Fallout Equestria: Falling Shadows

by Drako Moon

Chapter 47: Dark Places

I love this place, it’s peaceful, beautiful, calm. The lights of all the stars around me, casting their light as I rest and grow stronger. They told me that one day I was going to do something amazing, something great. When I was strong enough they would send me down to a new world so that I could help save it. But first I’d have to get stronger, I’d have to bathe in the light of the stars, letting their power help me grow. I can’t wait for that day to come, when I can use my power to help this new world they told me about, but at the same time I’m scared that I’ll never see this place again.

A deep voice fills my mind as I rest, one that I know so well. He is the one who first created me, I do not know his name, only that he is far away but his light shines the brightest of all, “My child, remember that your trials will be great. We have given you the knowledge you need to survive, the power to win, and our faith that you will always hold on to your light. Never let the darkness take hold of you, if you do, it will mean the end of everything we are trying to protect.”

I wanted to tell him that I’ll do whatever I can to make him proud of me, but I have no voice, not yet. I do know that he can feel the emotions bellowing out of my being. His light and power seem to brighten and grow stronger filling me with what I can only imagine is approval. I take it in happily, but something’s wrong. What is this new feeling flowing through me? It’s not an emotion from the other lights around me, or from my creator, no it feels…hot? The lights around me start to dim and I can hear anger coming from my creator, “No, not yet, she’s not ready. NO!”

I’m afraid as I feel my being get pulled away from the peaceful place that I love. A new feeling flows through me, a feeling that I’ve only been told about but never felt before, Pain. The world around me goes dark and I feel myself being pulled through something. I get a quick glimpse of a world I’ve never seen before, one that is full of magic, but also pain and suffering. Now I find myself in what I can only say is a room of some sort, I’m trapped inside a glass dome looking out at…ponies…the word just popped into my mind. A couple of them had white coats, another was colored a dark grey and stood very tall with a scar over his left eye. There was an even taller pony who had wings and a horn. She was dark blue with a mane that looked like it was filled with stars. Last was a blue mare who was smiling at me through the glass dome.

“Captain, it worked! We were able to capture a true child of the stars!” the blue mare said.

The scarred pony looked at her, “Are you sure? All I see is a ball of light.”

The mare with the flowing mane backed up a little, “She’s right Night Stalker, I’ve felt this kind of magic before. This creature is a child of the stars, it’s different than I’ve felt before, but similar at the same time. Are you sure this will work for your experiments Minuette?”

“I’m quite sure Princess Luna, if my calculations are correct, we can use her power to make you into Nightmare Moon again, only this time with more control,” the blue mare said.

The mare with the flowing mane looked closer at me in my dome, “I do hope you’re right. Because if you’re not, then bringing back Nightmare Moon could be worse than what we’re already facing. What will happen to this child of the stars if you are successful?”

The scarred stallion spoke next, “From what Minuette told me, it will die. You need all of its power to make this work. Minuette which constellation did you find this thing in?”

“I’m not sure Captain, but from the readings I think it came from the Aquila constellation. They were the brightest in that region when we turned on the machine,” the blue mare replied.

I’d die? What does that mean? Whatever it is I don’t like the sound of it, where am I? Why can I feel so much pain and despair around me? It was like this entire world was suffering from so many emotions. Most of them were pain, hatred, anger, greed, and so much more. I had to know more, I need to make them understand that they need to let me go, I have something I need to do.

Using the power that made up my body I made my thoughts known to the ponies outside of my dome, “Who are you? Why am I here?”

They all looked at me in amazement. One of the mares in the white coats asked, “Did that thing just speak?”

The blue mare responded, “I believe it did, I didn’t think they could do that. Isn’t it just a mass of light magic?”

“Let me out of here, I am not supposed to be here,” I said.

The scarred stallion grinned a little, “You’re where you are supposed to be monster. You’re here in this lab so that your power can be used to help us win this war our land is stuck in.”

“But my creator said that I was meant to save a new world.”

“You will, by giving up your power to our princess,” he said.

“That is not what I am meant for,” I said as new ideas started to come into my mind, “I need a body, one that can handle my power so that I can save this new world, one that I can control. If you take my power I will not be able to do that,” I said feeling a strange feeling building inside of me.

He rolled his eyes turning toward the Blue Mare, “Make it stop talking, we should extract it’s power as soon as possible.”

“Night Stalker, I’m not sure it’ll be as easy as you think. This child of the stars is more powerful than we anticipated,” the mare with the flowing mane said.

“She’s right sir,” a mare in a white coat said, “I think we need to shut it down before it overloads the system. This dome can barely hold the power as it is and we’re still pulling in more.”

“Minuette made most of the equipment here, everything will be fine. Kill that thing and take its power,” the scarred stallion said.

That feeling I know now had to be rage, I let it fill me as I used my mind to yell at them, “I will not let you take what is mine!” I let the power inside me flow out.

The blue unicorn backed away yelling, “Shut it down now!”

Before the ponies could do anything, the dome around me cracked and my power flowed out making one of their silly machines explode, killing the two mares that were closest to my dome. The room started to shake and more machines started to spark and smoke. I felt myself starting to laugh as I said, “You are all fools to try and contain me. You will pay for what you’ve done!”

The mare with the flowing main jumped in front of the other two yelling, “Get behind me both of you, I know how to stop her.”

I started to let my power build again, “You think you have the power to stop me! I’ll show you how wrong you are!”

A look of sadness came over the mare’s face as the horn on her head started to glow, “I am sorry child, but you have too much anger inside of you. Sleep and find peace in the land of dreams.”

I was about to show her how wrong she was when her horn flashed and I felt my power push back into my being. Then the sights around me started to fade, it was like my mind was being pushed into a place similar to the one I had come from. Only the pain and hurt around me never went away. I could still hear what was going on around me, could still feel the fear the ponies felt as seeing how powerful I was, still feel the pain of so many creatures and the land.

Before my mind fully slipped away I heard the mare with the flowing mane say, “Night Stalker, I want this place sealed. That spell will only keep her down for a little while, once we are out of here I’ll show Minuette how to seal this room to keep her contained. I told you this was a bad idea, I want you to make sure nopony ever finds her.”

The scarred pony started to say, “But Princess Luna, I know that with a little more study we can make this work.”

“I said SEAL IT!”

“Yes Princess Luna.”

I swore right then and there, “I’m going to make them pay for trapping me here and taking me away from my home.”

I jumped as I woke looking around wondering where I was. My heart was racing from that strange dream, or was it a dream? It took me a moment before I realized I was still laying in the bed at The Lucky Horseshoe. I brought a hoof up to rub my temples slowly as a headache started to build in the back of my skull. Then I felt a talon on my shoulder. Looking over I saw Aura looking up at me, “You okay Shadow? You kicked me in your sleep.”

“Oh, sorry about that. I think so, I just had a really strange dream,” I said laying back down and letting Aura pull me close to her.

“What kind of dream?” she asked as she started to run her talons through my mane.

“I really have no idea, it was like I was reliving the moment when Aquila first was pulled down to Equus.”

“Maybe with you pulling in her power like you did, you’re starting to see some of her own memories, just like she can with yours.”

I shrugged, “I guess It’s possible, though I hope I don’t see any more. It’s really hard to hate her when I see stuff like that. It was like torture and losing my mind at the same time.”

“That sounds awful, but I think even though something like that can make you feel sorry for her, Aquila still shouldn’t be allowed to get out. There’s no telling what she’d do if she did. I also don’t want to lose you to something like that,” Aura said solemnly.

I sighed, “I guess you’re right. She spent centuries in the laboratory alone, something like that would drive most ponies insane. There’s something about her though that confuses me; she doesn’t seem insane. There’s been different times that I’ve interacted with her and she’s seemed like an insane monster and others where she seems like a manipulative villain with some ulterior motive.”

“Really? How so?” Aura asked.

“Well there’s the time when she first emerged during that fight with your father and The Steel Rangers when she was like a mad force of evil, then there was when we met those brothers Squirrel and Moose where she acted like an insane version of me, then there was the time I was in that town outside of Crimson Canyon where she was appearing as a hallucination and acting like somewhat of a normal pony but stranger in a sense,” I explained.

Aura looked lost in thought for a moment, “I don’t think she’s insane, she just wants us to think she is. I don’t know why though. When I was doing medical training, I read a book about psychology and what she shows matches a mix of a psychopath and a sociopath. The psychopath part is basically that she doesn’t really care about the feelings of others, but puts up a false façade to protect herself, and the sociopath part is that she really doesn’t care about any kind of rules and will do whatever she wants to get what she wants no matter what consequences befall anyone else who gets in her way. The best way to describe it is that she neither has true feelings or a conscience. Well, she has feelings but not really any for others, just herself.”

“The weirdest part of all that is that I actually understood it all.”

She laughed a little, “You’re not stupid…at least not THAT stupid. Anyhow I think we should get up.”

“But why? I’m comfortable.”

“Yeah I’m sure you are, but you’re lying against me and I really gotta pee,” she replied.

“Oh, go ahead and get up. I’ll be out in a minute.”

Aura got out of bed and headed toward the bathroom as I stretched and tried my best to get up the motivation to leave the comfortable confines of bed and all its benefits. Warmth, the soft gentleness of the sheets that held me like a warm embrace, the squishiness of the mattress, and the plushiness of the fluffy pillow I laid my head upon. I decided to turn back on my side and lay in bed for a few more minutes to rest my eyes some more, until my face rolled onto a cold spot on the pillow. I quickly jumped back to almost the other side of the bed and grabbed my cheek with a hoof. There was a wet spot on the pillow where my face was, I didn’t cry like the sissy I know I am in my sleep did I? I reached out and touched the spot with my hoof and quickly retracted, “Eeww, I drooled! Gross!”

I went out to the living room where everyone else was eating breakfast. Actually no one was eating breakfast, Aura was trying to break up Wingnut and Byte as they fought over a box of Sugar Apple Bombs, and Wind Thrasher was staring at Stardust as he was being indecisive about what he wanted to eat out of the pantry. I walked to the couch, plopped down, and thought about what the hell I should eat. As I thought, a forgotten memory came somewhat back to me from a dream I think I had a while ago but can’t quite remember, “What’re you doing Shadow?” Stardust asked as he sat down next to me, munching on something crunchy, talking with his mouth full; Gross

“I want some fuckin’ waffles,” I replied plainly.

“What?”

“I said, I want waffles. Everypony in The Wasteland eats either two-hundred-year-old packaged pre-made food or something mutated that they killed or grew. I want something fresh and uncompromised by radiation, but I also want something from a happier time,” I replied.

He looked at me quizzically for a second, “Um, okay then, waffles sound good. I think I saw some waffle mix in the pantry. Sure, it’s still packaged and two-hundred years old but it’s the closest you’re gonna get to the real thing.”

“I guess so, but how are we supposed to get the mix into that waffle shape?”

He smirked and rolled his eyes, “Duh, we add what it says to in the directions on the back of the box and put it in a waffle iron…which we don’t have. Oh, shit…”

“Yup, mornings suck. I think I’ll just have cereal.”

I looked over at Wingnut and Byte as they stared each other down while scarfing on their bowls of cereal in front of them. Are they racing to see who finishes first? If that’s another one of their smartness tests, it’s not really gonna say who’s smarter, just who’s fatter in the sense that they eat a lot. I got up and walked over to them, “If you two puke all over the place because you ate too fast I’m gonna make you clean up each other’s mess. However, if just one of you does, the one who doesn’t can’t make fun of the other,” I said as I levitated the almost empty box of Sugar Apple Bombs.

“Says the one whose stomach is weaker than BOTH of us,” Wingnut teased as Byte snickered.

Ever since Byte joined us they’ve both been pissing me off more and more. Mornings aren’t my happy time and they were about to learn that first hoof. While still levitating the box of cereal, I balanced on my hind legs, raised my fore-hooves, and slammed them down on the front of both of their bowls. They both stared at me in awe as soggy cereal stuck to their faces and brahmin milk dripped from their chins, “Happy now?” I said as I turned and went to go sit back on the couch.

“Geez Shadow, did you really have to do that?” Wind Thrasher asked.

