandoned house, barn… or anything really. Anything that protects more than the outdoors will do. As for food,” she paused as she looked around the barren ground. “We will see what we find.”
“Sounds promising…”
“Well, it’s all we have right now. You’ll have to get used to it.” She turned around and gave me a smile. “I’m sure we’ll find something soon.”
It was still light, but I had no idea for how long it would stay like that. “Yea, what’s the worst that could happen?” I asked as I returned the smile.
“In worst case, we will have to sleep under the open sky, without anything to keep us warm.”
The smile died on my lips. That didn’t sound very promising. “We will find a place to sleep, right?” I asked with a frown.
Precious didn’t answer, instead she laughed heartily as she looked on the road ahead.
{-.-}
“Are you sure that this is safe?” I asked, looking up at the house in front of us. With its door hanging on the hinges and the windows hidden beneath thick wooden planks, not to speak about the state the walls were in, the entire house seemed as if it should fall apart at any second. Or rather, as if it should have years ago.
“Not exactly what I wanted, but it’s the best we got.” Precious said cheerfully as she trotted past the open door and into the house.
It was true that it was the best we got. We had walked, mostly in silence, for hours without seeing any place to stay. On top of that, the sun started to set an hour ago, the world around us was getting darker and darker for each passing minute. The sky above was grey, nearly black, and it felt as if the trees would jump at me without any warning. Hasting my steps, I followed the unicorn into the house. Who knew what the dark could bring?
Like this house would protect us against anything, the logical part of my brain pointed out as I entered the dusty hallway. Without a door that can even be closed! It didn’t take long for my eyes to adjust to the dim light in the hallway. Curiously, I looked around me in this new place as I followed the two trails of hoofprints into the house.
A drawer had photo frames in various sizes lying on it, and the wall around it was decorated with photo frames as well. The photos within them had long since faded away. The only furniture besides the drawer was a hatrack that stood empty above me.
The wooden floor protested with each step I took, the creaking echoing in the otherwise silent hallway. Light shone from a room before me, only blocked by Precious who stood in front of the doorway with a smile on her face. “Sleeping like a baby,” she whispered, audibly enough for me to hear it, as she motioned me to come over.
Tiptoeing over to where she stood, I looked in into the room. The room wasn’t big, but still there was room for a sofa, three bookcases and two armchairs, as well as a fireplace, without it being cramped. Photo frames, these as empty as the ones in the hallway, stood side by side by books and broken statues in the bookcases. Dirt and dust lingered on the floor, although not as much as had been in the hallway. But the thing that Precious most likely smiled at was Dust, who lay snoring in the sofa with a deep pink saddlebag in a tight hug.
Precious yawned and took a step into the room. “I’m going to get some sleep,” she whispered as she crawled up in one of the armchairs. “You should, too.” She looked at me with one eye. I nodded at her, keeping silent, lest I risk waking Dust up. It seemed to be enough, as she closed her eye and moved her head slightly between her fore-legs. “Good night, Cogwheel.”
“Good night,” I whispered as I walked deeper into the house. The tiredness had started to get a hold over me as well, but I doubted that I would fit in anything but the sofa. And, seeing that it was occupied, I could as well try to find a bedroom.
I quickly found out how small the house really was. Besides the living room, where the siblings lay asleep, there was nothing more than a kitchen, a bedroom and a bathroom, all of them smaller than the living room. However attractive the bed was right now, there was one thing I wanted to do before sleeping. So I steered my steps into the kitchen instead, hoping to find some food for tomorrow. I might still have one or two tin cans left, but that wouldn’t be enough for the three of us to survive very long.
A table, crafted in dark wood, took up most of the small room. Cupboards and Drawers were stacked effectively around the stove. At the opposite wall, thick planks covered the windows and doors that I guessed had once lead to the backside of the house. A layer of dust covered everything. A paper lay on the table. I gently dusted of the note and saw to my surprise that the words were still there, as readable as the day the note was printed.
Dear Ms. Mane:
Congratulations on your recent inclusion in the Stable 31 community!
You will find outlined in your application materials a full review of rules and procedures related to preparing for shelter in a Stable-Tec facility. We will outline a few key points here:
· Stable-Tec provides all clothing, bedding, and accommodations for residents. Personal belongings must be reviewed and approved of by an authorized Stable-Tec hermetics technician before such belongings can be delivered to your reserved quarters within the Stable. In the event of an emergency entrance to the Stable, no personal belongings will be permitted beyond the main door of the facility.
