Fallout: Equestria - Murky Number Seven

by FuzzyVeeVee

Every Pair of Wings

    “What did it feel like to be alone?”

    For the longest time, I had never known.  To be alone, you must have had a presence to lose.  For me, that had been my mother. To witness her slowly getting smaller as I was dragged away over the wet mud into the barn of the rock farm was the first time in my life I had felt the painful sting of loneliness.

    But they say time heals all gaps in the soul, whether you want them to or not, and the life of the slave took over.  I missed her, but I no longer felt the loss of her presence so keenly as I once did. After all, my time around her had always been preordained to end. A childhood safety blanket that, after growing up, was thrown away once I had come of age. That was how slavery worked. No, I had never truly felt alone because I had always known I was going to be so one day.  I had been prepared for it, however subconsciously, by the conditioning that had become my forced instincts.

    That day in Fillydelphia changed all that.

    A mother is a requirement.  Everypony has one. It is the people you meet who you do not expect that defines your feelings around others.  From birth till death sentence I had never known a single pony to come under that label. But approaching my darkest hour I had been shown not one, but four.

    Number Six.  The fearsome pony that had attempted to set me free and fought with terrifying brutality to escape.  I had been nothing but an acceptable tag-along to him, yet such an act was unique in my life, for nopony had ever lifted a hoof in my defence.  He had shown me the will to fight; to pursue and attain something. But as my mental instincts kicked in, I lost him to the Fillydelphia ruins, presumably forever.

    The unknown mare.  A pony that had shown me kindness and concern when I had been injured.  Who had seen my somewhat more...risqué pictures, and only grinned rather than judged.  For the brief few minutes I had seen her, she had given me hope that perhaps not all ponies were so quick to leap to assumptions.  However, she too was now lost to the masses of slaves, never for me to know if she was still alive or even in Fillydelphia any more.  Despite that, I could not remove her from my mind.

    The Stable Dweller.  The pony who defied a Master.  Who alone had fought and escaped from his clutches by ascending to the heavens above, taking with her the zebra who had tried to kill her.  A merciful act from a better soul that had lit an inspiration in my heart and soul forever. The sight of her rising in the Pit; bright, fearless, and wreathed in magic would never leave me.  I would have drawn it, had I still a journal to draw in. Amongst Red Eye's best efforts, she had escaped and proven that leaving Fillydelphia was possible.  That if somepony were to show that same courage...they too could take for themselves the freedom they desired and dare to dream of better times.

But even as she brought us hope, that fleeting time in which I had 'known' the so-called Stable Dweller ended.  Fillydelphia once again took control with no real visible change. For her impact was not in our environment. It was in our hearts.

    One by one, I had lost the three ponies who had shown me what it felt like to have another pony there for me. To protect me. To aid me. To inspire me.

    Now they were gone.  And now, for the first time, I had felt true loneliness.

    It had consumed me.  Down in the muddy refuse pit I had lost my composure, my temper, and all understanding of what to do.  Personal emotion was not something I was tailored to feel or deal with, despite my regular tears. But in my lowest moment, filled with rage at the solitude I could not comprehend, I was handed by fate the fourth, a voice that could not leave me.  Who I could see as a guiding light through the darkness of the wasteland.

    So long as the airwaves were open, I would never be alone again.

    “So you see, my little ponies, today we bring you the first of a new wave of goodwill to all the unfortunates out there in Fillydelphia.  Yeah, that's right, all you slaves in that foul end of the wasteland can have a little cheer once more. Until recently you've been denied the privilege of my oh-so-wonderful tips and tunes.  But no longer! DJ-Pon-Three is in the airwaves! Ol' Red Eye can't stop this signal! Thanks to the efforts of the one and only Stable Dweller, these broadcasts can now reach you all down in Fillydelphia to bring that little glimmer of hope to your lives.  Warms the heart it does, that finally, I can let you understand that no, you haven't been forgotten out there.”

    My pigsty hiding spot was gone.  But I'd always had something of a talent for finding the little nooks and crannies in which to wriggle away and hide.  In this case, an old feed cupboard within the petting zoos that stank of rot and damp with a collapsed roof. The fallen timber created a hidey hole that I could slink off into.

    And listen.

    “Now information is still creeping into us from out that direction, but from what I know thus far, it seems our Stable Dweller got right into Fillydelphia itself.  Not only that, but she made one heck of a show in front of that egomaniac himself, messed up his operations something fierce, and got the hay right back outta there with another slave by her side!  Tell you what, folks. I've seen some amazing stuff in my time, but even just hearing about this, she really is something special, that little mare.”

    Isn't she just?

    I felt that smile creep back into my face again.  I had stuffed the device inside my jerkin to hide it as I had crept back to the petting zoo a few hours later.  Whiplash had returned, a nasty deterrent for the gangers to not attempt murder again. Not that it had stopped their more 'normal' activities however.  My rump still stung from the half buck as I had wriggled my way into the feed shed. I could hear them nearby, discussing things about mares I felt best to avoid my imagination dwelling too deeply on.

    “So take heart, little slaves.  I'm with you all now, the rebel DJ, as a lovely alternative to all that nonsense Mister Eye loves to spout all damn day long.  Better music too, much as Pinkie can bring a smile, that stuff does get a little grating after a while. But that's not all we offer here at Tenpony Tower.  We've got wasteland tips, tricks, and lessons to help give you all an edge to stay alive in there as best your little souls can, my little unfortunate ponies.  But above all, you can come to this signal for respite. For an escape. Just be careful, I can't imagine Red Eye appreciates superior radio. So find your hiding spots, relax, and get ready to experience some real sound.  To let that hard and death defying work shift slip from your mind for a few hours and relax with a little Sweetie Belle, Sapphire Shores, or our wondrous new Velvet Remedy. Speaking of that hot singing and hot-looking mare—hey come on, credit where credit is due—here's some of her right now.”

    I clutched the device tight, the volume down so low that only my strange hearing could detect the noise.  The absolute last thing I needed was for the gangers to know about this precious device. I would never leave it elsewhere, better to remain strapped around my torso under my clothing.  My jerkin was pretty good at keeping things hidden after all; it had done so for a very long time and now would do so for even longer with this device. Its volume could be low enough that only I would hear, and remain hidden from everypony else.  Only here, safe in a small place, could I take it out and hold it close, almost nuzzling the thing as I sought comfort from the hellish life that I could at last recognise as my own. Since yesterday, I had spotted a few slaves clutching similar such radios, hiding them from slavers to tune in to the new broadcast.  The DJ had brought a silent, almost undetectable revolution of hope to them. I had witnessed some being caught; the guards had standing orders to stamp it out wherever they could, both the radio and the slave.

    As the music began, a wonderful uplifting beat and beautifully struck first note caught my attention immediately.  I heard this 'Velvet' sing of hope and better times, lighting the colour in my imagination to follow what she sung of.  I curled up, eyes clenched tightly shut as I held the device close, its small speaker against my ear. Music and voice in such harmony, blessed with a stirring tempo and words that spoke to my very soul.  The song rose to a triumphant and motivating crescendo before the quiet and oh-so gentle end. Almost before the dead silence between tracks became unbearable, another began. The DJ was showcasing her to us, the wasteland's own born talent.

    I felt wetness on my hooves from holding the device to the side of my face.  Even as I imagined the same beauty that she sang of, my body shuddered with emotion as the first real songs that felt like they were meant to help me continued through the night.  I wanted to hear more, to see her, to try drawing her even though I didn't know anything about her.  I just wanted to lose myself in that tune and stay imagining forever.

    Filled with emotion by the music and voice of Velvet, I fell asleep to the imagining of finding the beauty she sang of. I heard her voice in my head gently hushing me to not worry through the medium of her music, even as I heard a growing wind building in force outside.

    I had fallen asleep with Velvet Remedy.  My dreams of colour, light and optimism afforded me the first real sleep that did not contain the recurring night terrors of my masters deciding they did not need me anymore.

    I only wish it could have lasted longer.

    With the comfort of the DJ and the music in my ears, I wanted to just sleep forever.

    To just not wake up and have to face the day once more.

    Fillydelphia was rarely that kind.

    Yesterday I had been woken by Whiplash beating on the pig sty.  Today differed only in that the pig sty was a feed cupboard. A sharp rapping jerked me awake all the same.  Murmuring and groaning quietly I hastily hid the device under my jerkin, not daring to leave it behind where it might be stolen.  Outside, I could still hear the wind whistling between the FunFarm's stalls like an ongoing howl in the air.

    “Murky Number Seven!  Slaves tell me you're hiding in here. Now get your little rump out here!”

    Whiplash.

    Normality had returned to Fillydelphia.  The day was about to begin again.

    Hazy-eyed, I rolled my neck and crawled slowly out. Each hoof that left the hiding spot hesitated with the wish to just dive right back into my cosy hole and go back to sleep.  Judging from the light in the air, it was still the same night as I had returned to the FunFarm from the refuse pit. All the same, some more open air away from the rank stench of the two-hundred-year-old rotting feed cupboard was easier to breathe.  That was, until I remembered it was radioactive and poisoned, anyway. My throat felt dry and tight while my stomach ached with neglect. It occurred to me that I hadn't been given any food or drink for over a day now, and the lack of nourishment was beginning to tell.  Once in Fillydelphia I had been reduced to drinking from a sink in a workplace just to survive until the next rations appeared. It hadn't helped my radiation sickness. Already I could feel my rad-fever creeping back in as a stinging sweat all over.

    I pushed myself more fully out from the wooden door that had collapsed inwardly and immediately felt every muscle in my body stiffen in shock.  Sweet Celestia, it was freezing out here!  Where had that stuffy heat gone?  What was with this wind? The gusts hurtling through the petting zoo felt like they went right through me, chilling to the bone never mind the body as a whole.  Looking off to the side, I could see what looked like a growing storm over the nearby hills outside the Wall. The clouded sky had become dark, rumbling menacingly in the far off distance.  Thunder, probably a storm coming this way too. I shuddered. Nopony had told me about the rain in Fillydelphia on my first night. Coming through the poisoned cloud of radiation and industry, it burned.

    Fillydelphia was known for its blistering and stifling heat, but the wasteland, ever powerful in Equestria, could do as it willed anywhere.  Including making my personal hell freeze over, apparently.

    Any feelings of cold or far-off sounds were quickly driven from my head by the clip around the ear I received for not immediately turning to attention for Whiplash.  Caught off balance and still physically exhausted from yesterday, I stumbled and fell from the stinging strike, only barely catching myself before my head rattled off a rock.

    “Get it together, you filthy little wretch, get the hell up!” Whiplash's voice was like his signature item, sharp and cracking for emphasis as I felt him wander forward, kicking me in the ribs every second I delayed as I attempted to get my sore hooves under me and rise.

    Wincing in pain already, I reflected that this probably wasn't going to be a very good day.  Well, another one to add to the pile since I was bought by Master Red Eye. Turning, I bowed my head before looking up at Whiplash.  Clearly I had been just in time, for that length of leather was already drawn, his whip ready to strike me if I had delayed any further.  He must have seen the twitch of fear in my eyes, for the whip moved forward to lightly bat my face to either side on each word major punctuation of his speech.

    “You will come when I tell you!  No delays, Murk! I'm getting tired of this dragging you out of holes.  Do you think I have the fucking time to waste on you?”

    I shook my head.  An oral reply, I had learned, more often bred a twisting of words and a fierce lashing.

    “Good!  The only reason I'm not having you strung up and whipped till your back is raw flesh is because your shift changed,” he sternly announced, walking back to the main zoo area. “Your number came up.  Lucky number seven, right?”

    He sneered at me as I tried to fight the urge to roll my eyes. If I had a morsel of food for every time I'd heard that 'joke,' I'd only be slightly malnourished instead of ghoul-like.  I backpedalled into the wooden side of the petting zoo feed hut as he approached, reaching into his saddlebag. My imagination went wild. Whiplash not using his whip? What was it then?  Pliers? A mallet!?

    It was a piece of old yellowed parchment and a quill.  He threw them at my feet.

    “Take a note, Murk.  I need you to remember this precisely.”

    I simply stared at the parchment and quill like it was an indecipherable puzzle.

    “Um...master?” I started, “I...uh...I can't write...”

    Whiplash turned his head to me, eyes narrowing as his magic picked up both the quill and whip, a look of ‘You're kidding...you're kidding, right?’ on his face before grunting in annoyance and drawing the parchment up before him as well.

    “Well, I'll write it then—”

    “I can't read either...” I muttered, closing my eyes and whinnying as I lowered my head.

    His whip blurred, and cracked upon my face.

    I screamed, leaping backwards on instinct, half-falling into the feeding hut hole again as the line of agony tore across my forehead.  My hooves came up to protect it against further strikes from that whip, feeling a small trickle of blood dripping from my forehead onto them.  I hesitantly opened my eyes to see the whip raised, ready to strike again.

    “I swear to Luna's almighty royal arse, Murk!  You are the most useless slave I have ever had the misfortune to own!  Now you listen up, boy, you listen good!  I'm going to tell you this message once, and if you fuck it up then I promise you'll be working the Parasprite Pits from tomorrow onwards!”

    I opened my mouth to plead or beg.  The Parasprite Pits were a death sentence!  Those little flying critters had been twisted by the radiation into carnivorous little demons.  We had all heard the story of the pony who had got one in her mouth and been eaten from the inside out by an ever growing swarm.  I didn't know if that nightmare-inducing situation was true, but I had seen a pony without a hazard suit devoured by a loose swarm in mere seconds.  Working in the pits to incinerate them was danger beyond any other appointed shift, even more than exploring the crater or a Stable. However, I was not given the chance to voice my begging against being sent there.

    “I need somepony to run a message for me,” he continued, throwing the parchment and quill back at me anyways. “I've got a request for four new slaves from Wicked Slit after yesterday’s work shift.  Apparently three of them fell into a vat of molten metal or something. The fourth was sent to the Pit.”

    He narrowed his eyes for a second, before shrugging.

    “I guess that means she'll only need three, given the last one is probably you.  But that psychobitch could probably do with another one to keep her mollified anyway.  You go straight to the manufacturing foundry, Murk. She'll not be on the shop floor this time of night, so you'll need to go find her in the overseer huts near the factory.”

    I groaned out loud, my own sleepiness had been warning me but here was the confirmation. I had indeed been woken early. This was out of hours shift work, and in this case, it involved potentially having to wake up a slaver who I doubted would be too pleased to see me, let alone have me interrupt her sleep.  If Whiplash cared for my obvious discomfort he didn't show it, simply letting his instruction sink in before continuing.

    “Tell her that the slaves will be delayed today, she won't have them.  The groups are still too messed up from all that...pandemonium...yesterday.”

    Oh great.  It's bad news.  This just got better and better...

    “However, on account of you surviving, somehow, you are to mention that she will have you back again to continue work in her foundry.”

    I wanted to just start beating my head off of the feed hut's wall.  Back to that routine again for another few months until my inevitable poison-aired death?  Is that what I'd been through all this for?

    “Now she won't be too happy, so that's why I'm sending you.”

    Oh come on!  What was this?  I had to speak up, but mentally I was already preparing how to best tell Wicked Slit to not shoot the messenger.  A neon sign from three miles away seemed the best option at this point. Accompanied by a very fast train to get on.

    “Master...I...I don't think that's a good idea.  She isn't too fond of me as a worker,” I squeaked out, eyes warily watching that whip of his. “In fact, I think she outright doesn't want me.”

    “Then that makes two of us,” Whiplash retorted, snorting and turning away. “As far as I'm concerned now, Murk, you're expendable.  If I have to lose a slave to Slit being in a sick mood waking up to get a message on time, I'd rather it be you than any slaves that the overseers actually want from my stock.  Now, leave in ten minutes time, I've cleared the guards for you to leave at that point, understand?”

    “Yes master...” I lowered my head, sighing to the ground.  Luck may have helped me yesterday, but was turning its head from me today.

    Whiplash wandered off soon after.  I lightly stomped the ground in frustration at the new role as ‘messenger to be stabbed.’
   
    On the other hoof, at least I had ten more minutes to hide away.  I wriggled on the ground to fit under the locked door back into the feed hut.  I had spotted the rotten wood around the bottom when I arrived back at the FunFarm from the refuse.  A swift half buck had given me some room to squeeze under.

    Inside, I didn't own much.  Well, I didn't have anything at all, actually, other than my jerkin, sticks of charcoal, a parchment and quill now, and finally, of course, the device.  Or radio...or hoofmachine...whatever the thing was called by ponies who had an education or experience of the wasteland. I set it to the side on what used to be a feed box, turning up the volume just slightly, half-hoping to hear the DJ's sweet soothing words to help me feel safe.  No such luck, although the unknown singer's voice (not Velvet; I'd recognise that voice anywhere now) brought a smile to my face as I sniffed and lay down again.

    What now?  Was I just meant to go back to daily life in Fillydelphia?  I doubted it could ever be the unthinking toil to inevitable death it used to be.  Several ponies, and the music of the wastes had shown me there was more to life. I had shown myself there was more to life when I started drawing for myself yesterday.  How could I just turn my head away from all that? How could I go through the agony, sickness, and deprivation until death with anything more than a constant fear for losing the small things that I had gained?

    A hacking cough sent a flare of pain into my lungs.  Radiation sickness reminded me that it, too, was still present, its fever hidden by the chill wind outside.  I covered my mouth with a hoof. The last thing I needed was the gangers knowing how bad it was getting.

    The hoof came away bloody.

    Ooooh, not good.