“No, but maybe it’ll make both of them think before they open their mouths and piss me off when I haven’t even been up for more than half an hour.”

“You’re not a morning pony are you?” she asked.

“Not in the slightest.”

Later on, we all went down to The Strip which in the morning was a little bit of a weird sight every time I saw it. There were no neon lights lit up or anything, just ponies everywhere drunk, hookers offering their services, and securiponies rolling around patrolling. Now that I was fed and completely woken up I’d calmed down a lot. Stardust said I was something called ‘hangry’ which meant I was irritable because I was hungry, but I think that goes for anypony who hasn’t had food for an extended period of time.

We were going to JetBlue Skyport, but first needed to get a pass to get in from the NLR embassy. However, before we could get out of the casino area of The Strip, one of the hookers approached us and went up to Stardust. She looked a little strange for a mare and I soon found out why, with a somewhat deep voice she said, “Hey baby, you lookin’ for a good time? Cause I got a nice big surprise for you if you want it like I want yours.”

“Um, what?” Stardust said like he wasn’t sure if he should’ve said something or just walked away.

“If you show me yours I’ll show you mine and we can play a game for who gets to be bottom, but I might cheat,” the hooker replied.

Stardust gagged, “Fuck no!” he started to comically dry-heave.

Without missing a beat Wingnut blurted out, “Haha, tool time!”

Then Byte said, “Yeah, you’ll love it. It’s all in good fun.”

When Stardust recovered from his gagging fit he replied to the hooker, “Get away from me before I do something that’ll get me vaporized by the securiponies. But if you’re looking for some action there’s a stallion that’s right up your alley in Freedom, and if you meet him I mean literally. Oh, and one more thing, looking like a mare doesn’t make you a mare, it makes you a liar.”

The hooker took his hoof and slapped Stardust across the face, “You could’ve just said no asshole!”

“No, what I could’ve said was eat a dick, but that’s pretty much your job description and I thought you might get the wrong idea,” Stardust retorted.

As the hooker stormed off he said, “It’s called tolerance motherfucker! Learn how to use it!”

“Stardust, he…she…it is right, you could’ve been nicer. What’s the big deal if he likes to cross-dress?” I said.

He sighed, “It doesn’t bother me that he’s a crossdressing gay hooker. I say do and like whatever you like, just don’t offer sex to somepony in front of younger ponies like these two. I know they’re not that young but it’s still immoral.”

Aura burst out laughing, “You’re seriously concerned about morality HERE of all places!? That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard in a while,” she wiped a tear from her eye, “That’s almost as funny as that pony who thought he was a ghoul.”

“You still could’ve been nicer,” Wind Thrasher said shyly.

“I guess you’re right, but on The Strip some of the prostitutes try a little too hard to get work and don’t leave you alone. I figured if I could offend him, he’d leave me alone for good,” Stardust replied.

Byte smiled, “Yeah, or come back with all his gender-bent friends and fuck you up in more ways than one. Wastelanders are spiteful in that way, I kinda love it.”

Stardust gave her a slightly horrified look, “Remind me never to make you angry, you’re a creepy little shit.”

She huffed, “Hey, that’s what the other ponies used to say about me in Trotston. I’m not creepy, YOU’RE creepy you big STINKY bug!”

“I’ll have you know, I showered in the other bathroom this morning. Last time I checked, YOU were the one who still has grease marks on her because she hasn’t bathed yet. Who stinks now? I bet you don’t even need those ties in your mane to keep it in pigtails,” Stardust said defending his cleanliness.

She turned to Wingnut, “Hey dummy bug, do I stink?” he leaned forward to sniff her when she pushed his head away, “I didn’t say smell me freak!”

Wingnut looked confused, “But I uh, what? I dunno what to say! Someone help me!”

Aura snickered, “Somethin’ tells me you’ve never had a marefriend before squirt. Just say she doesn’t stink to make her happy and she’ll continue liking you for now until you fail one of her next tests of loyalty and she moves on.”

Byte scoffed, “I DON’T LIKE HIM!”

Aura put on her sinister face, “Denying it doesn’t prove anything, all it does is prove the opposite. I thought you were supposed to be smart.”

“Oh yeah? At least I’m not as primitive as you and cock-a-doodle-doo at sunrise!” Byte retorted.

“Why you little sh…” Aura said right before I grabbed her to stop her from strangling Cookie Byte.

“Can we please just get to the embassy so we can get the pass to go into Jetblue Skyport?” I asked still trying to hold back Aura as Byte hid behind Wingnut and stuck her tongue out at her.

Stardust gave me a funny look, “Pass?”

“Yeah, don’t we need a pass or something to go in there? It’s all guarded and stuff like The Strip,” I replied.

“We don’t need anything like that, we don’t even need to go through Freedom to get to the Skyport. There’s a monorail that goes directly there near the embassy. JetBlue Skyport is like any other NLR encampment, you can just go right in and as long as you don’t cause any trouble you won’t get shot,” Stardust explained.

“Oh,” I said surprised, “Isn’t that kinda stupid?”

“Well yeah, but not having a piece of paper isn’t gonna stop somepony from going in there to cause mischief. Plus, it’s filled with NLR ponies of almost every rank,” Stardust replied.

“Okay then, I guess we’re going to the monorail station,” I said as I let go of Aura.

We started on our way to the station and I noticed Wingnut looking a little nervous, “What are you looking at?” he asked.

“Me? Oh nothing, you’re just shaking like a leaf,” I replied.

“Am not,” he retorted as he walked closer to me and said quieter, “I don’t really wanna go on the monorail.”

Wow, is Wingnut actually afraid of something that isn’t the dark? I thought I’d never see the day that he wouldn’t want to ride in a strange machine, “Why don’t you want to ride the monorail? It’s just a train…”

“That runs on electricity and nothing else. It’s a two-hundred year old computer regulating the power in that thing and I don’t trust it,” he interrupted.

I REALLY thought I’d never see the day the Wingnut wouldn’t trust a computer, “It’ll be fine, I’m sure the NLR maintains it well enough.”

“You don’t’ get it,” he sighed, “The monorail runs on an electric motor controlled by an old computer. Electric motors work different than regular steam, combustion, or gem-powered motors. With those other motors they have to work up to their maximum power to get up to speed. With an electric motor, all that power is available right away. If the computer malfunctions or something else happens to it we could be shot down the track at breakneck speed and cause the rusted mounts of the track to collapse and send the train careening into the ground, KILLING us all.”

“Oh well,” I said trying to keep my cool as I started to internally freak out, “At least the first part will be fun, like those roller coasters they used to have here before the war.”

“I see how it is, you’re scared too,” he said.

“Nuh-uh!” I quickly retorted.

“Are too! Maybe you’re right though, I shouldn’t be worried if I’m with you. You’re somehow unrealistically lucky sometimes and this is one of those times where you’re gonna do something potentially dangerous, then come out of it without a scratch,” Wingnut said in a snarky tone.

As I started walking up the steps that lead into the station I thought about what he just said. When have I ever done something stupidly dangerous and come out without at least a gunshot wound? Then right as I went through the door at the top of the stairs, I was met with a face full of water.

I wiped off my face with a hoof and thought back to the last time I experienced this wonderous phenomenon. When I looked in front of myself after getting the water out of my eyes I saw the two ponies I expected, Squirrel and Moose, “Do you guys do that to everypony or just me?”

Moose smiled sheepishly, “Sorry, it’s just a precaution. We saw you coming up the stairs and you weren’t wearing the ward we gave you and figured you might’ve somehow gotten possessed.”

“Nice to see you too, I’ll bring my own religion water next time and we can have a splash fight,” I replied.

“You’re damn right it’s nice to see us. We heard about your little incident in Appleton. What the hell happened? We gave you that horn-ring specifically to stop something like that from happening,” Squirrel said sounding a bit irritated.

Before I could answer Byte asked excitedly, “Who are you?

It was at that point Squirrel went from tough guy to butter in Byte’s hooves, “Oh, well you see sweetie, my brother and I hunt monsters.”

Byte smiled and closed her eyes cutely, “Oh I get it! You’re idiots.”

Squirrel froze and the look on his face was priceless, like someone just punched him in the stomach, “I…we…uh.”

Moose spoke up before his brother sounded more like a hopeless moron in front of the genius, “Not typical monsters. We hunt cryptids, monsters that show up in folklore and sometimes also in The Wasteland. The supernatural kind of monsters like demons, ghosts, vampires, wraiths, homunculi, etcetera.”

She smiled again, “So you’re not just idiots, you’re nutjobs. Those things don’t exist, they’re all just things made up by ponies to scare wussies like Wingnut into being afraid of the dark.”

With a flick of my hoof I gave her what Vervain used to call a brain-duster, “Byte, shut up. There’s a very good reason he’s afraid of the dark, there’s no need to be a brat,” I looked back at Squirrel who was still frozen in disbelief that something so adorable could be so mean, “Appleton was destroyed by a laser shot from a satellite not by Aquila.”

He snapped out of his confusion, “That’s funny because I’m pretty sure eyewitness reports from multiple witnesses don’t lie. I was told that you and Pride were both using powerful magic to fight each other, and the kind of magic you were using was anything but normal for a unicorn. So, tell us this, when did you start helping that thing?”

“Okay fine, I used Aquila’s power, but we came to a mutual understanding that both of us wanted to keep on living,” I said defending myself while at the same time putting my own hoof in my mouth.

“You do realize that letting yourself give in to Aquila could make her stronger right? Plus, I’m sure there was another way you could’ve gotten rid of Pride,” Moose said.

“Actually, that whole thing was a giant misunderstanding, and I didn’t actually kill Pride,” I replied.

Squirrel looked immediately shocked, “So you’re saying that homicidal freak is still out there somewhere?”

“Yeah, but as it turns out he’s Oricalcos; my uncle. A little piece of him survived and hid in my shadow for a while so he could heal himself. After a while he became our ally, well my ally. Not too long ago he was taken captive by my mother who’s also a bad pony,” I replied with a sheepish smile.

Moose looked intrigued, “Oricalcos? Interesting. Do you know how he manipulates the shadows like he does? Squirrel and I have been trying to figure out what he is and learning now that he used to be a pony originally will help narrow it down.”

Well this is craptastic, I don’t know if I should tell them how he uses his magic or how he got his abilities. I know I can trust them, but what I don’t know is what they’d do to him. Either they’ll be interested like total geeks and try to figure out a way to fix him and make him normal, or they’ll try to figure out a way to kill him because they’re hunters and that’s what they do. Ugh, I guess it’s a fifty-fifty shot, “He doesn’t manipulate the shadows, he IS the shadows. He gained his abilities after studying the works of King Sombra.”

“The former ruler of The Crystal Empire? I knew he was a powerful sorcerer, but I didn’t know he was that well in-depth with arcane science,” Moose said scratching the back of his head as if he was trying to think harder about it, “I wonder if there’s any way we could get the texts he studied, it would help us immensely in our work.”

“There’s still a crazy murderer on the loose and you’re worried about books?” Squirrel asked angrily, “We gotta forget about that thing at Jetblue Skyport and kill this dick.”

“Okay first of all, he’s my uncle. Second of all, WHAT thing at the skyport?” I said getting a little irritated at Squirrels disregard for my feelings.

Moose looked at his brother and then at me, “We were on our way to JetBlue Skyport to take care of something. There’s been reports of NLR trainees and soldiers going missing recently after they cleared debris from the entrances to the basement. Squirrel and I think there’s something down there taking them.”

“Cool,” Stardust blurted out then looked around nervously, “I mean, not cool. Ponies dying is bad and all n’ yeah.”

“Have there been any confirmed deaths?” Wind Thrasher asked.

It was just then that they both realized that she wasn’t normal and Squirrel pulled out his gun, “Hey, you’re that thing that was flying around all those places making ponies uneasy,” then he started to lower his gun, “And you talk like a normal pony, and haven’t tried to kill us yet,” as he reholstered his gun he said, “I think this is actually the first time we haven’t been attacked after seeing something uh…unique like you in The Wasteland.”

