//------------------------------// // Chapter 15: Monsters // Story: Fallout Equestria: The Ditzy Doo Chronicles // by Ten Mihara //------------------------------// Chapter 15: Monsters “Better Wiped than Striped.” Beast. I would not be the first pony to describe the wasteland as a monstrous beast, nor do I imagine I would be the last. One mare in particular thought of it as an insatiable, gaping maw. I find that the fate of Equestria is not that different from the unfortunate one that befalls my feral ilk. A lifeless husk that mindlessly destroys what is around it simply because it does not know how to do anything else anymore. It is a horrific fate that I would not wish upon anypony. Even more so because I had to watch it happen to my best friend. *** May continued to sob wretchedly at her failure. I couldn't help but cry along with her, looking over my regenerated hide and knowing that she had come so painfully close, only to trip at the finish line. As I held May, my thoughts turned to what little I knew about our condition. It was a complicated state of being, and May understood it better than anypony. If she had been unable to unravel the truth to undoing the condition, then what hope did I have? The thought only brought more bitterness to my tears, knowing that I could offer no real consolation to my best friend as she wept so wretchedly. I don't know how much time passed as we sat there and held each other, crying and sniffling. Time has a different feel to it when you can live for hundreds of years, and loses some of its meaning. Eventually, May released me from her grasp, only to sink to the floor, looking more defeated than I had ever seen her. I wished for something to say, something to ease her pain, but no words came. I knew I was disappointed at not being truly cured, so her own sadness could only be many times worse. “Where did I go wrong?” came May's voice, coarser than ever, her throat cracked from abuse by her sobbing. I had no answer for her. “What could I have missed?” she continued, as though asking aloud might spark some long overdue revelation. I had no answers for May. My complete lack of understanding of magic, left me without anything to contribute. I could only hang my head and sigh. May didn't move as she continued to mutter. “Could I have... no. What if... no. Maybe a... no!” She growled in frustration and smashed her hooves against the floor. Her futile rage hurt her hooves more than the cement, their enamel splintering. I winced. Sadness turning to anger was never a good thing. I had to coax her back down somehow, keep her focused. She had been so close, surely she could manage something with a bit more effort. “May... um...” I fumbled with my words, but she glanced at me. At least I had caught her attention. “I know I don't know anything about magic, but what if we found another unicorn? Someone else who might be able to assist you better than I can?” May shook her head, “Ditzy, you're my best friend. Nopony could replace you.” I blinked at the response, then waved a hoof, “No, I didn't mean it like that. I meant, y'know, in addition to me.” May sighed once more, “Where could we possibly find anypony qualified to lend aid on such a complicated magical undertaking? This is the sort of thing that entire ministry departments would be dedicated to. I don't know why I ever thought I could do it myself.” The word 'ministry' clicked with me and I thought of something. “Bright Light.” May blinked as I mentioned the name. Perhaps she still remembered? “The glowing unicorn ghoul with the airship,” I noted to be sure, “she used to work for the Ministry of Magic.” May let out an exasperated groan, “The one pony in the wasteland who might be able to help and we have no idea where she is.” She rolled over onto her back kicking her hind legs in frustration. I raised a hoof in objection, “She flew off in a big airship. Surely some people would know which way she went.” May snorted, “Ditzy, that was forty years ago! She could be anywhere in the world by now! Not to mention the fact that anypony who did see her is probably long dead.” I winced, once again reminded of my poor comprehension of time. I sighed. The best suggestion I could come up with dashed before it even spread its wings. I slumped down to the floor and grumbled, “Okay, so there's nopony else who can help us... what if... no... how about... no. Grah!” I was getting nowhere. May sighed and rolled onto her side facing away from me, “Maybe it was a given that this whole thing would fail... Maybe we're supposed be stuck like this. Maybe being ghouls is our punishment for bringing the world to the state it's in now. Maybe we're supposed to watch as what's left slowly falls apart...” I frowned. That kind of attitude wasn't good for anyone, least of all a ghoul. If I didn't find some way to comfort May or get her thinking positively again... I didn't want to contemplate that possibility. “May, the world's state isn't our fault. It isn't anyone's fault, really. At least, not anyone that's alive today. However, those of us that are alive today can still do something.” May didn't move, “Like what?” she mumbled. “Um...” I tried to think of something, “Well, you know balefire radiation like the back of your hoof. You could-” May's ear flicked up, “What did you