· All Stable residents must attend an orientation seminar. If you did not attend such a seminar as part of the application process, you must make an appointment with your Stable-Tec representative.
· In the event of a Stable activation, whether actual or drill, Stable-Tec will sound a siren audible in the immediate vicinity of the Stable facility entrance, and residents will be contacted via message at the address provided in their resident profile records. Please report promptly to Stable 31 to await admittance and processing upon such a notification.
Stable-Tec looks forward to having you and your family as valued residents!
Sincerely;
Stable-Tec.
What’s a Stable? I asked myself as I read the note again.
“Considering the first lines, it sounds like some kind of shelter. Maybe a shelter from the bombs?”
Maybe. My eyes stopped at the last word. Stable-Tec. The name sounded familiar, but I couldn’t put my hoof on why.
“Maybe Precious know?” Spitfire asked.
Maybe. I put the note in my saddlebags. I will check with her tomorrow. With the note out of my mind, I trotted over to one of the cupboards and opened it, hoping to find some food. The dust whirled up and into my nose, causing me to sneeze violently. I quickly moved my hoof up to my nose, preventing the next sneeze before it could escape. Standing completely still, I listened for any sign that I might have awoken the siblings.
A minute crept past, and I didn’t hear anything else than my own breathing and the steady beating of my heart. Thanking my lucky star, I returned to searching through the cupboard, careful as to not repeat the sneezing accident. The first two cupboards I looked through contained plates, cups and drinking glasses, some of them in pieces. I opened the last one, but quickly closed it again at what I saw inside of it.
“What was that?” Spitfire asked.
“I don’t know,” I whispered, my pounding heart starting to slow down from the shock. “But I have to check if there is any food in there.”
I softly nudged the cupboard open and took a step back when it was opened enough for me to see inside it. Staring back at me was the biggest, fattest cockroach I had ever seen. Not that I remembered seeing any before this, but the name cockroach came into mind as soon as I saw it, together with the feeling that this one was a lot bigger than it should be. Its red eyes bored into me. For close to a minute I stood there, eye to eye with the cockroach, until I realized what I was actually doing. I chuckled softly to myself as I looked away from the strange creature. My smile broadened as I saw the boxes and tin cans that were hidden behind the insect’s body.
“Sorry, little big insect, but I just want to move you a little so that I can get that food,” I murmured as I brought forward a metallic limb to nudge him away. I yelped and drew it back as he started to bite on it. It was strong, it held tight even as I flayed wildly with my hoof, desperately trying to get it away. “Come on, come on!” I whispered between clenched teeth. “Just let go already!” to my surprise, as well as the cockroach I assume, it actually let go, landing onto the floor with a thump. It glared at me for a second before it marched into one of the other cupboards I had opened earlier.
I could feel the cockroach’s eye on my back as I started to move the carton boxes and tin cans out from the cupboard and onto the table. What I saw wasn’t very encouraging. The cartons had been chewed into, and the food inside had been eaten. I suspected that the cockroach was the guilty for the state of the cartons. The cans weren’t much better.
Who put empty cans back into a cupboard? I asked myself as I hold up one of the cans in question. Why? I thought as I sorted away all the empty cans, ending up with a single, unopened can left on the table.
“Maybe they liked the colors?”
I snickered quietly as I showed the can down together with the cans I had since earlier in my saddlebag. Yes, maybe. Yawning widely, I stepped out of the kitchen and staggered down the hallway into the bedroom. The sound of rain against the roof, soft at first but quickly becoming hard, accompanied me as I walked. It surprised me that the water didn’t find its way through the roof and into the house.
The paint on the bedroom walls had flaked off, blending together with the dust on the floor. A bed stood against a wall, a desk on the other side of it. A stool lay shattered against a bookcase, the books within had long since withered. A couple of photo frames stood on the bookcase, most of them faded, the rest showing pictures of a young earth pony.
I slumbered down in the soft bed, sneezing and coughing violently as the dust reached my nose and mouth. Once again covering my mouth so to not get any more dust in it, I listened after any sign of that I might have awoken the siblings. When no sign from the siblings came, I rose from the bed and removed the cover. Gently, while holding my breath, I shook the dust out of it.