    Only now it occurred to me that my saviour yesterday, the balefire phoenix, had perhaps been a double-edged sword.  The same green fire that had driven the gangers off had given me a severe dose of magical radiation on top of what Fillydelphia's smog had already done to me.

    I shook my head, driving the thought from my mind.  I was dying anyway. This didn't change anything. If anything it was more important I did this right now.  I needed to concentrate on what I was supposed to be doing before I was too sick to do anything. Tossing the quill to the side, I drew my charcoal stick instead and pulled the parchment across.

    This would be different.  I had ten minutes with no interruptions.  The gangers were asleep. Whiplash wasn't coming back for now and I had control of my own drawing.  Yesterday before the Pit had been...it had been something special. I had to use what time I had left to feel that again.  Lacking my journal, it fell to the parchment.

    There was only one thing I truly could bring myself to draw.

    The parchment was large, I wanted to make use of it.  I drew rough lines, like before I was simply throwing things at the page and seeing what stuck.  Eventually the way shone through to me and I set to work.

    Down at the bottom of the parchment, I drew a small figure.  Glaring upward with wonder on its face, eyes open and full of realisation.  He held limply in his hooves a small device. I dearly wanted to draw what was above him, but that had to wait.  Some things needed finishing before it.

    To the right, bigger...no, much bigger!  Dark and brooding, sharp designs and a look of absolute cold determination.  I even felt fear just by looking at him on paper from my own charcoal's rendition.  On the right of the drawing space, he stood with his head low, and ready to unleash imminent violence.  As my charcoal darkened the tribal designs, I began to notice that I had unwittingly drawn him to be looking away from the small pony in the centre, as though protecting him.

    To the left, I began to draw a second pony.  Quickly, I changed, instead doing just her face.  A mare with a flowing mane looking off to the left of the parchment with concern and kindness.  I remembered that face. Gently, I brushed away some of the blackened markings nearer to the centre, giving it the illusion of light.

    I paused. I knew what I wanted above those three, but I was afraid that my skills would not do it justice.

    Slowly, I touched it to the parchment.

    Gently, I began moving it to form shapes and curves as always.  I could feel sweat stinging my brow from concentration. I could not mess this up.  A pony took shape, weightless and heroic, floating in the air itself. Growing in confidence I drew heavier lines, magical wisps and beams of light from her horn that would have lit all of those below watching her ascend.  The central pony below was staring directly up at her with wonder on his face.

    I sat back from the parchment and took in what I had done.  I felt a smile creep on to my face, allowing me to almost forget my predicament or sickness as I touched the parchment with a hoof.  As though I could somehow let that image become my life before my eyes once again.

    I could see mistakes.  There always were, but they didn't matter.  What I drew was what I felt. My journal was full of such things, most drawings telling my emotional state or hidden wishes, however large or small.

    I knew I had to retrieve it.  But I also knew that I had no help.

    I wasn't alone.  The DJ had seen to that.

    But I had to do this by myself.  Through all sickness, fear, slave duties, and unclear dreams, I could see the one thing I knew I had to retrieve.

    That journal would be mine again before I died.  I would find it, take it back and then...and...

    I looked down at the ponies before me, each surrounding the one in the centre who looked so afraid and lost behind his wonder.  I saw the Stable Dweller flying free.

    I was going to...be...

    No.  One thing at a time, Murky.

    Flipping the parchment, I quickly sketched my journal on the back corner.  I would track my things to do in the day to avoid as much harm as I could. The journal was the signal to find and retrieve it.  I placed a curved knife beside it, to go and find Wicked Slit and deal with that job. The last thing I needed was to be thrown in isolation for failing to complete a task.

    Two tasks added to the parchment, I rolled it up and stuffed it inside my jerkin along with the device.  Pulling the frayed cord tighter about my body, I ensured as best I could they wouldn't slip. If I lost my jerkin...

    Shaking my head, I sat and for the remaining minutes tried to figure out why, despite an objective to go for and something to accomplish, I still didn't feel brave or heroic at all.

    I was willing to bet the Stable Dweller never felt this way.

    The ten minutes had passed.  My resolve to begin acting for myself and seek what I wanted had not wavered.  But as I crawled out into the reality of Fillydelphia, the safety of my drawings and wishes fell away to the cold and harsh weather through the normally stiflingly warm city.  No, I was not brave, no doubt there would be tears, whining, and pain to go yet, but I held tightly in my mind the hope that it was all leading to an end soon, and that some time soon, it might be worth it in the end.

    I shook, trying to work some feeling into my quickly numbing limbs before moving out.  I could see the other slaves clustered together in corners, sharing body heat against the wind.  A few, woken by my yelp of pain earlier, glared with hateful eyes at me, apparently jealous of my ability to fit into small places for warmth.  The gangers in particular seemed to be looking at me with grim intentions. They had taken shelter in the ruins of the pig sty, the only remaining wall dragged around as a primitive wind break.  Seeing it sparked a memory in my mind of being dragged along this very ground, chains around my legs as I watched the sketch of my mother disappear from view.

    Whiplash wasn't nearby anymore, so I couldn't linger much longer.  But as I harboured the quest to reclaim what was mine, a thought struck me.  Those gangers had come back here after chasing me down last night, and I knew for a fact that no other slave would touch the spoils of their 'conquest' over me, lest they became the new target.  So it stood to reason that those gangers knew what happened to the small sketchbook.

    After a second, it occurred to me that perhaps standing and staring at them wasn't the greatest plan of mine thus far.  The black-haired buck in particular was eyeing me up with murderous intent. His muzzle still looked swollen from where I had given it a good kick.  Perhaps, though, if I played this right I might get a few clues.

    “What do you think you're looking at, runt?”

    “Nothing!” I answered as I turned my head away from them. “I...I just wanted to find my journal...”

    “What?” The second buck looked around, before grinning.  “That thing of yours? Oh don't worry, it went to a better cause, got some gooood swag for it on the slave market.”

    The what?  I had never heard of such a thing in Fillydelphia, although it didn't sound impossible.  Everywhere I'd been, slaves had traded things behind slaver backs, or sometimes even in direct view if the material was innocent enough.  But a market? I didn't suppose it was impossible. After all, Master Red Eye wasn't stupid. Allowing the slaves a small area to trade their meagre belongings would go a long way towards keeping them in line.

    “You wanting trouble?  What you doing just standing there, runt?  Looking for your head bucked in?”

    I drew breath quickly, backing away and shaking my head.  Oh please let them think I was just frozen in fear...please please please...

    “Yeah, you better back off.  Just wait, runt. Just wait till you've got no place to hide in at night,” the mare threatened menacingly, spitting into the dirt. “After all, you're 'expendable' now, remember?”

    I heard her sick laughter even as I turned and galloped out of the FunFarm, struggling not to show the terror on my face until they were out of sight.

    It took me a good ten minutes to build up the courage to go back again.  I wasn't done in the FunFarm, not at all. For as much as they terrified me, I wanted that journal.  I needed that journal.  The one thing that I had shown to myself—that I could break the chains on my own mind—was lost to me.

    I had to reclaim it.

    I had to see her again.

    The pig sty had been located near the edge of the low scrap wall surrounding the petting zoo that marked our enclosure.  My idea was to sneak back around and hide just opposite the gangers on the other side. If I kept low and crept, I could lie unnoticed and eavesdrop. I would often sneak around using my size to remain hidden behind small objects.  I had once done it to steal food from my master in the rock farm.

    Part of my mind, the one trying to push me to ignore this and go and do my slave duty before I was noticed, seemed to take sick pleasure in reminding me that 'Yeah, I did sneak out then.  I got caught.' This was going to stretch my time thin.  Being late to bring a message to Wicked Slit often meant being late getting back to your enclosure on account of having to limp the entire way.

    Circling around the petting zoo while trying to calm my beating heart, I hid behind a small stall.  What it once sold was indecipherable, or perhaps I just couldn't understand the words. Possibly both.  My entire body was sweating from the effort it was taking to overcome my fear...but they were the only ones who held any clue as to where my journal had gone.  I needed to listen for any clues they might let slip. Names, places, shifts; anything that might give me a lead.

    The petting zoo wall was about twenty feet away across the blasted remains of what I guessed was a field where larger animals were kept in the FunFarm's heyday.  No noise came from the other side and I could only occasionally see the top of one of their manes popping above the top of the wall. Made of scrap metal and rotting wood, it functioned only as a border.  If they were to spot me, it would prove no obstacle and there was no humongous balefire phoenix to save me this time (not to mention I doubted I could survive another rad-burst like that). Gulping down fear, I put one shaking hoof in front of the other and began creeping forwards.

    Every small step lit another part of my brain instructing me to turn around.  The bleeding wound on my forehead from Whiplash's strike throbbed to remind me of what would happen if I weren't done on time.  I blinked the dripping blood from my eyes, lowering my torso to the ground as I slid forward. Great Goddesses...if they only turned around they would see me, I would have to hide right up against the wall itself.  Less than a foot from the ponies on the other side

    It took every effort I could pitifully muster to not squeak in terror as I dragged my tired body forward, inch by painstaking inch, scooting carefully toward them.  The harsh gravel pulled at my jerkin, leading me to take a few tense, heartstopping moments to pull it back into place and ensure the device was still held snugly inside.  I couldn't lose my jerkin, not for anything.

    Just a few feet to go.  I could hear their voices, despite their hushed tones. They were discussing me and their sick pleasure at scaring me off.  I trembled as I realised their threats were not idle should they ever get me alone. However, I couldn't stop. I had to be closer or they could simply turn around and see—

    The mare turned.

    I didn't have time to think.  With a quick shuffle, I flung myself forward the last few feet and rolled on my side behind the wall, below her field of vision.

    “The hell was that?”

    I could hear her getting up and turning towards the wall.  Panicking, I started trying to sneak as quietly as I could along the edge, keeping my mouth clamped shut to stop any fearful whimpering giving me away.  Every small movement felt deafening to me; my heartbeat alone would be loud enough to hear, surely!

    The mare's head peered over the wall behind me. I prayed deeply, ‘Please don't look to the left, don't look to the left…’

    “Anything?”

    “Nah, radroach or some shit.”

    She moved away from the wall as I took the first breath in over a minute.  Resting my head on the ground, I tried to ensure my staggered breathing wasn't too loud as I closed my eyes and shivered on the spot.  I was in position. I could still hear them just over the wall.

    “Swear, the moment I know I'm dying, I'm bringing that bastard overseer down with me.”

    It was the black-haired buck. I recognised the slight muffling on his words.
   
    “Fuck that noise, only pony he's getting throttled by is me, Lemon.”

    That was the mare.  But the brown and black buck was called Lemon?  I...that didn't make any sense at all!  Perhaps he dyed his mane. I'd occasionally wondered if I'd like that done, get rid of this murky (yeah, yeah...) colour and get something brighter like a light blonde.  I listened to them complaining about who I guessed was a shift overseer from wherever they got sent each day. Apparently, this stallion was a pretty mean apple who delighted in giving gangs a hard time.

    Briefly, I sent a little thanks in my thoughts to the overseer and wished him the best of luck in his future for the act.

    “Eh, no matter,” continued the mare. “You can get rid of your frustrations on the runt when he comes back.  'Ere, Lemon, after the food comes round? Get those hooves of yours into smashing that feed shed. Doubt Whiplash will complain, and it'll lose his only place to hide.  I'd like to see how his raggedy little coat takes this wind chill when he 'aint got nopony to bed up with. Even the other slaves avoid him, 'fraid we'll take em on!”

    I had to bite my lip to stop myself from whimpering out loud as I felt tears well up in my eyes in abject terror.  One way or another, I was going to be badly hurt by the end of the day, either from Whiplash, Wicked Slit, or the gang.  Holding my head in my hooves, I wracked my brain to think of a way out of this. How could I avoid the beating? Thoughts were slow in coming, like some cogs in the machine of my brain just weren't there at all, never mind being slow.  I wasn't brought up to make decisions or be decisive! I just...followed.

    The Stable Dweller would know what to do here.  I didn't.

    That fact hurt.  It hurt bad, because I knew that my day was taking an inevitable turn.  No matter what, it would end in me returning here for punishment of some sort or another.  The most I could do was steel myself against it.

    Yeah.  Me. Steeling myself.  What a joke; I'd probably just cry and beg, like I always did.

    “Hey, you got that Wingboner magazine there, Noose?”

    “Yeah!” the mare I now knew as Noose lashed back, her voice savage and filled with possessiveness. “I'm not done with it yet!”

    “You've had it since we got back from the damn market!” Lemon threw back, “C'mon!  I've never seen them pegasi like that before!”

    “Then you'll wait your turn to read it,” Noose spat. “All they're good fer these days is sitting on clouds and being pictures in old magazines for our benefit, so I'm gonna enjoy it as long as I damn well want!”

    “Like you could ever enjoy anything like that for 'long,' Noose.”

    I heard a curse screamed incoherently before what seemed to be a small pony-on-pony brawl broke out between them.  The sound of them scuffling on the ground, swearing colourfully and beating one another around reminded me all too much of the sounds I had heard in the Pit.  Well, at least at first. I sighed about the hatred of the pegasi. No pegasus could ever walk the wastes without being hunted now. The slave in me understood the feeling all too well.

    I heard the remaining, yet unknown by name, buck reach forward as the others fought and pick up what sounded like a magazine, muttering something to himself about 'those two weirdos...' before shuffling around.

    “While you two mess about, I'll take this.”

    I heard him pick up the magazine.

    “Little runt's pictures of mares were just shit anyway.”

    I felt offended! I'd always thought they were pretty nice looking!

    Deciding to trust the mare from yesterday's judgement more than this ganger's, I kept listening.

    “Least Sooty was willing to give us this in exchange for it and a couple caps...heh,” he muttered, before leaving a silence. “Ah, not like you two fuckers are even listening...”

    That was it!  Elation flew through my mind; I had a name to who now owned my journal!  The slave in my head came to the surface once again, mentally waving a clock at me and trying to drag me away from the wall.  Finally, I could obey and get back to normal. It was time to leave, to go and find Wic—

    The pair tumbled against the wall just beside me in their exertions.

    I didn't expect it.  I squeaked loudly.

    “Hey!  Noise again!”

    “What?  I thought that was you.”

    “Screw you!  I don't make sissy runt noises!”

    I heard the three of them scrambling to their hooves.  There was nothing else for it. I upped and galloped around the wall, hugging it closely.  Behind me, shouts and more foul mouthed curses as they heard me take off. The wall shook as they climbed it.  I didn't even look back as I turned the corner of the wall, going for all I was worth to find a hiding place before they got over the wall and came after me.  I could only pray they hadn't identified me.

    Ahead, I saw nothing but road.  I tried not to curse out loud (after the gangers, I almost didn't want to swear again) as it gave me nothing but flat ground.  Hooves on gravel sounded behind me as the gangers began to come around the wall. For one of the few times I thanked my height.  If I had been a normal-sized pony the wall wouldn't have hid me at all while running. I made for the road anyway, what else could I do?  The hard surface and my hooves while galloping were hardly quiet, but little choice remained. So long as I could reach the other side...

    My sprained front leg clearly thought otherwise.

    A clenching pain burst through it, the hoof stomp from the crushing under the slaves yesterday made its presence known again through the mass of bruises and pains I had as it felt my hooves landing on solid asphalt repeatedly.  I fell with a cry of pain, going head over hooves to collapse off the side of the road and down the embankment, the pain in my leg throbbing wildly. I could run no more. Yesterday’s exertions had caught up to me through my wounds.

    “I heard them fall off over there!  They're over the road!”

    Noose's vile tongue echoed between the ruined buildings as I lay in the blackened gravel at the side of the road.  A foul stench was in my nostrils, making me gag as I lay, awaiting them to appear over the top and do whatever it was they were wanting to do.  No phoenix to come to my aid now, and I highly doubted Number Six was going to stop doing his own things to come out and rescue me. Sweet Celestia, that smell was horri—

    It was a sewer drain under the road.

    I blinked and stared at the small entrance, dripping with mould and slimy substances.  Immediately, I knew how I was meant to survive this.

    I didn't like it one bit.

    The sound of Noose's hooves coming closer reminded me that I disliked dying even more.

    Crawling with three hooves, I pulled myself along the ground, smearing over the exuded gel-like liquid coming out of the drain.  There was no way this wasn't going to be highly radioactive or filled with disease. But at this point, I doubted my life expectancy would really be worth worrying about.  Trying not to breathe, I pulled myself into the small tubular drain and curled up inside it, feeling wet mushy material squelch beneath me.

    The gangers ran over the road, their hooves sending echoes down into the drain as they leapt above the entrance.  I stared upon them from behind as they stopped and looked around. I had never noticed this drain until I had been lying down randomly from falling.  Surely they'd never notice—

    “What's that smell?”

    Oh, come on!

    They paused, looking around and wandering past the drain a few times, muttering about the smell it was making.  They couldn't miss the entrance, but if they thought to look inside...

    “Eh...forget it.  Whoever that was, he's long gone.”

    “Unless they hid in the drain?”

    I froze, every muscle tensing up, my foreleg aching from the injury all the more.  I could feel my sickness building, the stench and tension in my stomach wanting to make me cough again.

    “The hell?  Only that filthy little runt would do that, and he's way too scared of us to eavesdrop.  Just come on, I don't want that bastard Whiplash giving me another doing.”