say?” I blinked, then repeated, “You know balefire-” I was cut off as May sat up abruptly. “That's it! Ditzy, you're a genius!” All I could do was blink in surprise, “Um... I don't think I'd be named Ditzy if I was a genius.” Not the most flattering self appraisal, but I couldn't really think of any other response in my confusion. May stood up and shook her head, “No, you really are. You figured out the missing piece!” I tilted my head, looking thoroughly confused, “How did I do that?” May smirks, “Balefire. Specifically, balefire bombs, the zebra megaspell weapons. When I tried to cast the spell, I was basing all of my work on the idea that magical radiation was the same no matter where it came from. Which, based on what I had seen working for the MoP, held true.” I nodded slowly, but kept my mouth shut, waiting for May to tie all this together into something that made sense to me. Some genius I was, considering how much more quickly her mind was working. I shook my head to clear out the self-depreciation in order to focus on what May was actually saying. “So... is balefire different somehow?” May nodded, “Not so much the balefire itself, but the form it was stored in. Unicorns cast spells, and all of our magical artifacts and technology are based around that. All my experiences with the MoP were working with other unicorns. Zebras aren't unicorns!” The obviousness of that statement was obvious, but I was beginning to get an inkling of what she was getting at. “So... because zebras do, or did, magic differently, the magical radiation from their megaspells would be different as well?” May stamped a hoof firmly. “That has to be it. It's the only thing I never thought to consider or look into.” May's voice quivered as she spoke, desperately wanting to believe her own new theory. I nodded slowly, wanting to believe it too for her sake. “So... there is a megaspell crater nearby, right? Is there any way you can get the information you need from there?” May shook her head, “Wouldn't tell me anything I don't already know. What I really need is an unused source of balefire.” She chuckles a bit morbidly, “If we knew any dragons, we could get some of their breath and then I could try to find the spell to weaponize it myself. If they didn't just roast or eat us first.” I spoke up, trying to help once more, “Alright, so let's go find a zebra and have them make some for us instead.” It seemed simple really, at least in my head. They made the balefire bombs in the first place, so if we could find another one- May stamped a hoof and snorted, interrupting my train of thought. “Out of the question. They would have been wiped out by Equestria's megaspell counter attack. Even if they weren't, the odds of actually finding one that actually has enough alchemical knowledge to produce a fresh balefire weapon... it's just not gonna happen.” I was mildly shocked. I knew May wasn't fond of zebras, but I had always guessed, even with a counter attack from Equestria, that some of them would have survived just like ponies did. She did have a point about scarcity though. “What's the plan then?” May had always been the one with the plan, so I really hoped she had some idea of how to follow through on this new theory. May looked like the gears in her head were turning rapidly. She blinked a couple times, then facehoofed. “Probably one of the worst ideas I've had yet,” she said with a bit of a groan. “Unfortunately, it's probably the only one that might work.” I had a feeling I knew what she was about to suggest. “So when do we leave?” May rolled her eyes at me. “You haven't even heard me out yet. This is probably the craziest, most dangerous thing I'll ever do. I have no idea what we might encounter or what effects Equestria's counterspelling might have done to the place. The actual odds of find-” I raised a hoof to May's muzzle to shut her up. “I've stuck with you this long May, I have no intention of going anywhere else.” May smiled. She seemed at least slightly reassured, but was still obviously nervous. “We're as close to the Zebra Nation as we can get here in Equestria, but we'll still have to pass through no-mare's land in between.” I raised a hoof to my chin, the partially restored flesh feeling a little weird after being blotchy for so long. I tried to recall some wartime history; “The battle here was the furthest into Equestria the zebras ever came by land, right?” May nodded in affirmation, “Yes. Most of the war was fought on their home turf, and quite frankly we were on the verge of winning the war entirely before they decided to blow up the world.” I frowned a bit at that. She made it out as though it was a simple case of sore losing. I wasn't really up to snuff on politics, but I was certain there had to be more to it than that. Of course, the whole thing was entirely moot now. Their decisions had led to our destruction and ours to theirs. We had all made mistakes, and now all those of us who were left could do was try to pick up the pieces. Like May and I were trying to do now, in our own way. *** May and I emerged from the bunker, and had to stop a moment, shielding our eyes from even the filtered sunlight. We had been down in that facility for at least a few days, our eyes adjusted quite thoroughly to its dim interior. It was honestly a little