//------------------------------// // 3: My friends are losers // Story: Crystal Apocalypse: Redux // by leeroy_gIBZ //------------------------------// For hours the trio walked. Sour had recalled passing an abandoned filling station on her way to the city and, since it was out of the way of the path Sombra’s Legion took, she decided that it would make for serviceable shelter that night. Mostly Sonata talked. Both of the former Shadowbolts were too drained emotionally to mutter any responses to the other survivor’s rambling and so they walked, dumbstruck and staring with wide eyes and breathing with shallow breaths as one foot stepped in front of the other. Sugarcoat had trouble believing it. Only now, in the relative tranquillity of the march did she realize how bad things actually were. This was not a holiday. This was not a dream. This was reality now and was a nightmare. There was no returning home because, judging from the way people lived now, her home had been burnt to the ground. There was no relaxing bath and cup of tea either. Water seemed to be too rare to waste on such luxuries, if the smell of her newfound companions was anything to go by. And there were not even going to be any breaks either. That Sour had decreed. It was too dangerous to stop and rest beside the road while bandits prowled the land. And so Sugarcoat trudged along. Exhausted on all levels, it took what little strength she had left to simply will her legs to move. She was too empty to cry anymore and thinking of the shattered skyscrapers on the city’s skyline merely filled her with dread. They looked like coal-black vultures busy picking at the bones of everyone who lay within their broken limits. Sugarcoat would rather be empty of tears than full to bursting with paralyzing fear and regret and confusion. Eventually, Sour stopped. As did Sugarcoat, who was all too relieved to finally stop moving. All parts of her hurt and parts of her she that she did not know could hurt, ached. Sonata, oblivious, was yanked back into reality by Sour’s fist clamping itself on the scruff of her collar and tugging sharply. “Ack!” she gurgled as the cloth cut into her neck. “Ouch!” she then yelped as her footing lost itself atop the grey road’s gravel and she thumped to the ground. “If you haven’t noticed Sonata, you nearly missed the turn off! We’d have to circle and fetch your idiotic ass then and to be perfectly honest, I’d rather not stick my neck for you because some crazed fuck might try and hack it off.” “Yeah, but still, you meanie,” Sonata whined as she climbed to her feet, rubbing her butt in pain, “you could’ve just told me.” “She’s right, Sour,” Sugarcoat added, “that was pretty cruel.” “Oh, so now you’ve come to moralize at me, Sugarcoat? When you’ve seen your entire family die before your eyes, feel free to continue that lecture!” then Sour smiled and she did so like she was a chimp psyching itself up for a war, “But since you got lucky enough to forget the end of the world, kindly shut up and let me do my job, please?” Sugarcoat stood her ground. This was the apocalypse but it did not have to be a violent hell populated by berserk assholes. She crossed her arms and stared at Sour. “You’ll catch more flies with honey, you know.” “Like you’d know about honey. Didn’t Lemon burst into tears after you insulted her singing?” “There’s a difference between being honest and being cruel. Nobody should have to deal with cruelty. Everyone should be able to deal with honesty.” “That’s super cute and all, girls, but I think Sour’s right. We probably should get going,” Sonata said, pointing back up the hillside they had spent the last hour hiking down. There was another truck rumbling down it, complete with raiders clinging to the side like embittered Cossack raiders to their horses. Only Cossacks sometimes took mercy on their victims. Sombra’s Legion did not take mercy. They took prisoners. Sugarcoat gulped. Sour winced and she winced again upon seeing the man trussed to the undercarriage of the semi like a keelhauled pirate. Sonata grabbed both girls and shoved them behind a boulder. The solitary reinforcement growled passed the girls. Although it had seen better days, better years for that matter, and what visible metal there was seemed to be mostly rust. It still intimidated the trio with its whimpering prisoners, hooting riders, and wicked sigils and insignias engraved into its side. Heavy, and carrying a shipping container on its flatbed, it shook the loose stones and dust from the road and those gave a new percussive dimension to the explicit war songs sung by the legionnaires piloting it. It left a trail of unease in its wake. Sour hopped up first and immediately started back down the offramp towards the gas station. The others quickly followed, with Sugarcoat sparing one last glance down at the war machine. They arrived at the dilapidated station two hours later. By then, the sun had set and the way was illuminated by the dim torch Sour held in her shaking