//------------------------------// // 26 - Romeo Foxtrot, shall we dance? // Story: Fallout Equestria: Operation Star Drop // by Meep the Changeling //------------------------------// It felt good to be back on hoof again. As nice and speedy as land trains are, it’s just really boring sitting down all day. I don’t know how pre-war ponies could handle office jobs and commutes. Judging by how many motorwagons and auto-wagons littered Route 38, they must have done quite a bit of it! We’d been walking all day, sunrise to just about when the sun was ready to set. The entire time we’d been walking, we’d been weaving around abandoned wagons of all kinds. The Herd definitely didn't care about clearing pre-war roads as much as the NCR did. Or even, like, at all. I was pretty eager to see what their nation was like. They split from the NCR for ideological reasons, so while I doubted they would be the exact opposite, I was still interested in seeing just how different they were. I’d get my answer soon. Their nearest town was just half a kilometer up the road from us now. I could see the whole thing. It was built around an old wagon stop, the kind meant for long-haul freightmares to sleep at back when goods were regularly shipped in bulk. From this distance I could see the residents had made a fairly nice farming town using larger cargo wagons and shipping containers as the frames of the buildings and homes. What was extremely interesting to me was the wagon stop’s old sign, which towered over the town below, had been converted into the mother of all sniper’s nests. The old letters had long since been removed, but the crisscrossing scaffolding and framework had several platforms built on it, providing spots for as many as ten snipers to cover the town’s northern and southern approaches, with another three for the east and west sides. Even more interesting was a very-clearly-post-war ramshackle radio tower perched right on the very top of the sniper tower. These ponies had radio communications! Almost certainly thanks to the Applejack’s Rangers who had an outpost here, if the tri-apple flag fluttering from the radio tower was any indication. Then again, the Herd could also have used Miss Applejack’s cutiemark for a flag for some reason. It’s not like the Royal Vexillological Society had survived the end of the world and become totalitarian overlords who policed the use of flags and symbols to ensure everyone had a unique symbol compliant the rules of good flag design. If only we lived in such a world. Celestia knows we could use such policing in Lith. Most of the town’s flags would make anypony who cared about flag design vomit… I shook my head to clear it and focused on trotting along towards the town. Vinyl (It was so weird calling her a different name after so long, but she kept insisting it was time to try to be her old self now) had gotten tired of talking, and Speed was on full alert thanks to the forest of abandoned cars providing literally millions of ambush points, so the walk had been pretty quiet. Funny how, after centuries of wandering through the snow, rad-storms, and bloodice all alone, having company for a few weeks makes an hour of silence almost torture. At least Wander had explained the difference between auto-wagons and motorwagons. For the longest time, I’d thought the terms were interchangeable. The history books in Mom’s library hadn’t really ever been clear on the specifics of the matter. Auto-wagons were simple ordinary wagons equipped with a few enchanted items to allow them to move without a pony pulling it, some were used to transport ponies between cities, some were used to move dirt around your garden, or boxes around warehouses. Motorwagons, on the other hoof, were completely technological in nature. Big boiler attached to a drive chain and gearbox mounted to a frame. Same effect as an auto-wagon, but they burnt coal to move. Strictly a toy for the wealthy to get about the nation in, of course. Coal had gotten quite scarce in Equestria by the end. It was enough to make a mare wonder if they’d never heard of charcoal… Seriously, fighting over coal when you have an absolute ton of trees everywhere and a whole nation of Earthponies who can speed up growing trees? How about instead of going to war you take some trees, crush them into chips, stick them in an earthenware oven and burn them? Sure, it’s not as potent as coal or as long lasting, but it’s almost endlessly renewable! Actually, wait… Hold on… We’re not using charcoal either! We’ve got more trees than we need to. There has to be some kind of technical reason for it. “Oh that’s an easy one, hon. The size of the fuel box on a boiler is based on the specific heat of the fuel meant to burn in it. A boiler made for coal might