difficult to tell how long exactly we'd been down there, given my numbed sense of time awareness. Fresher air breezed against my face as we stepped back outside, which was actually kind of nice. Even though I was still a ghoul on the inside, the sensation of wind blowing against my no longer blotched skin was very refreshing. I decided that I would enjoy it while I could to further ignite my hopes for a permanent cure. A thought crossed my mind just then. May and I were both in excess of a hundred and fifty years old now. If we were to be cured of our ghoul affliction, what would we look like? Was it possible that, given our age, a true and proper cure could be lethal? Granted, sometimes ponies could live a really long life under good conditions. Granny Smith of the Apple Family had been well over a hundred before she passed on. However, that was in peacetime, and in a clean Equestria. Now, normal ponies tended to be lucky if they lived much past forty. In the time it took me to run through that series of notions, May had shut the door to the facility behind us and closed the uplifted hatch on top. She trotted up to me and looked around. She glanced down at the Pipbuck on her foreleg. Sometimes I forgot she had it. “It's been three days since we landed here,” she informed me. Looking to take advantage of May's superior knowledge on the subject, I decided to point out my concerns to her. “Hey May,” I began, choosing my words carefully, “once you finish that curing spell, what happens to us?” May blinked, then tilted her head, “Um... presumably we'd go around and teach other unicorns the spell, then once we have enough who know it, we can form a megaspell casting matrix and cure large numbers of ghouls at a time.” While that was a good thing to know, I kicked myself mentally for not being more specific. “I mean, physically speaking. Will we be the same age we were physically before mutating? Or will we age more rapidly?” May pondered that a moment. “I suppose I can't say for sure,” she admitted, “but I would theorize that the regenerative aspect of the ghoul mutation also halts conventional ageing. Like... our cells are necrotic, but they are also in a sort of biological stasis. It's not perfect, so they do degenerate over time, some faster than others, which is why feralism tends to affect every ghoul differently. If I manage to finish the cure, my best guess is that we'd physically be a few years older, a decade at most.” I nodded. I would still rather be an old pony with only a few good years left than live forever with the threat of feralism hanging over my head. Although if that did end up being the case, I would feel worse about the wasteland losing a good doctor like May. Those with medical knowledge and training were in extremely short supply compared to the number of ponies who needed them. Which was everypony really. With my momentary curiosity sated, I turned my attention back to the task we had set for ourselves. I had to regain my bearings a little, and began walking back towards where we had parked the cart. “So,” I said, starting up a fresh conversation, “if we're gonna do this, where should we look?” May began to follow alongside me as she answered, “Well, the one useful thing about zebra magic, relatively speaking, is that once its put into a phylactery of some sort, it tends to last indefinitely unless it's deliberately destroyed or used up.” She also noted, “Stronger magic requires stronger containers, so if there are any unused balefire bombs or missiles, they would likely still be around if they weren't already detonated.” I nodded. I had to admit to myself that it felt a little strange that my companion knew so much about these destructive weapons, only to remind myself that she had, in fact, played a hoof in inventing them. Back when they weren't actually tools of destruction. As that thought passed over my mind, I stopped, looking to May. “This is where...” I paused a moment, unsure of how to say it, “the first megaspell test took place.” May stopped as well, looking around. She nodded solemnly. “Yes, it was. Back then... back then, when Fluttershy first introduced the idea to the Ministry of Peace, it was so... radical. No one had ever thought on that scale before for magic, except perhaps the Princesses moving objects as large as the Sun and Moon.” May continued as I listened intently. “When we started working on the megaspell project, we had all sorts of idea for its application. The ability to heal everypony on the battlefield all at once, shielding an entire city from harm, mass teleportation spells making battlefield logistics so much easier.” She looks around at the blighted landscape around us and hung her head. “We never wanted this.” I sighed, not really having anything to say. May still had a habit of holding herself personally responsible for failures beyond her ability to control. Especially where the Ministry of Peace was concerned. I gently placed a hoof on her shoulder. May met my hoof with one of her own. “C.A.R.E.” she stated. “Communally Assured Reciprocal Existence. It's what Fluttershy originally dubbed the project. With healing spells able to fix any injury no matter how grievous, shield spells capable of repelling any attack, and teleportation spells capable of advancing or