hand. Only then did Sugarcoat feel truly grateful that she’d stolen the parka. Without it, the cold would quickly remove all differences between her and the mummified skeleton she just passed. Again, the grisly sight brought bile to her throat. However, this time, she avoided retching. Having eaten nothing the whole day and having drunk nothing but a few bitter sips of polluted water, she had nothing to actually expel. Sonata still sang, but now she did so in hushed tones and her lyrics grew softer and softer as the shadows around grew taller and hungrier. Her hands stayed clasped at her sides, at the handles of her axes while her eyes stayed large and constantly darted about the desert road. Only Sour remained stable and, even then, she felt colder than ice in the chill night. And that ice was beginning to crack. But then they arrived at the filling station. It hulked a mammoth’s half-eaten shadow around the rest of the landscape and its sharp form, like an overturned and rectangular black baseball cap, stuck out from the surrounding soft sand and weathered stones. “Finally,” Sour sighed, her shoulders drooping. “Did you forget where it was?” Sugarcoat asked. “No, Sugarcoat, of course not. It just took ages to get here and I’m happy I can finally eat and shit and sleep without some psycho trying to knife me. That’s why I said what I did,” Sour replied, swinging around her torch like a battle axe. “Well then, let’s eat, girls!” Sonata cheered, skipping towards the shelter. Once there, she began to loot the remains of the convenience store. Although long-since deprived of any edible stock, the neglected building had ample wrappers to kindle. Adding a few chunks of barbeque charcoal from her rucksack to the pile of garbage and placing it all within a stray hubcap, Sonata soon had a campfire crackling. Once the fire both lit and warmed the wintry surroundings back into something habitable, Sour shut off her torch and started over to it, shrugging off her rucksack and taking a seat on the patched and worn canvas bag. Lacking a rucksack of her own, Sugarcoat tugged over a nearby jerry can and rested on that. Dinner was two cans of tinned ravioli. Sonata split hers with Sugarcoat, who said grace before eating it. Both of the other girls glared at her. She finished the prayer quietly and quickly and then set about eating the rapidly-congealing pasta and avoiding conversation with Sour while Sonata took watch. Unsurprisingly, the no-name brand ready-to-eat meal tasted awful. The tomato sauce could have been red paint and the globs of toxic orange pasta floating within it were no better. While the vile sauce was scalding her tongue, the ice-hard and stone-cold meat within the pasta envelopes nearly cracked her teeth. Still, Sugarcoat could not help but shovel down the meal and only stopped when her borrowed fork scraped against the bottom of the can. She stared down. There was barely a third left. Better than nothing? Worse than nearly anything else. While Sour was content to ignore her and scribble down the day’s shortcomings in her journal, Sugarcoat stood up and followed to where Sonata sat on a ledge and swung her legs slowly over the concrete cliff-face that separated the station from an eight foot drop down to the desert below. “I brought you the rest of the food,” Sugarcoat said, handing her the can. “Keep it,” Sonata muttered, “you need it more than I do.” “Are you sure? I’ve eaten regularly the last few years. I think, anyway. Magical interference notwithstanding. You, however, look like a skeleton and I think I’ve seen enough of those for one day,” she replied, setting the tin down next to her. “I’m not hungry.” “You’re lying. I saw how eager you were to eat earlier.” “I changed my mind, okay?” Sonata shot back, “I can take care of myself, Aria.” Sugarcoat started. Sonata cut her off. “I mean, Sugarcoat. I can take care of myself, Sugarcoat. Don’t worry about me, alright? I’ve always been okay.” “I’m trying to be generous. But if you insist, I’ll finish it,” Sugarcoat said, picking up the can and taking another bite of the ravioli. To prove she was enjoying it, which she wasn’t, she smiled. Sonata turned to staring out and back into her own memories. Her own regrets. Sugarcoat returned to the filling station and ate the remains of the food. There she found Sour setting down two bedrolls. “What was that you were writing earlier, poetry?” Sugarcoat guessed as Sour coerced a sleeping bag out of its position strapped to the underside of her rucksack. “Oh, how kind of you take an interest in my life. I don’t appreciate it and its none of your business,” she hissed. “Fine. I guess wanting to have a conversation with somebody who didn’t hate my guts or mistake me for her dead sister was too much to ask, after all.” “Considering I already fed you and stopped Sonata trying to kill you, yeah. Yes, it is. Now either help or get out of my way.” “What can I do to help then? I’d rather be useful at least, especially if you’re kind enough