But not even holding my breath could help me from sneezing as the dust grains rose in a mighty cloud around me at the first shake of the cover. Apparently, shaking something which had laid and gathered dust for two hundred years wasn’t the smartest thing to do. Especially not in a room in which floor had done the same for that time.
Maybe the cloud would have set faster had I not been sneezing, but I couldn’t help it. Every time I thought the sneezing had stopped, a new grain of dust had tickled my nose. It took minutes before the cloud had completely set and I could lay down the cover on the bed again. It was a miracle that I hadn’t awoken the siblings. That, or they slept really deep.
One thing the sneeze had done was give me a headache. My head pounded as I once again slumbered down in the bed. I ignored the headache and turned around in the bed until I had found a comfortable sleeping position. Slowly, accompanied by the sound of the rain hitting the roof, I started to relax. It didn’t take long before sleep overtook me.
{Z.Z}
A mighty roar, followed by an even mightier bang, violently stirred me awake. I looked frantically around me, trying to locate the source of the sound. The rain was hitting harder against the roof now than it had when I fell asleep. I had kicked off the blanket in my sleep, and it now lay abandoned on the floor.
A bright flash shone through the barred window, lighted up the every corner of the bedroom I lay in. The flash was followed by another mighty roar and bang, the sound overwhelming the sound of the rain for a second. What’s happening? I thought as I rose from the bed.
“Come, Cogwheel.” Precious suddenly appeared in the doorway. “You have to see this!”
“What is it?”
“Just come already!” she said, tugging me to follow.
I followed her, or, rather, she dragged me out to the door. Dust already sat there, the only proof that he knew that we were there was him giving me a dark look as he moved aside to give space to his sister and me. He didn’t say anything, but the sour look he gave his sister made me believe that they had talked. And that he had lost the argumentation.
“What is it?” I asked again.
“Stop asking and look,” she said as she sat down, motioning for me to sit down next to her.
The rain poured down on the other side of the door, droplets shattering against the ground and nearly splashing into where we sat. A bright light shot down from the pitch black clouds in the sky, dividing the world in two and lighting up the forest around us. Another mighty roar followed the flash.
I just sat there, completely unable to move. My heartbeat came in fast and the blood rushed in my ears, cancelling out all other sounds. I wanted to run, to hide. I wanted to get away. My mind clawed against me, screamed at me to run, cried loudly. But I couldn’t move. My eyes were still locked at the place where the light had split the sky. I started to breathe faster and shorter, the air flowing down my throat but never reaching my lungs. Run, flee, escape!
“Cogwheel!” Spitfire shouted.
Run, flee, escape!
I heard Precious shout something, but I couldn’t make it out.
Another bolt of light divided the sky, the thunderous roar piercing through to me. My mind screamed for me to run, flee, escape. But I couldn’t. Whimpering, I jumped down on the floor and tried to make myself as small as possible, protecting my head with my front limbs. I have to get away from here. I closed my eyes tightly. If I couldn’t see it, it wouldn’t be able to hurt me.
“Cogwheel!”
Run, Flee, Escape! The words continued to repeat themselves in my head, forcing out every other thought. My heart started to pump out the blood faster, the fiery ice in my veins threatening to burn me from the inside.
“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” Precious whispered in my ear, her voice like a cliff around the ocean that was the blood rushing in my ears. “The lightning won’t hurt you.”
Another bolt lit up the world through my closed eyelids, causing me to yelp and start trembling.
“It can’t hurt you. It’s far away.”
“It can’t hurt me,” I repeated her words. I felt how my heart slowed down some, even if it still pounded hard in my breast.
Keeping my eyes shut, I listened to her voice. She repeated the words over and over again as she gently stroked my back. At every flash I yelped and started to tremble again, and she would continue whispering to me. For every boom the distance between them increased, until the point where it had completely stopped.
I could still hear the rain pouring down from the other side of the door as Precious whispered “It’s gone. The thunderstorm’s passed.”
My legs trembled as I removed them from my face and opened my eyes. The clouds above us weren’t nearly as black as they had been before, and the weak light of the morning sun illuminated the rain through them.
I took a deep breath as I rose. My real leg wobbled slightly, threatening to make me fall over, but my mechanical legs stood fast.
“Feeling better?” Spitfire asked. A question that Precious mirrored.
“Ye… Yes,” I said.
“Come here. Let’s get you back to bed,” Precious said. “No need to get up yet.”
“But—“ Dust started, quickly shutting his mouth again.