retreating armies in the blink of an eye, the whole idea was to end the war. With all of those things factored together, the zebras would have had no choice but to surrender, or come back to the table of diplomacy.” I patted May's hoof. “The zebras were there that first day too though. They saw what you could do, and there were those among them who twisted the idea into something unconditionally deadly.” May frowned, “They did, but that's not the whole of it.” She sighed and brushed my hoof away. “It was Fluttershy who gave the zebras our work on megaspells.” I blinked. “So that's what you meant when you said the zebras poisoned her gift.” May nodded. “Literally. Fluttershy couldn't have known what the zebras would do with it; she was too kind to even think of that possibility. Those of us working on the project should have tried to stop her. Of course, she was the head of a Ministry, and there weren't many of us willing to challenge her. Not even me. After that though, we had no choice but to respond in kind for the sake of keeping the playing field level.” May lowered her head and looked down the hill. She was now staring at No-Mare's Land. The vast sea of cratered and trench scarred earth between Equestria and the zebra nation. I couldn't even remember if it had a proper name anymore. Our next stop on our quest to try and make things right. Wasn't that, in essence, what Fluttershy and May had been trying to do here so long ago? Everyone had a different idea about the nature of doing the right thing. *** May and I returned to the caged cart we had flown here in. She stepped in first, taking my rifle and saddlebags with her. I hitched myself back up to the front of the cart and took off, flying out over No-Mare's Land. Looking down as I flew towards the zebra nation I felt a chill, knowing that so many ponies and zebras alike had died down there in the pair of battles fought for the ridge. It was the closest the zebras had come to successfully penetrating Equestria, and now it was just one big graveyard. When flying over the devastation of the wasteland, it was easy enough to remove myself from it by staring forward and focusing on my destination. However, the weight of everything that had happened sat heavily on my shoulders and kept my gaze focused downwards. So much death and destruction and pain. I felt a few tears roll down my muzzle and fall onto the ruin of the battlefield. If only Fluttershy's plan had kept to its original form, maybe this could have all been avoided... As we passed over the far side of No-Mare's Land, I noticed that the edge of the zebra nation was not all that different. Once I had flown over the trenches on the zebra side, I was officially in their country. It was so... barren. I was used to seeing the Equestrian Wasteland in ruin, but this was something else. Everywhere I could see from where I now hovered was scorched, and there were huge puddles of water that looked out of place so far inland. It hadn't rained over the past couple days, so where did they come from? I continued flying into the zebra lands, my curiosity increasing. Where Equestria had vast forests and jungles and mountain ranges and plains, the zebra lands were remarkably static. Almost nothing but flat, dry land, except for a jungle to the far east that bordered on Equestria. The same jungle that had passed over Crescent Moon Canyon, the site of Luna's school at Littlehorn. There were hardly any trees, and any that were still standing were shrivelled, black, and dead. The rest of the land's flatness was occasionally broken up by large rock formations, equally scorched, or ruins that might have once been towns. It was actually hard to tell the difference between those two possibilities in the current state of the land. I looked back over my shoulder to May, who was again trying to keep from noticing that she was flying. “What happened here?” I asked. May stood up and took a quick glance downward, immediately blanching before seating herself again. “If I had to guess, I'd say Celestia One.” I raised a curious eyebrow, “What's that?” May sighed and looked upwards, “Our response to the zebra's weaponized Megaspells. Or, one of them at least. It was housed in the Manehattan MAS Hub, and basically turned sunlight into a giant heat ray. Before the pegasi threw up their cloud cover, it was used to strike back after Manehattan was destroyed.” I looked down with a mix of horror and awe. The zebras had hit Equestria with numerous balefire bombs, and yet with a single spell, we ponies had been as devastating in return, if not more so. As I continued flying over the ruined zebra nation, an important thought crossed my mind. “How are we going to find a balefire bomb?” May shrugged, “I don't know, but we need to find one if I'm to have any chance of filling in the missing piece of my spell. The best I can think of is to look for some sort of military base.” “Would there be any along the coast?” I asked. “I read about a few big battles during the war taking place at sea.” “Doubtful,” May replied almost immediately. “If Celestia One could do this to the land, then it could have just as easily boiled the ocean and anything on or near it.” I nodded. That was one idea out, but at least she sounded more sure of herself when it came to that. That begged the