run on charcoal but not nearly as efficiently as if it were running on coal. You’d have to design machines from the ground up to work with charcoal and by the time coal became scarce most of our power plants were built and running on coal. It was never about motor wagons and household appliances. It was about infrastructure and power generation on the state level,” Imaginary dad explained out of nowhere. I blinked as a realization struck me out of the blue. Wait… When did I ever read that anywhere? “Oh great… here comes this conversation again,” imaginary dad groaned. “I’m going to say you didn’t know that, and I told you, because I’m not a figment of your imagination, I’m trapped in a computer. You’re going to roll your eyes, point out that is the exact kind of psychologically damaging coping mechanism your imagination would supply you with, so clearly I’m not real. But, you’re going to interact with me anyways because as long as you know it’s pretend it’s fine and you miss me. There! Can we skip the seven thousandth some odd iteration of this debate and go back to occasional social interaction?” I smiled to myself. Heh. My imagination was something else. I could probably tell stories for foals if I wanted to do something other than deliver the mail. Yep, that about sums it up, Dad. I thought happily. Nice try, me! You’re not gonna fool me that easily. “I swear if I were to tell you the combination to enter the Crystal Heart’s chamber you’d think you just heard it somewhere…” Imaginary dad grumbled to himself. “It’s six, by the way. Just six. Stupidest thing I ever encountered in my whole life. Spent two days trying hacking tools on it. It was six. A single digit. The tools were programed to start with a minimum of four digits. What bucking giant brained pony though that up?” I paused midstep, fighting off a sudden surge of curiosity. The combination or the program? “Both!” Dad snapped irritably. I stepped around a broken axle laying in the road, then sighed aloud and asked, You do understand how obviously impossible it would be for the crystal heart to turn dad into some kind of a computer ghost that can only haunt his robot-daughter, right, me? “I don’t just haunt you. I can haunt anything with a term-link transponder that I know the network info for… And also firewall codes. Tried to tell Katydid to please pick me up a few times but I can’t get through the firewall on her terminal, your mom’s mental problems make her laugh and tell me to just go tell her myself, and you just flat out don’t believe me... You know she actually understands you’re gone this time? She’s really worried about you,” Dad asked curiously. We were getting pretty close to the town up ahead now. The rusting and rotting vehicles made it impossible to see any of the town’s ground-level parts, but I could now make out the helmeted head of a sniper watching us through a spotting scope. I gave him a friendly wave. He returned my gesture with a nod and turned his spotting scope elsewhere. Good to know they were not trigger happy. I turned my thoughts inwards again. Dad, you sometimes say things that make me wonder, mention things I don't remember knowing. But then you claim things like mom’s noticed time’s passed. Enough time for her to worry about me being gone. Not only is that impossible, but— “Call Katydid right now. Go ahead. Call her. Ask how your mom’s doing. She’ll say she misses you and is in a total panic because she thinks you died.” I rolled my eyes at the idea of mom noticing time had passed… From her point of view when I got home and gave her a nice big hug and said hello, I’d have done that right after having said “goodbye”. Uh, can’t? We’re walking to.. What was it called again? “Pinto Creek.” See? That, I knew. I just didn't consciously remember it. Mom realizing I’m gone and being worried is impossible, but one of my biggest fears. You’re just making me nervous, probably because all these cars and a sniper tower has me a bit nerv— My thoughts were interrupted by the slight crackle and hiss of an MoA pin’s radio coming to life. “Take cover, right now,” Loom’s voice whispered from the pin on my collar. I frowned and stopped in my tracks. Speed turned around instantly drawing her assault rifle. “What is it?” Realizing that someone who was a soldier or spy wouldn’t say that for no reason, I squatted down and moved my back up against the overturned auto-wagon to my right. Vinyl froze and took cover beside a car. I pointed to the pin on my collar. “I don’t know,” I said, moving my lips slowly so they could read my lips even though the pin’s privacy charm would mute my words. “No! That won’t work, you need air cover. There’s a cave a kilometer at mark two-forty-eight one point two three kilometers from your current