    I heard them wander off, the buck who had offered to check the drain reluctantly trotting after them.  With relief I pulled myself from the drain. With a hideous sucking noise, my hindlegs came free from the smelly slime that composed of the bottom of the pipe, letting me wade through the damp muck surrounding the entrance.  I fought the urge to vomit as I let out the rasping cough that I had somehow held in. Checking myself over once again, I felt the radsores on my back left leg stinging and burning from the rubbing on the ground. I was coated in the drainage gunk—my jerkin was damp as well—I didn't even want to identify what was clinging over my cutie mark.

    I just wanted to stop.  To go into the building to throw up and just lie down, to let myself just...expire for the day.  Or forever. But instinct, for all the Stable Dweller's inspiration, still existed in my mind. I pulled my jerkin tighter, made sure the radio was still intact, and set about being a slave.

    What a pathetic little sight I was after that. Just a small pony limping slowly down the roads in the howling cold wind, with a yelp of pain on every step of his front left hoof. A pony covered in the stinking slew of a drain. A pony stopping only to let a hacking cough out from my radiation sickness. A pony...a slave...carrying on walking to his eternal place of work to no doubt be hurt more, with nothing more than a promise of pain on his shifts end.

    I couldn't take this...

    Not any more...

    I needed something to give me hope, more than just the scrawls on a piece of parchment.  That journal had to be mine again, to see my mother once more. Those pages had come to mean freedom in some way.

    I silently pleaded to the Goddesses, praying that I was right.  That by doing something for myself I might finally break the chains and have the courage to do something more.

    Something greater.

    To follow her.

    Choking down the pain, I carried on.

    Waking up Wicked Slit went much as expected.

    Even a pained, exhausted, and dizzy pony like me could muster enough strength to high-tail it out of her scrap-built hut at high speed.  Especially when I saw a huge knife like that being magically lifted with great purpose from the dresser beside her bed.

    Lacking any support from her guards to wake the overseer, I had been reduced to simply prodding her with a hoof.  From as far away as I could. While getting ready to run.

    I'd had time to blurt out ‘Slaves late, one extra, I'm back’ before I’d seen the awoken fury in her eyes and immediately scampered for the door.  My mind caught up with me, only now realising that there had been another lump under the dirty covers beside her. Oh this wasn't going to be good at all. Not only had I woken Slit, I had woken her up while sleeping off—

    Actually, I didn't want to think on that one too hard.

    Diving out her doorway, I stumbled down the metal stairs leading to the second floor workers’ quarters she inhabited, falling onto the broken concrete road outside.  I saw Wicked Slit scramble to the door, teeth bared and a bed-mane sitting messily about her head.

    “Murky Number Seven!  I am going to make you wish you'd never been born!”

    I fought the temptation to shout back ‘Agreed!’ as I got to my hooves and galloped for the gateway out of the factory.  All around me, ponies working with the magical auto axes were tearing hunks of metal into fragments for the melting pots.  They glanced up in curiosity at the sight of me diving madly from their overseers hut.

    “I am going to fuck you up so badly, Murk!  You get back in here right now! Close the gate!”

    To my horror, the guards outside reacted with enough speed to slam the door shut in my face.  I hit the thick metal just hard enough to come off of all fours and fall to the floor with a groan.  As I turned to look behind me, I could swear some of the slaves were trying not to giggle at the misheard context of her last sentence.  Wicked Slit advanced, devoid of clothing but still carrying that knife magically in the air beside her. I closed my eyes, half-expecting the knife to descend.  Instead I just heard the sound of magic as she dragged me by the tail back toward her hut with her own telekinesis.

    “I swear, I'm going to strap you down to stop you running away someday, you spineless wretch.”

    I saw some slaves snort in laughter...and some of the guards.  I facehoofed, even through my fear. I could almost hear the rumours already.

    “Now get in here, I'm not done with you.”

    She telekinetically hurled me inside, shooed the buck from the bed out, and slammed the door as I heard the entire work yard roar with laughter.

    I sat meekly in the middle of the floor as Wicked Slit paced across to her small desk.  Sitting on a cushion behind it, she glared at me before slamming the knife point down into the floor a few inches from me.  Wrinkling her nose, Slit made sure to keep me some distance from her desk.

    “I'm not even going to ask why you're covered in shit, Murk.  Alright, you've got five seconds to explain why you woke me...and why you had to do it with a hoof that's been in some latrine somewhere.”

    I wasn't going to waste them.

    “Uh...uh...Whiplash!  He says the slaves will be late because they're all messed up and stuff but...um...you get an extra one!” I tried to smile. “And it's me, M-Ma'am!”

    Someday, I was going to learn that smiling was not something that would help with Wicked Slit.  Why, oh why, couldn't I learn to just nod and shake my head again? Breaking the instinct that had kept me chained all these years was not without its consequences...

    If Wicked Slit was 'mollified' in the slightest by the news that she had me back, she didn't show it.

    “So...” she said, her knife plucking out of the ground and lightly stabbing the wooden floor in a circle around me, tapping incessantly. “Basically...you're saying I'm screwed for work efficiency?”

    Tap.  Tap. Tap.

    “Well, maybe not screwed, Ma'am...”

    “So you have an idea on how to cover for three lost slaves and my replacement being the most pathetic slave in Filly?  Or do you have any talents other than becoming the worst smelling slave in Fillydelphia? Seriously, where have you been today?”

    If I had any real pride about my life as a slave, that would hurt.  Born to be a slave and given the cutie mark to lock me into it forever...and I was even bad at that.  Ouch.

    “Well...”

    Tap.  Tap. Tap.

    “...perhaps there's another way?”

    Oh, why was I even trying this...

    “Do tell, Murk.”
   
    Her voice held no promise of her actually listening.  Judging by how the knife missed my tail by a scant inch, she clearly was just drawing this out in anger.

    “Perhaps...perhaps...” I searched and searched my mind for anything. “Perhaps one of the machines could be fixed to do the work of three?  Like...get the parts and put it all together so you work better than ever? I mean...um...Ma'am.”

    I was proud.  The machines in Fillydelphia were still in the process of repair, many didn't work at all, hence the need for such huge numbers of slaves to often manually operate them on giant treadmills or turnwheels.  The war had not been kind to the more complex machinery the ponies of Old Equestria had cooked up.

    Wicked Slit's expression changed only from fury-filled rage to abject annoyance.

    “And what makes you think, Murk, that we haven't done all of that already?  Do you think we are idiots, Murk? Do you think Great Red Eye is a fool who doesn't know when a machine cannot be fixed?”

    I saw the traps waiting for me. Years under slavers had taught me that much.  Don't argue back, go with the flow and make your point.

    “No!” I cried out.  “Master Red Eye is very wise...but I think I may know...know...”

    What did I know?  The knife was even closer to me.

    Tap.  Tap. Tap.

    I begged myself to think harder, reaching into every random idea I could.

    Tap.  Tap. Tap.

    Yet, I had nothing, I lowered my head as the knife rose up...

    “Thought so,” she muttered, lowering her head, that horrid cracked horn sparkling wildly as she moved the knife in front of me. “Now you have disturbed me...for bad news, waking me up and bringing nothing but crap to my desk again.  In this case, literally.”

    I fought to not wail in fear as she spoke, her knife floating out in front of me, point down.

    “Hold out your hoof, Murk.”

    I had bitten off more than I could chew here.  I should have just kept my mouth shut, accepted the beating, and moved on to get my second beating on returning to the FunFarm.  I shivered, my hoof not moving as I locked up, whimpering.

    “Hold out your hoof!”

    I yelped, fear escaping as I felt my eyes cry, as always. Wicked Slit only looked at me crying, swore to herself and stomped out, screaming into my ear with enough volume to cause me to scream in aural pain.

    “HOLD OUT YOUR HOOF, SLAVE!”

    Instinct kicked in. My master demanded, I obeyed.  My hoof shot out, holding shakily under the knife as I saw it rise up.  I shut my eyes.

    Yet then, I heard a voice. A voice so quiet from under my jerkin that only I would notice.

    “Welcome back, wastelanders!  DJ-Pon-Three here with your daily tip of the day!  Now remember what I said about scavenging? No? It's the same thing I always say.  It's safer to trade than it is to search, ponies. Yes, yes, I know, you'll be paying something—

    Eyes clenched shut, I heard her magic begin to spark to move the knife down.

    “-but it's better than paying with your life!  Remember, kiddies, trade is what helps everyone in the end.  Just be prepared for a haggle, y'here? So visit those markets, you never know what others have dug up!”

    “The slave market!” I screamed. “THE SLAVE MARKET!”

    The knife stopped.  I drew a breath, my eyes opening as I saw the knife midway to my hoof.  I didn't dare move it...

    “What, Murk?”

    “The...the slave market, Ma'am!  Perhaps they've got something...something they found and hid!”

    Wicked Slit paused, the knife spinning on the spot (did she ever stop moving it?) as she clearly thought this over, before glaring back at me, the tip of her knife lifting my chin up.

    “Listen here, Murky Number Seven.”

    Listening!  Very much listening!

    “You know where the market is?”

    I couldn't shake my head, “Um...no?”

    Wicked Slit sighed, letting the knife go from my throat and embedding it in the desk a few times instead.  It glinted from the small magically powered gem light on the roof each time it came down.

    “The old terminal building at the pegasi chariot skyport. There’s another slave enclosure in the baggage handling and waiting rooms for the slaves that deserve a roof.  They think they're subtle, but we know all about them, Murk. Red Eye isn't blind. We just let them do it because it's just all pictures of mares, rotten food we don't want, and ragged clothing.  Sometimes they get something valuable, but really...the advantage of them keeping the slaves down there in line is worth it. But perhaps you can be of some use...”

    I didn't like where this was going.

    “Go there, Murk.  Now. You come back with parts to fix either a machine press control panel or a conveyor belt engine and I'll let you keep your hoof intact.  Use however you want to get them. Beg, trade, or steal...but don't you show your face around here again until you have them, understand?”

    Not entirely.  How I was going to convince anypony to give up valuable parts was beyond me, but it was better than an eighteen-inch knife in my hoof.  I nodded, taking the slim cue to get the hell out of here. I got to my hooves, limping away toward the door.

    “Oh, and Murk?”

    Oh, here we go again...I turned to look back at her, trembling.

    “Y-yes, Ma'am?”

    “You interrupted my sleep for some very shitty news, don't you have something, anything good to say before you go?”

    She was fishing for an excuse to hurt me.  I could see it. I looked around for inspiration, yet found absolutely nothing. My eyes fell back to Wicked Slit, standing there near her bed, mane hair fluffed out madly from being woken suddenly.

    “I...really like your...mane?” I squeaked.

    I only barely managed to dive out the door and tumble down the steps as the knife embedded itself in the door frame with enough force to puncture out to the other side of the hut.

    Entering another slave master's enclosure was not particularly difficult for a slave.  After all, if you were indeed a runaway, you'd be missed at roll call each morning anyway, so they had no real objection to a slave without a shift wandering into their territory.  The fact that most of Fillydelphia was still confused and recovering from the slave riots only harried Red Eye's force's efforts to control the exact location of each individual within the Wall.

    Besides, I had Wicked Slit's approval to be here now, if no way to really show it.  If confronted, I had to hope that her name carried enough weight to permit me access or avoid the guards simply throwing me out the door again.  If that happened, suddenly this would have to become a lot more covert than before. There was no way in Equestria I was returning to Wicked Slit empty hoofed.  I liked having four functional legs.

    As I trotted over the concrete expanse of the airfield, I winced in pain as my injured front leg caught one of the many cracks and small fissures.  I fell back onto my rump, rubbing the fetlock gingerly.

    Okay, three and a half functional legs.

    Ahead of me was the expanse of the pegasus chariot airbase.  Pegasi didn't need a runway, of course, but some of the larger sky wagons of the past had clearly needed a little space for them to reach some momentum.  Strewn across the field were the mangled and blackened wrecks of every type of chariot imaginable, from small personal transports, to huge antique flying skytanks, and well as everything in between.  Many were jumbled into one colossal pile of twisted scrap on the eastern edge of the airfield, the opposite side from the crater. Their light materials had simply been blasted away by the force of the Zebra megaspell to become a small mountain of metal against the walls of the hangers that lined the eastern border.  Briefly, I imagined what it might be like to fly with one of them tied behind you. I kept an eye on the vehicles, tightening my jerkin. Even as I watched, slaves picked over them. They sought small components, magic spark matrix gems, or cut the fuselages apart with those ever-whining auto axes. No matter where I went in Fillydelphia I could spot or at least hear them in the background.

    If I ever got out of here, a silent night would be the first thing I would desire.

    Red Eye had not let the airfield go unused.  Much of the forces stationed in Fillydelphia used it as a makeshift arrangement ground.  In between the wrecks, teams of his army checked weapons or stood ready for instructions on their next task.  I suspected they mostly lived in the masses of buildings nearby that used to belong to the residents of Fillydelphia.  I always wondered how they dealt with that, sleeping in rotten beds that had once contained somepony's entire life and sense of safety before the megaspells.  How could anypony stay sane invading such a sacred place of memories? The FunFarm had been bad enough, but a pony's own home?

    A memory sparked, I remembered the first time one of my Masters had sent me scavenging in an abandoned farmhouse.  Inside there had been bones, two sets of them, huddled together on their bed with limbs curled around one another for reassurance.  The wall had been facing a balefire crater. I imagined them lying there, trembling and saying their last assurances of love as sirens blared and the world ended around them, before the terrible force of the megaspell surged through their home...

    In the next room I had found another skeleton, even smaller than I, alone in a cot surrounded by foal's toys.

    I cried a lot in life.  But that day I had done so more than most.  To be standing there, alive and lost in a far-flung, ruined future, seeing the preserved horror of the moment that Equestria had died simply broke me.  It had taken my master himself to come in and find me huddled up in the corner. I had been clutching a little woollen doll that had somehow survived, as though it would somehow help relieve the pain.

    I kinda missed that doll. Aside from my mother, it had been the only thing I'd ever hugged.

    Shaking my head, I let my eyes traverse toward the airfield’s terminal and away from the homes of Fillydelphia.  One farm had been bad enough. To linger on the hundreds of households holding all sorts of memories would probably drive me insane if I stopped to think about it.  Getting to my hooves, I began the journey to the entrance from the runways.

    The terminal was a strange building.  Most huge public buildings I had witnessed tended to try and be somewhat fancy or stand out.  I had once glimpsed Tenpony Tower whilst being dragged through Manehattan toward my next master.  The colossal building had struck me as rather pretty, as though some of its elegance had survived the bombs.  The terminal, however, was somewhat more hardened.

    Pillars supported a flat-topped dome in a slight throwback to the architecture the pegasi of old used to have in their cloud cities.  A book my mother had once called an ensico...ensiclo...

    Ah, forget it, I couldn't remember.  Some big book with lots of pictures about the old world.  She had pointed out the cloud cities to me, wishing I could be up there and safe instead of down here in the muddy ruin like all wasteland-born ponies.

    But this terminal had none of the light and gentle flair of the cloud buildings.  It was built from heavy concrete and inlaid with hard steel panels or angular decorations, the same as the rest of the new age buildings in Fillydelphia. I saw more loading bays for materials than I did areas for passengers. It matched the city’s tone even now, clearly intended be functional and affordable in the face of a city that had become the centre of materials industry in Equestria. Empty frames where enormous windows might once have sat dominated the level above the goods entrances. Only the barest roots of pegasi architecture were present with indented lines showing what might have once been columns, save for a single mural above the main entrance from the airstrips bearing a motif of six ponies.

    Including that accursed pink pony.

    Someday, I was going to escape her gaze.  She was even glaring right at me off the mural!

    The size was deceptive, what I took for a small mural above a door simply kept growing as I crossed the wreck-filled fields toward it.  By the time I neared the terminal, the reason it had stood from the balefire was obvious. Whoever built this had built it to last. The pillars were a good six feet thick, and the entire building was made of huge concrete blocks, now coated in sprays of graffiti from two hundred years of abuse.  No wonder it showed little real exterior damage.

    As I moved inside the entrance—noting the guards who watched me warily growing in number from the mostly empty airfield—I had a sense that it would also make getting out a hell of a lot tougher than getting in, should I need to leave in a hurry.  Concrete wasn't well known for little gaps I could squeeze through to escape.

    “Oi!  What're you doing here?”

    Twenty feet from the main door, the buck's voice rang out just as I approached the gateway into the slave enclosure.  It encompassed an entire wing of the terminal building, barricaded off by a huge wall of piled up scrap and metal sheets.  I could only presume the slave market was beyond it, somewhere Red Eye would be happy for it to function where they could keep an eye on it.

    Even as I approached, timidly trotting, the voice made me stop dead.  I looked to the right and left, but saw no pony at all.

    “Oh you...up here!”

    I backed off, tilting my head upwards toward the interior scrap barricade and spotting a slave with broken shackles stuck on each hoof glancing down at me.  Tall and lanky, he attempted an indignant look as he stomped a hoof on the scrap in annoyance.

    “I know every slave around here, I do!” he shouted.  I could only presume the act was to try and make him seem intimidating.  Well, I had seen a pony beat almost half a dozen to death with his bare hooves yesterday and had a crazed mare try to impale my hoof earlier.  This slave didn’t exactly rank too highly on the 'Murky Scale of Run the Hell Away.'

    “So if you ain't a slave from here, then you's here for the market, ain't you?”

    Well, not exactly arcane science.

    The buck's face twisted at my general look of confusion and wonderment, lacking the reaction he presumably wanted.  At this point, there were greater things in my life threatening my health than this weedy-looking slave. All the same, I allowed him a brief glance of worry...he clearly had a modicum of authority to be up there.  Best to play it safe as per usual.