question of where we might find a zebra military facility. I kept my good eye locked on the terrain below, but all I could see was untempered devastation. My bad eye rolled around absently, not really registering much. I decided to suspend my search briefly and put the wagon down for a little while. I wanted to join May in the back, knowing she was almost certainly going through more than I could understand. The best I could offer was a bit of closeness and conversation. “Do you think any zebras survived?” I asked May, hoping to keep her talking. I got nervous when she was quiet for long periods of time. “I certainly hope not,” she scowled in response. “Those monsters deserved to be wiped out for destroying Equestria.” I winced. That was harsh, especially for May. I knew she hated zebras, but to pin her hopes on their indiscriminate genocide... I had to speak up. “Not all of them deserved it,” I replied with a frown. “I imagine our soldiers were seen as monsters by those on their side.” May snorted. “Maybe, but they are the ones who started the war, they are the ones that massacred a bunch of foals at Littlehorn, and they are the ones who decided to destroy Equestria and so many of the innocent ponies living there when they launched the first Megaspells. All we did was give them the response they deserved.” May was visibly fuming by the end of her little tirade. I sighed and frowned. Everything May said was true, but I just couldn't understand why she wouldn't let go of her hatred for them. “Even if they did all of that, any zebras alive today would have had nothing to do with it. Just like ponies born nowadays had nothing to do with the war, or the Ministries, or any of it!” I was getting mad myself, which I didn't like. Yet at the same time, I felt I had to get through to May on this. May groaned and shook her head, “Don't you get it Ditzy? These are the- the things that took everything away from me! My hopes for peace, my desire to help ponies, my family, my marefriend, everything! All because of them. You didn't have any family that lived to see the horrors of war! You have no idea what I had to suffer through! You just-” SMACK Before I fully realized I had done it, I had struck May hard across the face with a hoof. I was seething, and my eyes were full of tears. They began to stream down my rejuvenated skin, making it itchy. May's words hurt, but not as much as seeing a mare I knew genuinely cared about other people turn so angry, so hate filled. “Stop it!” I threw my hooves around her and sobbed. “P-please May! Just... st-stop!” I don't know if it was my crying or the slap to her face that had snapped May out of it, but I felt her hooves wrap around me and her tears trickle down my shoulder. “Ditzy, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. It's just... being here, where all of this happened... so many old wounds opening at once...” May trailed off as I just pulled her closer and tighter. It was times like these that sometimes it was just better not to say anything more. *** After spending a while just hugging and crying, May let go of me and I slipped out of the back of the caged wagon, returning to the harness. Before I could strap myself in however, my lazy eye rolled, and I swore I saw something move. I turned to focus my good eye in that direction, slipping Stronghoof's Legacy off my back and bringing it to bear. I didn't raise it up to eye level just yet; it might just have been a mirage. Then, I saw it again. Except it wasn't anything. It was an ever so subtle ripple in the air, like you would see coming off a space heater. Then it was gone again. I hadn't actually seen anything other than that ripple, and yet I was on edge for some reason. So sure that there was something there. I kept my rifle out until I got back to the harness. I slipped it away and reattached myself to the harness. “What was that about?” called May from behind me. “I thought I saw something,” I replied honestly, “but it might have just been my eye playing tricks.” May just nodded and laid her head back down. I supposed she couldn't really offer any more insight than I had myself. She had never crossed into zebra lands before, and her hatred of their kind most likely kept her from doing any in-depth research into their lands or culture. It was times like these that reminded me May was a good two decades younger than me. Most of her life had been lived during the war, while most of mine, prior to the wasteland of course, had been during peacetime. I really couldn't imagine the kind of difference that would make, although May served as a fitting example. I took off, bringing the two of us back into the air to resume our search for a balefire bomb. It still sounded so surreal, and yet May was right about it being her best chance to find what she was missing for her ghoul curing spell. At least, I hoped she was right. I flew back and forth over stretch after stretch of zebra land, travelling further and further into their borders as the day wore on. As the sun began to set, all I could see was more and more of the same barren wastes. It chilled me to think that May actually might have been right about the zebras being wiped out, but so far I hadn't seen even a hint of any occupied settlements or survivors. As night approached I started