I walked slowly to the bedroom with Precious walking next to me, ready to steady me should I need it. “I… I just need to lie down,” I said as I lay down in the bed. “No need for sleep.”
“Are you sure you are better?” Spitfire asked with concern.
Yeah, I’m fine.
“One-hundred percent sure?”
I sighed. I… was afraid. I wanted to run and hide. I couldn’t think, I couldn’t move. Whenever the lightning struck, I couldn’t do anything but sit there. Then there was that loud bang after each thing of lightning. My heart started beating faster only thinking about it. I don’t know. I lay there in silence for a moment, allowed my heart to slow down again. But I’m fine now.
“It was nothing like that, Dust!” Precious voice reached my ears. She sounded angry. “He was scared.”
Dust must have answered something that I couldn’t hear. “Enough, Dust!” she shouted.
I rose from the bed and, after a growl from my stomach reminded me that I hadn’t eaten since the day before, picked up my saddlebags. I walked out in the living room, where the siblings sat and looked sternly at each other. Dust opened his mouth as I entered the room, but a look from Precious made him stay silent.
Not even the dim light shining through the cracks in the wall, illuminating every dust grain that danced in the air, seemed to warm the room. I put down the saddlebag and sighed as I looked between the two siblings. “Are you hungry?” I finally asked as I picked up the two cans of food I had left. “I only have this food left.”
Dust sighed and, after giving his sister a quick, disapproving look, nodded. “I think we all are,” he said.
Precious smiled wide at her brother’s word. “Yes, I think we are.”
I looked between the siblings once again, Precious smiling and Dust… well, at least he didn’t glare at me. “Well, I have already eaten, so you can take what food is left,” I lied.
“What are you doing?” Spitfire asked as Dust jumped down from the sofa and picked up a can, giving me a hasty “thanks” as he did. Precious floated over the second can to herself, looking at me with a disapproving frown.
They’re barely adults. It’s better that they eat and I go hungry, than we all eat some and all go hungry. I answered as I sat down on the floor, my stomach growling. Hopefully it was low enough for the others not to hear it. Precious smiled at me as she tilted the can in small circles, seemingly thinking about something, while Dust had nearly finished the can already.
“Are you sure?”
Absolutely, I thought, before I raised my voice. “So… you said something about your—“
I didn’t get any longer before my mouth was suddenly filled with food and my jaws violently forced shut. It had happened faster than I had time to react. Surprised, I looked over at Precious, who still sat in the sofa, smiling gently at me. Her horn glowed as she not only kept the can afloat, but also my jaws shut. “Oh, don’t look so surprised, Cogwheel. Just swallow your food,” she mused at me as she looked down at me. “You didn’t eat yet. Don’t think you can lie to me like that.”
I nearly choked on the food as I swallowed it. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Precious asked as she released my jaw and took some food herself from the can. “It’s not like that’ll keep you from starving, but it should help a bit.”
Coughing, I took a deep breath. “You… you could have just asked!” I panted out between breaths.
“Where’s the fun in that?” she asked with a smile.
Dust couldn’t keep the laughter back. “You aren’t the first one she’s done that to,” he said between laughs. “She did the same to me when I tried to tell her she could take all the food when we were younger. I even saw her doing it to Vigil once.”
“Just because there isn’t enough food for everypony to be satisfied doesn’t that mean that one should give up his part of the food,” Precious said as she floated over the last of the food to me. “Now, open up.”
I could hear Spitfire snicker at me as I opened my mouth, quickly swallowing the watery, tasteless food that Precious pushed into it.
“Good,” the unicorn mused as she threw away the can. “Now, what were you saying?”
“You said something about your brother. That you were looking for him?”
“I did,” she said, glancing at her brother who just sat there, seemingly ignoring us. “And we are.”
“We left three days ago,” Dust spoke up from where he lay in the sofa. “We bought food for a week, deciding that that would be enough time to find a merchant or something to buy more from.” Dust sighed and nudged the can in front of him, causing it to fall over. “We had walked to nightfall before we realized that half the food we had bought was rotten.”
“But we decided that it wasn’t time to give up yet, that we would find a merchant to buy some food from. Or in the worst case, find somewhere to scavenge,” Precious said, looking at her brother with a small smile.