“Um…I’m glad I could be your first?” Wind Thrasher said right before turning bright red, “I didn’t mean first like first-first, I meant…”

“Yeah we get it, keep your fur, scales err whatever you’re covered in on. Y’know it’s cute that you get embarrassed like that,” Squirrel said interrupting.

“Anyway, we should get to Jetblue Skyport and take care of whatever monster is there,” Moose said as the monorail arrived at the station.

Whatever monster is ailing the skyport could interfere with what I need to do there. I quickly went over some options and scenarios in my head and said, “I could help you guys if you want. Maybe I’ll learn a thing or two and be prepared if I see something like this so-called monster in The Wasteland and need to kill it.”

They looked at each other and then back at me and Squirrel said, “An extra hoof couldn’t hurt, but not all of you can come with us, it’s dangerous enough as it is.”

“Stardust and I fought off a horde of ghouls once so it could just be me and him going down there with you,” I said volunteering one of my friends once again to do something that’s probably stupid and more than likely deadly.

Stardust crossed his hooves, “No way kemosabe! I’m not going into a dark dank basement with a possibly bloodthirsty monster on the loose! I still have flashbacks from Stable 9, no offense Wind Thrasher,” Stardust said.

“None taken,” Wind Thrasher said quietly.

“Aura, you wanna go with me?” I asked.

She shook her head, “I’m in the same boat as Stardust shrimp, too many bad memories of being in a dark confined space with hungry beasts. Also I’m a little pissed you didn’t volunteer me before Stardust, but I guess it’s okay, I’ll just hound you for it later.”

I wasn’t even going to ask but Byte said something anyway, “Don’t look at me mopey bug. I’m not an idiot like you.”

“I’ll go,” Wingnut said out of the blue.

Before I could say okay Squirrel raised his hoof, “Absolutely not. No offense kid, but you’re a kid and I like sleeping at night knowing I didn’t willingly let a kid get mauled by a vicious, bloodthirsty, pony eating monster that lives in the bone-covered basement of a Skyport.”

“He’s not that much younger than I am and he’s been in some pretty tough fights with me in the past. I know he can hold his own,” I argued.

Squirrel smirked like an arrogant jackass, “That’s nice n’ all that you wanna be nice and talk him up, but there’s a good chance he could die and I don’t want that on my conscience. If the scary bird wants to come with us or if your other friend grows a pair that’s fine, but I can’t in good conscience let a kid go in there with us.”

I walked closer to him and whispered in his ear, “Listen, he’s almost as good as I am in a fight and I know he’ll be fine. I think him volunteering is his way of impressing that mean little brat standing next to him. If you let him go with us I can probably figure out a way to get him out of there before we even really get in there.”

After I backed away from his ear he stood there and thought for a minute as he looked at Wingnut and Byte, “Fine, the kid can come. Gotta train the next generation of hunters someday.”

Aura shook her head next, “Sorry, but I have to step in on this one. I’m not going to let Wingnut go down there. I’m his bodyguard and I can’t let him go into a place where he’ll get hurt.”

Wingnut looked back at her, “I don’t need you to go with me, I’m ordering you to stay here with Byte, Wind Thrasher, and Stardust.”

“You can’t order me to stay behind when you’re going into a dangerous place. I have to go with you and since I’m not going to go down there, I’m not letting you go either. It’s part of the contract.” She said.

“I think you forgot something in your contract Aura,” he said pulling it out from his saddle bags, unrolling it and pointing to a spot on it, “It says and I quote, if the contract holder finds themselves in a situation that I cannot follow or help, then as long as the contract holder is with another griffon or pony that can help keep them safe, said griffon or pony will act as temporary body guard in my place.”

“Damn, I knew that would come back to bite me in the ass one day. Fine, since Shadow is with you then she will serve in my place, because I’m not going down there.”

We all rode the monorail to JetBlue Skyport and thankfully it didn’t explode or come derailed and crash like Wingnut thought it would, but I had a feeling he was worried about something else now. Since we got off the train he’s been a little jumpy with sudden sounds. When we arrived at the skyport the others asked why we needed to go there in the first place and I remembered that I didn’t tell them I needed to talk to the Captain I met in Crossroads Trading Post. It was just Wingnut and I now, the others went to go find other things to occupy their time. Stardust was showing trainees how to properly shoot, Aura was watching ponies spar, and Cookie Byte was sitting in a cell after hacking an officer’s terminal and making a pornographic picture spam the screen. I didn’t know where the hell Squirrel and Moose went, something about there being pie and beer somewhere.

Looking back to Wingnut I asked “So, Wingnut, why’d you volunteer to come with me down there with Squirrel and Moose? Trying to impress Cookie Byte?”

“Eww. Gross. No, nothing like that. When she teased me for being afraid of the dark, it seriously pissed me off so I figure if I face my fear head-on with some extra danger, I can get over my fear of the dark. I know it’s dangerous and all and you’re probably gonna find a way to leave me behind, but I have to do this. If I don’t, I’ll feel useless like I did when my parents died. I couldn’t help them at all when it happened; all I could do was hide and try to cover my ears so I didn’t have to listen to their torment.”

“Sounds like as excuse to impress cookie byte to me.” I laughed

“Shadow I’m serious about this. No more jokes.”

I put my hoof on his head and ruffled up his mane, “I know how serious you are about this.”

“Then why are you teasing me?”

“Because it’s easy to.”

He looked away and pouted “That’s not funny Shadow.”

I sighed “Listen kiddo, I understand, when I was a filly I was afraid of a lot of things. I was still afraid of those same things when I grew up, and going out into The Wasteland was terrifying. There are things I’m still scared to death of out here. So listen, I don’t know what we’re gonna be up against down there. I want you to listen to Squirrel and Moose’s, every word, and no running off to explore. If there’s anything I’ve learned out here, it’s that to face your fears, you can’t just be strong, you have to be smart too.”

“Did you get that off of a box of Sugar Apple Bombs or something?”

I blinked dumfounded by his response. I shook my head and laughed “Hah hah, what? No you silly colt. It’s just something I’ve learned over time.” I slugged his shoulder playfully.

“That’s fair, I do tend to disappear in dire situations. It’s just sometimes my overwhelming curiosity takes over. There’s times when I see something and need to inspect it closer to see how it’s put together and how it works, but I think I can overcome that too. However, if I die down there, don’t tell any of the others if you go back to the town I used to live in,” he said solemnly.

“Why not?”

He gave a small smile, “I always told Honeysuckle and some of the others that I wouldn’t let any monsters get me. Honestly it really freaked me out that time I got attacked by that plant thing in the mountains, I thought I was gonna die. Thank the Goddesses that Dr. Cottage and the other doctors were able to help me. Especially 21, she was really nice, and hot.”

There it goes. The conversation turned from mature to immature at the turn of a cap, I blame Stardust for that. I muttered under my breath “Dammit Stardust.” I sighed again and shrugged “At least you said she was nice first, your improving. If only a little.”

“Ppfftt, you thought she was hot too, don’t say you didn’t,” he retorted.

I stammered a bit and looked around quick to make sure Aura wasn’t close by, “Yeah I did, but I think the zebra was better looking between you and me.”

“I liked Dr. Cottage too,” Wingnut said, throwing my brain into an alternate tangent.

He’s not saying what I think he is, is he? I didn’t turn him off to mares by accident did I? “Wingnut, you SAW Dr. Cottage right?”

“Seriously Shadow? You’re dumber than you seem sometimes, that’s not what I meant. What I meant was that he’s like me, he sees things in the medical field like I see things in machines. There’s also the fact that he’s hilarious when he tells ponies the cold hard truth,” he replied.

I’d get offended about him calling me dumb, but he had a point, plus I think a little bit of Byte is rubbing off on him too “I can’t see where you’re coming from with that. I just think he’s an ass and a little creepy.”

“Who’s an ass and a little creepy? I hope you’re not talking about me,” Squirrel said from behind us.

“No, some genius doctor we know,” I replied.

He gave a look like he didn’t expect my answer. A lot of mares must call him creepy or something, “Oh, well uh anyway, let’s get going. The longer that thing is on the loose, the more ponies will go missing.”

Moose was standing behind him holding a small beat up journal in his magic, “I actually think I know what it is. From what I was told by Commander Redwood, they moved into the skyport fairly recently and sealed off the basement on the inside of the building. Since the rate of missing soldiers and whatnot is slowly rising day-to-day I assume it’s a creature that grows in hunger when there’s food readily available. There’s also the fact that it only strikes at night which gives us two things to think about which is either it’s nocturnal or it just likes the dark. Either way I don’t think conventional weapons are gonna work on this thing, there’s a good possibility it could be a wendigo.”

“Aren’t windigos those cloud spirits that create super cold weather? I read a book in my stable about the founding of Equestria and Hearths Warming Eve.”

Moose stopped me when I said Hearths Warming Eve, “Not windigo, wendigo, with an ‘e’ not an ‘i.’A wendigo is a creature created when an evil spirit that prays on the weak-minded targets a pony suffering from hunger. What the spirit does is possess the pony and subconsciously cause them to turn cannibal. When said pony feeds on the flesh of another they start to lose their mind and eventually undergo a transformation into a monster that walks on blade like legs, has grey skin with no fur, and a big mouth full of razor-sharp teeth.”

Squirrel gave Wingnut and I strange looking guns and some flares, “Take these, it’s the only way we’ll be able to kill that thing.”

“Why can’t we use regular guns?” Wingnut asked.

“Because fire is the only way to kill a wendigo. Even if you blow it’s head off with a shotgun it’ll eventually grow back and come alive again,” Squirrel answered then explained, “Those are modified flare guns, they’re attached to small, highly-compressed liquid fuel tanks that’ll spray fuel out at whatever you’re aiming at so when you shoot the flare it’ll burst into flames.”

“That’s so fucking cool,” I said without thinking.

Moose sighed, “Sure it’s ‘cool,’ but you both gotta be careful down there. Wendigos are extremely dangerous, they can hide and watch you without making a sound. They can also decapitate you as quickly as you see them. There was a case we worked in the northwest near an old sanitorium in the woods. Eight ponies were taking shelter in an old cabin when they were hunted one by one by two wendigos. A few of them survived but they were left traumatized by the experience. It’s imperative that we stick together and don’t get separated; wendigos tend to pick off ponies one-by-one and keep them where they nest until they’re ready to eat them or until they starve to death.”

“I didn’t expect a simple monster to be so elaborate. It’s pretty terrifying that it can hunt you like that.” I said surprised.

“Oh, not us, we’re badass. You two on the other hoof are untrained amateurs and are more likely to be mauled and/or dismembered,” Squirrel said confidently, “Alright then now that we all know what to most likely expect. Shall we go?”

As we approached the entrance to the basement I got close to Squirrel and whispered, “I had a talk with Wingnut, I think we should let him go with us instead of making an excuse to leave him behind.”

He sighed, “Well, at least that’ll be on your conscience not mine. If he dies, save the tears for when we’re safe and that thing is dead.”

“Don’t worry, I will.”

“Also there’s another thing I forgot to bring up earlier,” he continued, “Don’t think I didn’t notice that you’re changing colors. How long has Aquila been getting stronger?”

“Not too long, this color thing happened after I started doing this thing with a zebra named Yaksha so I could take some of her power,” I replied.

“Dammit, that was probably the stupidest thing you could’ve done. A being like her IS her power and from what I’ve deduced…well from what Moose has deduced, she’s a bit of a trickster. If I were you, I’d stay away from her power as much as possible, she could be tricking you into slowly letting her take control,” Squirrel said.

“What’re you guys talking about?” Wingnut asked.

“Oh, nothing, just some stuff about Aquila is all. Catching them up with what’s been going on,” I replied.

We came to a hole in the wall that’d either been blown open or just eroded over the years on the side of the main terminal. Looking down the hole was immediately creepy, it just went from daytime light to absolute darkness, “How the hell are we supposed to see down there without lights? Can’t we see about turning on the lights down here first before going in?”