looking for a place to set us down. I wouldn't have minded overnight flying back in Equestria, but this was unfamiliar territory. I wanted to be able to see where I was going and what I was looking for. My lazy eye rolled about and, in the dimming light, caught what looked like a collection of ruined buildings near a small lake. Considering the arid nature of the nation as a whole, it wasn't that surprising they would build settlements near any decently sized body of water they could find. I passed over to the far side of the lake as I brought the wagon down once more for a landing. On that side I could see a narrow river running along the southern edge of the town towards the ocean that lay somewhere beyond the visible horizon. I could see the ruined supports of what I could only assume used to be rope bridges that spanned the river. Naturally they would have been incinerated when the land was scorched by Celestia One. Lowering our altitude gradually to her a better view of the area around the city, I finally brought us down on the north side of the lake, just beyond the edge of the former settlement. The first thing that struck me, getting a closer look at it for the first time, was how alien the zebra architecture seemed. In Equestria the rural settlements had their cozy wooden town and farm houses, while the cities had their towering glass and metal skyscrapers. Here, all of the buildings were cut from what looked like giant stone blocks, and none of them rose above two or three stories. There was a complete absence of windows and doors in spite of the frames that should have held them. I suspected this was also the work of Equestria's megaspell counterattack, the various scorch marks plain to see. I shuddered at the notion, having never really contemplated what might have happened on this side of the border on the day of the holocaust. After a minute or two of curious observation, I detached myself from the wagon's harness and moved to let May out. When I opened the cage, I saw that she too was looking at the zebra settlements. “I take it you've never seen them before either?” May shook her head, “In pictures, but not up close.” She touches the surface of the closest building, her hoof coming away with a bit of black on it. “Ashes burnt onto the stone,” she remarked. “Reminds me of Manehattan. Nothing left but ashes.” She frowns deeply. I couldn't tell what part of it was bothering her, so I simply said nothing. May lit up her horn and floated out Rottingtail's revolver, slipping into the nearest building, her horn bathing the interior with light. Following behind her after retrieving my things, I could see... nothing. The first floor of this building was a single large room, and there was absolutely nothing inside but for a coating of ashes and dust on the floor. There was a stone stairwell with a rotted-away banister leading up to a second floor landing. A quick flight up there showed me a few more rooms, all of which were equally empty. I came back down to find May absently staring at the ashes. Any hopes that she might have some sympathy for the deaths that occurred here faded when she gave a derisive snort before turning to face me as I landed next to her. “This will do,” she said simply. I nodded in reply. The stone construction was sturdy, even though it lacked any underground foundations. I didn't know what, if anything, we might possibly encounter here in the zebra lands, but if anything did show up, we would have a clear view of the only entrance. I pulled a lantern out of my pack and lit it, allowing May to kill the glow from her horn. I placed the lantern in the middle of the floor, its light dim but adequate enough to fill the room. I approached May, wanting to speak with her again, but she curled up any turned away from me, indicating that she wished to be left alone. I sighed, but knew that she had a lot of conflicting emotions to sort out, and trying to press her right now would simply make things worse. I retreated to the other side of the room and laid down. My skin felt itchy as it began to dry out, the arid conditions hastening its decay. I feared my complexion wasn't the only thing beginning to deteriorate, and hoped for May's sake we would be able to find what we came here for. *** I hadn't realized that I had dozed off, but was awoken with a start as I heard a noise from outside. Low and guttural, it was the sound of some manner of wild beast. Casting a quick glance at May, I could see that she was alert and aware of it too, and the way she was looking at the wall indicated that, whatever it was, she could see its position thanks to her Pipbuck. She said nothing but levitated out Rottingtail's revolver, her horn's glow not much brighter than that of the lantern. As I pulled Stronghoof's Legacy off my back, my bad eye rolled towards that lantern. Its flickering light was probably responsible for having drawn... whatever it was towards us. Unfortunately, dousing it now would probably do nothing, since the pungent smell of ghoul (more from May at the moment than me) would still be more than noticeable to any wild animal. I braced the rifle against my shoulder and brought the trigger up to my mouth as my good eye followed May's gaze, turning her head as the creature moved. Suddenly, before the creature