//------------------------------// // Chapter 37 - Ashes Are Burning // Story: Fallout Equestria: Blue Destiny // by MagnetBolt //------------------------------// "Hello! The following is for your ears only. If you're hearing this, you've been selected for a very important job. I'm not sure who will actually be selected as Overmare for your stable, so forgive me for not having a personalized message, but I promise you were chosen for a reason. "My name is Scootaloo. I'm the vice-president of Stable-Tec. If you're hearing this, it means your Stable has been activated and you and the ponies you were chosen to protect and serve have been sealed within the most state-of-the-art survival shelter ever created. "Our job, and yours, is to save as many ponies as we could. I wish we could have saved more but... nopony wanted to believe we could lose. Nopony wanted to be the one to think hard about how to survive. Everypony thought the war would be over by this time next year. Always 'this time next year', for more than a decade... "Anyway, by now you're probably grateful you signed up for this, and I don't need to tell you 'I told you so'. There's much more important work to do. The war started because of an energy shortage. Well, no, it started because of stupid ponies and nopony being willing to back down, but the energy shortage was the excuse. "Stable 83 was built to utilize a revolutionary new energy source. Instead of dirty coal power or expensive gem reactors, it has a geothermal well that injects water into superheated rock and uses the resulting steam to turn a turbine. It can't be used everywhere to solve our energy problems, but my scientists tell me it should be extremely safe and virtually maintenance-free. "As the Overmare of Stable 83, your duty is to keep your ponies alive above all else. Most of the ponies pre-registered for entry to your Stable are former mine workers and construction experts. In return for building Stable 83 and a few other projects, we promised them spots for their families. It's the least we can do for them when they're working to save so many other lives. "We don't expect you to do anything except survive. Because of the expertise of your inhabitants, we've supplied Stable 83 with additional mining and construction supplies in case there's a need to expand the Stable. Even if there isn't, they might help you rebuild after... after the end. "Thank you for believing in us. Because of your work and sacrifices, so many others will get a chance to live. It's not enough, never enough, but it's all we can do." “This is Overmare Ore Skiff. I’m making my first official log as Overmare, and I want to start this off on a positive note. We got sealed in here two weeks ago, and things have been busy. There was some kind of seismic disturbance right after we closed the door. It’s probably some kind of aftershock from the megaspells that went off everywhere. “Part of the Stable collapsed. Nopony was hurt, but we were all pretty scared. Stable-Tec was smart enough to give us supplies to fix everything, and we did just that. All of us worked together, and our first big project as Stable 83 was reinforcing the walls and digging out the parts that collapsed. “I think all the work really brought us together. It feels like we’re a family now. I just got back from a sing-along in the atrium, and it was the first time in years I started to really feel happy. The worst already happened outside, and we’re alive and healthy and safe in here. All the worry and tension about what might happen is just… gone. No matter how bad it gets out there, we’ll survive. “Over the next few weeks, I’ve scheduled equipment inspections for all Stable systems. When we brought everything up to full power, we had some surges and brownouts. The Chief thinks the problem is that most of the systems were designed for a gem reactor and we’ve got the geothermal tap, and the circuits just don’t respond correctly. It’s going to be a learning process to figure out how to do things with these systems, but I know we’re up to the task.” “This is Overmare Ore Skiff. It’s been a few months since the bombs fell, and I can’t deny the evidence in front of me anymore. The geothermal well has dropped in temperature day by day, and the more power we use, the faster it goes. “Stable-Tec gave us a lot of literature on geology and vulcanology, so we’ve got a theory on what happened. The earthquake that hit us was part of some larger seismic event, and the magma well we’re using for the geo-tap got cut off. I don’t know if it’s budget cuts or they just didn’t