    He stomped a hoof even harder, seeking a reaction as he snarled...and promptly screamed.  His hoof dislodged the scrap beneath him. With a horrid creaking sound, the entire top layer of the barricade came crashing down, the buck tumbling over it all.  Squeaking in shock at the sharp metal barrelling toward me I dived to the side before feeling the buck collapse onto me from above. The impact led to me crying out in agony as my still damaged ribs and masses of bruises were struck.  The pair of us rolled to the side as I felt a horrid tug on my jerkin before collapsing to the ground with a solid thud.

    Vision hazy from pain, I tried to wrench my pained body up.  Exhaustion was kicking in once again from sickness, malnourishment, and the lack of any decent sleep.  Perhaps I should just stay down for a few minutes, at least until the spiking lance of pain on my side went away.  I could pick up my radio device from over there later...

    Wait!

    With a shout of effort that ended in a spluttering and bloody cough, I dragged my body inch by inch toward the device.  I needed to hide it! I felt panic rising as the buck began to rise on the other side, shaking his head from the fall. I just...couldn't...move...

    My hoof limply flopped down just short of the device by the time he picked it up.  I lay flat, feeling my body beginning to fail. A month had been optimistic. I doubted I could last, well...long at all, really.  I could barely stand until the pain had died down.

    “Tho wuth thith hen?” the buck spoke as he held the device in his mouth, leering down at me.  An earth pony, he was almost as dirty looking as myself, with a dull orange mane and a coat that could only be described as the colour of vomit.  This included the specks and lumps made instead of boils and scabs from the sickness that pervaded Fillydelphia.

    “N-nothing!” I shouted as best I could, reaching a hoof up, “It's nothing!  Just a bit of old scrap I...I wanted to trade with!”

    The buck spat out the device to the side before stepping on it with a hoof to keep it still.

    “So you want into the slave market, huh?” he said slyly, inclining his head toward me.

    “Yes...please?”

    He rolled his eyes and gave me a nudge with his hoof to get up.  With a grunt of exertion I obeyed, before almost collapsing again as I spluttered and choked on a dry cough.  The buck backed off quickly as he saw the light splatters of blood on the ground.

    “Aaah...so you're after medicine, I see,” he muttered, before laughing and kicking the device just behind him, “well I guess you'll have to submit to a search when you go in and come back out.”

    “Oh and of course...” he added, “pay the fee to get in.  This isn't your enclosure.”

    Wiping my mouth with a hoof to clear the blood, cringing as I remembered the sewer pipe, I shook my head.

    “I don't have anything to give...”

    The buck tapped the device with his back hoof lightly.

    “Not any more.”

    Oh no...no way!  That device was the only thing that kept me going!  I was living on borrowed time with a sickness and untreated wounds that were eating away at me.  The dried blood on my scalp still stung as much as my near-broken hoof from yesterday ached. All the while my lungs felt ready to pop out my mouth on my next cough. Without that device constantly broadcasting, I...I didn't think I could have made it without the hope it gave me.

    The hope that I could do something worthwhile, before I succumbed in here.

    “No!”

    I shouted, stumbling forward to try and grab the device, only for the buck to simply knock it out of the way again with a hoof. This was like a child trying to get something away from an older sibling.  If I'd been healthier, I knew I could have been more agile. But in this state I was just a little weakling pawing at him, as small as he was, too.

    “Oh no, no, noooo...” he cooed, “you gotta pay the fee to get in, or you's doesn't get any trading!”

    “I...I need it!” I screamed as I tried to duck around him, slipping and falling each time.  I fought back the urge to cry...not in front of this pony. I had been shot at, put in the Pit (well...kinda), and survived a riot.  I was not going to cry in front of this little slave! I wasn't! I...I...

    I couldn't get it back...

    I stepped back after my last desperate grab for the device, strength leaving me as my stamina failed.

    “There we go, accept that this is mine, and you can go in,” he sneered, “and get me something on the way out if you want to pass this border again.  Red Eye doesn't care what we do, so long as we don't have any items he wants in our enclosure or that get in the way of our work shifts. So this is our job and right to claim!”

    I stomped a hoof and shook my head in frustration.  The buck was right. I'd been so damn close. Not only was I having to risk everything for Slit, now I was losing my radio device hoofmachine thingy in the process.  As I dejectedly turned, another buck's voice rang out. This one less nasal as the first buck, but filled with a curious tone.

    “Hey...what's goin' on with that midget out there?” said the second buck as he trotted out.  This one was almost as short as I was, but a lot more thickly set.

    Figures, I thought, that the tall and skinny one, and the short and stubby one would be together.  There seemed to be one pair like this in every slave farm I'd been to in my entire life. Perhaps every generation had their own in Equestria.  Only briefly, it occurred to me that myself and Number Six had been almost the same thing for a short time.

    “Little slave here wanted into the market, I was just taking this as the payment.”

    They continued to talk, boast, and snigger amongst themselves.  But even as I cowered slightly further away, trying to tear my eyes from the radio device, a thought entered my head.  I had one ace left up my jerkin’s sleeve. I began pulling out the parchment and quill, before taking the quill and pretending to write something.  The obnoxious slave pair finally noticed me.

    “Hey!  What're you doing?”

    I looked up, spitting out the quill briefly.

    “Oh, me?” I began.  “I...I'm just taking your names down.  Wicked Slit will want to know who stopped her messenger getting in.”

    To their credit, they hid the look of stark terror well after the first three seconds.  The skinny one grinned.

    “Hah!  You don't know our names!”

    “Yeah,” interjected the smaller buck, “you ain't got nuthin' on us!  We're not gonna tell you our names...are we?”

    The smaller one glanced up at his colleague before receiving a clip around the ear with a hoof.  Damn, they weren't completely hopeless. However, for once in my life I felt like I had an advantage here.  I could do this without resorting to violence from Wicked Slit or by having to break rules. Call me crazy, but hearing the device playing Velvet's music seemed to clear my terrified and conflicted thoughts just enough for me to know what to say to get by them.
   
    “I'm afraid you have to,” I continued, nudging the quill and motioning with my eyes toward the skinny one, “what is your name, so Wicked Slit can find you and gut you?”

    The stubby one looked a little panicky at the mentioning of gutting. He stepped from hoof to hoof with nerves as I spoke before blurting out to his comrade.

    “D-don't tell him, Pike!  I don't want to be gutted!”

    Aha!  Success!

    “You idiot,” screamed the taller one, batting the shorter around the head with his hoof, “what did you tell him that for!?”

    “I...” the buck stopped as his comrade's hoof belted him across the face a few times, “I didn't mean to, Pike—”

    “Stop it!”

    “Sorry, Pike.”

    “STOP IT, COSH, YOU BLABBERING IDIOT!”

    I couldn't resist.

    “Pike and Cosh...” I muttered, “right, I'll report that you barred me entry...”

    The pair turned from screaming at one another to glare at me.  For a second I was afraid they'd simply try and attack me...but it seems they figured that Slit would want to know where her 'agent' had gone.  They simply shoved the device back to me and stood aside without another word to allow me through. I'd done it. Okay, they weren't particularly intelligent foes, but I had managed to pass without any beatings or injury!

    As I retrieved the radio, a happy little note of Velvet's struck a high pitch in my ear from the small speaker, making me smile as I trotted into the enclosure, the volume too low for any but I to detect.  With a silent thank you I tucked it back under my jerkin, pulling it back over quickly.

    That little device had been meant to guide me.  I knew it.

    I had envisioned a bustling market of slaves in an enclosure under the watchful eye of guards and slave masters.  What I saw was entirely different.

    Set among the waiting room where passengers in the past would have sat to await their pegasi transports, the slave enclosure had few boundaries and a lot of slaves simply lying on the floor.  What envy I had for them having four walls and a solid roof quickly evaporated as I witnessed the bare stone they had to sleep on in here. At least the FunFarm Petting Zoo had dirt...

    The ponies looked like they were sore on one side, presumably from lying on the hard surface for so long each night.  The old areas where seating cushions might have sat were long gone, leaving only sharp metal fixtures in their place. Rows of chairs littered the floor, punctuated by empty rigs on the ceiling that may once have held flight times. The displays had been removed; I’d seen them once having in a factory and used for shift work instead. One remained, however, broken and shattered in the middle of the great hall, where it had fallen long ago.

Around the edge of the walls were shop fronts, their windows and walls blown in or stripped out for Master Red Eye’s industry. Gift stores, arcane technology and food outlets were visible by their symbols, but these days they held something else. In those broken shops lurked what I was searching for.  Three of them were on this side of the waiting room. Through some arches I could see a few more, one boarded up and the other two bearing another couple of 'merchants.' At the back of the room was a set of still escalators that led to the a sky deck. That would have been the place I’d seen from the outside with enormous windows over-viewing the runways and, presumably, leading further into the facility.

    The slave market was definitely not how I had imagined it.  There was a stillness. It occurred to me that the crowded rush I has expected was born only of my brief time hearing about Tenpony Tower in the past.  Here, slaves simply had nothing to trade except in rare cases.  I could see the 'traders' lying down like any other slave next to their wares.  I wondered how they didn't have it all stolen when they were called to a work shift.  Perhaps they were all pretty dangerous and beat anyone who dared take goods.

    There were about six of them.  Most didn’t seem to specialise, simply having whatever they could scavenge instead.  I didn't imagine any valuable goods would be on display where the slavers could see and confiscate them.  Five of them followed this pattern, rough-looking slaves with more rags than the others, patched into warmer and tougher clothing to protect themselves.  

They seemed better fed too.  Three mares and two bucks made up their numbers, and there seemed to be at least one 'guard' nearby to each shop as well, also a slave.  Red Eye's guards were beside me at the entrance, clearly more for a presence inside than any real purpose. A sixth merchant caught my eye though...a unicorn with an old saddlebag bearing the image of three butterflies in a yellow and pink pattern.  I knew that design. I'd seen it before in the bathroom of the home I’d been forced to search years ago.

    It meant medicine!

    Even my journal could wait, if it meant I got to see if the unicorn could get me something.  Or better yet, heal me!

    I trotted as fast as I dared on my now-wobbly leg through the arches into the second half of the waiting room.  Dejected ponies lay on the ground around me, watching me with hazy and hopeless eyes as I moved toward the healer.  Many moved away from me, hobbling lazily dragging themselves over the ground on weary legs. At first I presumed this was due to my sick appearance but after a quick sniff...it was probably due to the fact I was still reeking of drainage.  Well, bartering was going to be fun while smelling like a latrine.

    All the same, the slaves backing away from me only served to remind me I was in dangerous territory here.  Slaves were opportunistic. If any of them thought of a reason to bring me down, they would. I was alone. Nopony was waiting in the wings to save me now.  Fear bit at my mind and gnawed at my determination to achieve my aims and get my journal back. Was it worth risking dying for a few scraps of paper I never even really looked at?

    The unicorn healer seemed to regard me with some distaste as I approached, his eyes following my clearly sick self right up to looking down his own nose at me past a small set of glasses.  His cutie mark didn't fill me with great confidence...a bonesaw.

    “I...uh...heard you can get healing here,” I hardly even knew what to ask for, “could I be healed?”

    Fairly basic, but what else could I ask for?  I certainly didn't know exactly what was wrong with me and if I started listing everything we'd be here till the end of time.  The healer snorted, spitting to the side and moving around me as his horn flared into being.

    “Check up is free, shrimp,” he began muttering as his glowing horn flickered to and fro across my body, “but the healing costs.  What you got to trade?”

    I sighed, my head drooping.  Just typical...healing equipment away from assigned medical facilities would be rare and valuable to slaves, but healing magic was hardly a finite resource to a unicorn.  Yet he still charged?  That just wasn’t fair! As he trotted around to look me in the eye and cock his head, awaiting the offer, I could only lower my head again and shake it.

    “So, just another sick little slave who thinks I give out everything for free just because I'm medically trained.  What did you honestly expect? It's a buyer’s market among slaves these days. Only reason I'm not drafted to heal his army is because I've not got any stamina for this at all.  I can only do one pony a day with magic and still have enough left in me to work my shift.”

    He eyed me up, eyebrows narrowing.

    “And here you think I'm going to waste that on you?”

    “Please...isn't there anything?” I couldn't hide the shaking fear in my voice as I was forced to admit the truth.  “I...I think I'm dying, sir...please...”

    “You certainly are.”

    My heart skipped a beat, I'd had theories, but to hear it straight from him was chilling.  I felt my eyes beginning to well up as I stared at the healer. He just tossed his mane and sighed, turning away to his inventory in a bag.  I could see little orange packs and small bottles of sloshing liquid alongside a few syringes. Why did the slavers allow this? For a second my heart leapt, until he simply sat on them instead of fetching anything, crossed his hooves and fixed me with a stare through his glasses.

    “You have an irradiated lung infection on top of some pretty severe radiation poisoning, kid.  Throw on top of that a minor taint mutation—that'd explain the ear—and a high level of toxin in your general respiratory systems from Filly's oh-so-lovely smog.  Not so uncommon around here, I get about a dozen or so a week who want healing without anything to trade. For you? Well, the taint isn't curable, that's a given.  But the radiation poisoning and the rest? It'd take about five Radaways and a few healing potions with a charge of magic to save your life. As you might imagine, I'm not about to give them away from free.  You can wander off and die in your sleep like all the rest who want handouts.”

    I felt my hooves going weak, I had to lie down to avoid collapsing.

    “A pony in good health might survive a week or so with all this.  But you've got multiple barely healed lacerations, bruises everywhere, acute radsores on your leg and face, a sprained front leg and bruised ribs.  Couldn't see how many, that jerkin got in the way of checking. With all that? I'd say you've got perhaps a few days time out there in the smog. Hell, you might drop off any night at this rate.”

    I was trembling, wet dots appearing on the ground in front of me.  My raspy breathing led to a few coughs as I attempted to keep my emotions in check.  I...I was dying. There it was, right there. The confirmation that my time was up.

    I could barely believe it.  Yesterday morning I was ready to accept this happening any day...but now after being shown what was truly possible with life I didn't want it to happen..  In its own way, this was worse than the Pit. At least there I could have run away or tried fighting back! It wouldn't have saved me, but that feeling of resistance was a small, if important, comfort.

    But sickness...I couldn't get around that.

    “Please!” I was whining, but I could barely help it.  “You must want something! I...I'll do anything!”

    I reached my hooves forward to his, only for him to pull them back in disgust and scowl.

    “Get off, you irradiated little shit!” he screamed, moving away from me and zipping his bag closed.  He made to turn away, before stopping and looking back, a different glow in his eyes as he looked up.

    “Actually...anything, you say?”

    I didn't like his tone.  Not one bit. But I still nodded.

    “Well, how'd you like to earn your healing?”

    I hardly had a choice.  I nodded again.

    I walked away from his booth in a fearful mindset.

    I had stolen before, but I wasn't sure if I could do this.  I had stolen to survive before, but this was taking somepony else's property for another pony's gain.

    But really...wasn't this stealing to survive too?

    He had asked me to knock out his competitor across the hall.  An earth pony buck who sold a couple of illegally hidden medical items to some slaves for lower prices...thus taking business away from the healer himself.  The healer (I really had to learn to get the names of the ponies I dealt with) had said he'd give me one medical item for every two items I stole from his competitor.  I had no idea how that would be possible. The earth pony looked hard; tall and strong with an equally big guard sitting watchfully nearby. Clearly he was confident...I could see the items all laid out on his table.  Bits of rags, bandages, small bottles of dirty water and oatmeal stored in plastic tubs from past dinners. He even had a thick brown sketchbook that looked a lot like my...

    ...oh sweet Celestia!

    I ignored the pains of my protesting body as I full out galloped to his stall so fast that his bodyguard snapped up, ready to defend his charge.  I didn't care, I ducked around him and grabbed the journal in my hooves, hugging it tight. It was mine! I recognised the feel, the size, and even the smell.  As fast as I had it in my hooves, it left me as the bodyguard's magic yanked it from my grasp roughly and held it above me. The merchant, seemingly not having been ruffled at all, rounded with a sly grin and approached.  Tossing his braided grey mane, he leaned on the counter to look down at me. He spoke with a high voice, his accent similar to Number Six, if a little more flighty.

    “Well well well...eager for that little bit of merchandise there, aren't ya laddie?”

    “It's mine!  It was stolen from me!  I just want it back, please...”

    Somehow I doubted my bargaining was going to work, but what was the harm in asking?

    One look at the bodyguard reminded me to never ask myself that question again.

    The merchant took the journal from his bodyguard, balancing it in one front arm as he leaned on the counter and flipped the pages with a hoof.  He glanced, but his eyes never left mine. Immediately, I realised just how shrewd this pony was to have carved out such an inventory as a slave in Fillydelphia and somehow managed to bribe enough guards to look the other way.  Despite that, the scars and scabs across his body indicated even that didn't help him avoid the punishing work details.
   
    “So y'say this is yours, little lad,” he murmured, before chuckling to himself and continuing, “well I'm afraid I don't see yer name on it, my boy.  I got this from some fine ponies who took some quality merchandise off me in exchange for the fine item I hold here and a few caps for my oh-so-loyal guards at the entrance there.”

    Fine ponies.  Yeah, right.

    I let my eyes glance to Red Eye's guards.  Almost to my amazement they were looking over questioningly until the merchant shook his head.  They relaxed. Great Goddesses...how many pockets was this slave in?  The guards didn't just overlook him, they actively helped him flourish.  I wondered what their cut was...