“And that wasn’t the end of our bad luck.” Dust sighed, not even looking at her sister. “The second day, we came across a raider. He surprised us, and I had only got up my revolver when he aimed his shotgun at my head and started to talk about my sister. Then you came and saved us. Not only that, but you gave us food.” Dust’s face darkened for a second. “... And you saved the raider.” Precious raised an eyebrow at her brother, who quickly added. “I never thanked you for saving us, or giving us food. Thank you.”
I looked surprised between the two siblings. Precious smiled widely at her brother, who sat there and looked at me. I shook my head. I’m not sure I want to know what happened with Dust, I thought. “I would do the same thing again,” I said with a smile. A smile that Dust, surprisingly enough, returned.
“I don’t want to know either, actually,” Spitfire said. “Let us just be happy that she talked to her brother before he decided to take the matter in his own hooves.”
I nodded. “Didn’t your parents try to keep you back?”
The smile that Precious and Dust had slipped away. The unicorn looked down in the floor, while the earth pony just glared at me.
“Our parents died years ago,” Precious whispered. “Vigil’s the one that takes care of us now.”
“Oh… sorry.”
“You couldn’t have known,” Precious said, her voice wavering. Dust snapped his head away from me and looked at his sister. Sighing, he walked over to her and hugged her.
I just stood still and looked at them the minutes it took before Precious pushed her brother away, mumbling something I couldn’t hear.
“Always, sis,” Dust answered as he picked up their bags from the floor. “Time to leave if we want to get somewhere today. We need to find food as well.”
I nodded as I picked up my own saddlebag. “Yes. Any idea where to go?”
“There should be a town not very far from here,” Dust said. “I looked over some maps at home before we left, and after seeing which way Vigil left, he’s probably going through that very town. The worst that can happen is that we find somewhere to buy food. Hopefully, we can find something about Vigil there, too.”
I looked surprised at Dust. “But didn’t you say yesterday that you wouldn’t travel with me any longer than next town?”
Dust laughed as he gave over Precious saddlebag. “I sort of overreacted yesterday. You might be a bloody raider-saver, but you also saved us, without asking for anything in return. And besides,” he said, scratching his head with a hoof. “Precious… convinced me to trust you. Not that I do trust you completely.” He paused to look at Precious, who shot him a disapproving glare as she rose from the armchair. “What? I don’t!”
Precious walked over to her brother and nudged him with a hoof. “I know you don’t, but you won’t run off again. Understood?”
“Yes, sis.”
I smiled at the two siblings. Maybe someone in that town knows about SAT, I thought.
“Someone is bound to know something about SAT. And it is better to follow these two than to go alone, especially since you don’t know where you would go,” Spitfire agreed.
“Let’s go then,” Precious said.
Together we walked out from the small house that had been our shelter for the night, out into the rain. It didn’t pour down as it had done before, instead coming down light and carefully, dampening our coats. The road had nearly turned into mud from the rain.
“So,” I started. “Where are you from?”
“We are from Marvel, a smaller town in the ruins of a pre-war city,” Precious answered absently. “A trading town, a place where traveling merchants and caravans stayed and traded before continue their travels.”
I sighed and continued walking on the muddy road. The sunlight barely touched the ground around us, not as big of a surprise seeing how cloudy it was. I wished that the clouds could just disappear and the rain stop. But it didn’t seem that it would happen soon; the grey clouds were everywhere around us, covering every inch of the sky above us.
It didn’t take long before the road started to go up a hill. From the top of the hill I saw a valley, bordered with trees. In the middle of the valley lay a city. Most of the buildings were in ruins, dead trees growing in them and dark ivy growing on the walls, but there was a part of the city that still seemed alive. The road we had followed ventured down the valley and into the city. A sign, slanting on its hinges, read “Welcome to Green Valley – Equestria’s Greenest City!”
Footnote: Level Up!
New Perk: Don't stir the sleepers: Luck or drugs? Nopony knows, but one thing is certain: You don't have to be careful when around sleeping beings. They usually don't wake up! (This perk gives a +10 bonus to sneak around sleepers)
Note: Cogwheel can, at this point of time, have a maximum skill of 50 in Sneak. Yea, his metallic legs are not only for the better!
First, a really big thank you to Masquerade313, not only for proofreading and editing, but for giving the story a hell of a lot more life than it had from the beginning. I can’t thank him enough for all the time he devoted helping me with this!
Secondly, thanks to Rising_Chaos for proofreading and listening to my never ending babbling.