think anything could go wrong, but we’ve got no backup power supply. “Right now we’re running with minimal power everywhere. It’s dark and hot down here, and the air feels stale. “The Chief came up with a proposal at dinner today. No more sing-alongs for us, just quietly eating our mush in the dark. He thinks we can use the gear Stable-Tec gave us to drill a new Geothermal Well. It seems like it might be possible. We’re pretty sure we know where the quake blocked off the current well, so if we drill a line beyond it, we should get to a fresh magma pocket. “We all voted on it. There are some dangers -- we’ll probably hit some noxious gas, the equipment is really rated for the repair of what we’ve got and not drilling down that deep, so it’s going to be a tough dig and we’re on a tight timetable. It’s also our only real hope unless we want to walk outside, and the radiation count from just outside the door is… we wouldn’t survive out there. “The operation starts tomorrow. I’m trying to temper my hope, but I really want this to succeed. We survived for a reason. This is just another trial for us to overcome, and we’ll be stronger for it.” “I was wrong. Celestia, Luna, I’m so sorry. “The dig was going fine. It wasn’t easy, or safe. There were a few accidents. I should have stopped it there. We found magma, but we didn’t know it would be under high pressure. The second we tapped the magma sea, it shot up our borehole. Four ponies died right away and they were the lucky ones. The way my PipBuck was clicking, that magma was so radioactive anypony who didn’t die right away wasn’t going to last long. “We sealed the place off, but it wasn’t enough. “This was a coal mine. We all forgot that, somehow. The magma set the bucking rock on fire! The rock wrapped around us on every bucking side! Even after we sealed the bore room off, it kept getting hotter. The old coal seams went up and fires broke out everywhere. There was so much bucking tar and it just… it melted out of the rocks and started falling like rain! “The Chief saved my life. He saw the ceiling buckling before I did and shoved me out of the way. There must have been gallons and gallons of that bucking tar, and he just… he never stopped screaming! He’s still screaming! It’s been hours and hours and he’s just… he isn’t dying! Celestia save us, I don’t know if any of them are dying! “I think I’m the only pony left. I won’t last long. It’s a bucking oven in here. The heat is going to get me even if they don’t. I can hear them out there, stumbling around, moaning in pain, just… burning forever like living torches. “I don’t want to go out that way. I’m so sorry. We were like a family and I failed us. If you’re here listening to this, turn around. Go somewhere else. This isn’t a place for ponies. It’s Gehenna, and only monsters live here now.” “That’s the last entry,” Destiny said. “The scientist was talking about burning monsters,” I said quietly. “Does that mean those ponies are still… around?” “I don’t know. Radioactive magma, coal fires, buck knows what else…” Destiny hesitated. “It could have done almost anything. Whatever it is, it’s enough that a dozen armed ponies weren’t enough to take care of the problem.” “Great. Split Moon, what do you think?” I looked back at him. He’d been listening to the terminal recordings with me, leaning against the doorway and keeping his eyes open for stragglers. Towards the end of the recorded logs, when the voice was heavy and full of coughing and pain, his vision had started to dwell more on the barricades leading deeper in instead of waiting for reinforcements. He shrugged. I guess it was my decision. “I’d feel dumb if we didn’t at least try,” I said. “You stay behind me. I don’t want to hit you with this cold gun.” Split Moon nodded curtly. I checked one more time that the scientist we’d knocked out was still alive. I thought about tying her up, but she was unconscious and if something happened to us, I didn’t want to leave her here restrained and helpless. I still felt a little sick when I thought too much about killing ponies that were shooting at me. Leaving her to a slow death lying in a pitch-black Stable? That could never sit right on my conscience. I sort of hoped she’d be gone when we got back. I didn’t know if Split Moon would be okay with leaving her alive. He’d knocked her out, but he was a Dashite and I couldn’t read him very well. He might kill her on the way out just to wrap up loose ends. He stepped outside and looked around at the mess we’d left on the atrium walkway and I followed him, trying to step around the bodies instead