    “Now you want this...hmm...piece returned, do you, laddie?”

    I was really beginning to hate that accent. It was like every word he spoke was condescending.

    “Yes, yes please!” There was no sense in hiding it, he clearly had me judged before I even spoke a word.

    “Then let us do business, lad.  Me name's Sooty Morass, what about yourself?  Shackles?”

    He managed to sneer and laugh at once as he patted my brow with a hoof.  Urgh...even slaves looked down on me now. Sometimes I really wished I could hide that damned cutie mark.  But this was the pony the gang had mentioned! So this was definitely the right place, my journal hadn't gone to anypony else first.  His bodyguard snorted with him, but maintained a watch on the merchandise while Sooty Morass dealt with me.

    “Murky Number Seven...” I muttered, looking to the side.

    “Well, lil' Murky,” he began, flicking my journal from hoof to hoof almost hypnotically, “for a lovely bound book with thick good quality paper pages filled with all sorts of...interesting pictures of mares for a good buck's enjoyment...”

    Oh come on!  Those weren't for others!

    “...I'd have to say we'd be looking at requiring something to produce more enjoyment.  Any chems or even certain medical supplies like Med-X. Normally I'd say about three doses or so.  But for you laddie? Ten.”

    What!?

    “Ten!?” I almost screamed it, before choking on my own words.  Almost degradingly, I felt him slapping my back to help me with my coughing.  It felt like I was about to cough out my own ragged and bloody windpipe soon.

    “Well you see, son,” he began, lowering himself down to my level, “I'll give you one bit of information about this world.  Nothing is free. Not us, we're slaves, laddie. Not trade, it's a ruthless market and we're all out for ourselves. Last of all...not information.  I'm being all nice and telling you this because I know you ain't gonna be around much longer, are you?”

    He grinned wickedly as he saw the shocked look on my face.  His voice lowered again, becoming airy and dry.

    “Yeeees...you think I didn't spot you over by ol' Artery over there?  I don't need to be a medical trained unicorn to spot an irradiated little pony on his last legs.  So I know you need them there medical supplies more than anypony. As such, I can afford to raise my price because I know no matter what happens...you're going to try and do it for me, ain't you laddie?”

    I gulped.  He was right.  Anypony who knew the position I was in would realise they had me over a figurative barrel when it came to haggling a price.

    “Oh and also...” he continued as he rose up and turned away, picking up a few bits of what looked like arcane gem circuitry. “I know you aren't here just for your own little book, eh lad?”

    He knew about Wicked Slit?  How?

    Then it occurred to me.  Those two idiots on the enclosure gate were in his pay to find out in advance for him...oh, that sneaky rat!

    “Fifteen, Murky,” he finished, “fifteen for the parts and the book together.  Put that unicorn out of his supply and you'll find me a very able trader. Then we can negotiate your next job for me...perhaps you might like to earn your survival day to day, eh?”

    If I took his offer, I wouldn't just be solving one thing, I'd be putting myself in for a whole new level of control from other ponies above even Master Red Eye!  He'd hold my very life in his hooves by controlling the substances I needed to survive in small doses.

    “I...I'll think on it...”

    “Don't think too long,” he sneered, “wouldn't want you to...expire...would we?”

    I heard his chuckling even as I wandered away from his booth in defeat.

    I lay between two slaves in the terminal enclosure.  They were asleep, twitching as nightmares no doubt interrupted their brief rest.  Both had come back from their work shift, backs raw from whips and choking on what I could only guess was either smog or dust from the mines.  They had been too tired to notice my smell or sickness before collapsing beside me.

    Meanwhile, I was deep in thought.

    I sat with the parchment, my charcoal sketching on my makeshift checklist.

    My journal sat at the top.  My main goal, provided I could stay alive, was still to regain it.  To have it sitting mere feet away beside Morass was loathsome to think about.  It was not directly attainable right now. I needed to think outside the box.

    I crossed out Wicked Slit's knife.  I had already spoken to her and relayed the message.  Instead, I added a small magic gem to represent the parts I needed to get for her.  Without them, I was due for nothing other than a bloody demonstration to the other slaves.

    I added a syringe.  That was for Sooty Morass and his will for me to acquire chems from the unicorn healer.  Briefly I wondered why he couldn't deal with it himself. It wasn't like the guards were going to stop him.  If anything, they protected him. It had to be some sort of unofficial ruleset from Red Eye on how a slave market could run without becoming a nuisance to him.

    A small magic potion was drawn below it...to steal Morass' smaller medical supply for the unicorn, to monopolise the market in his favour for healing.  Contrary to what the unicorn said, I doubted it would put Sooty Morass out of business, but it would assure the unicorn's rise within the slave ranks and pecking orders.

    I added the head of a ganger.  Whatever happened, I still needed to figure out how to evade their attentions tonight.  Perhaps if I could find another slave master or get transferred to this terminal building?

    Finally, I added the symbol I knew was that of magical radiation.  A poison that was slowly taking my life. I needed to survive.

    As I looked at the growing list of jobs and tasks before me, I had a sense of impossibility.  Some of them countermanded the others. Without Morass, I would get killed by Slit. But without Artery I would die anyway!

    I wanted to run away.  I wanted to hide. But it wouldn't help any more.  Nopony would want to help me and I had nothing of my own to exchange other than a broken radio that wouldn't cover the costs.
   
    I...I didn't know what to do.  I clutched the radio under my jerkin, holding it tightly down...but only the thick and full voice of Sapphire Shores greeted me.  Almost on cue I felt my eyes watering. I closed them, tucking into a small ball as best I could to just try and escape it all. Perhaps I could find something painless...just take the easy way—

    “Haha!  Who'd have thought they'd miss our shift, eh, Noose?”

    “They didn't 'miss' our shift, Lemon, you idiot,” I heard the mare reply, “we got rotated onto a different master for tomorrow who doesn't need us right now, you think Filly ever gives a proper break?  We'll be worked to the bone anyway.”

    “Same difference,” he snapped back, “means we get to come back here and see about some more trading for a few hours.”

    I looked up to see the final nail in the coffin.  The gang marched into the enclosure loudly and proudly.  Behind them I could see Pike and Cosh cowering away.

    Well...that was it then.  All I needed was Wicked Slit to appear and then it'd be a full house against little Murky Number Seven.  These slaves didn't even like each other, never mind lonely little...

    Wait.

    An onrush of sudden hope blossomed in my mind as the pieces fell together.  It wasn't perfect but...but it was something!

    I got to my hooves, tucking the parchment carefully beneath my jerkin. If nopony else was going to help me, I’d have to get on with helping myself!

    “Oooh look who it is, everypony!”

    The gang stopped in their tracks after intimidating a smaller slave merchant into giving up some month old oatmeal for a few bits of scrap metal to look at my mangy and weakened self trotting up.  Briefly I realised that if they smelled the sewage stink about me they'd be informed very readily about who was spying on them earlier.

    Well, best not give them a chance to get their bullying started.

    “I've got a deal for you.”

    The silence that followed seemed to last about a year.  I wasn't sure what shocked them more, the fact that anypony had approached to ask them about it...or that it was me.  My wondering was answered promptly, as the trio collapsed to the ground in laughter loud and raucous enough to wake every slave in the terminal waiting area.

    “I'm serious!”

    “Oh, boys, he's serious!”

    “What does he want?  He want to bargain for his little hidey hole?  Too late!”

    This wasn't getting anywhere, I decided to play my trump card.

    “I can get you chems.”

    Their demeanour changed almost immediately, the two bucks perked their ears as the word triggered an instinctual reaction.  Mentally, I leapt with joy that my wild shot in the dark seemed to be right on the money. Okay Murky, hurdle one crossed. Time for the meat of the issue.

    “I know where to get them...help me and I'll tell you.”

    That didn't go down well.  The mare particularly stayed right where she was without so much as a twitch in her eye.  I guessed she perhaps hadn't partaken, not good if she was the de-facto leader of their little gang.

    “You're playing a dangerous game, runt...”

    Her voice was low, ignoring the glances of the two bucks...if I could just get them talking.

    That was I could even keep myself talking...I felt like I was about to go rigid and fall over.  These were the gangers who promised to kill me, after all!  Noose was right, I was playing with fire by even coming this close to talk to them.  She seemed intent on reinforcing the fact, advancing close enough that I had to lower my hind quarters to give my head enough range to look up at her.  I was trembling, I knew it...but that was normal for them...right?

    “So what do you want, runt?”

    Right...here we go.  I couldn't give out my entire plan or it'd all fall apart.  If the gang knew then they'd be able to pick out every problem with it immediately to benefit themselves.

    “G-get me some t-too...I can't get them myself.”

    “And what's to stop us just taking the lot for ourselves?”

    I wasn't wanting them to spot that little fact, guess it was too much to hope for.  I really didn't want them figuring out the entire story...especially because it sort of swung more in my favour than theirs in the end.

    “Because I'm...uh...I'm on a job for somepony,” I said, stammering over my words enough to make me mentally kick myself for being an awful liar, “if I get some of it back I can...I can get better deals with Sooty for you!”

    Okay...technically true, maybe.  Perhaps once he had no real competition he'd lower his trade prices?

    Also, Princess Celestia might descend from on high and whisk me off to my marriage with the Stable Dweller in Canterlot Castle.

    Noose narrowed her eyes, shook out her mane and looked back at her two comrades.  Their eyes betrayed a fervent wish for chems, to add some spice to their hellish life in Fillydelphia.  Eventually Noose sighed and sank her head.

    “Fine,” she said, deadpan delivery very much intact, “but this isn't a 'deal,' runt.  We see something we want or prefer...your loss.”

    My heart leapt, perhaps this had a chance after all!

    “Oh and runt?”

    I froze on the spot.

    “Don't think you're off the hook.”

    Her face came right down level to me.  I bit my lip, trembling so hard I feared I might shake a tooth loose.

    “Your little hidey hole is gone, runt.  Y'see...we got tired of you being all cosy in there.  Not when we’re freezing our asses off outside. More to the point, we still remember that you bucked one of us in the face...we don't let that shit go easily.  You listening?”

    I nodded a little.

    Her hoof struck me across the face hard enough to cause the bad tooth from yesterday to come loose again.  I yelped loudly enough from the pain that everypony in the area stared for a second.

    “I said...you listening!?”

    “YES!”

    “Who's in charge of this little thing then?”

    “Y-you...”

    The hoof struck again, the other side.  I felt the tooth wrench slightly further as I fell to the ground.

    “Don't forget it.  Love taps, is all they were.  When we're done with you...you'll wish that we just taunted you like before.  Fuckin' runt...”

    She wandered off to join the bucks.  Teary eyed, I got to my hooves unsteadily, trying to avoid coughing up more blood as I held a hoof to the loose tooth.  Of course I couldn't lead this...I was the slave at the bottom. They would lead...I would follow.

    Just like always.

    I explained my plan to them.  They were not attentive listeners and I had an uneasy sense of them just watching to look for loopholes in it.  We sat in the baggage exchange of the terminal, a good thirty feet from the slave market. I knew Sooty had ears everywhere, I couldn't take any chances.

    I nursed my head as I sat with my back to the way out.  If they made a hint of a move...I was gone. I didn't like being so close and alone with these three, but right now they were my only hope.

    That thought alone scared me to the core.  Being forced to deal not just with one devil, Sooty...but three demons too.

    “The medical unicorn, Artery, has the drugs.”

    The two bucks seemed agitated at the mere mention.  I sincerely hoped they wouldn't just go for them instantly.  Lemon in particular seemed to have a nervous twitch...I wondered if he was fighting addiction to something.

    “I...I need to get the drugs out from him to trade with Sooty.  If you three distract him...cause some disturbance? I think I can sneak his pack away from him and take what we need.”

    Noose stared hard at me.  She didn't like the plan, that was obvious.  I could tell what she was thinking. 'Why not just take it?'

    “We can't just take it openly,” I spoke carefully, “because Sooty Morass is watching and he wants it done quietly...I think.  The guards are there anyway.”

    Noose didn't relax at all.  Her stare was beginning to make me uneasy.

    “So...um...if we were spotted then we'd all be thrown in the Parasprite Pits or...something.”

    “Runt, I assure you that if you mess this up for us, I will ensure that a parasprite swarm would be the least of your worries.”

    Her voice was cold.  For the first time I began to grasp the weight of this situation...this wasn't just them bullying me or seeing me as a target any more.  This was a gang member making a promise.

    “I won't!” My voice was higher pitched as fear ate at my confidence to speak.

    I couldn't falter...I needed that journal and medicine!

    “So when I have it, we'll take what he wants and then sneak it over to him in a bag.  Then he'll...he'll give us stuff.”

    “What stuff?”

    Oh come on!  Enough with the questions!  I really didn't want them to know so much...given the last part of my plan.

    The one that relied on me betraying them.

    By my standards, this was pretty inspired.  I would take all that Sooty wanted, but also take five Radaways and as many magical healing potions as I could manage.  Artery had claimed that I would need magic to repair myself, but I figured that if I took enough healing, it'd restore me to a point where I'd at least live...right?

    That was how it worked, right?  More healing was good...it had to be. I didn't want to think about the alternative. At the very least it had to buy me time.

    But for the gang, that was the next part.  After Sooty got me everything I wanted from him, I would also give some of the stolen syringes to them as their payment in chems and immediately get back to the FunFarm after delivering the parts to Wicked Slit.  Once there, simply tip off Whiplash about the gang having contraband chems and they'd no longer be around the FunFarm to hurt me!

    Sooty got what he wanted.  I got my journal and life. Wicked Slit got her parts.

    Of course, this meant I was going to be effectively killing three ponies by turning them in.  The thought lingered in my mind, no doubt ready to crop up in guilt later. But at this point, surrounded by self-admitted to-be murderers, I realised it was them or me.  Artery would lose his business, but perhaps it would make him rethink how he used his magic?

    “What.  Stuff. Runt?”

    My thoughts snapped back to the present.

    “Chems!” I screamed.  “I said I'd get chems for you and I will!”

    The panic in my voice was evident.  There were so many ways this could go horribly wrong for me, especially the rogue element of these three gangers.  I couldn't tell them how to distract Artery. I couldn't guess what they'd do when they saw the prizes. To them, gaining that entire sack might be worth more than anything Sooty could do for them.  My weak assurances wouldn't hold long. It dawned on me how quickly I'd have to get that sack to Sooty and get my own share before the gang finished and moved to claim their prize.

    I could see it in her eyes. She had no intent of me getting anything at the end of this.

    They were using me.  Just like Whiplash was, just like Wicked Slit was, just like Artery and Sooty Morass were too.

    But then, I was a born slave, wasn't that my role in life?  Did my cutie mark mean everypony got to use me how they wanted?  Even other slaves?

    Noose turned without a word and moved off. Negotiations were done then I guess.

    “Just be ready, runt.  We do this our way. This fails, you're coming down with us.”

    'Their way' turned out to be pretty much what I expected.

    I watched Noose wander up to a group of rough looking slaves.  Given their ruined clothing, I presumed they had used to be caravan guards.  She had no subtle notion to her approach in the slightest as she saw the guards glance up at her.  Gangs and caravan groups did not get along very well in the wasteland. More than once a slave transfer caravan including me had been attacked by gangs.

    “Hey boys, lose any good caravans recently?” Her voice was jovial, taunting and just as despicable as ever when she spoke to me.  I could see Lemon and his buddy wandering around the long way to sneak up behind the guards.

    “Are you wanting your head cracked on this concrete, mare?”

    The lead caravanner stood.  He was over a head taller than Noose with a shotgun for a cutie mark.  Boy...didn't that bode well.

    If Noose cared, she didn't show it.  Pretending to back off by turning away, she launched a full buck without any warning aimed for the caravaneer's throat.  Her legs moved fast enough to blur as she made the cheap shot and the foe collapsed while gasping for breath from his crushed windpipe.

    Very quickly I became significantly more afraid of Noose than ever before.  I watched as the two bucks ambushed the caravan guards who were still getting to their hooves.  In a flurry of hooves, screaming, cursing, and splattered blood on the concrete floor, I witnessed the three-on-three brawl break out as more gangers and caravan guards from across the room rushed to join in.  I saw Lemon floored by a unicorn hurling a fragment of concrete, while another stallion choked out a gang member with his front hooves. Sheer brutality and senseless beating between both parties descended into a frenzy of pent up aggression and simple minded violence.

    After Number Six, I thought I'd get used to seeing this sort of thing; but as I witnessed wooden fragments trying to stab and the sickening sight of Noose stomping a hoof onto the back of a badly hurt mare's head forced me to turn away in disgust.

    I was hidden at the side of the room, taking shelter in a small space of the boarded up shop.  I could fit between the boards to hide in the shop beside Artery's one. But until he looked away or moved I couldn't do anything.

    He was indeed looking at the brawl, but hadn't moved away from his supplies yet.  Clearly, he was made of sterner stuff than I. All I wanted to do was creep into the shop and hide away from the violence now raging around.  Even not looking, I could still pick out screams, thuds and sickening crunches every so often. The entire centre of the waiting area was one giant brawl now.  Slaves rushed away in all directions, fearful of more riots. I could hear guards screaming for order to be restored. Gunfire sounded in the air as warning shots were fired into the hard ceiling.  I didn't have much time, I’d have to go now, and just hope Artery didn’t look thius way.

    Creeping out of the shop door, I hugged the wall edge of the waiting area as I cautiously approached his shop from the side.  The front desk was passable at both sides, while Artery himself stood on the far side. I could get in and out, but if he did anything to turn, I would be seen immediately.