to share your supplies.” Sour looked up, grinning. “Aww, how considerate. You can be useful by staying out of my way and thinking up an idea of how to kill an entire army, since thinking’s all you’re good for anyway.” Sugarcoat tried to respond but found that the words required to do so either had died along with the rest of her life or would need her to lie. “Exactly. Like. That,” Sour sneered. “Who hurt you?” “Fuck off, Sugar.” Again, Sugarcoat held her ground. If being an idiot willing to take somebody, namely Rarity, at face value had gotten her into this situation, perhaps not being an idiot and digging deeper into somebody’s, namely Sour Sweet’s, story might get her out of it? “I’m honestly asking here. I know we’ve never gotten along that well but I’d like to start and I’d like to actually make a difference. And that’s not going to happen if you want to treat me like I’m not even here. So, I’m asking, why are you doing this? Who hurt you?” she repeated. Sour stood up. Her hands were stiff and they itched to slap those stupid glasses off her old classmate’s stony face. But then she realized something. Sugarcoat was a creature of logic. And nothing shorted out logic better than incomprehensible emotions, genuine or faked. “Santa Claus did.” “Santa Claus? You know he isn’t act-” “Goodnight, Sugarcoat. Sleep well.” Sugarcoat did not sleep well that night. Nobody did. She shifted back and forth uncomfortably in the sleeping bag Sour had loaned her. The chill bit at her skin and the grimy fabric of the blankets scratched it raw. Her head throbbed from her earlier fall and so did her arm from firing the shotgun. A mosquito landed on her exposed hand. Frowning, she took a minute to muster the strength to brush it away. Anticipating the swipe, the bug flew off to bother one of her companions instead. Just as mosquitos whined in her ears so did questions buzz in her mind. Turning over, she again spotted the campfire crackling a few yards away. Against the midnight-black canvas of the desert evening, the flames glowed brightly and lit up just enough of the world to let Sugarcoat despair at what she saw. Although it was blurry until she rubbed the sleep from her eyes and put on her glasses, the husk of the gas station was still the most unwelcoming sight the girl had ever seen. Graffiti coated all available surfaces. Others were unavailable because they had been desecrated in different ways and had names and swears carved into them or were burned to charcoal and scorched brick or were smashed to rubble and swamped with beachside sand blown in from the poisoned shores by a scouring wind’s howl. She rolled over again and stared out the doorway of the convenience store she and Sonata rested in. Outside, Sour Sweet paced back and forth in a relentless patrol, first around the sputtering stack of flaming cardboard and then around the station itself, bow in hand and the cracked binoculars swinging from a makeshift string lanyard around her neck. She sighed. Why did this have to happen to her? Why did this have to happen today? Why did this have to happen at all? Another sigh. Sugarcoat gave up on getting any sleep. The second she closed her eyes her mind would flood with images of the dead corpses she saw and with such twisted and broken things polluting her imagination it became no mystery as to why even the dismal decay of the world around her was preferable to entering another layer of nightmares. Beside her, and laid out across the doorway of the store with her loose hair pooling like indigo crude oil dangerously close the fire, Sonata snored. She snored loudly, but so did Sugarcoat’s mother. The guttural breathing was a sound that reminded the sleepless girl of poutine. Just like the Canadian delicacy was vile and poisonous, so was the jarring noise of another’s snoring. But if tolerating it is the only choice available if one wants to be fed, or rested, it becomes a choice one begrudgingly learns to take. A minute passed. Sugarcoat continued to stare resting her chin on her hands out at the barren wilderness beyond the relative haven of the dilapidated station. Her eyelids weighed tons but the fear of a reunion with death gave her the strength to lift them back up every time she was forced to blink. A minute passed and Sour walked by. In promising to take first watch that evening, she had found an excuse to avoid any more awkward conversation with her old classmate. Sour had found an excuse not to list out the names of those mutually known to the two. The names of those she had seen torn to pieces by those who had been corrupted by the grim circumstances the world had sunk to. She had found an excuse to avoid giving the reasons why she had, for the five years that they’d known each-other, never really been sincere about anything. Sugarcoat’s gaze wandered around the store. There was nothing on the shelves except litter and filth. A drinks fridge against a wall had been tugged down and now glass glinted in a corona around the