position. You have a minute tops. Run. Keep low, stay in cover, and run.” “What’s wrong?” I asked while turning my head to look at the pin. “Go now!” Loom ordered, her whisper taking on an urgent tone. “Look, I— I owe you one for being nice to me a few days ago. This is that one. Pinto Creek is about to become a warzone. De-Ass the area!” My tail raised in alarm. Speed took this as a signal that the end of the world was nigh and jumped up on top of the auto-wagon to her left. “Show yourselves, dinner!” She bellowed at the top of her lungs. Okay. Okay. That did NOT seem like the right thing to do to signal to your enemy that you knew this was an ambush. I looked up and searched the horizon to the west for any sign of a cave. I couldn't see anything, but then again, there was a lot of brush… If Loom had an elevated position and good optics she might see something I couldn’t. Loom sighed through the pin. “Gears, I can see you right now. I don't just see your transponder on my pipbuck. I see you. You’re looking up at your friend on the auto wagon in shock. Go. Now. You have forty five seconds of safety left. Do you copy?” I nodded. “Yeah, I copy… Thanks Loom. I appreciate it.” “Don’t mention— ” Loom paused for a moment then whispered. “I’m going to give you access to my radio. Hear-only link. Use it to stay clear.” The comm pin hissed and clicked, not the call end click, but a click I didn’t recognize. Almost instantly the pin began to hiss and crackle with more static than usual, but I could hear half a dozen muttered conversations in the distance, as if the pin were a normal radio rather than privacy enchanted. Vinyl’s ears twitched as she looked at me, clearly hearing the noise as well. “What’s going on?” Vinyl asked with a worried frown. I pointed to the hills. “There’s a cave that way, we’re running for it. The Tainted are about to attack the town, let’s go!” Vinyl frowned. “I— Are you sure? We’re not exactly inexperienced or under equipped. We could help.” Speed nodded in agreement. “Yeah! We should help. Besides, I’m hungry… Pegans only gave me a pint. That’s like, half a breakfast!” I hesitated a moment. Deep down, I did want to help… But that would mean fighting Loom, and Rainbow had said it would be best to try and recruit her to our side. Also, I really didn’t think even I could withstand a punch from her if it came down to melee combat, and she could definitely wear enough armor to make my weapons look like popguns. “As much as I think we—” I said before a new voice came from the pin interrupting me. “Sergeant, what is the delay?” Even over a tinny radio speaker, Gale’s voice was impossible to mistake… Also why was the wide-area microphone so tinny and bad when the normal mic was crystal clear? “We only have one shot at the opening volley, sir. Some tech messed with my settings. I’ve been putting them back how I had them.” Loom said matter of factly. “Understood. We are behind schedule. Commence bombardment as soon as it is possible.” Speed’s ears drooped back as she winced. “Oh. Artillery. Running now!” Without another word, I turned towards the compass heading Loom gave me and began to run. “Yes, sir! Thirty seconds ‘til I can lay the smackdown on that radio tower.” “Acknowledged, dropping to attack altitude.” Vinyl and Speed moved with me, keeping as close on my tail as they could. I wove around and over the wagons, vaulted over the rock wall into the largest cabbage patch I had ever seen. From the edge of the road, all the way to the town’s piled-up stone wall, nothing but cabbages. Easily a square kilometer of cabbage. We made it halfway across the field before it began. “All set, sir,” Loom said over the Tainted’s radio frequency. “Excellent. Enter siege mode and await laser designation.” “Sir, are you absolutely sure we have to annihilate this Ranger outpost? It’s a bit of a shame to waste what, three dozen suits of power armor. Aren't our Rangers a bit low on supplies? We could take their communications out and go in ourselves, recovering at least some suits—” “Command gave us highly specific orders, Sergeant. Mortar crews, engage as soon as Loom takes the first shot in the perimeter. These traitors are to be given no quarter. If a single one of them escapes, the entire operation will be blown. Sergeant, you have your orders.” “Yes, sir.” A very distinct mechanical hum rolled over the hills, and from my pin. The sound of massive, high pressurized hydraulic pistons moving an amazing amount of steel. Then, a loud hiss as pneumatic cylinders discharged. Vinyl inhaled sharply at the distant, yet loud, hiss. “That’s a bad sound!” “That sounded like a Crucio deploying its stabilizers,” Speed remarked with a quaver in her voice. Crucio… I knew that name… What was it? “AAV-7 Crucio