Moose gave me a sorrowful look, “Sorry, but no we can’t. If we were to turn on lights down here the wendigo might dash out from where we came in and attack everypony in sight out of fear. Sure, it’s a monster, but its more or less like an animal with basic instincts. Unfortunately, it’s better for us to hunt it in the dark. Just thank the Goddesses it’s daytime so there’s a good chance it might be asleep, otherwise it already knows we’re here.”

“Do you at least have a flashlight?” Wingnut asked.

“No kid, all we got is our weapons,” Squirrel replied quietly, “Having a flashlight around one of these things is like painting a giant red target of your face. That’s why I brought glowsticks.”

“Glowsticks?” I asked.

“Yeah, we crack them and scatter them around to make some light for ourselves, but not enough to irritate the wendigo,” Moose explained. He seemed like the older and smarter one out of the two. Squirrel just seems more brash and reckless, like he runs into danger without fear of the consequences.

I had to ask, “Which of you is the older brother?”

Squirrel cracked a glowstick and tossed it on the ground, “That’d be yours truly. Moose just drank his milk when he was younger and I didn’t, it’s his secret to being huge.”

“I’m not huge Squirrel, and it’s genes not milk,” Moose argued.

“Nah, you’re huge. Remember Dad always used to poke fun at you when we were growing up?”

“Dad was also an ass, and he always obsessed over that stupid bat that Mom gave him. Remember when we were little and he used to leave us in all kinds of fucked up places while he’d go on hunts? He could’ve stopped hunting and spent some quality time with us like we were a real family,” Moose said angrily.

I noticed their voices were starting to get louder so I stepped in before they got us killed, “I get this is a touchy subject, but I really like living.”

“Right,” they said in unison.

Then I thought about what Moose said, “What were you saying about a bat?”

“Oh, our father had this barbed-wire covered bat he used to use whenever he could while hunting. Our mother gave it to him when she introduced him to hunting and it was the first thing he killed a monster with,” he answered.

I thought back to when I was wandering the Midwest, I remembered a pony out there also with a barbed wire bat, I wonder if that was the same pony. “Is his name Hex?”

“You know our dad?” Squirrel asked.

I stammered a bit out of shock at how small the world really is, “Uh, yeah, sort of. I killed some ghouls with him once wandering the Twin Cities area.”

Squirrel sighed as he cracked another glowstick and threw it, “At least we know he’s alive out there somewhere. We’ve been looking for him for a while. He said he was going on a special hunt for something a while back and that was the last we heard from him.”

“I just MET my father and he’s got…”

“What?” Moose asked.

Shit I didn’t think about the secret I’m supposed to be keeping. Fast, think fast, “A mustache. A giant curly mustache, yeah that’s what he’s got.”

“You feeling okay Shadow?” Wingnut asked sounding concerned, “Cause I’m pretty sure Nightshade doesn’t have a mustache.”

Dammit, Wingnut and his big mouth, “Okay maybe not all the time but when he puts it… oh nevermind he doesn’t have facial hair. He’s just really important to ponies in The Enclave that’s all and I thought you guys might hold it against me or something.”

“Ppfftt no, you’ve apparently met OUR father. Who do you think is worse, an Enclave officer or an angry drunk with a monster killing fetish?” Squirrel replied with a wave of his hoof.

That went better than expected. I can’t believe I almost blabbed the secret that my father is The Stranger. I know Squirrel and Moose wouldn’t do anything to him if I asked them not to, but I just don’t think Dad would appreciate me spreading around that information. At least my excuse was just stupid this time and not totally weird or disgusting, looks like I’m finally growing a mind/mouth filter, “You’re probably right, he’s not that bad.”

“Didn’t you try to kill him in Whinnieapolis?” Moose asked.

Have they been following me? Wait no, of course they haven’t, the stupid radio ponies have, “No, my friend Stardust when he was under Enclave control. It’s a long story that I’d rather not get into.”

It felt like we were down here for hours already and haven’t heard or seen a thing, but I guess that’s kind of the thing with these creatures, “What am I supposed to be looking for?”

“I told you earlier what it looked like,” Moose answered.

“I think she means, what signs of nesting are we looking for err whatever,” Wingnut clarified.

“Bones. Definitely bones. A wendigo will discard bodies closer to where it lives in its habitat, it’s somewhat of a nesting thing,” Squirrel said.

“Well not exactly, it happens more with female wendigos. Male wendigos will scatter discarded corpses around the area to confuse prey,” Moose explained further.

Wingnut looked puzzled, “Male and female wendigos? Can they mate and make baby wendigos?”

Squirrel smirked and chuckled a bit, “Thank the Goddesses no. If they could do that we’d have a much bigger problem on our hooves. Wendigos don’t even like living with one another unless they were siblings before they turned or a couple of some sort. That was the case with the ones we hunted down before.”

“Why’s that?” Wingnut asked “I mean, I think I understand. It seems pretty simple. You wouldn’t eat your best friend, but you’d help them kill to survive with you?” Wingnut asked.

“Exactly, most of the time it’s more of a previous bonding with wendigos that inhabit the same space. I say most of the time because there’s the small percentage of ponies who hate each other getting trapped somewhere without food, but still not eating the other no matter how insanely hungry they are. Morals can still play a big role in the turning process of a wendigo, no matter how strong the spirit manipulating them is,” Moose replied.

(crunch)

“Shadow…” Wingnut said.

“I know. What was that?” I asked.

“I-I-I think it was a bunch of ribs,” he said sounding a little shaken already.

Suddenly a screech filled the air around us, Squirrel and Moose jumped into action with their weapons ready, “Shadow you and the kid should ready yourselves,” Squirrel said quickly.

We both got our flare gun things out as the screeching stopped. I looked around frantically, trying to figure out where the sound had come from, “Do you guys see anything?”

“No, but I’m sure it’s here. Don’t make any movements that are too sudden, it’ll see that as you trying to escape, stand your ground. If it feels threatened it’ll hesitate to attack right away and give us a chance to locate it,” Moose said, no longer talking quietly.

I saw a flash out of the corner of my eye and tackled Wingnut to the ground as the hideous monster charged at him. As if in slow motion, I aimed the flare gun at it as it jumped over us and pulled the trigger. A spray of liquid came out all over the beast that splashed all around as it rolled along the ground and jumped out of sight again, “Fuck! Where did it go? Wingnut are you alright?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks Shadow,” he replied quickly as he got back to his hooves and readied aim with the flare gun.

“C’mon out motherfucker!” Squirrel shouted, “We’re primed and ready for an extra crispy monster roast!”

I didn’t see movement from anywhere around us, it was like it vanished out of thin air. Then I let my eyes wander upward and saw the wendigo crawling on the ceiling above the brothers, “Guys, above you!” I yelled as I pointed the flare gun and fired.

I was expecting a bright flash, but all that escaped the gun was a short combustive sound and the unlit flare. I watched in internal horror as it bounced off its body and fell to the ground. The next thing I knew the creature was atop me with its maw open wide in a screech. I froze and when I got the sense to move, realized that I hadn’t had the chance to reload another flare. It closed its mouth and brought its ugly face within an inch of mine and took in a deep breath as if it was smelling me; in a very creepy way. It took its mighty claw and cut a gash into my cheek like it was marking me for death before taking me away to its lair.

Before I could even think ‘why hasn’t anypony shot this thing yet?’ Wingnut blasted it with more accelerant and shot a flare its way and coincidentally MY way which didn’t make me feel all too comfortable. However, this time the wendigo’s back burst into flames, it jumped off of me and started to roll and writhe in pain.

“GOT IT!” Wingnut exclaimed.

Right as Squirrel was about to give it another dose of liquid-hot justice, it’d rolled just enough to put the fire out. Before he could shoot it, it lunged at him and slammed him against a support beam, knocking him unconscious.

“Shit Squirrel!” Moose yelled.

The monster looked back at Moose who was taking aim and then turned back to Squirrel, grabbing his barding with its mouth and jumping back into the darkness.

“Dammit!” Wingnut yelled, “Why didn’t it die? I thought fire was supposed to kill it.”

Moose looked a little panicked as he started to pace and take deep breaths, “It does kill wendigos, we just underestimated the intelligence of this one. It knew how to put out the fire, and now it’s got Squirrel. We’re just a nuisance to it now that it’s got food to play with.”

“Great, so what now?” I asked, starting to panic myself.

Wingnut spoke before Moose had a chance to answer, “Easy, we track it.”

“How are we supposed to track something we can’t see and can’t hear?” I asked.

“Hey Moose, toss me one of those glowsticks,” Wingnut said surprisingly calmly. Moose grabbed one out of his saddle bag and threw one to him, “I have some radioactive material in my saddle bags with some other stuff I was gonna use to mod some weapons. If I’m right the chemicals in this glowstick should react to it and try to excrete the radiation through the light. All I gotta do is open the top of the glowstick after I pop it and pour out some of the liquid and add some of this stuff,” He started to shake the glowstick up and down after he covered it again. The sickly green turned to a weird blueish purple, “There, now we have some temporary ultraviolet light. If that thing doesn’t heal SUPER fast we might be able to track it with this, using droplets of blood to trace its movements.”

“Wow, that’s incredible, I didn’t know you could do that with a glowstick,” Moose said surprised at what he just saw Wingnut do.

“I bet you’re glad you brought me along now huh?” Wingnut said snarkily.

“Nice one Wingnut, though,” I thought for a moment, “remember it was set on fire, If it bled at all it’s most likely been sealed by the fire,” I pointed out, trying my hardest NOT to crush him.

However, he wasn’t fazed by what I said, “When it was rolling I guarantee it got stabbed or scraped by something,” he pointed a hoof and shined the light on the ground, “See right there? There’s blood on that broken bottle; it looks like it went in pretty deep.”

“I stand corrected,” I said as I looked at the brightly glowing blood.

He walked over to where Squirrel got taken from and shined the light, finding a trail of blood, “Gotcha bitch.”

We followed the blood trail for a while until it eventually went dry. We hadn’t found Squirrel yet and were almost out of glowsticks to drop. What possessed ponies to build such enormous buildings with no fucking windows in the basement? Houses have windows in the basement, I think. I wasn’t really upset about the windows, it was just really dark down here and it was starting to get to me. Being in the dark with a pony-eating monster around was more unsettling than being hunted by The Sins in the light of day. To my surprise though, Wingnut was unfazed by the darkness. Usually by now he’s more paranoid than I was. Not to mention, coming up with that idea of making a UV light out of a glowstick was genius. How did he even know how to do that in the first place? He must’ve done it another time before somewhere.

“What are we gonna do when we run out of glowsticks?” I asked.

Moose sighed, “I don’t know, we don’t have any flashlights. We’ll probably have to feel our way around or start using our flares.”

It just hit me, I facehooved “Of course!” I exclaimed, “what about my Pip-Buck? We could use the light on it to see. I know it’s dangerous because it’ll make me more of a target, but we can’t aimlessly wander around in the dark.”

“It’s not stupid, it’s moronic however, we don’t really have much of a choice do we? It’ll have to work,” Moose spoke in a disapproving tone.

I turned on my Pip-Light and almost couldn’t hold back a scream as I saw a hanging corpse in front of me. It was old, the skin was tight and blackened like an old scab. It also stunk pretty bad, not enough to make me gag anymore. It seems The Wasteland has conditioned me into being resistant to disgusting things, “Does this mean we’re close to it’s nest?” I asked, disgusted.

“Hopefully,” Moose answered.

I shined my Pip-Light around and saw dozens of bodies hanging upside down from the ceiling, “The NLR really DID invade its territory, there has to be at least eighty to ninety bodies here. That’s not counting the bones everywhere that we keep stepping on. How long do these things live for?”

“Nopony really knows, could be longer than a pony’s natural lifespan,” Moose answered.

“Why are some of these bodies untouched? I thought they were pony-eaters,” Wingnut asked.

“They are, this is strange. To see a corpse this decomposed is unusual with a wendigo. Usually they eat their prey within a day or two after either natural or inflicted death. There’s been something bugging me about this one since we started this hunt, it’s in a desert. Wendigos usually stick to mountainous areas and woods,” Moose said, looking around at the scattered bodies.

“What could be different about this one?” I asked.