broken appliance like a lake of knives. In the opposite corner, the till had been ransacked and pennies lay scattered about the dusty floor tiles. Some lay wedged in cracks vertically like miniature sunrises, promising only another day of blistering warmth and choking drought. Again, she sighed and she longed for the comfort of her own bed, a hundred miles away and locked behind the security gate of an otherwise unremarkable suburban home. Probably, anyhow. At least, it should be. Nowadays though, should seemed to mean nothing at all. Her stomach growled from emptiness. One can of ravioli did not the day’s three square meals make. Her skin prickled with gooseflesh in the cold. Her eyes brewed more tears that felt like ice against her cheeks and those tears pattered the sleeping bag’s ragged fabric like hailstones. A minute passed and Sour walked by and Sonata snored like she had a warthog up her nose. Every time she did it spiked another prick of irritation into Sugarcoat’s brain. It could be lived with certainly but, then again, despite spending two weeks at that Newfoundland summer camp she had never learned to enjoy poutine either. But that was not what worried her. Sleeping in the same room as somebody else was merely annoying. Sonata breathed in and breathed out and muttered indecipherable lyrics all the while. And in doing so, she always inched closer and closer to the burning stack of paper stuffed inside the rusted hubcap. Sugarcoat stared at her. Sour ignored her and kept up her patrol. If Sombra’s Legion was in this area to stay, if they had claimed her home as part of their ever-growing empire, if they were willing to kill or worse at a moment’s notice, then caution needed to be advised. Arrow in one hand, compound in the other, she continued to march around the stretch of battered concrete. Each crackle and hiss of the campfire she herself started was a footstep and a cocked hammer she would need to deal with. Her head spun like a loose nut on a greased bolt. Maybe she should have called for a new shift by now? No. Sonata was a moron. She could get distracted with one of her stupid stories or she might trip over her two left feet or she may simply fall asleep without waking Sour for her next shift. And Sugarcoat was in no condition to do anything right now. She had barely come to terms with the apocalypse. Forcing her into guard duty while she could barely muster an emotion that was not sorrow would end in disaster. Preferring to muster a combination of disgust and anger then misery, Sour insisted on trusting only herself. It had kept her alive. It had not kept her brother alive, but he had been weak. Too weak for this world. While Sour thought herself to be strong. Sonata snored again and unconsciously inched ever closer to the fire with Aria’s name on her lips. Aria had been strong. But Adagio had been smart. And Sonata thought she was neither of those things. Sugarcoat reached a hand over and brushed her friend’s face with it. As soon as her fingertips touched the outcast’s freezing flesh, Sonata awoke. Her eyes flew open and she shot up like a firework rocket was lit beneath her pillow. For a few seconds, she panted. Her chest rose and fell like tidal waves as she scanned the ruins surrounding her. Eventually, her gaze came to rest on Sugarcoat, who lay next to her. “Why’s it still dark, Sugar?” she whispered. “It is dark because it’s night time,” Sugarcoat replied, “and don’t call me that. That was my father’s name.” Sonata giggled. “Phray-sing,” she said in a singsong tone. “You shouldn’t sleep so close to the fire if you move in your sleep. I don’t think Sour would want me to use the water to put you out.” She stared behind her, at the fire smoking half a foot away from where her head had been lying atop a bundled-up hoodie. “Don’t be silly, that’s what sand is for.” Sugarcoat blinked. “If you haven’t noticed, we don’t have a spade. And you’re in a nylon sleeping bag. You’d be incinerated before you had a chance to put yourself out.” “Oh yeah. Kinda lucky you saved me now, huh? And since Aria’s…” her chipped grin then melted but, as quickly as it did, it reformed, “I guess I owe you my life now!” Sugarcoat eased herself up. There was no point in sleeping anymore, not with the talkative Sonata awake and the dawn breaking in tints of slate blue and jaundice gold on the horizon. Out she climbed from the flea-bitten sleeping bag and she stood up, stretching with her hands against the parka’s material above her hips. “So… don’t ask me to do anything stupid, okay? I mean, this one time I, like, got covered in coal fire and had to fight in this crazy arena with a bunch of other teenagers,” Sonata said, before grimacing for effect. “That didn’t happen to you. That was the plot of The Hunger Games, Sonata.” “Oh. I thought it did,” she said, scratching her neck, “but, like, still. Be nice. Siren Code and all.” “You don’t owe me anything. It was just the right thing to do. Besides, nobody owns you. Except God.” Sonata