Self-Propelled Gun. Run. NOW!” Imaginary dad snapped. I mentally cursed my design for having a top speed of less than 500 kph. “Let’s not find out! “Gun deployed in siege mode. Waiting on the spotlight for curtain call,” Loom reported. My ears picked up faint traces of a dull roar coming from high above us. I tilted my head back as I ran, squinting as I searched for any sign of a threat from overhead. Boy was there! The unmistakable outline of Gale’s absurdly over-armed airborn power armor was overhead, circling Pinto Creak. “Target illuminated. Fire!” Gale ordered. I reached up to grab the top of the field’s wall to vault over it. THOOM! The earth shook beneath my hooves, knocking me off balance and sending me to my knees. The tremor wasn’t so great, if I hadn’t been rearing up at the time— “YEP! CRUCIO! RUN!” Speed shrieked, flapping her wings frantically to try and take to the air even though she couldn’t really fly. I got back up on my hooves and— FZZZZZT— KROOM! The earth punched me in the stomach, flinging me onto my side. The sky was filled with shards of metal, bits of wood tumbling end over end, seemingly hanging in the air like clouds… then falling like rain. Rain made of a weird high pitched hum. Oh. My audio system overloaded. Let me just reboot tha— The debris began to crash into the earth. Splintered 2x4s fell like arrows, slamming into the cabbage patch all around me. I rolled left just in time to dodge a leg-sized chunk of steel which buried itself deep into the earth, nearly disappearing. My sound system reset. The sound of falling debris was pierced by a distant rumble like thunder. A sort of brrrt, maybe? I had just enough time to realize that was the sound of several rotary cannons before the sky was full of burning tracer rounds and a 20mm rain fell on Pinto Creak like the deadliest hailstorm there ever was. The fiery plumes of tracer rounds followed a pattern. A pyramid shape, the point high in the sky, the base centered on the newly sans-sniper-tower town. It almost looked like Gale was firing a flamethrower with impossible range. I felt pure horror well up from deep within me. Suddenly his armor’s weapon system made much, much, much more sense. Suddenly the horrors of the Great War were crystal clear. Gale’s armor was a miniaturized AC-47 gunship! THOOM! Pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop! Oh, Celestia, not another one! Wait, what were those pops? Vinyl yanked me up onto my hooves with her magic. “RUN!” she shouted as she jumped the field’s fence into the carrot patch beyond it. I jumped over the fence half a second later, following on her and Speed’s hooves as we all ran in the general direction of the cave. The bullet rain continued, shifting location from moment to moment, saturating the entire town with lead and phosphorous. From what little I saw through the corner of my eye, after absolutely shredding the center of the town, Gale shifted to the outer edge, sweeping across it in a ring of— FZZZZZT— KROOM! Chunks of stone began to rain down on us. Flecks of rock and metal plinked off my armor. The MAS security armor was sturdy, but each impact sent a jolt of pain into my back. As for my unprotected head, shrapnel and debris sliced right on through to my subdermal plates. Fortunately, the pain was muted by pure terror as everything around us began to explode. Dozens of small explosions flung dirt and debris everywhere as the Tainted mortar shells dropped down on us. My hearing was offline again. I didn’t even bother trying to reboot it as I sprinted through the fields. Vinyl reached out with her magic, grabbed Speed by her hips, and yanked her towards us. Before I could question why, Vinyl ripped Discord’s fang out from her jumpsuit, screamed something at it once, twice, three times, and then suddenly we were surrounded by a blue-white bubble of arcane light. Right! Shield! Like the wasps! Thank you, Vinyl. I love you so much! A memory came flooding back to me. A memory of just how that shield had performed the last time. Oh, Celesita, no! The wasps chewed through it in a few seconds! I rebooted my audio systems. Vinyl’s terrified quavering voice chanting ancient lyrics was the first thing I heard. “Run! She can’t keep this up for long!” I yelled to Speed. We bolted under the cover of the shield. Shrapnel plinked off the glowing barrier at first. Then it began to stick in it. Slowly at first, but with ever increasing speed, the translucent blue-white of the shield was replaced with the opaque gray of mangled metal. The firing rain stopped. I only noticed it because the light it had been giving off had managed to mask the sunset entirely. The moment those guns stopped, the valley was plunged into near-darkness. “Guns three through six are dry,” Gale