    I froze as I approached it. I wasn't guilty in this spot, just a little buck hiding away from the fighting.  But if I moved further it would be obvious. I fought with my fear to allow me to try, to try and save my own life!

    Dare or falter, Murk...dare or falter...

    I saw Artery move forward.  He was going for an injured pony who was screaming for his help and offering his stock of caps!

    Dare!

    I rushed forward, my little hooves almost silent on the ground as I ducked in behind the front stand of his makeshift shop.  The big saddlebag was sitting there! Tugging it open with my mouth, the Radaways and potions spilled out alongside boxes of chems.  Most of them I didn't even recognise or want to try. I couldn't read their labels to check.

    But I could count.

    Oh...that...

    There were only fifteen medical elements in the entire saddlebag.  Five Radaways, five potions and five boxes containing a few doses of chems each.

    He'd known.  He'd damn well known the entire time.  Sooty never intended to save me at all.

    A scuffing sound came to my ears over the screaming and shouts of the guards striking and controlling slaves. Looking up, I hastily ducked back behind the shop’s counter. Artery returning with his patient in tow!

    I no longer had time to think.  I grabbed the entire saddlebag, stuffing everything back inside it before simply charging back out of the shop the way I had come in.  For once, my luck held as Artery was focussed on his patient to pull them telekinetically to his shop. I ran back toward the boarded up shop before using the cover of de-cushioned seats to crawl my way out of the area.

    Behind me, I heard the screaming of Artery.  I had gotten away clean. For once, no overly close calls.  No chases. No being spotted. An elation passed me. I had just stolen a whole ton of medical supplies!  Go...me?

    Moving out of the waiting room, I bucked open a shaky cupboard door and hid inside.

    Radaway and healing potions!  The two things that would save my life, right here in my hooves!  No more sickness, no more rad fevers and aching hooves.

    But yet...I couldn't.  If I didn't get those parts, then Wicked Slit would make sure my newfound health was very short indeed.  Not to mention my journal. After yesterday, it meant more to me than ever before. It was the first thing I had ever been truly creative with, the first thing that had let me show resistance to my masters!

    I couldn't abandon it.  Or the parts.

    I needed a plan, but suddenly resources were so much more limited, and I had to go now before the gang returned from their brawl to seek chems and their own healing from the violence, too.

    Wrapping the saddlebag in an old cloth from the cupboard, hoping Artery would miss that it was his, I moved out again.  My limp returned, the fast rush having aggravated the joint. Biting back the pain, I took solace in knowing that if all worked out, it wouldn't bother me for much longer.

    With the adrenaline lowering, the sickness returned like a crushing wave.  I had to hang back for a minute as my vision swam and my centre of balance lost its way entirely as I fell against a wall of the side corridor in the terminal.  Breathing heavily, my breath thin and airy, I stumbled on, sweating and shivering.

    Not far now...not far now till I would be better...

    My lungs burned.

    This was cutting it close...it really was.

    By the time I reached Sooty Morass, I could barely carry the saddlebag.  I could feel it tugging at my jerkin the whole way. Trotting slow enough to avoid attention had been one of the longest walks of my life and I had to keep stopping to pull my jerkin tighter around me.  Fears played in my head...if I was this sick, what if I never even woke up tomorrow to enjoy the journal that I had reclaimed? Was it too late to heal it? Could the Radaway get rid of the magical radiation that infected my body so much for so long?

    Dumping the saddlebag down before the sly merchant, I knelt down to merely catch my breath before tipping the saddlebag out behind his counter, hidden from Artery.  The medical unicorn was arguing with the guards, but I could only presume Sooty had paid them off.

    “So, little laddie,” he began, “seems you held up your end of the bargain.  Now I may be a ruthless and sly old devil, but I always honour a deal. You don't stay a merchant long if ye don't.”

    I looked up at him pleadingly, while using a hoof to push my jerkin back into position carefully, dumping that saddlebag had almost made it ride up.

    “Please...I need this medicine now,” my voice was barely a whisper as my throat fought to move without pain. “I...I can feel it getting worse.”

    “Well of course it would, exertion won't help your sickness,” he sneered, counting the materials. “And I can only presume that you have exerted yourself a fair amount while worrying a lot.  Now...”

    He nodded in approval at my efforts, before tapping a hoof on the counter.

    “What say you and I discuss your employment, lad?”

    That grin could have launched a dozen balefire missiles with the sheer hate it brought up.  Here he was, looking at a dying pony and all he could think of was how he could exploit him further for his own ends.  I had met horrible ponies and seen the work of tyrants like Master Red Eye, but this was a whole new and personal level of malice.

    “I...if I agree, can I have some medicine now?  Please, I don't think I'll live past tonight.”

    It was begging, but I had nothing else to bargain with.  A ruined hoofmachine thingymajig wouldn't be worth anything, right?

    “Oh now, Murky lad.  Don't go getting eager now, we've yet to find out what you can do for me before I give you something.  Far as I see it, you've got to earn your medicine, not to just take it then not come back, see?”

    He had me trapped.

    I agreed.

    He explained his job.  It was quite simple really, but deceptively important.  I would have to carry bribes to various individuals, both slaver and labourer.  Scrap workers to pocket goods, guards to look the other way for said goods, and of course, deliver merchandise.  He would pay one medicine per job, just enough to keep me alive from day to day. That was my only payment to work as his little courier.

    My life was entirely in Sooty Morass' hooves now.  A slave to a slave.

    “Now in accordance with our deal, I'll present to you the things you did earn from putting me competition out of business, lad.”

    He had continued talking even as I sat in the back of his shop, listening to the guards restoring order.  The trio of gangers would be along any moment, I could guess. I hadn't cared. I simply sat on my rump, a good little slave awaiting Morass' command or my time to return to the FunFarm for a shift.  I wondered if Morass could get me to stay here with him rather than at the FunFarm with the gang...

    Wait...the things I earned!

    Even as I looked up from my hooves, he let both my journal and the arcane component drop from his mouth in front of me.  I didn't hold back, taking the journal in both front hooves and hugging it tightly. I felt my eyes water.

    Sooty left me alone to return to his merchant front, no doubt preparing to argue with Artery when the unicorn noticed Sooty's sudden increase in merchandise.  He said I was to be sent out at night to take a bribe to a guard near the gate who might be able to hook him up with a small supply of Apple Sugar Bombs from the slaver kitchens.  Until then I was just to stay quiet and hidden in the back of his shop unit, and be as invisible as I could be to his operations until called.

    Right now at least, I didn't mind that. I had something to look at.

    I sat the arcane circuit board to the side, behind the ancient ceramic stove I was leaning against. Old Equestria must have been wonderful to have such home cooking even in an skyport lounge.

    I tuned out the slaves crying out in pain as Artery helped them with his magic...he hadn't ever learned anaesthetic spells.

    I laid the journal before me and slowly...oh...so...slowly...opened it to the page I knew.

    ...

    “...hi, Mom.”

    Reaching over for just a second, I crossed off the checklist image of my journal.  I didn't have a real home, but looking now at her before me, drawn by my imagination and memory, I felt like I had come home to something.  Even as tears dropped on the page, I managed to smile a little as I saw her comforting gaze.

    I paused.

    She was just a drawing...but seeing this, I remembered.

    I remembered the feeling.  To have shaken off my Master, to ignore Red Eye's demands and try to stay inside and draw this when they were demanding me to leave.

    I had taken my own path.

    Looking from the beautifully comforting face of my mother to the back of Sooty Morass, I knew that there was no way he was going to keep me under his hoof like this.

    I was getting out of here.  I was going to live on my own terms.

    “Thanks...Mom.  Glad you're back.”

    My plan was not entirely advanced.  There was little I could really do here but simply attempt to steal the medical supplies from behind Morass' back and then hoof it for the exit before finding a way to blend in outside.  Morass wouldn't come chasing me all the way to the FunFarm across Fillydelphia. Even he didn't have that influence.

    Nope.  It wasn't too fancy a plan, but it was surrounded in dangers.  From Morass and his bodyguard to the guards at the exit. If ponies tried to grab me, they could stop me.  Or worse, they might even tear off my jerkin. The device and everything else would be lost, among other consequences too.  I pulled it as tight as the frayed cord around my torso would go, feeling the radio, parchment, journal, and circuit board stuffed inside.  I was going to use the saddlebag I'd brought in to leave with the surplus items Morass had left behind his counter, but even so, the amount stuffed in my jerkin felt unsteady and cumbersome.  I was not going to risk it being anywhere else, however, they were all too important.

    Even as I readied up quietly, I felt another wave of nausea wash across me.  Coughing loudly, I stuffed my mouth with a hoof as I attempted to stop myself from drawing too much attention.  Stomach retching from the harsh coughing, vision hazy from the pain and exhaustion, I lay back for a good time simply trying to get my strength back.  I couldn't do this, not physically. My limbs were too weak and my injured one was only getting worse. I couldn't run on a hoof that was mildly disjointed!  If only I could dull the pain...

    My eyes fell to the syringes around the bag left by Morass.

    I didn't know which one was...what were they called?  Med-X? There were a few styles. One with two little pipes to send extra drugs in with it, one thin and simple, one constructed out of a bottle with a greyish liquid in it.

    In my condition...to take the wrong one would probably kill me through system overload.

    The one with two feeds looked tempting...it was fancy.  Pain removal was fancy wasn't it? The simple one would be just some chem drug, right?  I rolled the third one, the bottle over. It had a picture of a broken hoof...then a cured one.  Aha! That was just what I needed, right?

    I glanced around before gently putting the bottle up against my injured hoof, the needle pointing at it.

    Wait a minute...I remembered last night, listening to the DJ.  He had been warning about a drug made from the grey blood of a hydra beast.  I glanced down at the bottle before almost kicking it away in shock and disgust.  My face clenched as the thought of what I had almost done slammed home.

    No chances.

    I took the simple one.  The simpler the better...simpler couldn't kill as easily, I assumed.  Maybe it was the right one. With a little whine, I plunged the needle in and hoofed the plunger. And then I waited...

    ...okay, I didn’t feel very much change going on.  I didn't feel any—

“Wooooooah booooy...theeeeere we go…”

    My vision swam as I wobbled and then fell to the side, my everything utterly numb.  A bliss of relief crept across me, as my hoof stopped aching and my lungs dulled off entirely.  Sleep felt tempting as the waves of pain receded from my body. Slowly, I began to feel a return of control to my limbs after a minute or so, but in my mind I felt so different.  I felt...nice. Like all the pain of the world had just disappeared. If only I had more of this stuff to take...

    As I waited for my limbs to regain enough feeling (and to be frank, my mind to stop thinking ‘pretty lights, wheeee…’ at the ceiling) I began to think about my plan a little.  Perhaps I was thinking about all of this wrong, trying to take a ton of medical supplies with me. If I was going to be waiting to regain the ability to move, perhaps I could sneak a Radaway and a healing potion to get ahead of the game...in case anything went wrong?

    Couldn't hurt.  Not that I'd feel it right now anyway!  Hah!

    I realised that I had a smile plastered on my face when I saw my reflection in a metal oven door opposite me.  Wow...it even made me smile! Med-X! Best. Drug. Ever!

    Whilst enjoying the high of a painkiller, I lay back, hiding around the back of the oven from Morass, sipping a Radaway while glancing at my mother's picture.  It made me smile for real, even through the haze of medically induced relief from life.

    That was a feeling I'd always—

    “URGH!”

    I almost sprayed the Radaway right over my journal as I sickeningly swallowed the horrid liquid.  It tasted like orange paint!  The cover featured a little foal enjoying it with a straw, smiling like a little puppy.  I seriously questioned the taste and sanity of any pony who enjoyed this stuff.  It'd take clinical craziness to see this as anything but just disgusting.

    Sighing, I kept drinking.  All things considered, I had no right to complain.  I watched Morass from behind. Clearly he believed me to be a broken in worker given that he was paying me little heed.

    I'd show him.  I'd show them all.  I was going to get out!

Just...just as soon as the wallpaper stopped dancing.

    When the time came, I didn't hesitate.

    For once, I didn't falter.  I didn't hold back or restrict myself.  I couldn't feel the pain any more. I didn't feel as sick after a Radaway and a healing potion.  They'd taken the edge off things, I knew I'd need more to actually combat the sickness. But I had to go suddenly. Morass was coming back from the front to inspect, so I had gone for it.

    I barrelled past him, ducking to one side and grabbing the saddlebag in my mouth as I darted out into the waiting area.  Slaves looked up at the commotion, and I saw the guards look ready to repel another riot. The entire place was already on high alert, even as ponies lay on the ground injured still from earlier.  I felt my jerkin bounce about a little from all the items stuffed tightly in it, including one healing potion for quicker access.

    “Get back here, you little thief!  Chisel Hoof! Get 'em!”

    Morass bellowed behind me, sending his bodyguard to chase me down.  Finally able to gallop properly, I put my head down and pushed harder, ducking under chair platforms to avoid the huge bodyguard with his longer strides.  I felt his mouth try to grab my tail even as I wriggled between two rows of seating, the ensuing tug pulling a few strands of hair out with a horrid snap, but with Med-X still dulling some of my senses, the pain didn’t register.

    The bodyguard snarled, shoving chairs away in his frustration at missing me, as I ran between them or over them. My hooves clattered and slipped; I weaved this way and that; I threw myself around pillars before making a mad gallop straight for the exit the moment I heard him trip on a low waiting lounge table.

    “Dammit! Guards! Stop him!”

    Up ahead, there were two rows of chairs on either side of the pillars that went all the way to the exit.  I could see the two guards already galloping towards me from ahead. I hadn't anticipated them openly helping Morass like this!

    Hurdling the chairs with a quick hop, skip, and jump apiece, I kept ahead of the bodyguard, but the guards were clever. They backed off a little, spreading out to block my route.

    “Halt! Stay where you are!”

There was only one hope to make it by them. I saw a huge pile of mangled chairs thrown together in the waiting area near a barred window.  Presumably the megaspell shockwave had blasted them away from the large open area near it. Two choices...jump the window and fall, or hide in the chairs.

    As much as the Med-X dulled pain, I knew leaping from two stories up with a damaged hoof would be asking far too much of it, and my sanity.  I dove into the pile of chairs, wriggling in among the twisted metal and sharp edges as only a small pony like me could. The bodyguard and two slavers arrived and just stared at it, before starting to hurl wrecks off of the pile.  I could hear the other slaves milling about in fear or confusion while Morass was arguing with Artery over what I had really stolen. Somehow, I doubted I would have many friends around here after this.

    I crept through the wreckage of the chairs, invisible to the guards tugging on them frantically.  I could hear them screaming for me to come out and be punished. As terrified as I was, I had to agree to the snarky part of my mind that they were not using the most persuasive argument to convince me.  Fighting down the overwhelming urge to curl up and shiver, I kept creeping. I had to get out, I had to get my Mom out, too, even if it was just my drawing!  

Sneaking through the chairs, I noticed an error on their part.  They were all on one side of the pile, assuming I was just hiding.

    Quietly, I pulled myself from the opposite side, silently praying no watching slave would give me away.  Cautiously, I trotted off. The guards were still pulling at the pile! They hadn't even looked up as I began to canter and then gallop again, looking behind me.  Hah! I felt an elation as I saw them get smaller and smaller, not noticing me. What idiot wouldn't watch everything around them?

    I promptly felt myself run into something with a dull thud.

    Well, that answered that question.

    It hadn't hurt, but the impact had knocked me over, spraying the chems across the floor.  In a panic I reached out to reclaim them before seeing what I had hit. My mood dropped like a stone from the top of the terminal control tower.

    “Hi,” sneered Noose, as her two buck companions spread out around me. “Come to give us your prize?  Or just to report for the flank kicking your going to get for trying to betray us?”

    My blood ran cold. No! This wasn't supposed to happen!  I was so close to being out!

    She didn't hesitate either.  Noose had taken a heavy blow to the head during the brawl and blood still matted her mane.  She wanted payment, and she wanted revenge. Her front hoof slammed into the side of my head hard enough to whip my small frame clean around and launch me a good three feet to the side.  Even through the Med-X, I felt that hard as pain lanced through my mouth and jawline. Whimpering and trying to get up, I saw her shadow. Noose raised up on two legs and slammed her front ones home upon my chest.  I couldn't hold it in. I screamed at the top of my voice as I felt ribs take the impact, and a spray of blood come from my mouth. High pitched and raspy, I howled as she beat down on me. Hoof after hoof after hoof.  I went blind in one eye as it blackened and began to swell up. She picked me up to my hooves and bucked me into the wall. The hard concrete re-awoke my sickness as I felt the wind knocked out of me through a rough throat and lungs, only to wail as she kicked out my injured leg.

    “Don't, please Noose!” I pleaded, trying to stand back up, but it was to no avail. “Don't k-kill me!  Don't!”

    I collapsed against the wall, sliding down.  I had been beaten before, but this was different.  She wasn't aiming to knock me around. This was ruthless, with the intent to genuinely hurt me.  I...I wasn't built for this!

    “Please...Noose, I'll do—”

    With a sudden removal of gravity, I was hurled back toward the centre of the entranceway.  Landing on my front, I cried out as my ribs crunched on the floor directly. My legs didn't even bother to stop me.  Without the Med-X, I'd probably have passed out.