huffed and rolled her eyes. “Like I haven’t been stoned to death over that one before.” “You’ve been stoned… to death?” “I mean, I once got so stoned I was sick but that was a really different kind of stoning. And, I mean, hasn’t everyone?” “No,” said Sugarcoat. Sonata sat up to shrug. “Guess it was just me then. That’s where atheism gets you in this world. That flirting with the Emperor’s wife anyway. Was she his wife? Might’ve been is mother actually. Total hottie either way.” For once, Sugarcoat had no idea of what to say. “Uh,” she mumbled as her mind tried to conflate Sonata the Immortal Siren with Sonata the Utter Ditz. “Yeah. It rocked. Well, not really. Kinda… kinda hurt. Luckily I got knocked out soon and Aria fetched me so I could regenerate in peace.” “… Regenerate?” “That’s what I said! Back when we were immortal, we meant like properly immortal. So yeah, you can see, right? Why I don’t exactly buy your God being real?” “He’s not my God. He’s everyone’s God.” “And when I see this mysterious man, I’ll believe it.” “Fine then. Go do that. If you excuse me, I’m going to ask Sour what her plan is. Because, if you’ve forgotten which you probably have, your home is being attacked by barbarians,” Sugarcoat said, leaving the store and starting over to where Sour stood and watched the landscape decay. Out of the cover of the scorched walls and cracked brickwork, the wind slapped Sugarcoat like a sandpaper fist. In response, she flipped up the hood of her parka and steeled her nerves as best she could before walking over to Sour. The girl stood at the edge of the concrete platform at a crumbled spot inches away from where the establishment gave in to the dust and the dirt yards below. The railing she leaned her elbows on was rusted and creaked beneath the weight. Sour muttered curses under her breath as she stared out through the binoculars at the flames of war in the distance. A second passed. “Bastards. Shitheads. Dickholes. Can’t leave me alone, can you Dusty? Just have to ruin my life.” A second passed and Sugarcoat tapped the other girl on her shoulder. Sour yelped in surprise, springing forward and dropping her binoculars. The black plastic clunked against the rusty red railing. Combined with the force Sour jumped at, the fence quickly broke apart, giving way for the scavenger to tumble forward and down to the rocks below. A second passed and Sugarcoat’s eyes went wide as Sour screamed. Then she threw out her hand and caught the string of Sour’s bow. The momentum tugged her forward as well but, digging her heels into the ground, she bought Sour enough time to catch her own footing and stumble back from the edge. As soon as she was on stable ground, she spun to face the other Shadowbolt and smiled like a cat does before it dismembers a mouse. “Why Sugarcoat, how kind of you to let me know you’re awake. Now if only you could do with without trying to kill me!” Sugarcoat took a step back. Seeing Sour’s eyes twitch and her hands shake towards the bowie knife at her hip didn’t fill her with courage at all. Quite the opposite in fact. While Sour thought herself to be brave, Sugarcoat had none of her old classmates delusions. By then, Sonata had woken up properly and was busy rolling up the two sleeping backs and strapping them back to their respective rucksacks. Sugarcoat had been brave before. But she wasn’t today. And Sour drew the knife and stepped forward again and her boots clicked like a rifle’s trigger against the ash-coated smoke grey floor. Shaking, hyperventilating, Sugarcoat raised her palms in fear. “I’m sorry!” she insisted. Sugarcoat did not want to die. And Sour knew that. Smiling warmly, she sheathed the blade. “Excellent, so be more polite in future! You’re not the only one with problems, you know.” She knew that all too well. “I just wanted to know what we’re going to do now. Now that those… people are at your home. Can you please tell me that, where we’re going to go, at least?” Sour opened her mouth. Then she paused as the wind rattled rough sand against her teeth. Where could they go? “Well, I think it might be nice to show you, at least. Show you what you could’ve had. We’ll walk to a ridge overlooking the camp. I want to see what Sombra brought with him. Depending on whether we can take his forces or not, we’ll either go back to the city and spend the rest of our lives fighting over scraps or we’ll die in a pointless battle against overwhelming odds. Got it?” she spat the last words like poison out of her mouth. Nodding, Sugarcoat sighed, “Got it. When do we leave?” Like a flipped coin turning up heads, Sour instantly grinned. “Why after breakfast, Sugarcoat,” then her manic grin faded to a sneer, “I hope you like canned beans.” “I like them better than poutine at least.” Sour had already walked off and back to the campfire by the time Sugarcoat had finished speaking. There Sonata already sat and fiddled with balancing a pot over the dying fire. Hopefully this one would end better than the last.