reported over the radio. “Sergeant Loom, transition to assault mode and proceed into the town to direct my remaining fire on any survivors. Mortar crews, continue bombardment and move inwards to start shelling the rubble perimeter to center.” “Understood. Switching to Lemon Rush cannon.” The mountain side was so close now! Just a hundred meters away. We would be there soon, but where was the cave?! Vinyl’s shield exploded in a shower of bright white sparks with the sound of a thunderclap. We’d taken a direct hit… I expected her to scream as the shield sucked her magic dry trying to stay up. Instead, she just slumped over. I stared at her limp body in horror. Speed turned, looked, scooped Vinyl onto her back and pointed ahead. “Cave! Behind those rocks and the wildflowers. GO!” “Right!” I shouted, resuming our mad dash once more. A new voice spoke through he Tainted’s radio link. “Commander? We’ve been shelling an enemy wizard circling the town’s perimeter. We got through the shield, and well, we have a bead on The Machine, sir.” My eyes shrank to pinpricks as my core skipped a cycle. “Oh, buck the hay no!” “WHAT?!” I swear I heard his voice from the air, not just my pin... “None of my crew has a sniper rifle, sir. Nothing we have will—” “I see her! Loom, new plan. Move to the laser coordinates. She survived me before, let’s see if she survives everything you got!” NOPE! Not doing this again! Nope-nope-nope-nope-nope! ALL OF THE SPEED NOW PLEASE! I didn’t even have time to put one hoof in front of the other before the shredded dirt and carrot-mulch in front of me erupted in a spray of earth. “LOOM! I blew her leg off, it grew back. We’re dealing with a zebra warlock. Full rocket strike on these coordinates, NOW!” Gale ordered as another spray of bullets missed me. How could he miss?! He had a billion bullets to shoot at buck-me rounds-per-minute and the mother of all height advantages! “I don’t have a clear shot, sir.” “Why the buck not?!” “I’m plowing through a building, sir.” “Fire as soon as your clear! I’m keeping her fenced in!” Oh, that’s why he was “missing”. I turned to look up, assessing my options. The small speck in the sky firing on me looked to be nearly 3.45 km above us. Well out of range for everything I had… Shooting back was not an option. Running? I was pretty sure my shields could take one hit from his cannon and hold. Unfortunately I wouldn’t be hit with one if I ran through his bullet fence. I’d probably take half a dozen. Running was not an option. Speed had Vinyl on her back. Swiping her gun to take a shot was out of the question. Especially since she kept the extended barrel off Bad Trip to use it as a pistol most of the time. Wait, Speed! I doubted her hunting rifle would do anything, but maybe he’d take evasive action and I could make it to the cave. “Speed! Shoot him!” I called, pointing up to the spec in the sky. Speed stopped running, standing next to the rock pile which seemingly marked the cave’s entrance, let Vinyl slide of her back, drew her rifle, aimed carefully, then lowered her gun. “No good! Well out of range for this thing.” “BUCK!” I growled as another line of bullets swept its way around me. “WHERE ARE THOSE ROCKETS, SERGEANT!” Gale demanded over the radio. “Just made it through… I got stuck in the stupid thing. Sorry about that. One barrage coming right up,” Loom reported. She’d been buying me time… But she also wouldn’t disobey orders. Well, thanks for the chance I guess. The fwish-fwish-fwish-fwish-fwish-fwish-fwish of a rapidly emptying rocket pod pierced through the sharp booms of the mortar shelling. A dozen firey plumes of smoke streaked out from the burning rubble which had once been a town. They arced around everything in their path, each taking their own route towards me. This was it. Sorry, your highness… I was bound to miss a delivery sooner or later. The column of rockets rejoined each other, raced the last hundred yards towards me. I closed my eyes and turned away. The shriek of rockets almost deafened me as each rocket flew past me. A dozen explosions shook my chassis as the mountainside above and behind me was obliterated. “YOU MISSED!” Gale bellowed through the radio. She did? I opened my eyes. “The buck I did! Those were guided rockets!” Oh, hey! She did! “YOU MISSED!” Yay! “Then she’s got a jammer of some kind! “Then you’ll have to shoot her! I can’t spend all my rounds fencing her in! Engaging priority target in melee combat. All available units, provide covering fire.” Oh buck he’s coming down to me! Wait. He’s coming down… Last time he faced Feature’s wrath, I put a hole through his wing. Okay! I mean, I don’t have another depleted arcanite round, but that’s okay! I’ve got other goodies. I ripped open my saddlebag and dug out my ammo