of on top of them, then jumped off the edge and down to the lower level. “The maneframe should be near Engineering,” Destiny said. “We don’t have a map, but my guess is that’s below us. They’d want to put a geothermal well as deep in the ground as possible.” That made sense. I pulled one of the barricades aside. The other side of it was burned and blackened, like the inside of an oven. Something sticky and awful was baked onto it. I moved slowly and carefully past it, casting Destiny’s hornlight into every dark corner like some monster might jump out at me. The floor was splattered with half-hardened masses of glassy black debris, streaking from overhead and running along the walls and hanging from the ceiling like stalactites before pooling on the ground and freezing in place. It stank horribly, even through the air filters. It reminded me of the Exodus Blue, where the magma had broken through the hull. I saw the flickering light of the fire ahead of us, and I didn’t realize what it meant until the thing stumbled around the corner. Maybe it had been a pony once. It walked, stumbling on four black, boneless legs more like molten tentacles than proper limbs. Boils and bubbles swarmed to its surface, popping wetly. Flames flickered across its body, It turned to me, and I couldn’t see eyes, just an open wound where a mouth should be. I don’t know how, but it could sense me. It turned and came at me with hooves slapping on the ground like raw meat. It was radiating heat, the temperature creeping up faster and faster as it approached and a radiation warning sounding with rapid clicking. “I sure hope this works!” I shouted, before firing the Cryolator. Liquid nitrogen streamed out in a foggy spray, splashing against the tar-ghoul and letting off huge clouds of mist. The undead horror stumbled, falling into the wall in shock. It… stuck there for a second, deforming when it touched it. It was as if the entire monster was just jelly that just had a memory of being a pony. It tried to pull itself free, but I sprayed it again and it slowed, its body getting thicker and stiffer. It struggled to get off the wall where it had fallen, but couldn’t manage it. A third spray and the last few flickering flames died, and the tar-ghoul went still, surface solidifying and cracking. “I think that did it,” I said, taking a deep breath. “We’ll call that a big success,” Destiny agreed. Split Moon made a contemplative sound and stepped closer to the frozen tar monster before flicking his wing out, slashing it with his wingblade. The ghoul cracked and fell apart, and Split Moon looked at his blade and winced. There was a chip in the edge. “It might be better to hit them with a wrench or something,” I suggested. I held out my hoof and Destiny popped a big machine wrench out of the Vector Trap. I held it out for the extremely dangerous Dashite. He nodded glumly and folded his wings, taking the club and looking disappointed. “This place is really badly damaged,” Destiny noted when we continued down the hallway. “I hope we can actually find what we’re looking for.” Stable 83 really was a lot like Gehenna. The only light came from fires that had been burning for generations, the coal seams behind the walls smoldering and bursting into short-lived puffs of flame. Tar and heat had popped a lot of panels out of place, and behind them it was like the embers left behind when a fire hadn’t quite died, glowing with terrible orange-red light. Pitch dripped in almost-frozen slow motion, forming those awful, stinking pillars and stalactites before spreading out on the floor in rubbery puddles. Split Moon coughed behind me. The air was just on this side of being safe to breathe, but he’d torn up an Enclave soldier’s uniform to make a face mask to filter out the worst of it. I was faring a little better with my armor’s air supply, but I kept getting whiffs of burned hair and toxic, melting plastic. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Destiny whispered. “You remember the hospital?” “The hospital full of bad stuff? The one where I got tricked by an ancient evil zebra lich into releasing it? That hospital?” “Yeah. This place gives me the same kind of shivers.” “Great,” I whispered back. Now I was worried an undead Steel Ranger was going to tear through the wall and try to cut me in half with an unstoppable weapon. A chill went down my spine, and that really stood out because the Stable was hot. The Overmare’s last message compared it to an oven and it really felt like one. I wasn’t claustrophobic, but something with the heat and the uneven floor and the darkness was getting to me. I could feel an edge of panic under everything. I glanced back at Split Moon. He didn’t have fancy magic armor to help him. “You want to head back to the atrium?” I asked. “It was a little cooler there.” He shook his head and motioned for us to continue. Maybe he was okay, probably he just didn’t want to look weak. He looked past me, and grabbed for a knife. DRACO squealed an alarm. I turned back in time to see a misshapen mass of tar tear itself from the wall and reach for me. A knife as long as my hoof hit it in the head, and sank in with no visible effect. I heard Split Moon grunt in annoyance. The Cryolator hissed at my side, almost silent in action. I sprayed liquid nitrogen into the thing’s chest. It didn’t have much force behind it, but the effect was immediate. The tar solidified and the tar-ghoul’s mouth opened in a bubbling scream. I adjusted my aim and fired right down its throat, freezing its head. The thing fell over and shattered. More screams echoed from around us. “Buck. Looks like that woke the monsters up,” I said. The tar-covered walls rippled with fire. For a moment I could swear the flames themselves were shaped like a pony, flat against the wall like a painting. The shape pushed out, taking flaming pitch with it. The tar liquified with the new heat of its birth, melting free and stumbling out with liquid legs that half-collapsed with every step. “I’ve started to develop a theory and I don’t like it,” Destiny said. I sprayed the emerging tar monster and kicked its head off, the misshapen mass rolling down the hallway like a bowling ball. “Is the theory that the bucking things are coming out of the walls?!” I shouted. “Coal and coal tar come from dead plants! It’s like compacted layers of tree corpses! It’s possible that necromatic energy could seep into it!” “The coal is haunted?!” I saw three small half-sized shapes trying to free themselves from one of the columns of tar running from floor to ceiling. They’d been foals in life. I felt sick. I sprayed them and couldn’t bring myself to shatter their frozen forms. Foals. “The coal is haunted, and the spirits trapped in it are animating themselves with the energy from the coal fire! All we’re doing is banishing them until they recover enough strength to make a new body!” “This is some real bad stuff,” I mumbled. “We can’t stay here and fight,” Destiny warned. “The Cryolator is almost tapped out.” “Yeah. This might be a bust,” I agreed. “Split Moon! We need to figure out another plan! We’ll--” A hoof grabbed mine, wetly latching on to my right forehoof. I hadn’t even noticed the fire spreading into the tar next to me, but I sure as buck noticed when it was attached to me. Panic welled up and I twisted to try and fire the Cryolator at it, but the cold-gun just sputtered and failed, only throwing out a few snowflakes. I pulled the trigger again, my heart pounding. Nothing. Not even a sputter. I tried to pull free, but the tar-ghoul was heavy and sticky. All I did was help free it from the wall, the body stretching as it held on, a second hoof latching on to mine. “Get off me!” I shrieked. I’m not going to pretend that it was some kind of warcry. My breathing was coming short and fast and the sweat was getting in my eyes and I was half-blind and the heat was so oppressive like it was sinking into my bones. I could see it all over again, like back in Thunderbolt Shoals. Fire and pain creeping up my hoof. My skin melting. The pop of flesh blackening and burning. The horrible thing underneath it, the thing that wasn’t part of me and I tried to pretend everything was okay and-- The panic stole all thought. I snapped my blade free, the one attached to my bones somewhere inside, and tried to cut my way free. It was like cutting hot sugar with a dull blade. There was nothing solid, no leverage, just terrible wet heat. I threw myself backwards, desperate to get away, and the tar-ghoul’s body stretched and finally snapped, leaving a thick coat of burning pitch. I saw the fire reaching for me. A hoof made out of pure flames trying to push out of the black bubbling mess and touch my face. Everything seemed to tilt. It was something I hadn’t felt since I was a filly. Vertigo. Up and down turned into sideways and I stalled out in every way, my brain just stopping. Somepony grabbed my left forehoof and pulled, and I couldn’t fight them. They dragged me somewhere, not that I could focus enough to tell where, and everything quieted down. A wave of crimson light washed down my tar-covered right hoof and the fire died down, sputtering and