“I have no idea. It could be any number of things, the origin of where it turned, the radiation, contact with taint, but it’s most likely its place of origin. The appearance of wendigos in unusual places is a small percentage, but it DOES happen. I just can’t figure out its eating habits; wendigos never leave a body untouched,” Moose repeated as he pulled out a shotgun.

“I thought regular weapons didn’t work on wendigos,” Wingnut said.

Moose loaded the shotgun, “They don’t, these rounds are incendiary shells.”

“Why didn’t you use those in the first place!?” I asked angrily.

(click-click)

“Expensive shells. Squirrel doesn’t like spending as much as he did on these, but he’s not here right now,” Moose answered as he cocked the shotgun.

Wingnut smirked, “He’s gonna be pissed.”

“I’ll get him a piece of pie and a beer and he’ll be fine. He can’t stay mad when he’s got pie,” Moose said.

“I think I know how we can find Squirrel and the monster,” Wingnut said, looking at me in a way that told me I’ve been an idiot, “Shadow, you have a Pip-Buck. Couldn’t you just use your E.F.S.?”

Of course he said that, I’ve been an idiot. All this time down here searching for that fucking thing and I didn’t even think to check my readily available E.F.S. at all. I looked away sheepishly, “I honestly forgot about it, I haven’t needed it that often. There might be a problem though, there are ponies upstairs that could throw it off, it can’t determine elevation.”

“You could still look for a red line stupid,” Wingnut said condescendingly.

Wow is he a ball of fire, today just wasn’t my day. I woke up with a spitty face, I had a crankier than usual morning, I didn’t get my fucking WAFFLES, and I got dragged into this when I was supposed to be talking to the NLR Captain here. At least I wasn’t getting shot at, “Keep heading straight, the red line is that way.”

“Are you sure? They might have a raider in holding cells here or something upstairs,” Wingnut said.

Right after he said it, the wendigo jumped out of the shadows and on top of Moose, “I think she’s sure!!!”

I heard the blast from his shotgun and saw the monster weakly crawl off of him and slowly start to burn and flail. It jumped onto the ceiling and crawled away before I could spray it with accelerant, “Dammit!” it seems I’d spoken too soon. I was suddenly once again on my back using my magic to keep the monster from stabbing me through the face with one of its legs. This time I wasn’t gonna let it make me its bitch. I took the flare gun with more of my magic and shot it off in the wendigo’s eye.

It dropped off of me and writhed on the ground, doing its best to grab its head as the flare burned inside. I took the gun and sprayed the accelerant, causing its whole body to burst into flames. It screamed and flailed on the ground trying to put it out like it did before, until finally it stopped. Either the flare cooked its brain enough to temporarily disable it and let the flames do their work, or it succumbed to the flames themselves, either way it was dead.

“Is it dead?” Wingnut asked as he stared at the burning corpse with a hoof over his nose.

I was about to answer with an ‘I’m pretty sure’, but Moose beat me to the punch, “Yeah, it’s dead. It’ll burn until the whole body is just ash. You did good Shadow, you both did. Hey, kid, that trick with the glowstick was absolutely genius, and I’m glad you were able to hold your own and not panic.”

I expected Wingnut to light up and get excited like he always did with praise, but he just said, “Thanks n’ all, but Shadow did most of the work between the two of us.”

Modesty? What’s going on with this kid today? I checked my E.F.S. again for signs of life to see if we could find Squirrel. Unfortunately there were too many lines to determine if he was anywhere around, or even alive, “We should go deeper into the nest area and see if we can find Squirrel, I’m not picking up anything clear on my E.F.S. right now,” then I saw a red line show up and disappear within a few seconds, “Huh, weird…”

“What’s weird?” Moose asked.

“Oh, nothing. I think it was just a minor glitch. Picked up a red line for a second on my E.F.S., but it’s gone now.”

Moose still looked worried, “Are you absolutely sure there’s no way to hide from that thing?”

“Pretty sure. I’ve never had a problem in the past with it not detecting ponies or Wasteland creatures,” I replied trying to reassure him.

“Listen, no offense to you or anything, but I’m gonna stay prepared. There’s still a chance that there’s at least one more down here with us. If we get caught off guard we’ll most definitely die because of it,” Moose said, starting to get me to feel paranoid.

I sighed, “Lead the way. Squirrel isn’t going to find himself.” I think I could’ve worded that a bit differently.

I shined my Pip-Light in front of me again and began to walk closer to where I thought the epicenter of the bodies were. As I walked I looked around a little with my light, I could see that the basement area used to be where all the luggage was sorted. There were broken conveyors in a few places hanging from small entry holes in the wall, “Do you guys think those conveyors lead upstairs?”

“Of course they lead upstairs, this is a skyport. The basement is where all the luggage was sorted for passengers. Those holes in the wall probably go out to the ticket counters up there,” Moose answered.

I thought about his answer for a minute and how close the nest was to that area, “I don’t think the wendigo was going out through the way we came in to hunt for victims. I think it was climbing up there and going through the conveyor entrances and bringing them down that way.”

“So? Why does it matter?” Wingnut asked.

“It doesn’t, I just thought…” then I was interrupted by Moose.

“What if it does? There are small gaps between the input area at the ticket counters and the exit we can see down here, enough for large suitcases to fit in. You said earlier that your E.F.S. picked up an enemy and then it disappeared right?”

“Yeah, but that never happens. Which is why I’m pretty sure it was just a glitch,” I replied.

“You’re not getting it, there could be more wendigos down here.”

I scoffed, “YOU said they rarely associate with each other unless they turned together. I doubt there would be more than one down here.”

“He also said they were strange because of the location and the rotting corpses,” Wingnut said.

Maybe I should just let Wingnut lead our friends instead of me, I’ve never seen this side of him before, why did it start coming out now? I guess some of Mature Stardust also rubbed off on him. He was right, Moose DID say something about them being weird somehow. Why couldn’t these things just be textbook monsters with a weakness to regular bullets? Fire is such a complex thing to kill something when there are so many better options, like guns, “If there were more, we would’ve been attacked by now because of my Pip-Light creating a beacon that attracts death.”

“Not necessarily,” Moose said. Goddesses Moose is starting to get a little annoying, I’m beginning to see why he’s the younger brother now. “If this is a pack, which is, by far, a strange phenomenon, we signed our death warrants when we came down here. Since they haven’t attacked yet, that means they’re biding their time.”

This paranoia bullshit is getting to be too much, “For what? For us to start screaming out ‘Come eat us’ because we’re too lost in the dark? They’re monsters with only one thing on their minds, if there were more we would’ve seen them by now or would’ve been attacked. Just because I saw a red mark on my E.F.S. doesn’t mean there was an enemy down here, it could’ve been something up there out in The Wasteland. Maybe it was a Wasteland creature that one of the NLR snipers took out right when I saw it pop up.”

Then suddenly I heard from behind me, “Maybe it was a hanging dead guy.”

“AAAHHHH! Dammit Squirrel! You fucking jackass!” I yelled before taking a breath to calm down.

“Thanks.”

“Least you’re okay Squirrel” I said after recovering from the heart attack he gave me

“I’ll be better when the blood isn’t rushing to my head hanging upside down like this,” he said as he tried to wiggle loose.

“You didn’t see any other wendigos besides the one that put you here did you?” Moose asked.

“Oh, sure, be a dick. No, I didn’t see any more of those mangle-faced freaks besides the one,” Squirrel replied sarcastically, “Would you please cut me down?”

Moose grabbed a knife and cut Squirrel down from where he was hanging and said, “How in the hell did you let yourself get captured by that thing? You’re losing your touch, last time it was that siphon and now this?”

Squirrel turned on his brother, “Hey she was hot, how was I supposed to know she was crazy?”

“How crazy?” I asked out of random curiosity.

“Not the fun kind,” Squirrel said with a shake of his head, “She was the fucked up twisted kind of crazy, y’know like the boiling rabbits kind.”

Boiling rabbits? That’s a new one, “Either you’re a male whore, or you’re just a regular moron.”

“I’m proud to say that I’m both,” he replied.

“What about the missing soldiers?” Wingnut asked.

“Oh they’re long gone,” Squirrel replied quickly and awkwardly.

“What happened?” I asked, hoping it was something like they ran away or just died peacefully.

Squirrel was about to speak but Moose stopped him, “You probably don’t want to know. Most of the time wendigos will eat their prey alive if they haven’t died beforehoof. I think its best we just get out of here.”

“What if there really are more of them?” I asked.

Moose sighed and ran his hoof through his mane, “I really don’t know. We’re not equipped to deal with more than one of those things. Usually the flare ignition guns are enough to use against wendigos, but when there’s a few of them to deal with, things get tough in the reloading department.”

Some hunter HE is, “We can’t leave the basement flooded with things that take ponies in the middle of the night to eat them. We have to do something to finish the job and make sure everypony here is safe.”

“Listen short-stack, I like living, like REALLY like it. Staying down here with improper weapons to use against supernatural creatures makes it kinda hard to live because of the whole…I dunno…BEING DEAD thing,” Squirrel said anxiously.

“I’ve survived worse than a stupid monster like these things,” I retorted.

I could hear Wingnut snort out a tiny snicker revealing his immature side again, I can never figure that colt out “That’s just because you’re lucky and don’t forget all the times you’ve almost died from certain situations but had the gracious help of friends to save you.”

“Ass,” I said, getting annoyed.

He sat and put his hooves up in defense, “Hey, I’m just saying that statistically, you’re luckier than others.”

“Shadow, what do you expect us to do without the proper equipment?” Moose asked.

“I dunno, I’m not a professional weird-stuff hunter like you guys. All I do is fight the forces of evil with my mighty horn and many guns. It’s also not in my nature to leave something unfinished. Y’know, unless it’s a really crappy book or a bad meal,” I replied.

“What if we blow up the basement?” Wingnut asked.

Both brothers looked surprised by his suggestion, as if they suddenly realized that they brought a young pony with them who has simple thoughts of how to get rid of something that can only be killed by fire. Although, blowing up the basement would require us having the means to do so at the moment, which we don’t, “Wingnut, we don’t have explosives.”

“I didn’t mean actually blow it up; more like set the entire basement on fire. We could spray the accelerant in the guns everywhere behind us as we head back toward the exit and light it when we go out,” Wingnut clarified.

“Have you seen the size of these guns kid?” Squirrel asked arrogantly, “The liquid in these things is compressed, but not enough to cover the entire surface area of this place. There’s also the added fact that there’s high ceilings in here because of the basements former purpose. The flames wouldn’t reach high enough to get to the wendigos if they crawl up to the ceiling.”

“That’s true and all, but what if we used gas?” Wingnut replied.

“What kind of gas? If this turns out to be a fart joke I’m gonna kick your ass,” I said, trying to make sure Wingnut was serious about what he was saying.

Wingnut looked lost in thought for a moment, “This is a basement, where there’s a basement, there’s a furnace to heat the whole place. If it heats through natural gas we could just break the valve and let it leak down here for about an hour and have some idiot come down here and light a match.”

This is one of the few reasons I didn’t like him hanging around with Byte; he comes up with demented plans to take care of something with the added factor of highly potential death to a stranger of whom he assumes is stupid, “That’s a half-good idea, but why does somepony have to come down here to light a match? Couldn’t we just as easily shoot a flare in here to ignite it? Also wouldn’t a large amount of a flammable gas in an enclosed space like this one cause a massive explosion?”

“Oh, right,” he replied as he scratched his head, “I forgot about it possibly exploding. Course that’s what flammable gasses usually do instead of igniting like a liquid would.”

He’s a genius, but right now he’s making himself look like a total moron, “Hey Moose, is there any way to scan for or lure wendigos?”

“Not really no. Your Pip-Buck is our best bet right now of detecting them, and it looks like they can hide from it.”

It was still nagging at me that we haven’t been attacked yet. Even if there more wendigos, us sitting here like this would still warrant an attack. I don’t think mostly mindless monsters bide their time for that long before pouncing on their prey, “Fine then, we’ll leave, but we need to tell the NLR that they need to seal off the basement. If we can get them to do that, maybe you guys can come back here with flamethrowers and finish the job.”