boxes. Cryo. Nope! Incendiary. Useless High explosive. No. I glanced up. Gale was plummeting through the air. Diving for me. Not much time! Canister cartridges… No! ARGH! Why did there have to be so many different types of— AH HA! HEAP! High-Ex might have done nothing last time, but maybe normal armor piercing shells would do something to his power armor. I loaded in the belt of HEAP, not bothering to take it out of the box, drew the bolt back, and turned up to aim. Fortunately, he wasn’t on top of me just yet... Locking on target… Target: Gale Force, center mass. Range: 132.73491 meters. Wind: 2.601 knots by 146.264 degrees. Compensate for target’s motion... Compensate for drag… Compensate for coriolis effect… Compensate for shell drop… Compensate for Equus’s rotation… Target locked! Targeting time, 0.01 milliseconds. Feature’s barrel blazed as I burned through the belt, putting every single shell I could into Gale’s barrel. Bursts of white sparks covered his armor like a blanket as my grenades hammered away at his armor, doing seemingly buck-all. Gale continued his dive, the blade housed in his armor’s foreleg snicked open. He aimed the blade for my head, his dive nearly complete… A flash of green light bloomed through the white sparks. His left pauldron exploded in a flash of plasma as something ruptured within his armor. The blast flung him through the air, and the crash he made as he buried his head in the earth shook the ground. He wasn't dead. No way, no how. I checked my belt. 4 rounds of HEAP left. I fired them into the sparking, molten mass of metal which had been Gale’s pauldron. It didn’t seem to matter. Gale began to stand. I turned to run. Vinyl had regained consciousness! Her blue aura snapped Feature’s breach open and loaded in a belt of cryo rounds. “He’ll follow us in the cave just keep shooting!” Vinyl shouted as she drew Bad Trip. That’s right. She watched my memory orb. Also, he would definitely follow us… I turned back around to cryo the ever-loving buck out of the madpony. He was already up. His front left autocannon blazed. My core skipped a cycle. The rounds flew past me and shredded the soil to my left. Gale growled loudly and lowered his head as if to glare more intensely at me. “You shot my targeting crystals… Nice job, for a deadmare.” I fired a burst of three cryo rounds. The shells burst against his barrel and shoulder, sparks of silver arcane energy flowered outwards as large ice crystals spread across his armor. Several centimeters of ice encased his barrel and shoulder within the blink of an eye, immobilizing— His armor hummed and screeched from strain. The ice cracked, shattered, and fell to the crater-pocked earth like so many shards of broken dreams. I couldn’t help but feel a little betrayed... A burst of assault rifle rounds rumbled behind me. Speed’s shots plinked off Gale’s armor as if they were nothing. He took a step forward and raised his hoof blade. “This time, stripe,” Gale growled. “I’ll take your he—” TESSEW! Vinyl’s shot streaked through the air and hit Gale squarely between the eyes! Bad Trip’s arcane energies cracked across the surface of his armor as the shot diffused. Diffused, but not completely! Gale roared, curled in on himself, grabbed his head with both hooves and screamed. I put another seven grenades into his head and chest, burying him under as much ice as I could. Vinyl fired again and again, but unfortunately, my ice provided more shielding for Gale, and her follow up shots did buck all. Whoops… The monster in front of us pushed through the agony and stood, shattering the ice again. He reached back, grabbed one of his autocannons and twisted it, forcing the barrels to point at me. “Aim with the head,” He groaned, clearly and thankfully injured. “Shoot with the mind… Kill with a heart like arctic ice.” His barrels began to spin up. Maybe I could dodge? He was aiming without his armor’s assistance “Really?” Loom said through the radio. “You seriously still quote that marching song to intimidate people? Really?! Every bucking colt ever knew that by heart. You might as well sing one of Vinyl Scratch’s greatest hits!” To my surprise, instead of Gale shooting me, he chose to reply. No sound came from his armor, but I could hear him through the pin all the same. “I suppose you have something that would work better?” “Sure do!” Loom replied cheerfully. Something rumbled and screeched in the distance. I heard metal squealing, and rocks crunching… the sound of tracks… Was that the Los Pegan land train?! I looked up, turned my head towards the ruins of Pinto Creek where the sound was coming from, and yelped in terror. A small quad-tracked tank jumped over the remains of the town’s rubble-wall and slammed into the earth, racing across the