going out. “Chamomile, calm down,” Destiny said softly from somewhere far away and echoing. “Everything’s okay. Just breathe slowly. In and out. In and out.” The only thing I could focus on was her voice, and she slowly brought me out of the panic attack. My vertigo and tunnel vision faded, and I could look around. We were in a big room lined with bulky electronic consoles and equipment. There wasn’t tar anywhere. Split Moon was kneeling next to where I was collapsed against a computer bank. He gave my shoulder a few soft pats and a squeeze. “Sorry,” I said, my throat dry and voice rough. “I… it was like when I lost my hoof all over again.” “You’ve been through a lot,” Destiny said quietly. “A big part of it is my fault. If this was… before… I’d say you were suffering from Wartime Stress Disorder and try to get you an appointment with a trained professional. I don’t even know where we’d find a psychiatrist now.” Split Moon helped me sit up and sat down next to me. He took my hoof and pulled out a knife, gently starting to chip away the solidified tar on the armor. “It’s not your fault. It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have fallen apart like that in the middle of a fight,” I said. “Where are we, anyway?” “Split Moon used that wrench you gave him to get one of the side doors open. He dragged you to safety. You’ve got mild heatstroke on top of everything else.” I nodded slowly. I didn’t want my vertigo to come back. Split Moon tapped my shoulder and pointed to a sign on the wall. “This is the maneframe room?” I asked. “We found it?” “Better than that, this place is almost pristine,” Destiny said. “There’s no tar anywhere. I think there are rooms on all sides, so there’s no burning mess behind the wall panels. Here, let me just pop these seals--” There was a hiss as the helmet detached, and Destiny floated off. She turned to face me, eyes flashing while she talked. “I’m going to look around and start gathering the parts we need,” she said. “You just rest and cool down, okay?” “Yeah, sounds good,” I sighed. I looked at Split Moon. “Thanks. You really saved my flank back there.” He nodded and motioned to the scar on his neck, grimacing a little. “You know what it’s like to be hurt?” I guessed. He nodded, then motioned with his chin inquisitively at my right forehoof. “This? Well… it’s not a cool story. I was in the middle of storming this cloudship, the Shiranui. Me and a couple other friends of mine were after the stallion in charge. He was the local gov, and a total jerk who was having ponies executed just to pass the time. We found these flame turrets, and there was a fuel explosion when we were disabling them and… yeah. It was bad.” I watched Destiny flit around, the disembodied helmet floating from one panel to another and pulling out crystal and silicon cards, examining them, and putting them into different piles based on some quality I couldn’t fathom. Split Moon finished chipping the solidified tar off my hoof. “Thanks,” I said quietly. He nodded and put his knife away. “Okay,” Destiny called out. “I’ve got most of what we need, but before I pull more, you two need to see this.” The stallion next to me got up and offered me his hoof. I smiled and took it, letting him help me back to my hooves. The vertigo was gone. Up was up and down was down. I nodded silent thanks and stepped up behind Destiny to see what she was looking at. “Security cameras?” I asked. “I thought all the power was out.” “The maneframe has a limited backup power supply,” Destiny said. “It’s not enough to run the Stable, just sort of a battery bank to ensure an uninterrupted power supply. We’ve got maybe ten minutes to decide what to do.” “Decide what to do about what?” I asked. She moved so I could see the screen better. “Oh,” I whispered. I was looking at a small lake of tar, filled with dancing flames moving over it in waves, with dozens of shapes trying to pull themselves free from the boiling pitch, struggling before being dragged down by the others around them, formless almost-ponies stepping on each other to try and escape endless agony. “We can’t fight that,” I said. Split Moon grimaced again, and he nodded. “I want to put them to rest,” Destiny said. “I have just enough control from here to open up all of the Stable’s water tanks and seal the drains. We could flood the whole Stable. I think the water would put out the coal fire.” “What’s the downside?” I asked. “With the drains sealed, the water is going to stay there. This whole place will be stuck underwater. Nopony will ever be able to come back here. If we need more