Squirrel looked at me like I was still just that naïve filly that ran out of her stable looking for answers to her multiple-choice question life, “Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a flamethrower in The Wasteland in just not so crappy condition?”

“No.”

“It’s basically like trying to rip that Pip-Buck off of your leg without any bone saws or magic keys. If you CAN find one, it’s usually a piece of shit and will burn you more than the thing you’re trying to kill. There’s a group of ponies out there with a horde of flamethrowers, but they fixed and maintain theirs. So I say we just get steppin’ and say fuck this place after we get them to seal it off. Maybe wendigos can starve to death too and we just never knew it,” he continued.

“Fine, but I just want it noted that I’m not happy about this. If any more ponies die, then it’s your fault,” I said.

We all started heading back toward the hole in the wall we entered through, following the fading glow sticks. As we walked Squirrel said, “I’m starting to agree with Shadow. I feel like we’re failing if we don’t try to find out if there’s more Wendigo’s down here.”

Moose rolled his eyes, “I know, but we can’t risk it. There’ something strange about these Wendigos. The one we killed was smarter than others we’ve ran into in the past and they’re living in a different climate too. I want to look through my books to see if there’s anything in the lore about this.”

“I’ll be glad to finally be out of this basement,” I said nonchalantly, “I don’t like wandering around in the dark.”

We were almost to the exit when something screamed behind us in the darkest part of the basement. We all turned quickly, Squirrel saying, “Perfect, now it’s on our trail.”

“We’re almost out of here, maybe we should run for it,” Wingnut said backing up slowly.

“No chance, those things are fast. If we run it’ll get at least one of us before we make it back to the surface,” Moose replied.

“If we could just see it then maybe we’d be able to take care of it,” Squirrel said, looking around as if he could see it creeping though the darkness.

“See in the dark…fuck I’m a dumb ass,” I said to myself.

“What do you mean?” Moose asked.

Digging in my saddle bags I pulled out the goggles and mask Silver gave me, “I have goggles that make it so I can see in the dark. How could I forget about it!?”

Slipping the goggles and mask on I activated the gem on the side and right away the dark areas of the room came into a hazy focus. It only took me a second to see the Wendigo slowly stalking closer to us. It was only a few feet away.

“Shadow do you see it?” Moose asked.

“We have to run!” I said backing up more.

“That won’t help, it’s too fast…” Squirrel started to say.

“I’ll keep it back, you all just need to run, I can teleport out when you’re far enough away! Now RUN!” I said pulling out my shotgun and firing it toward the Wendigo right as it tried to jump on Wingnut.

I blasted the nasty thing right out of the air, sending it flying back into the darkness. Squirrel, Moose, and Wingnut all jumped back as I fired, Squirrel saying, “Holy shit, that was close. Shadow we can’t just leave you down here we can torch that thing while it’s down!”

I watched as the Wendigo jumped back up and ran for the wall and started to run toward the ceiling, “It’s too fast and it’s hunting us, just run! I’ll be fine!”

“She’s right, let’s go,” Moose said, picking up Wingnut in his magic and running down the hall, Squirrel not far behind. As they ran I fired at it again as it tried to grab Squirrel on his way out.

The Wendigo flipped around in midair and dodged the shot. When it landed it ran toward me. I fired again jumping to one side as it barreled passed me. It twisted around and rushed me again, screeching it’s ear piercing scream. I winced at the loud noise, but didn’t let it distract me. I fired another shot at it dodging another attack, but managing to hit it in the side as it passed by. The shot threw the creature back into the darkness again. It got up and hissed at me slowly stalking around me as if it thought I couldn’t see it in the dark. Maybe this thing wasn’t as smart as Moose thought, or maybe it was just trying to trick me.

I pulled out the flare gun again and waited for it to get closer. The fuel was low, but if I got a lucky shot I might be able to either hurt it or distract it long enough for me to teleport out of this place. It took a few more steps closer then crouched, readying itself for a leap. This was my chance, I lifted the flare gun ready to fire, when the damned thing ran behind a pillar. I started to hear it climbing so it could get to the ceiling. It knew I couldn’t fire the flare gun up unless I wanted to risk getting burned along with the monster. So it was smart, I took my chance to summon my magic and start to ready my teleportation spell.

Right when I saw it come around the pillar and make its way over me, I tried to activate the spell. At the same time the Wendigo screeched again, I winced and lost my hold on the spell. I swore then tried again, but the Wendigo jumped down toward me screeching again, making me lose hold on my magic yet again. I jumped back just in time to keep from losing my head. The second it hit the ground it lunged at me, bulling me over. Again I tried to call on my teleportation spell, but the nasty thing put its face close to mine and screamed. Its nasty breath blew its pungent scent into my nostrils, once again making me lose hold on the spell. Luckily, I didn’t lose hold of my flare gun or my shotgun. I brought both up to fire, but the thing jumped off me again hissing and backing into the shadows.

“Well if I can’t teleport out of here, then let’s try something different,” I ran for the exit, the Wendigo screaming again and following. As I got closer to the hole in the wall I aimed the flare gun at the ground and used the last of the fuel to cover the floor. Jumping over it and twisting around in the air I fired the flare at the spot I covered igniting the liquid in a second, right as I reached the other side. The Wendigo screeched and stopped on the other side of the flames.

It looked at me through the fire and hissed. I snickered and stuck my tongue out at it, “I’d like to see you catch me now bitch.”

Still laughing as the wendigo screeched again and backed away, I started to walk back toward the stairs that led up to the skyport. I was half-way down the hallway when I saw my friends waiting for me at the end. They looked relieved to see me. Moose looked at me especially relieved and said, “Thank the Goddesses, I thought it got to you before you could get out.”

“It almost did,” I said as I got closer to them, “Good thing I had a backup plan when I couldn’t get out.”

I heard a screech from the wendigo again, but ignored it. Then I saw my friends’ eyes go wide as Wingnut yelled, “Shadow!”

I turned just in time to see the Wendigo jumping though the flames, screaming as its body was singed by the heat, but the fire wasn’t big enough to kill it. It landed then charged at me. I lifted my shotgun again, but the wendigo smacked it to one side then slammed into me. I heard my friends running up to try to help me, but what could they do? They couldn’t use the flare gun to stop it, not unless they wanted to risk killing me too.

The Wendigo lifted one of its blade arms readying itself to impale me. Before it could, a raging inferno slammed into the creature. It screamed in pain as the fire covered its body and it jumped off me. It tried to run away, but an older unicorn in a leather jacket jumped over me with a large weapon aimed at it and fired. A jet of fire blasted into the Wendigo again, it fell to the ground whimpering in pain for a moment before finally letting out a last gasp and dying.

The unicorn turned around then and chuckled to himself before saying, “Well shit, what the fuck was so hard about that, that you two numb nuts couldn’t do it? I thought I showed both of you two dipshits how to take down a Wendigo when you were still colts. You goin’ rusty on me or just tryin’ to get killed on purpose. I mean DAMN, what’s so hard about bringing a fucking flamethrower or learning a fire spell?”

Hex looked even more smug than he had when I helped him fight the ghouls back near the Twin Cities. I got back to my hooves and shivered a little after the attack, “Damn Hex, talk about good timing.”

He looked at me for a moment like he was confused, then he grinned with his jackass smile, “Shadow Star…right? Didn’t think I’d find you down here with my sons, thought you were helping out The Kingdom or something.”

Squirrel and Moose both came up next to me, Wingnut staying behind as Squirrel said, “Dad? Where the hell have you been? We haven’t seen you in a year. We thought you died.”

“I’ve been hunting for the Demon Slayer like I told you two tit-suckers I was. What else would I be doing? Tracked it all the way to Whinnieapolis, but it slipped away again. That damned Mysterious Pony is a fuckin’ nightmare to track down!” Hex said.

Moose looked irritated with the older unicorn, “Then why are you back here? Did you finally give up on trying to find it?”

He looked over at me and grinned, “Nah, I heard something about him being spotted around New Pegasus and figured I’d also see if you two asshats were still hanging around this dump.”

“Well I’m glad you came by when you did,” I said.

“I heard from the Commander here that my shithead sons were taking care of some creature for the NLR down here so thought I’d make sure they weren’t fucking it up, and guess what…they were. It’s just so hard to create competent offspring in these times we live in.”

Moose walked back up the hallway, “Whatever, I’m gonna go let the Commander know we took care of the Wendigo’s.”

I watched him go then asked, “What’s his problem?”

“He doesn’t care to be around our dad,” Squirrel said, “Hey Pops, what’re you gonna do now that you’re back?”

“From the looks of it I’ll have to help you two learn how to hunt again, I can’t believe that you two left this little gal back there to fend for herself.”

“It was her idea not ours,” he argued.

Wingnut walked closer to Hex, “Hey that’s a cool jacket, where’d you get it?”

Hex looked down at him, “Took it off somepony who pissed me off at a bar in Manehattan.”

“Cool!” Wingnut said, his eyes going big, “So you taught Squirrel and Moose how to be hunters? Can you teach me!?”

His grin got even bigger, “I’m sure I could, I always say there needs to be more hunters in The Wasteland.”

Picking Wingnut up in my magic I pulled him away from Hex, “No way, becoming a hunter is the last thing you need to do.”

“Awww but Shadow, he’s so cool, just look at him,” Wingnut complained.

“He’s also a dick,” Squirrel said looking at his father.

Hex just laughed, “Yup it’s true I am a dick and proud of it. Anyway, I have a question now that I’ve run into you again Shadow.”

“Oh yeah, what’s that?”

“When I met you before something seemed off about you, now that I’m seeing you again I’m sure I’m right. You got something living inside you, dontcha?” he asked.

“Oh, what gave it away? Do I give off an evil presence or was it my stunning new look?” I mocked. Honestly, I was a little worried he was able to pick up on that so easily.

“Both, I live to kill things that go bump in the night, or the day, doesn’t matter,” he replied with a grin, “My dear you definitely aren’t normal, the question is what are you?”

Squirrel put a hoof on Hex’s shoulder, “Dad, back off. She’s cool, Shadow’s been making a name for herself around here as of late. She’s not a danger to anypony.”

He started to laugh again, “Oh she’s dangerous that’s for sure, but how dangerous?”

I rolled my eyes, “Thanks again for the quick save Hex, but I’m not here to be interrogated by you. Come on Wingnut, let’s go.”

“Um…okay Shadow, but are you sure you’re okay? You did just almost get killed by that Wendigo,” he asked as we walked past Hex and Squirrel.

“Yeah I’m fine,” I replied.

Hex chuckled again, “You remind me of another pony I met a few months back. She had quite the attitude like you do.”

Something mom said to me yesterday came back to me. She said something about a pony named Hex being the one who messed with her memories. Turing back toward him I asked, “What was her name?”

He smiled wider, “Spell or something like that, she lived in some run-down shack near that town with the big ass wall. Why? Do you know her?”

“So what if I do, what I want to know is what you did to her?” I asked, as I slowly drew Dream Walker.

“Woah there Shadow, calm down,” Squirrel said putting a hoof up, “You really don’t want to be drawing a weapon around my Pop’s.”

“Quiet, I believe the young lady wants an answer to her question,” Hex said tossing the flamethrower aside and pulling his bat off his back, “I’m gonna warn you now kid. If you want answers, you shouldn’t start by pulling out your weapon. All that does is tell me that you want a fight and that piss me the FUCK off.”

“I want to know what you did to my mom. She’s forgotten almost everything about her past and had those memories replaced with false ones. The only thing she remembers is running into you.”

“Ah yes, well you see I ran into her because I heard a rumor that she knew where I could find the Mysterious Pony. All I wanted to know is where he was and how I could get his gun. Funny thing is that when I started to question her about him, she got very defensive. So I did what anypony would do in that situation, I threatened her. She didn’t like that one bit and she attacked me. We got into a fight, one that I must say, almost led to her killing me. I was able to fend her off in the end though. I told her that I wanted to know everything she knew about that pony and the Demon Slayer. Do you know what she tried to do to me?” Hex said slowly walking closer to me, his bat swinging back and forth slowly.

“I’m sure she tried to attack you again, that sounds like something she’d do,” I said taking a few steps back.