made it all the way to our door, there was a loud, pained sounding roar, followed by a thud. May blinked in surprise. “It's gone,” she remarked, then began staring intently in the direction it had been approaching from. “What the...” “What is it?” I asked with a mix of relief and confusion, not being able to see what her E.F.S was indicating. “Something definitely killed... whatever that creature was, but there's nothing else on my compass.” I raised an eyebrow. “Maybe it just died on its own?” I suggested a bit foalishly. May took that suggestion about as seriously as I would have and continued trying to make out something. Although May didn't manage to see anything else, we both started to hear something new. It was a sliding, scraping sound, like somepony was dragging something heavy. May gestured to the lantern, which I moved to extinguish, after which we both stepped out of the zebra structure to find out what was really going on. What I saw was not something I expected to see outside of Equestria. It was, by my first impression, a massive, oversized, mutated manticore. However, it was difficult to see in the dark, and the creature was slowly being dragged away from us by... something. However, as my eyes began to adjust to the darkness, I noticed two things. First, that the tail of the creature did not have a stinger and was decidedly feline. Secondly, it had no wings. What the creature was actually called I had no idea, but the wooden shaft of a spear sticking out of its back made it clear that someone else had slain it. Neither May nor I managed to get a glimpse of who was responsible, and May held out a hoof to keep me from following right away. She made a shushing motion with her hoof, then pointed to the ground. As the creature was being dragged away, it left a faint but noticeable smear on the charred ground. I nodded my understanding. Someone had killed this creature, and if that someone was dragging the creature off, it had to be going somewhere. Somewhere that might just have someone who could help us. At least, that's what I figured May was getting at. We didn't really have anything else to work from at the moment, so there was nothing to lose in following the trail. We waited a little while at first, to make sure that whoever it was we were about to follow had enough of a lead that we wouldn't be noticed. I took the air, flapping my featherless wings as silently as possible, while May started following the trail on the ground, her eyes glued to it. I pulled my rifle back up and kept it ready in case anything else like that not-a-manticore showed up. Taking a quick peek through the scope, I spotted it being dragged away farther ahead, still with no sign of who or what was actually dragging it. I figured it was somepony invisible, although how they were accomplishing that was a mystery to me. They were even hiding from May's E.F.S, which was even more curious. The trail led us out of the zebra settlement and down the length of the narrow river. Eventually we could see smoke rising up, illuminated by a massive bonfire. The fire itself cast flickering light over a group of figures, just over a dozen that I could see (of varying ages judging by the sizes), as well as what looked like a camp. Bringing the scope to my eye to get a better look, I could see a half-dozen conical tents made from animal hide and long wood or metal poles. They were decorated with hoof paint and wooden ornaments, some of them resembling masks. Looking to the assembled figures, all of them were wearing similar masks and cloaks that obscured their features, and each had a spear planted in the ground next to them. The dragging path of the creature's body led straight to the camp. I fluttered back down next to May, slipping my rifle over my back and whispering, “There's a camp up ahead. Maybe two dozen.” May nodded. “Although why anypony would want to live out here is beyond me.” I chuckled, pointing May to her Pipbuck, “There is the absence of radiation and a nearby source of fresh flowing water.” May blinked and looked at her Pipbuck. Sure enough, the radiation detector was silent. “I didn't even notice. I haven't paid attention to that thing in decades.” She chuckled a bit as well. I smiled. May chuckling was the first positive sign I'd seen in a while, even if it was just a little one. We crouched down and continued our approach to the camp. There was a slight ridge in the mostly flat land, just short of the camp, with a large rock on our side of the river that the water burbled against. May and I crept up to the rock and peered around it, the assembled figures not noticing as they watched the corpse of the beast dragged into the middle of their camp near the bonfire. From this angle, I could see some kind of podium standing near the rear of the camp, a heavy tarp covering something. Turning my attention back to the creature, I saw someone who hadn't been there before. Another figure wearing a dark cloak had appeared, shimmering into existence out of thin air. The cloak had a jewel in the clasp just below the hood and was both darker in colour, yet lighter in texture than the ones the other masked figures wore. The figure retrieved his spear from the creature's back and the others assembled picked theirs up, pinched in their hoof joints. The