parts or salvage, we’d have to go somewhere else.” “Destiny,” I chided. “Do you think there’s any bucking way I’m coming back here anyway? No way are we leaving this place the way it is. Besides, it’s all, uh, strategic, right?” I looked at Split Moon and shrugged. “We’d be keeping the Enclave from knowing what we took and preventing them from getting more salvage.” He smirked and nodded assent. “Good,” Destiny said. “We’re all in agreement. I’ll set the timer so the sluice gates will open just before the emergency power gives out. Plenty of time to get back to the surface.” “Do we have all the parts we need?” I asked. Destiny nodded. “Hit it.” She tapped a few keys with magic, and the camera feed cut out to show a timer on the screen, counting down from nine minutes. The floor shook under us. “Are you sure you did that right?” I asked. “Is it flooding right now?” “No, it can’t be,” Destiny said. “I’m sure I got it-- look out!” The floor bucked upwards. A terrible squealing roar filled the air. Not the kind made by a pony, but the roar of heavy machinery. A drill punched through the steel, the head like a three-jawed toothy mouth chewing the steel into shreds. The drill retracted, and a hydraulic shovel like an excavator’s bucket appeared in its place, forcing the opening further open. Something started pulling itself through, a mish-mash of broken mining equipment and boiling tar. Searchlights turned on us and focused like burning eyes. There was something in the middle of it all. It was black, but it wasn’t like the asphalt black of the pitch. It was a swirling core of something so dark it absorbed the light around it, so profoundly ebon that I couldn’t tell if it had depth or shape. Destiny cried out in alarm, and I felt it with her, that terrible sense of wrongness from the hospital. Pure evil and death radiating into the world. The pile of machinery and molten grunge shifted, arranging itself into something almost like a pony, with that black heart beating in its chest behind ribs made of torn structural supports. “Of course they wouldn’t let us go without a fight,” I muttered. The huge thing reared up and swung down with the drill-arm, the gnashing teeth screaming. Split Moon got right in front of it, and I was absolutely sure he was about to be torn apart. He hit it at the last second with the wrench, the thick tool metal catching in the drill and sparking, centrifugal forces knocking the whole drill-press off to the side, going past him harmlessly. “You’re just showing off!” I yelled over to him. Split Moon shot me a smile and shrugged, not even looking at the monster while he backflipped right over its return swing, deftly avoiding it in exactly the way I’d never be able to. Still, I had my own talents. I guess it thought I looked like easier prey, because it turned to me like it only just noticed I was in the room and shoved computers out of the way, steel cabinets tossed aside like plywood boxes with its huge mass. I planted my hooves and let it come. The power shovel curled like a metal scorpion’s stinger, and the hydraulics erupted into sudden motion, striking towards me in a sudden, deadly strike. Split Moon would have seen it coming from miles away and dodged it. Heck, even I probably could have managed to duck to the side. I planted my hooves. Sparks rained down around me. Hydraulics squealed and oil exploded out, the shovel straining to press down, stuck in the air a hoof-width above my head, my blade twisted and locked between the excavator bucket’s teeth. “You’re not as strong as you look,” I said, trying to act like it was no big deal. It was stronger than the bear I’d fought, but it didn’t have the leverage to really make use of it. “Chamomile…” Destiny whispered weakly. “The timer!” “Right,” I said. “No time to play around.” I turned and let the excavator bucket slide free, the monster not smart enough to see the motion coming. It slipped forward on its wet, sticky legs and the shovel hit the wall, crunching into and through it to the hallway on the other side. “This place is too small to fight a big monster,” I said. “Let’s bail and let it try to swim after us!” Split Moon nodded and kicked the panel next to the door, opening it up and waving me through. I ducked under the behemoth’s overextended arm and ran past him. He was right on my heels and so was the angry pile of mining equipment and black magic. The drill and power shovel slammed into the walls of the corridor, the mass of tar and rage pulling itself after us and filling every inch of the hallway. The atrium was a short run away. It had been