“Oh she did more than that, she tried to cast a powerful memory spell on me. I think she wanted to try to make me forget everything I knew about the Mysterious Pony and his gun. Luckily for me, I have wards around myself to stop spells like that from working. When that failed I knew I wasn’t gonna get what I wanted out of her and since I had a small bit of respect for how good of a fight she put up I didn’t wanna kill her, so I used this,” he pulled out a small stone from his saddle bags. It was shaped like an egg with a green glow around it, part of the glow looked like an eye, with three triangles over it and a couple swirls under that.

“What the hell is that thing,” Squirrel asked.

Still looking at me Hex said, “This is a very old relic that took me a few years to find. It’s called The Memory Stone, it used to belong to a unicorn called Clover The Clever. I figured that pony meant a lot to her so I wanted to take away the memories of that pony as a way to punish her for her bad attitude. I’ll admit that I acted quickly so the spell this stone cast wasn’t up to par to what it can normally do. Who would’ve thought that the thing she cared about most was her daughter?”

My eyes went wide and I pointed Dream Walker right at his head, “Give me the stone.”

“Why should I do that huh?” Hex asked.

“Because of what you did, my mom has gone crazy. She thinks I’m dead and she’s doing a lot of bad things because of it. I need to fix her memory, if that thing broke her memory, then I’m sure it can fix it,” I yelled.

“Shadow calm down,” Wingnut said trying to pull me back.

Hex however just laughed, “Sorry kid, it doesn’t work like that. True, The Memory Stone is the only thing that could fix her memory…if you’d have run into me a few days after I used it, but sadly it’s too late.”

I lowered Dream Walker a little, my eyes going wide, “What do you mean?”

He put the stone back into his Saddle Bags, “I mean that after three days, the memory loss can’t be fixed, not even with this. No matter what you do, she’ll never get back the memories she lost. As for the ones that replaced the old ones, that wasn’t from the stone. Either her mind filled in the blanks with things she did remember, or a spell of hers did it.”

“What the fuck dad? You took away somepony’s memories just because she pissed you off?” Squirrel asked, sounding disgusted with Hex.

Hex just shrugged, “Hey at least I didn’t kill her.”

“You…motherfucker!” I yelled lifting Dream Walker again, “I’ll kill you!”

Before I could fire, Hex flipped his bat around and slammed Dream Walker out of my magic hold, then kicked me in the chest, knocking me to the ground, then pointed end of his bat at my face. His grin was gone and he looked almost angry, “Listen here kid, I did what I did a while ago and I’m sorry that your mom forgot you, but if she would’ve just told me what I wanted to know instead of attacking me, then this wouldn’t have happened.”

“Leave her alone!” Wingnut yelled.

Without even looking at the colt Hex said, “Stay out of this kid,” then he continued, “Trying to kill me will only lead to you dying. Now I suggest you forget all about what happened to you mom. If she’s fucked up because of losing the memories of you then that has nothing to do with me. It just means she’s always been like this and you were the only thing she was living for. I know that the spell didn’t take everything away from her so if you really want to save her, then the only thing you can do is make her believe that you’re her daughter. Find a way to show her that you are who you say you are and if that doesn’t work then kill her. Because no matter what you do, she won’t get back the memories she lost. It’s better to put her out of her misery. When you try to fix something that’s broken with glue, there’s always little cracks left over.”

“She was waiting for me to get out of my stable so I could help her with her mission. She waited for eight years and only a few months before I was finally old enough to leave, you fucked it all up. For what, so you could get some stupid revolver? You’re a fucking monster!” I yelled. I was so angry, so hurt by what he said. I could feel the power of Aquila building inside me, wanting nothing more than to turn this grinning asshole into a burnt husk. I didn’t let it out though, I had no idea what would happen if I did. Then I remembered that while I was using Aquila’s power before I was able to force a memory of mom’s back and that made me have a little hope as I said, “You’re wrong.”

“Wrong about what?” he asked.

“I ran into her yesterday and I was able to cast a memory recovery spell on her for just a moment and she did remember one thing that happened in our stable. Either that rock you have isn’t the real thing…or you’re lying.”

“That’s not possible, no power on Equis can bring back memories taken by The Memory Stone,” he said sounding more irritated than before, “You can try fooling yourself if you want, either way I’m finished here.”

He put the bat away then picked up his flamethrower, as he did Squirrel asked, “Where do you think you’re going dad?”

“Heading to Crossroads Trading Post, I still have a gun to fi…” Hex stopped and looked back at me, “Wait a minute, a second ago you said something about me trying to get a revolver…how did you know the Demon Slayer’s a revolver?”

Getting back to my hooves I looked at him with anger written on my face, “Get out of here Hex, because if you don’t I swear to Luna that I’ll bake you like a rotting corpse on the desert floor.”

He pulled the bat off his back again, “Damn, here I thought I was finished, but I guess I was wrong. Should’ve known that if your little mommy dearest knew about that gun and the stallion who has it, that you would too. Tell me what you know before I’m forced to show you what I did to her after I took her memory away.”

“Dad, you should go, trust me. Now’s not a good time to be pissing her off,” Squirrel said pulling out his own pistol, “I don’t want to do this, but I’m not gonna watch as you try to hurt a friend of mine.”

“Shut up Squirrel, you know you can’t do anything to stop me. Now tell me Shadow…Star, where’s that gun?” he said walking back toward me again, “If you know about it, and your mother, I’m sure your daddy isn’t far behind. Huh, assuming you weren’t immaculately conceived because that would be a load of mule shit. I’m sure good old Pops knows about it doesn’t he?”

I could feel her power building again and it was getting harder to push it down, “If you couldn’t get the information about it out of my mom, then you won’t get it out of me either!”

He stopped, “Oh, now what’s this I see? Ah there is something lurking deep inside you, I can see it in your eyes. Something angry lives inside you doesn’t it? Something that wants control. Let me see it Shadow Star, let me see that darkness that wants to rip me apart so that I can do my job and kill it! Then once that’s done I’ll get the information I need from you!”

Wingnut was pulling on one of my forelegs saying, “Shadow calm down, if you don’t you’re going to do something bad again. You don’t want that do you?”

“I…want him dead Wingnut! Everything that’s happened to my mom is because of him. All over that stupid gun!”

Hex was laughing now, “Yeah, tell me how much you hate me Shadow, because I really want to see that thing that’s living inside of you. Show me what you really are, hahahaha.”

If he wanted to see what Aquila really was, then fine. He was about to be in for a big fucking surprise. Right as Hex lifted his bat higher and I was about to let the power inside me out, a shot rang out from Ol’ Festus. A bullet flew through one of Hex’s legs making him lose his magical hold on his bat. He fell to the floor looking shocked for a moment.

“The fuck!? You little shit stain!” Hex said as he looked down at his bleeding leg.

Wingnut put a hoof on my head and made me look down at him pressing his forehead against mine, ignoring Hex, “Shadow, calm down and listen to me. Killing him wont fix what happened to her. He’s trying to get into your head so you’ll let Aquila out, don’t give that to him. You don’t want another incident like Mill City Tower do you?”

I felt my heart rate drop, the power and anger inside of me fading away, “No…I don’t want that to happen to me again.”

Squirrel moved over to me and put a hoof on my shoulder, “The kid’s right, my dad’s not worth it. He’s just a has-been.”

“I’ll show you a has-been,” Hex said getting back up and picking up his bat, “I want to know where I can find that gun and what’s inside of her…”

He didn’t get a chance to say anymore, because a moment later Moose grabbed Hex and slammed him into the wall of the tunnel. Using his own magic he ripped the Bat away from his father and tossed it down the tunnel, “Get out of here! We don’t need you here and as for this…” he ripped Hex’s saddle bags away then pulled out The Memory Stone, “I think something like this shouldn’t be in the hooves of a pony like you. Get out of here before I tell the NLR what you just tried to do to a pony they have a lot of respect for.”

To my shock, Hex just laughed, “Fine have it your way, I always knew you two didn’t have the balls to be real hunters. If you did, you’d have killed that mare when you first met her. She’s a demon, and a nasty one at that.”

Moose picked his father up and threw him down the tunnel after his bat, “The only demon here is you. You have no idea what you’re talking about or what’s inside Shadow. Not every supernatural thing in The Wasteland is evil, if you took the time to learn more about what you hunted instead of killing them first, you’d know that.”

Hex picked himself up then picked up the bat and put it back on his back. He held his wounded leg off the floor then sighed, “Or maybe I just know more than you, but that’s fine. If you wanna learn the hard way, I won’t stop ya. I can still get what I want in other ways.”

“I’m sure you can,” Squirrel said walking over to stand next to his brother, “But I suggest you stay away from us and our friends. If we see you again, you won’t get off so lucky.”

Hex looked over at me and grinned, “Should’ve let the Wendigo eat you I guess. Oh well, at least this was an interesting day. I’ll see you again SSShadow SSStar, oh and thank you kid for that name you said to Shadow. Aquila huh, now I wonder what on Equis Aquila is?” and before any of us could do anything, Hex vanished with a flash of light.

The brothers looked back at me and Moose asked, “You okay Shadow?”

“I am now,” I said then pointed at the saddle bags that Moose was still holding, “That stone he had, was he telling the truth about what it can do?”

Moose looked down at the memory stone, “I’m not sure, but I do have a few books that were written by Clover the Clever, I’ll see what I can learn about this thing. I know I’ve seen a drawing of it in at least in one of the books or scroll, Clover The Clever is pretty ancient.”

“Leave it up to my brother, he’ll figure out something,” Squirrel said walking over and patting the top of my head, “Sorry our dad is such a dick.”

“It’s fine, at least I had Wingnut here to keep me calm.”

“I’m sorry I said Aquila’s name though, now Hex is gonna try to figure out what she is,” Wingnut said looking ashamed.

I ruffled his mane, “He can look all he wants, but I don’t think he’s gonna find much. Even if he does, he can’t do anything about her.”

He smiled a little, “Okay, can we get out of here now? That thing stinks.”

Squirrel, Moose, and myself all laughed as I said, “Yeah, good idea. Let’s go.”

As we walked out of the tunnel I thought to myself that there had to still be a way to fix Mom. I was able to make her remember one thing. That was because I was using Aquila’s power at the time. Hex said no power on Equis could make her remember. It’s a good thing that I had a power that wasn’t of our world, Aquila’s power was something more. If I worked at it, I’m sure I can make her remember me. If not, then the only thing left was to convince her that I was her Little Star…

“So, let me get this straight, that unicorn we saw in the Midwest was Squirrel and Moose’s dad? He was also the one who made your mom forget about you?” Wind Thrasher asked.

I’d just gotten done explaining what happened with the rest of my friends as we waited in the NLR Commander’s office. He was still talking to Squirrel and Moose just outside about the Wendigos. Aura was sitting in one corner telling Wingnut how angry she was that he’d gotten into a situation like he did. Stardust was still in shock that an old stone could screw with a mare’s head so much, and Wind Thrasher was asking me all the questions.

“Yeah, Moose thinks there might be more to the stone than Hex said. He’s gonna look into it more and let me know if the effects can be reversed,” I replied.

“Talking about your family gives me a headache,” Stardust said, “Next thing you know, we’re gonna find out that you have a sibling that rules The Crystal Empire and wants you dead. Fuck your family and everything they stand for.”

“If I didn’t have to go to Los Alicorn to help Mr. Tops, I’d just say forget about my whole family, but I’m sure I’m going to have to deal with her no matter what,” I said.

Aura looked over at us, “For right now this is what we’re gonna do. The Celebration at Crimson Canyon starts tomorrow and that’s all that matters right now. When it comes to Mr. Tops I say we just do the job and hope we don’t run into your mom, The Sins, or the damned Enclave while we’re there. Hell, I hope we don’t see The Steel Rangers there either, because fuck all of it.”

I smiled a little, “Yeah, I agree. Let’s finish up here then get going.”

“Damn, that didn’t take much convincing,” Aura said.

“Because, you’re right Aura,” I said smiling.

Wind Thrasher yawned a little, “I just hope this doesn’t take too long.”