    I tried to stand. If I could just reach another healing potion, gulp it quick.  Or another Med-X! Anything! Just enough to give me a boost to run! If...if I could just get away!  My efforts led me to stumble and collapse as every joint shivered and failed me. Gritting my teeth, I sought to crawl, whinnying as my eye pounded with the pain of quick swelling around it.  The feeling of not seeing...oh Goddesses, was it permanent!?

    They weren't willing to allow me to move.  Her hoof descended on my injured leg, putting enough pressure on it to make me howl in pain as she grinned wickedly.  I could see Morass and the guards approaching. He had that look of justification on his face as he looked on me, beaten and bloodied.  I shivered constantly, my body retching from coughing and feeling pain from my legs, ribs and face. I could feel blood running from somewhere on my face again.

    Noose’s friends were approaching, clearly wanting some of the game too.  She only glared at them as she looked down at me, her prize to beat on. As I stared upwards, my tears mixing with blood from stinging wounds flowing around the already swollen parts of my face, I saw the lack of mercy and the cold sadism that drove her.  My chest moved sporadically, my breathing irregular as I struggled to regain breath.

    “Hey!  Noose! He didn't drop many chems, where's the rest?” Lemon seemed intent.

    “Fuck if I know, just wait, we'll get em later.”

    The third buck wandered up to me, looking down.

    “Maybe not...” he grinned, his eyes looking at my jerkin. “He's hiding something, there's lumps.”

    No!  I struggled, pulling my hoof with a wrenching pain from under hers and trying to flail to my hooves.  I received only a half buck for my troubles sending me staggering even as I forced myself to my hooves.  They would get my journal again! And...and...

    “C'mere!  You're hiding my chems!”

    They advanced, I felt them on every side, grabbing, pulling, and trying to get at the things I had hidden beneath my jerkin for so long!

    “GIVE!”

    “No!” I screamed forcibly, lashing out to little avail as my little hooves were batted aside.

    “GET HIM!”

    I felt teeth grab my jerkin and pull, I tried to pull away but the pressure only increased!

    A horrible ripping sound met my ears as I fell forward, the pressure released.  I hit the ground without my jerkin, feeling the concrete across my whole body. Adrenaline overcame the searing pain enough to turn and hobble backwards.  My journal...my radio...the parchment checklist and the arcane circuit all fell on the floor beside the medical equipment and the torn remnants of my jerkin...

    But none of them were looking at them.  Everypony in the entire terminal simply stood and stared at the battered little pony before them who could barely stand up, who was crying with pain as blood from small cuts dripped to the floor.  They didn't even look at his swollen and blinded eye or the bleeding lips.

    They all looked at one thing.  And one thing only.

    “What?”

    “Is...are...”

    Lemon broke the ice proper.

    “What!?  He...he's a fucking pegasus!”

    “Hang on a second, you kept it hidden all that time?”

    I...may not have been honest with everyone.

    As you can see, I'm not an earth pony.  I am indeed a pegasus.

    But believe me when I say...how could I just admit it?  So many slaves in Fillydelphia hate pegasi. Wasteland ponies are bad enough, seeing us as an easy blame for the sky; but in Fillydelphia, that just makes you an east target. Someone to take their frustrations out on. I've been lucky my past masters were content to have any slaves, regardless of what type of pony they were.

    I do not know how it happened.  Perhaps genetically, my mother was related to a pegasus lost in the wastes.  Perhaps my father was one and my mother never told me. Maybe it's just blind chance of long lost genes from two hundred years ago.  One way or another, it happened. I was born with these wings on my sides. More than my size and timidness, they have been the reason that every place I was sent to work as a slave immediately treated me like dirt.  I would be blamed for mistakes that pegasi made before the balefire bombs or for the rumours of them surviving up there happily and ignoring us all. I would receive less food, have my wings prodded or struck by other slaves.  They used to call me ‘flightless.’ Many of them used to make up stories that I had come down from the clouds because my real parents didn't want me anymore. But I swear, this is the honest truth. I am a born wastelander, a born slave.

    My mother told me while I was young a little saying.

    “There's a story behind every pair of wings in the wasteland, Little Murky.”

    Pegasi were so rare that every one of them had a story to tell about the places they had flown to, such as what the world was like above the clouds.  About how they had survived in a world that generally hated them or the things they had done thanks to their unique abilities. Pegasi were incredible, unique, and every single one of them had some sort of tale behind them.

    When I was at the rock farm, I was still very young.  I hadn't yet grown up enough to fly, but once I was developed enough, my wings began flapping.  They had moved and twitched about however they wanted, and I kept imagining that if I could flap them hard enough, then my mother and I could have gone some place safer.  My master had spied them beginning to move and...and he took steps. Steps to ensure his slaves did not leave.

    A blunt mallet in his mouth, he had ordered two other slaves to drag me into his storehouse where an anvil had waited.  He...he didn't want me to fly. Ever.

    I had never recovered.  Damaged while too young, unable to develop properly, they ended up weak, with muscles too withered to lift my own weight or flap properly. The bones in my wings were fragmented and too poorly healed to not have enough strength to withstand the forces required.

A pegasus without the ability to fly. In other words, just a very weak pony with two big targets on his sides to draw attention and malice. To draw hatred he could barely escape from. I’d suffered from it in every camp before Fillydelphia. I knew they would be the worst.

And now they knew, too.

    I didn't have long.  Their confused stares and disbelieving mutterings as the crowd gathered would only distract Noose and Sooty for a short time.  Even as I heard some voices begin to raise, hatred and bile spilled forth with shouts demanding I be brought in to take revenge on.  I knew not everypony in Equestria hated us pegasi, but the slaves, often prone to emotional simplicity and seeking to vent anger, would see me as a common foe.

    I reached down, grabbing a healing potion in my mouth and simply letting the liquid fall down my throat without even swallowing.  The act almost made me choke and vomit it right back out, but the refreshing feeling of my new wounds beginning to close gave me enough strength as I scrambled to pack my things into the fallen saddlebag.  The entire crowd began to move as one, a surge of screaming faces still hopped up on violence wanting to express their anger on one of the race who they crudely believed had abandoned them.

    I could see Noose trying to force her way through.  Sooty Morass's bodyguard was behind her. I only had seconds to get away.  Lemon was still standing beside me, scowling as he attempted to grab me with his front hooves.  Panicking as I heard the stomping of the fanatical slaves gunning for my blood, I lashed out. My back right hoof flicked out just like before, connecting with a...much softer area.  I heard Lemon squeal and felt him fall right off of me.
   
    Throwing the saddlebags over my torso, I immediately galloped for all I was worth.  Ahead of me, whistles blew and warning shots blasted into the air as a line of guards galloped into the terminal building past the scrap wall.  Pike and Cosh dove for cover as the large ponies thundered through. Stuck between the two, I opted to keep going, trusting to my small size compared to the huge crowd behind me.

    Praying silently for safety, I dodged as best I could around them, even diving beneath a guard, shouting out in pain as his battle saddle opened fire right next to my ears.  I scrambled out the back of their line just as the slaves collided behind me into the guards.

    One guard looked at me for just a second before being pulled back into the terminal by the rush of slaves.  Assuming they were rioting, the guards paid me little heed. I stopped for just a second as I glanced back, seeing the rush being barely held in by the guards from charging onto the airfield after me.  All of their eyes were on me, or rather on my torso. I heard shouts, like 'Tear his wings off!' or 'Revenge for the wastes!' A hundred ponies crying for my death…

    Radio or not, hearing that, I felt very alone indeed.

    I galloped off, trying to not cry so much I couldn't see where I was running, as I hunted for someplace to hide. Somewhere. Anywhere.

    I didn't have to travel far.  With adrenaline dropping off quickly, I couldn't go too far.  On instinct, I sought out a place nopony else would ever go normally.

    The Fillydelphia skyport's control tower.

    Old scaffolding had been torn around it from the blast, but to a pony with nothing to lose right now it was an acceptable risk to climb.  I sat on the top, the roof above the control centre watching the expanse of industry and red haze of Fillydelphia around me in all directions.  On the horizon I could see the sunset, blurred and impossible to properly view given it was behind the cloud layers above. Tonight it was just a deeper smudge of orange, but something in me, perhaps driven by my status as a pegasus, just...knew it meant a lot.  That sunset escaped the darkness of the night each day...what lay beyond that horizon?  Could I ever follow it into the unknown?

    Sometimes, it felt like it was calling me to a way out, if only I could follow.

    Funny.  If I were a real pegasus I could have just flown away from here. I was higher than the wall after all. That sunset would be a beacon to call me to freedom.  But now, it played only to my deepest and most impossible wishes.

    I sat under a small tarpaulin that had once been used for observation to hide from the griffon patrols.  I doubted they'd be looking for me, their jobs were more specific and never involved hunting on top of control towers or other high places.  Indeed, most of them flew below the height I was sitting at.

    I was crying.  Of course, why wouldn't I of all ponies be?  My eye had slowly regained sight a little, but everything on that side of my face was still hazy from swelling.

    My journal sat open next to me.  The parchment sketch of the Stable Dweller, Number Six, and the unknown mare was beside it.  The radio was playing. Its ever energetic host spoke of the efforts of heroes all around Equestria, but really, none of it seemed to make a difference any more.

    Word would spread.  A pegasus was in Filly.  Then the witch hunt would begin.

    Not that it mattered.  I had the parts for Wicked Slit, but even now I realised a stupid point I had overlooked.  Like Morass, she had tricked me. The machine would count for three ponies. She never really intended to let me off the hook at all, given I was her fourth allotted replacement.  Everypony could take advantage of me, it seemed. Even when I thought I had been solving things myself.

    I lay down, covering my head with my hooves as I sought to somehow make it all go away.  No more merchants tricking me and withholding medicine until I worked for them. No more sickness eating at my lungs and blood.  No more gangs trying to kill me. No more slavers abusing my life to suit their needs. No more everyone judging me because of some idiots who ran away centuries ago!

    I had perhaps bought myself a few days, but my sickness hadn't gone away, only alleviated a little from the small amounts I'd taken before leaving.  Even then, the healing potions had used most of their potency fixing what Noose had done to me.

    It still hadn’t fixed my tooth though.

    My blood was rising just like in the refuge pit.  Scrambling my hooves over my head in frustration I stood up, pacing back and forth as I tried to think.  I drove myself to just...just think! Think think think! I beat my hoof against my head as I stared out over the city.  I could see the Funfarm, its rollercoaster ruins widely recognisable, as were the giant pink pony balloons above it.  

I could swear each one of the massive laughing faces was looking at me.  That freaky laughing pink mare...I really hoped I could never see her again!  That I'd never see anything again!  Just to leave and go some place it could just be me and my drawings and nopony else ever again!  Who needed others anyway!?

    I sighed, not even finding the energy to stay properly mad.  I was exhausted after two days of running, being beaten, and having the conditions in here aggravating my radiation sickness.  I couldn't move properly. I couldn't even think properly to come up with a curse colourful enough to describe this life. But as I turned from the FunFarm...an idea sprung to mind.  A little thought that I realised had always been in my mind. An inkling that had remained with me all throughout my life but until today had never quite surfaced on how to protect myself from all the pain.

    There...there was a way.

    I trotted forward to the edge, not quite feeling my conscious thoughts in control of my body.  I looked down at the ground thirty feet below.

    ...just one way I could avoid anypony else ever hurting me again. The only way out I could see right now.

    Shaking frantically, I climbed up on to the parapet.  I could feel my breathing getting faster. One hoof raised as I felt my balance waver in the wind.

    I felt my centre of balance adjust, drifting out a little.  The ambience went silent as though waiting for me, other than the rush of wind by my ears.  I fought down the sense of vertigo. Just one little bit of pain more and that'd be it...

    The wind caught my mane and wings, as though trying to remind me of what kind of pony I was.  I ignored it. The wind and the sky had no place for me.

    And in that moment, I felt all the noises gradually turn quiet. All my thoughts began to settle and find peace. It would be so simple...so simple that I began to question myself. Was this right? Would this work?

    Would it...hurt?

    Yet, I was so afraid to go on...

    I leaned out.

    Beep!

    I stumbled, my hooves skittering about as I fell back from the ledge to land solidly on the concrete of the balcony again.  Hot pain lanced through my body as I impacted on my side. In a moment of terror, I hadn’t known which way I was falling, tumbling head over hooves before dropping hard onto the tower again.

Safe.

Panting, eyes wide and staring at the parapet I’d been leaning over, I heard the noise again.

    Beep!

    My radio...the music had stopped.

    I scrambled over, picking it up, almost dropping it as my thoughts caught up with me.

    Replaying it in my mind, I realised what had just happened.I had been about to jump.  Oh...oh Goddesses…

    Like a wash of clarity, the insanity passed. The temptations washed away to leave horror. I’d been so...so zoned out. So detached in my fretting and worry, with my mind racing too fast to keep up with rational thought.

    More than any beating, that felt truly horrifying to have experienced.

    Shivering, I clutched the radio tightly. What in all of Equestria had I been doing?  I had been about to leap from the control tower! I screwed my eyes shut, shivers turning into furious shaking as only now the reality of how events were affecting my mind became clear.  Emotional discovery could go both ways. Learning what choice meant, it seemed, also meant learning of the bad choices available to us.

    My stomach churned at the thought of what I had almost done.  In fact, it did more than churn.

    Dragging my belongings further from that location, gasping for breath after my stomach had been done emptying its pitiful contents, I sat down with the radio. ‘Concentrate on it’, I told myself.. It saved me before, it could do it again!  Perhaps it would be more of the Stable Dweller? I honestly didn't care, I needed something, anything, to stop me thinking about what I'd just come so close to doing.

    On cue, the speaker started up.

    ...ffzzzssshh...
   
    “...uhm...hello?  Oh wait, why am I saying that?  This is a diary thing, isn't it?”

    I blinked, the voice was that of a young sounding buck.  He even sounded a little like me on a good day. Our ages were perhaps similar.

    “Well, what can I say for a first entry?  My dad told me I should keep this up to date. For the record, he says.  Well, I don't quite get what he means by that, but there's no reason I shouldn't, right?  What's the harm it could do? Plus I kinda owe him...he bought me the Stable ticket after all.  If things do go bad, at least I'll be safe underground while Dad should get evacuated with the pegasi.  We'll be safe...”

    This message, it was from before the war! Bewildered, uncertain of what this device was saying, or why it even had this, I found myself captivated, holding the device gently between my hooves as the little speaker played out the apparently voiced diary.

    “So I got sent this thing, right?  Came with the ticket, they said. My PipBuck.  Crazy little device really; pretty cool. I get my radio, audio recording, a little light to brighten up the darkness of the night and it even interfaces with the terminal Dad bought me for my birthday!  Some places don't get them early, but many of them are manufactured right here in Fillydelphia, so I guess they just send them direct because there isn't any shipping. Well, I can say I'm glad for it, this thing saved my life already!”

    You aren't the only one...

    “I was coming back from picking it up, right?  Well, Equestria's not how it used to be. Happiness, joy and understanding, right?  Things are just, well, different these days. Some earth ponies tried to take my ticket on my way home.  Came right out of the alleyway down Old Woodtree Road! I...I mean this thing, it saved my life. S.A.T.S. saved my life tonight, I mean.  Oh dear, I'm all shaky again. Ponies aren't meant to fight, so why do we have to?”

    There was a pause, as though he was considering something.  I could swear I heard a sniff.

    “I just...I want this to stop.  I don't want to go into a Stable knowing that everything out here is going to die.  But it won't happen. My dad tells me it's just all posturing and nopony would ever be so stupid as to do something that would endanger us all.  All the same, why else would he spend almost his entire life savings to get me this ticket? I don't want to know what it feels like to be the last of a generation. If the worst does happen, what will we be left with?  What poor ponies in the future will have to live not seeing the things I have here in the lovely city of Filly? Grass, trees, pure water?”

    I looked around at Fillydelphia and saw the slave driven hell industry and radioactive poison filling the air.

    There were no words to describe the weight of that thought.

    “I...I guess I should wrap this up.  I need to go find a job since I moved here to get the ticket.  Well, bye I guess, to whoever listens to this. Probably me. I can look back and realise how silly I'm being to believe that any of this will actually happen.  Well, my name is Sundial. I'm a unicorn, I guess it's worth saying. Maybe I'll tell this thing how I got my cutie mark or something next time. Till then...I guess.  Bye?”

    “Bye...” I muttered, before wondering exactly why.  I heard the speaker cut, before it switched right back to a song by Sweetie Belle.  A PipBuck then. That was the device’s name. Sundial's PipBuck.

    With a sudden and horrifying realisation, it all slammed home.

    That skeleton...that...that had been...

    I huddled down tightly, hugging the PipBuck for all I was worth while sniffling, and trying to quell the hollow, aching feeling in my stomach.

Sundial...

    My return to the FunFarm was as reluctant as it was inevitable.

    I had returned the parts to Wicked Slit.  Her 'reward' was a week of shifts working on the molten vats.

    My saddlebag had a couple of chems left over.  That might be able to mollify the gang enough to not kill...ah, who was I kidding? They would kill me as soon as look at me now.

    With a little biting, I had torn up the cloth I'd put over the pink and yellow medical saddlebag to make a rough vest for myself to hide my wings.  Only the gang knew at the FunFarm, provided the word didn't get out from other slaves across Fillydelphia. It'd only be a matter of time till Whiplash knew.  If he found out, I was dead.

    Wandering past the mirror, I only merely glanced at it.  I didn't want to look at myself. Yet my eyes were drawn to it, not in the least due to that big silly image of the pink laughing pony sweeping her arm towards the mirror as though encouraging me to look at it again.