slow getting here because we’d tried to be careful, but we were very motivated to go faster. “You can’t let it follow you out,” Destiny said. Her voice sounded distant. “That much necromatic magic would be like a moving apocalypse!” The drill slammed into the floor next to me, squealing and roaring while it tore up the deck. It hit something harder and the whole thing jerked. I knew that motion. It was a power tool getting caught and starting to kick back. I stomped on the long steel frame, driving it an inch deeper. The metal squeal changed pitch, and the biting head twisted deeper, totally caught up in the Stable’s structure. “Looks like somepony needs to give you a hoof!” I shouted, slashing into the metal arm with my blade. The SIVA-forged knife sliced right through it, and the creature fell back, the tar forming the central part of its body boiling harder, gouts of flame shooting into the air and turning the atrium into a giant kiln. “Do we have anything left in the cold gun?” I yelled. “We need something to freeze it in place!” Destiny whispered a reply, but I couldn’t make it out over the crackling flames. “Hey!” Somepony shouted. I looked up. The scientist we’d left alive was looking down at us from the walkway around the atrium’s upper level. She held up a pressurized tank. “Catch!” She tossed it down to me. I grabbed for it, missed, and Destiny’s telekinesis nabbed it before it could hit the floor. She popped out the old tank and pushed it into place. I nudged it a little, and by that I mean I had to smack it hard to get it into place, sealing against the pipes with a hiss. I sprayed the tarry mess. The spray was like acid to it, making it react with agonized thrashing, pushing itself back with its excavator arm and trying to get away. “What, is it getting too chilly for you?!” I shouted. I could see it working, the gouts of flame dying down and the surface starting to solidify and crack. The thing slowed down, jittering and stuttering to a halt like an engine stalling. The fire went out. Frost formed on the monster’s tarry outer shell. It ground to a total halt. “That’s it!” I shouted. “Let’s finish it!” I charged in, spinning and bucking the mess it had instead of a face. A huge, deep rift formed. Split Moon flew in over me, jamming his wingblades into the edges of the rift and pulling with everything in his shoulders, tearing it open. Glassy shards fell around us, and the knot of shadow and darkness at its heart lay exposed. There was only one thing to do. I punched the darkness in the face to establish dominance. I felt something like a beating heart that burst at my touch. Something that wasn’t blood splattered over me, black and white at the same time like I couldn’t see it properly. It evaporated in the air almost immediately. The darkness vanished, leaving only the mundane asphalt black of the tar. The feeling of death and pressure eased off, and I stepped back from the fallen form. “Sorry about that,” Destiny said. She was still rough around the edges. “That magic really messes with me. I’m okay now.” Split Moon tugged at my wing, motioning towards the exit. “Right. We need to get out of here,” I said. I looked up at the scientist. “You better get moving too! This place is about to be underwater!” She looked at the fallen behemoth and nodded, following along behind us. We ran for the Stable exit and Split Moon actually held the door open to make sure the Enclave scientist got out. The rock walls shook around us, rocks falling from the tunnel roof. Before long, we were out of the gloomy Stable and in the last hours of daylight, the sun just starting to become visible under the cloud layer and casting long shadows. New cracks crazed over the ground, steam slowly seeping out. “Thanks for helping out with the nitrogen tank,” I said. “It seemed like the right thing to do,” the mare replied, fixing her frazzled mane. “Right at that moment it was more important to kill that monster, whatever it was.” I nodded. “I’d leave it off your official reports, if I was you.” “Oh, I will,” she promised. She spread her wings and took to the air, looking back at me with a glare. “I don’t intend to get fired over this mess!” “If you do, I’ll get you a new job,” I promised, waving to her as she flew away. Split Moon nudged me. I turned to look at him. He struggled for a moment, like he was about to vomit painfully. Finally, he managed to speak. “We make a good team,” he croaked. It obviously hurt to do it, but he smiled. “We do,” I agreed. “Let’s get out of here before that scientist sends a VertiBuck here to gun us down.”