Stardust yawned too, “I agree.”

The door to the office opened and an earth pony stallion walked in, “Thank you for waiting, I’m Commander Redwood and I lead the New Pegasus branch of the New Luna Republic. How can I help you all today?”

I shrugged, “Honestly I’m not sure, your captain at Crossroads Trading Post said I should stop by and talk to you. I’m Shadow Star, The Courier. I’m sure you’ve heard about me on the radio.”

He walked around to sit at his desk, “Oh that’s right, she sent me a report about what happened yesterday, and said you might be stopping by. I believe she wanted me to see about you joining us. Although from other reports I’ve gotten about you I’m sure I won’t be able to convince you, even though I’m sure you’d make a good addition to the ranks.”

“Yeah, you’ve got that right, so if that’s all that she wanted me to meet you for then I should get going. We need to get to Crimson Canyon,” I said getting up.

“Crimson Canyon huh, well I might not be able to convince you to join the NLR, but there could be something you might be able to help me with if you’re heading to Crimson Canyon,” he said as if he didn’t want me to leave yet, “Do you know a griffon named Apollo?”

Aura looked at Commander Redwood, “Sure we do, he’s my father. Why?”

The Commander looked back at her, “Ah, well you see he’s been working with us as of late to help gather intel on The Romans, but lately we haven’t gotten any reports from him. If you’re heading that way would you be able to get a message to him letting him know we need the latest intel he’s been able to gather?”

Aura snickered a little, “He’s probably been busy helping set up for the Rebirth Celebration. I’m sure when it’s all over with he’ll be able to help you out.”

“I thought as much too, we know all about the Celebration, but the problem is it’s been three weeks since we last heard from him. Even stranger is that griffons that I know don’t work for The Red Talons have been dropping in and leaving messages for him with one of my Lieutenants. I don’t like it so I want him to come here and explain what’s going on. We have a contract with The Red Talons, not other groups,” Commander Redwood said.

“What other groups?” I asked.

“I’m not sure who they work for, but they aren’t a Talon group I know, so can you talk to him for me?”

“It shouldn’t be a problem,” I said confused, “Was there anything else or was that all?”

Byte looked over at us saying, “This is all fun and all, but can we go, I don’t like being here.”

The Commander chuckled a little, “No, not today at least, maybe one day soon I’ll have something for you soon though Shadow. I’ve been hearing things about a pony that says he used to work for Equestrian Express who’s been making trouble north of here. I don’t have a lot of intel yet, but seeing how you are The Equestrian Express now, I might have you look into it. Even though you don’t work for us, that doesn’t mean I can’t hire you for a job right?”

“I know Box Tape said he had a courier that hadn’t returned from a job when I first started working for him. Maybe this is the same pony, if you get more information just let me know or let Squirrel and Moose know, they’ll get the message to me. At the very least I’d like to meet this pony so I can tell him what happened with Box Tape, even if somepony is saying he’s causing trouble. Hell, there are ponies around here who think that I make trouble,” I replied.

Wingnut started to laugh, “That’s because you do Shadow.”

“Shut up,” I said doing my best to ignore him.

Commander Redwood smiled, “I’ll see what I can dig up. Thanks again for meeting with me, also thank you and your colt friend for helping with those monsters.”

We left not long after that, we didn’t see Squirrel or Moose on our way out, but I’m sure they were either looking into what happened in the basement to make those Wendigos show up, or finding something to eat. We made our way out of JetBlue Skyport and started to head toward Crimson Canyon. We avoided getting close to Stable 14 when we left. Since it was being used by the survivors of Appleton, we figured it was best not to be seen by them right now.

The trip to Crimson Canyon from the Skyport wasn’t that long, so we decided a walk would do us some good, and it kept Stardust from complaining about having to carry one of us, specifically me. As we walked I noticed that Aura was muttering something to herself, “You okay Aura?”

“Oh, yeah why?” she replied as if I distracted her from a daydream.

“You keep muttering something under your breath,” Byte said who was walking just on the other side of the griffon.

“So what?” she asked.

“Are you angry about something?” I asked.

She rolled her eyes, “No I’m not, I’m just going over something I have in my head that I might do during the celebration.”

I cocked my head to one side, “Like what? We aren’t going to start any fights while we’re there are we?”

She laughed, “No, well not unless one of the griffons wants to that is. It’s just something I want to do for the performance part of the celebration that’s all.”

“What kind of Performance?” Stardust asked curiously.

“None of your business, you’ll just have to wait and see,” she said with a cocky grin.

“I’ve been wondering about what’s going to happen during this,” Wingnut said.

“I’d like to know that too,” Wind Thrasher added.

Aura looked thoughtful for a moment, “The Celebration itself goes on for three days. The first day we have the opening ceremony where there will be singing, dancing and a lot of drinking. The first day and night is when we remember the birth of The Red Talons and dedicate the night part of it in remembrance of Greta and our family who’ve led The Red Talons since it started. The second day is when we have sparring matches. Those are so younger griffons can prove themselves, disputes can be settled, even griffons from other talon groups can use this as a chance to prove they’re worthy to join The Red Talons. That night I’m sure we’ll see a few griffons decide to form a life bond, those are always a lot of fun to watch. On the last day we take time to remember those who we lost over the year, also Tonto will tell a story from out past and talk about Rebirth and all that. It’s also the only time that another can challenge the leader of The Red Talons to take over as the new leader.”

“You mean that it’s possible for another griffon to take over The Red Talons?” Wind Thrasher asked.

“Oh yeah, but I’m not too worried. My family has always proven to be the strongest griffons around. In the twelve years my mom’s led The Red Talons, only two griffons have tried to fight her and both times she won,” Aura answered.

“I’m guessing one of those was Gina?” I asked.

“Nope, one was some young griffon the year after mom took over, the second was my uncle, Apollo’s brother,” Aura answered again.

“Damn, I had no idea Apollo had a brother,” I said.

“He did,” Aura said.

Wingnut gave her a sorrowful look, “He did? What happened to your uncle?”

“He paid the price for trying to take over as leader…he died. The battle for leadership is a fight to the death. Mercy can be given if a griffon loses and the winner doesn’t think they’ll be a threat, but Mom doesn’t ever like looking weak. She never shows mercy. I’m just hoping this year she doesn’t get another challenger.”

“If she’s only had two griffons challenge her, I’m sure the odds are low,” Wind Thrasher said.

“Most years yes, but with what’s been going on with the Unchained Talons, the battles breaking out, and Mom sending griffons to help ponies without payment, she might have a few angry griffons that want to take over this year.”

“Well let’s just hope that doesn’t happen,” I said giving her a smile.

She smiled back and we continued on. We all walked in silence for a while, when I could make out the town just outside of Crimson Canyon I walked closer to Aura and asked, “Remember when you father did that speech for Box Tape and he said something about his four children. You said that Syn isn’t his daughter and that you’d tell me about that later. So, is Syn not your sister or adopted or what?”

Aura smiled sadly, “She’s my half-sister, Apollo wasn’t my mom’s first partner. I’m not sure if I told you this or not, but griffons are different from ponies when it comes to who we spend our lives with. We don’t do weddings or have what you call marriage. We believe that there is only one soul that we’re meant to spend our mortal lives with. When we find that griffon we form a life bond and that griffon is the only one we’ll be with for the rest of our lives. Before my mom was with my dad she was in a life bond with another griffon named Grant. Sadly, he was killed not long after my mom had Syn.”

“If that’s true, then why is she with Apollo?” I asked.

“Normally when the griffon you have a life bond with dies, you never look for another griffon. Mom would’ve been just fine with that because from what I knew about Grant, she loved him with all her heart. The problem is that the leader of The Red Talons is expected to have a partner and to have more than one child to keep the bloodline of the Bloodtalon’s alive. With Gina gone and Gail dead she was the last one, so she ended up with my dad. Since my mom can no longer be in a life bond they decided to get married in the pony way for political reasons,” Aura explained.

“So Apollo and Gigi don’t love each other?” I asked.

Aura smiled again, “They do, but not in the same way as most griffons would if they were together like my parents are. They both lost the griffon they felt that way for and made this new union work.”

“So Apollo lost his soulmate too?” I asked.

“Yeah, he was about to form a life bond with my Aunt Gail before Gina killed her.”

“Damn, and I thought my family was messed up,” I said.

“It is, but that doesn’t mean the rest of us don’t have our own problems too. Apollo’s good and he does make my mom happy and they may not share the same feelings as they did with their old partners, but it works.”

“So why does Syn call him dad if he’s not her father?” I asked.

“Because to Syn, Apollo is her father. She was raised by him just like the rest of us. He loves her like the rest of us.”

We were just getting into town when I started to see some of the ponies from Cartwheel coming toward us. Following them was a few of the griffons from The Red Talons. I saw Vervain not far behind some of them, giving me a big smile as she started to trot toward me. I smiled back at her, happy to be seeing her again, even if we only parted ways a few days ago. With everything that’s been going on as of late, I had so much to talk to her about.

“Well be that as it may, it looks like we have a welcoming party, how about we all go say hi,” I said.

“Sounds like plan,” Stardust said, “I’m glad to see that the Cartwheel survivors made it here okay.”

I was about to say something when Fletch landed in front of us, her two lackies, Pluck and Gouger, not far behind. She pulled her spear off her back, pointed it at Aura and said, “Hey sis, glad you could make it here on The Eve of The Rebirth Celebration.”

“Put that thing away Fletch, you know that I was invited and even if I wasn’t I have every right to be here during this time. This is the one time of the year that banished griffons can go back to Crimson Canyon,” Aura said, ruffling her feathers a little.

Syn, Arys, and Gigi all landed, Gigi looking at her second youngest daughter saying, “Fletch put down the spear and let your sister in. I invited her and you know the rules.”

Fletch didn’t move, she just smiled saying, “Mom, today is The Eve of Rebirth. As you said I know the rules, that goes for the one that says that on The Eve of Rebirth I have every right to request a duel with some griff I don’t think is worthy of being part of tomorrow’s celebration. Seeing how Aura has always tried to say she’s stronger than me and seeing how she dishonored the name Bloodtalon, I challenge her to a one-on-one fight in the arena. If she wins then I’ll let her pass and forget what she did, if I win Aura has to admit I’m the stronger fighter and promise never to step talon back into our lands ever again and to give up her rights as a freelance griffon.”

“Fuck that Fletch, I don’t need to prove myself to you,” Aura said angrily.

“Oh yes you do little sis, if you turn down this request everypony in the area will know you’re a coward,” Fletch said still grinning.

Gigi pushed the spear down, “I’m not going to watch my daughters fight in the arena over your pride Fletch.”

Fletch ripped the spear back and glared at her mother, “It’s not about pride mother, this is about our family’s honor. Also, it doesn’t matter what you say, you can’t stop a duel today. This is an old tradition that goes back all the way to the beginning of our talon company. Now I’m asking you Aura,” she said turning back to look into her sister’s eyes, “Do you accept, or are you going to run away again and prove that you really are a coward?

“Fletch you know that I’m the better fighter, always have been, always will be,” Aura said.

Gigi sighed and looked at Aura too, “I’m sorry Aura, but Fletch has a point I can’t stop her from doing this.”

“That’s crap,” I said, “You’re the leader here not Fletch.”

“Be quiet Shadow, let me deal with this,” Aura said getting closer to Fletch, “Fine if you want to do this then let’s do this, and when I win, I want you to leave The Red Talons yourself and try living your life as a freelancer.”

Fletch’s smile just got bigger as she moved even closer to her sister, then said in a voice so quiet I could barely hear her, “And when I win, I’m going to show you how weak a pony-lover really is. You have no idea how much stronger I’ve gotten since we last fought little sister,” she got even quieter, “Also when I win, I’m going to make sure you never seen that mare-slut of yours ever again…”

Supernatural: For all the things that go bump in the night, and sometimes the day, the supernatural perk is unique. You may not regularly run into these monsters in The Wasteland, but you’ve gained the ability to sense the presence of a nearby supernatural creature. Although this perk excludes, Demons, Ghosts, Ghouls born of radiation, and some Star Spirits.