    I saw little different, yet for a moment I stood in surprise. My sickness didn’t look quite as bad as before. It wouldn’t last, but, for a moment it felt like some little victory. I’d survived. I’d lived. I didn’t feel overjoyed, but I was alive.

It had been something, but more importantly, it had been done not by somepony else, but by the choices of the pony I looked at now. That little pegasus with sad eyes and a slaver moving up behind him in the mirror.

    My eyes shot wide.

    “If it weren't Wicked Slit I'd sent you to, I'd probably have you up for delaying coming back.  Thankfully for you, I know she's crazy.”

    I squeaked, jumping as I spun and fell into the cold glass of the mirror.  Whiplash had moved with uncharacteristic silence up behind me from out of the mirror’s line of sight.  From the grin on his face, I could imagine he had meant to scare me.

    “Y-yes...master,” I whispered. “She...kinda held me back...”

    “Whatever.  Get back in the enclosure, I have a meeting with a liaison from Protégé.”

    “Um...master?” I had to at least ask.  “Are...are the gang members back in? I think they want to kill me...”

    “Murk, shift your arse.”

    “Yes, master...”

    It had been worth a try.  I slumped and wandered past Whiplash as we both headed into the Petting Zoo to his slave groups.  Waiting beside the old staff office that Whiplash used as his quarters, I saw one of Stern's griffons waiting for him.  Much bigger than a pony and bearing sharpened talons, the mercenary nodded curtly to Whiplash as he wandered over. She was clad in tough looking body armour over her almost jet black feathers.  Even the areas most griffons had lighter colours were still only a thick grey. Across her back was slung two long looking firearms, one a magical weapon and the other looked like some sort of scoped rifle.

    Her eyes watched me carefully as I moved past her, trying not to let myself stare as I sought out the gang.  I needed to avoid them and find someplace safe, though every instinct told me that there were none left. Behind me, I heard Whiplash begin talking to the griffon.  It quickly escalated into a near on argument; apparently she was wanting slaves for this 'Protégé' from Whiplashs’ stock. He didn't seem too happy.

    Neither did the gang.  They stood in the middle of the enclosure.

    Waiting for me.

    Noose had a look of murder.  Her back showed signs of lashing from the guards.

    Lemon stomped impatiently.  I didn't imagine a hoof to the loins was going to give him much mercy toward me.

    The third buck, I’d never heard his name, simply snorted.

    Well, here it came.

    “Forget your own desires, Whiplash! You are not in control here. I'm taking the ones that I want, you do not have the choice in this matter, understand?”

That voice had not been the griffon.

Rough, mocking and overbearing, that tone had reached the ear of everypony in the petting zoo. It was direct and loud with a fierce authority, like the words were spearing into my skull. The sheer power of command in that voice sent a chill down my spine, accompanied by feeling like it locked my hooves to the ground.

Even the gang perked up, their gaze turning to look at the situation with Whiplash and the griffon.  Where they had been talking previously, now a third presence had entered.

Yesterday, I had been sure I had seen the biggest pony in Equestria from Number Six.  This earth pony stallion seemed to be even bigger, if only through girth. He had simply barged in, the griffon clearly aggravated at her own meeting being interrupted by this new arrival.

    Number Six had been the single most terrifying pony I had ever met.  This one was perhaps the more disgusting, yet he carried a dominating presence with him.  Mangy dark brown made up his coat while his mane (and several patches of his coat) had a filthy grey to them.  His huge girth came atop powerful looking legs and, while he wasn't as tall and muscular as Six had been, he looked astonishingly strong from such a massive centre of force.  He was not obese, rather just largely built with a lot of weight and power. Across his hide were strapped high quality leather barding and metal plates that hung with trinkets and small bags.  Whips, clubs and what looked like a magical energy stun rod hung within mouths reach. 

I tried not to look at his mouth, filled with rotting and often missing teeth, I could almost smell him from here.  I had to fight to not gasp as I saw his cutie mark and almost checked my own flank to be sure. It was a single unbroken loop of chain!  The pattern was almost identical to my own shackles!

    He dwarfed Whiplash and even put the normally larger than a pony sized griffon to shame.  He was addressing them both, clearly higher in the pecking order of Red Eye's slavers. In fact, to my astonishment, Whiplash, the hard faced terror of my life, looked ready to whimper before him.  Who was this pony?

    “That little upstart, Protégé, won't let me anywhere near the slaves in his stock, so I gots to come to you, understand?  Now I asked you, which ones do you not mind, heh, misplacing? I require more for my own stock.”

    That rasping and filthy mouth grinned at Whiplash, before glancing at the griffon.

    “Unless you want to start anything, Ragini.  You still loyal to the code, eh?”

    The griffon nodded sternly, without a word.  I could see her talon resting tightly on the strap of her weapon.  Whiplash looked between the two with nervous eyes. This was clearly an animosity well above his level.

    “Look...I'll give you one slave right?  Go ask the lads at the terminal, I hear they want rid of some troublemakers after today, alright?”

    Oh boy, couldn't I just guess where this was going.  I stood rooted to the ground, wishing I could somehow make myself invisible in plain sight.

    “One, eh? That all? And what makes you think you can decide on only one? Better impress me, Whiplash. Who is it?”

    “...Murk!  Get over here!” Whiplash hadn’t even taken his eyes off of his visitor’s.

    I didn't move.  I didn't want to get any closer to that horrid beast of a pony.

    “Murk!  Move yourself over here right now!” Whiplash's voice was a mix of anger and fear as he finally got the courage to look away at me.  I was getting the feeling this wasn't entirely official business for Red Eye, judging by how the griffon was lurking to the side.

    I still didn't move.  I couldn't have. My hooves were locked firmly in the ground.  With horror, I saw the new slaver instead simply follow Whiplash's glare before advancing toward me.  Standing barely two feet in front of me, I almost retched on the stink of him alone. I trembled, clearly shivering and hyperventilating as he stared at me, looking me over.

    “Interesting...not often you see a small pony like this these days.  Pity I couldn't get a hold of that other one while she was here.”

    He seemed to lick his lips.  I had to close my eyes to not dry heave on the spot.  The thought of this disgusting slaver anywhere near the Stable Dweller offended me to the core.  The thought of him anywhere near me just felt like it was violating my sanity by his mere proximity.  I felt his hoof reach out, lifting my chin and roughly shaking my head from side to side, examining me from angles.  Bruises and sprained muscles screamed in pain, as did I. He didn't relent, judging my size and shape. My saddlebag was pulled from my back as he reached for my makeshift vest...

    No!

    Almost on instinct my back right hoof shot out again as he spun me around, aiming for the one spot I knew I could hurt him.

    A bellow of rage blasted my sensitive ears as he slapped me across the side with a hoof hard enough to catapult me over into the fence.  Crunching against it hard enough to set the entire fence wobbling, I fell to the ground beneath it and curled up in agony. Gasping hard, I felt my balance spin.

    I’d never been hit that hard. Never.

The slaver had murderous eyes as he shook on the spot at my impertinence to try and strike him.

    “You...little...runt...”

    He slowly started stomping towards me, one hoof at a time.

    “You think...you can just try bucking me in the loins...and get away with it?”

    I squealed in terror as I saw Whiplash not moving to interject.  The griffon had disappeared.

    “You know who I am?  I am going to be your new owner!  How do you you like that?”

    He yanked me up by my jerkin and slapped my clean across the face.

“My name is Chainlink Shackles, worm!  But you will only call me by one thing.  To you, I am nothing but The Master, understood?”

    His hoof knocked my cheek again.

    “What is my name?”

    “Master Cha—”

    Again, his hoof connected. I screamed. I squealled. I fought but he lifted me off the ground.

    “You didn’t listen! What is my name?”

    Gasping, whimpering, I retraced what he’d said. I’d missed the particulars in my panic. Every instinct I had kicked in. This was not just any slaver.  I had been born a slave, named as a slave and gained my cutie mark as one. Somehow, somehow I just knew that he had been born the opposite. His cutie mark seemed to make that clear! He was the opposite side of the coin; born to command me.  I could not disobey.  In seconds, he had asserted himself over my subconscious greater than anypony before.

    “Master!” I screamed, “Yes, Master!”

    Everything about him seemed designed to be the antithesis of myself, large where I was small, strong where I was weak.  Number Six had terrified me. The Master had an effect more profound, there was something deeper. There was a need in his eyes, a desire that I felt affronted by, but unable to escape its demand.

    He threw me down to the dirt.

    “Now get that vest off, I want to see what I'm getting.”

    No...I couldn't allow that!  But I felt every muscle rushing to obey. The DJ and others had broken me free, but I could feel the everlasting chain of The Master locking me back into place.

    “Hah!  I'll tell you why he doesn't want it off!”

    I looked up to see the third buck was running up to The Master.  The gang member skidded to a halt before him, pointing a back hoof at me.  The Master merely glared down at him with stern eyes and a scowl. I was terrified, if my place as a pegasus was revealed here I would be nothing but dead!  Or paraded in front of Master Red Eye by...by The Master!  My imagination outran my horror and revulsion so far that I almost didn't notice for a second as The Master's hoof slammed the buck to the ground mercilessly.

    “I didn't!”

    A hoof shattered the buck's mouth.

    “Ask you!”

    His mouth drew a knife so big it almost looked like a sword.

    “TO SPEAK, SLAVE!”

    The knife descended with enough force to puncture clean through the buck's neck and embed itself into the ground beneath.  Twitching and gurgling, the buck died within seconds as lifeblood pumped out over the dead grass and dirt. His hooves continued to spasm for a few seconds before everything went still.  The blood ran around my hooves, but I was too frozen in fear to move them as I felt the dull warm creepy over each hoof. Whiplash looked too terrified to react. The gang simply fled into the Petting Zoo.

    “Enough!”

    The griffon landed beside The Master.  Mouth splattered with blood, he rounded on her.  The rifle was drawn as she looked him in the eyes and stood firm, if cautiously.

    “Slaves aren't transferable until tomorrow night anyway, Shackle,” she barked. “You know that.  You'll get to see him then, you'll get your prize. I'll have Protégé look elsewhere tonight for a replacement to fill the gaps.”

    She was trying to mollify him by giving him precisely what he wanted, to avoid any more bloodshed or brutality tonight.  I had seen Master Red Eye's griffons display such behaviour before, their loyalty to him was absolute. They would often protect slaves against overly eager slavers to keep Master Red Eye's stock intact for work shifts if they felt the production was threatened. The Master narrowed his eyes, before bellowing in laughter and angling his head toward me.

    “You're just what I need, Murk!” He shouted, voice rasping on the air, just like mine.  “I'll be back promptly tomorrow to take you to my...hmm...special stock. We'll have fun for sure little Murky...find you some real work in Fillydelphia that you slaves should be doing, none of this pulling carts rubbish!”

    That decaying grin made me break down on the spot.  I had heard the rumours, slavers who kept “special” stocks of unofficial slaves for extreme work environments that they hoped would gain them more influence with Master Red Eye.  Some rumours even said they were little more than sick death games with slavers gambling on the survivors, or the ones who didn't live through them.

    To go with him was a death sentence.  The second one in two days. The Master was something bigger in Fillydelphia, part of the layers that led to such a heavy cost of lives.  Inwardly, I cursed my life. Everything I did just seemed to end in further slavery. Was that really all my talent was? To simply put myself into the service of others all the time?  Today alone I had run almost a half dozen errands for various ponies both slaver and slave, and I had not one thing to show for my efforts other than a couple of extra days till my sickness consumed me or The Master throwing me into some brutal ‘game.’

    Even as The Master left and Whiplash hurled me into his storage cupboard, I just felt numb.

    “Now you're staying in here for the night.  If you get brutalised in the night by them, Shackles will not be pleased. And I like having my own hide.  You're still working tomorrow though, so sleep.”

    Of course I was.  Why wouldn't a good little slave be?

    I didn't sleep all night.

    My imagination kept me awake filled with pain and bitter ends.  Perhaps I had been right in my belief. A slave's life only ends in one of two ways, really. Either a slow lingering fade from sickness or a painful and violent killing.

    I kept pawing at the PipBuck, willing it to say the right thing again.  It had broken me free before. It had stopped me taking that last step, why couldn't it do something now?  All I was getting was music from Sapphire Shores. I didn't even like her, why couldn't it be Velvet Remedy?  At this point I'd even like to hear more from Sundial. But with no way to understand how to control the PipBuck's diary settings, I could only presume it had glitched out before or something.

    I really was without any help.

    Alone.

    I couldn't see too well in the dark to spot any of my pictures I had before me.  I had tried drawing, but with no light to see by it had failed immediately ever since Whiplash had locked the door.  All I could do was wait until my shift, work myself to death and then be handed over...over...

    I gulped, breathing ragged.

    ...to The Master.  He had haunted my thoughts since the moment he had left.  A giant pony who had been born to keep me in line. It was his destiny to find me, just as it would be mine to be under him.  But I didn't want that! I didn't want to die! Hadn't I just spent two days trying to prove that to myself?

    I thumped the wall with a hoof, trotting around before settling, my head in my journal with a hoof over the PipBuck.

    Click

    There was light.

    I jumped, startled as the sudden brightness seared my eyes that had adjusted to the darkness.  Covering them with a hoof, I glanced carefully out to see the source of the light. The PipBuck sat across from me, the smashed screen emitting a glow that flickered and occasionally died for a second or two from the faulty arcane technology inside.  Sundial's words echoed in my mind.

    “...a little light to brighten up the darkness of the night...”

    Thank you, Sundial.  With the light that his little legacy brought, things changed.  Slowly my mind found the solace I had fought so hard for. To push back the slave in my thoughts.

    I could see.  If I could see, it meant I was not alone.

    Before me lay my drawings.  Myself in the corner of an empty piece of paper, smiling so joyfully with no injuries or sores at all, my wings spread out.  My mother, forever beautiful and comforting who looked at me off the page, so proud and hopeful for her lost little foal. Number Six, strong and relentless, his stoic manner defending me from fear.  The mysterious mare, aloof and filled with intrigue yet an undying kindness radiating from her eyes. Above them all, the Stable Dweller, bringing light not to one hurt buck, but to everypony that laid eyes on her.

    I grabbed my charcoal.  I began to draw again. I needed more, if this were to be my last night on Equestria, then I would die surrounded by those who meant something to me.  I scrambled to the parchment, filling it with images of myself standing with the others. Of the mare helping me up, and giggling as she looked at my more...uh...personal, pictures.  Of Number Six diving with a scowl in my defence.

    The parchment filled, I grabbed my journal, and by the flickering light of the PipBuck, I could not stop.  My eyes strained, but page after page filled with images of anything and everything I had seen from PipBucks to Tenpony Tower.  My mother cuddled into me in one, hushing away a little foal's fears. I imagined what my six other siblings looked like. I drew them, too.  Velvet Remedy, the DJ, and so many more. Charcoal raced and scratched, covering page after page...

    It wasn't enough!

    The journal was ditched, the walls themselves would be my canvas.  With each flicker of light from the PipBuck, more was added. A frame by frame patchwork gradually coming together each time it was visible, a stop motion wonder before my eyes as I swivelled my head from side to side with the charcoal in my mouth.  My eyes dried, my movements grew confident and my heart, while weak and sick, began to beat with the adrenaline of purpose.

    I moved from wall to wall, my movements hidden by the darkness between each spark of light as shape after shape appeared.  Eventually...exhaustedly...I lay back, holding the PipBuck in my hooves. As though driven by destiny, its light finally became a constant to witness my work.

    Around me, on all sides, was the outside world.  A gigantic montage of the things that held hope from the Wasteland still.  I saw Tenpony Tower and the little settlements I had passed by, like New Appleloosa.  I saw ponies moving as friends helping one another. The Stable Dweller was running to the horizon into the glorious sunset, floating in the air as ponies gathered around her in awe, she knew what lay beyond the horizon.  My own mind’s vision of the DJ’s broadcast room was imprinted beside his tower in Manehattan with a microphone. Velvet Remedy, the most beautiful design I could imagine chosen for her, was singing her heart out, notes drifting around her from where she stood in the images.

    I saw the world I had left behind when I had been locked in here.  The world with ponies who wouldn't hate me or simply want to abuse me.  Yes, there were bad ponies out there, too, and even worse on top of that, but there was good!  Ponies who might call me a friend...or heal me to save my life...

    I sat up taller.

    ...who might save my life...

    ...there was a way.  If only I could...could...

    With a fervent rush, I pulled my journal over and grabbed a new piece of charcoal.  I had plans to make. I needed supplies, weapons, armour, routes and above all...a method with which to make the terrifyingly real concept in my head come to life that would make my montage into a reality.  To allow me to travel into that sunset and find out just where it went to escape the darkness.

    I would escape it.  My life depended on it now.

    Tomorrow, I had one day to prepare and execute my plan.  To escape Fillydelphia. To go beyond the walls and run from this slavery that had held my life for so long to seek a pony who could heal the radiation and diseases that were killing me.  I caught my breath, holding a hoof over my frantically beating heart. After so long of not seeing it, not knowing what I wanted, it was finally to happen.

    It was time to stop crying.

    They say there's a story behind every pair of wings in the wasteland.

    Tomorrow, I was going to start mine.

    Footnote: Perk Attained!

    Low Hoof!  (Rank 1) – You have something of a habit to let your attacks go for those somewhat sensitive areas.  In other words, you fight dirty! Your first unarmed attack of any given engagement has a small chance to stun your opponent immediately!