smouldering field towards us at the speed of murder! “OH SHIT!” Speed screeched. “I don’t have an RPG! Into the cave!” I turned to start running. Vinyl and Speed ran through the wildflower bush into the cave that was definitely there. I started to follow them. The tank cut me off, turning in a power slide to block the entrance. Up close, the small armored vehicle had a very odd design. Lots of sloped armor, but everything seemed quite… modular. The tracks were split into segments, so it had four shorter tracks rather than two long ones. They didn’t seem to be joined to the main body in any normal way. Especially odd was between the two track segments were little hydraulic legs which would help it brace for shooting. I’d also never seen a tank with an over-under barrel combination on the turret. Or twin rocket pods mounted on the turret sides. Or what looked like the visor of a power armor helmet for the driver’s view sli— The “tank” shifted, the tracks moving as if to push the main body upwards. I wasn’t looking at a tank. I was looking at a heavily modified set of powered armor, which, if the wearer lay down in it, tank tracks joined to their shoulders and hips would provide a speedy means of crossing a battlefield. And when standing, made attacking from the flanks stupid, as they provided what was effectively four shields as thick as a pony’s body. Loom rose to her full height. Her armor’s turret swung its barrels to point at me. “I’m wearing a tank and your not!” Loom said pointedly. ”Oh. That is better.” I squeaked in terror and nodded. My MoA pin clicked and hissed, its connection resetting. “I’m going to miss,” Loom said to just me through the pin. “Run around me into the cave. I’ll “miss” again and collapse the entrance. You can blast your way out with your grenades later. Good luck…” The pin clicked silent. Loom fired. I felt the heat from the smaller of her two cannons as the muzzle flash engulfed me… but the shell missed. It exploded behind me somewhere. I didn’t look, I just ran. “BUCK!” Loom bellowed. “She dodged!” “GET HER, YOU USELESS HALF-MARE BASTARD!” Gale roared with more rage than I’d ever heard in my life. Cave close. Almost cave. Almost safe. Side note: Holy crap. No wonder Loom is doing this for me. I dove through the bush, my belly hit stone and gravel, I slid across the ground into the cave, jumped up and kept running. Fortunately, Vinyl and Speed were already well within the cave. They were coming back towards me for some reason, but they should be out of the danger area. Loom’s cannon thundered again. The sound of cracking stone and showering rock drowned out the echoes from the shot. Stone fell all around me, smashing against my head, back, shoulders… An especially large and jagged rock smashed into my spine. My MAS security armor, tough as it was, cracked open. I could feel hot coolant dripping across my back form the wound. Rocks continued to fall around me. If I couldn’t make it out of the way, I would be buried beneath several tons of stone. Blue light lit the cave. Vinyl! She grabbed me and pulled me forwards, clear of the collapsing cave entrance and to her side. I immediately hugged her. “Thanks.” “Don’t thank me yet,” she sighed. “We’re still trapped in here.” “Yes, but I can blast the rocks later and—” I paused for a moment. At least twelve meters of cave had collapsed from that shot. “No… No I can’t. Nevermind…” I sighed. “We’re trapped…” Speed shook her head. “No, we’re not. I can hear the cave system. It’s big. Deep. Probably other ways out.” My ears perked up. “That’s good! Thanks for coming back to see if I made it.” Vinyl coughed into her hoof. “T— That wasn’t what we were doing.” I blinked. “Then what?” “Well, it’s not a problem for me… Might be for you, and it definitely is for Speed, but…” Vinyl reached down to her leg with her hoof, pulled her jumpsuit back… and I could hear the soft ticking of her pipbuck’s geiger counter. I winced. Speed nodded and pointed to me. “Yes. That… The ticking is ten times worse just like, another six steps down the tunnel.” “The Gardens didn’t exactly have the power this far out to clean the inside of mountains…” Vinyl added as she rolled her sleeve back down and sighed. “Speed’s going to die if we’re here for more than a few hours. Sooner if we go into the cave system.” Gale had ripped through an armored elevator shaft last time we fought… I turned and looked back at the mountain of stone. If he ordered Loom to shoot this ‘til it was cleared, or decided to use his power armor to dig through after us… I looked over to Vinyl and simply said. “Elevator.” She nodded. “Yep… We’ve got to go in.” Speed looked down and kicked a loose stone. “So uh… Is this a bad time to mention I forgot to pack anti-rad drugs?” Great. Just great.