first figure, who had all the eyes of the others on him now, threw back his hood and thrust his mouth-held spear into the air. I gasped. It was a zebra! *** I had only ever seen one zebra up close before. Her name was Zecora, and she lived in the Everfree Forest near Ponyville. It seemed a little ironic that I had been afraid of her, as had everypony else in town, until her mysterious nature was cleared up by Twilight Sparkle and her friends. They had befriended the zebra long before the war, only for her kind to be branded as enemies of Equestria, and subjected to hatred, fear, ostracizing, and who knows what else. At least when we were afraid of Zecora in Ponyville, we hadn't resorted to any kind of violence, we just avoided her. There had even been other zebras living in Equestria during the war. I had never given them much thought until just now. As soon as the zebra removed his hood and cloak, the others took their masks off and threw their own hoods back in unison. The removal of their cloaks showed that most of them were wearing crude armour made of animal hide. They were talking loudly, so my gasp went unnoticed, but I couldn't understand a word of what was being said. It was probably their native language. I looked on curiously, just watching for a moment. The zebra that had killed the creature stabbed his spear into the ground and hung his cloak on it. He turned to show off his flank, adorned by a squiggly looking mark whose meaning was lost on me. Perhaps this was the zebra equivalent of a cuteceñera, or some similar coming of age ceremony. Before I could really get any better idea of what was going on, May bit at the scruff of my neck. “Okay fine, so they did survive. Still, we don't need their help,” she hissed, trying to lead me off. I raised an eyebrow. “This is their homeland, May,” I retorted. “Theirs is exactly the help we need.” I took another glance back at the zebras, all of whom seemed to be paying attention to the one that had been invisible. The cloak must have been enchanted. They proceeded to plant their spears back in the ground around the bonfire. May's voice pulled my attention away again, “Look at them Ditzy. The fact that they're zebras notwithstanding, they've devolved to a hunter-gatherer tribe. They probably wouldn't even recognize a gun, let alone a balefire bomb.” “That doesn't mean they don't know their way around,” I suggested. “If we could approach them and ask for directions to other old settlements-” “Do I look like I speak zebra?” May scoffed. “Maybe they speak Equestrian,” I countered. May didn't want their help, but for her sake, we needed it. Causing her a bit of annoyance would be worth it if we could get what we needed to finish her spell. Rather than trying to argue further, May simply turned and began to walk away. She probably figured that I would follow after her, and she was right, although I would at least keep trying to convince her. I couldn't leave her alone in a foreign land, but I also could not pass up an opportunity like this. Even if the zebras couldn't understand us or mistook us for monsters, it was the first time we had a chance to get help, and for all I knew it might be the only chance we would ever get. If ever there was a time I wished I could go back and do something differently, it was right then and there. As I turned to catch May, my eye rolled back towards the camp. As it did so, I was able to see an elderly looking zebra move away from the congregation towards the podium. He pulled off the tarp, revealing something that stopped me dead. I had no idea what it was, but my attention was drawn to it like a magnet. It was small, geometrically shaped with surfaces that seemed to twist through each other. The whole thing was the size of a bushel of apples and swirled with sickly mesmerizing coloured light. I turned to focus my whole attention on it, both eyes locked on to it, unable to tear my gaze away. The zebras seemed fixated on it as well, turning towards it in unison and then kneeling to it. The only exceptions were the elder and the young stallion, who trotted up next to the podium as well. What they were really doing I would never find out. May turned back around to address me, but whatever she might have been about to say died on her muzzle. Her gaze immediately fell upon the object of the zebra's worship. Her eyes went wide, and a single whispered word escaped her muzzle: “No...” With my focus locked on to the object, I barely registered most of what happened next, only coming to the realization of what was going on after it was too late. The glow of May's horn was effectively lost to the light of the bonfire and the glowing, twisting colours of the object. I only realized that she was levitating Stronghoof's Legacy as the strap pulled taught against my shoulder. A moment later, the gun was wrenched off my back, the strap sliding up and catching my neck, gagging me for a moment before slipping loose. I fell to the ground, retching and coughing hoarsely. I looked up to see May's face contorted with a rage the likes of which I had never seen, my rifle and Rottingtail's revolver both floating beside her. I was incapacitated and having trouble breathing, and could only watch in horror at what May did next. She bounded over the rock and began to fire on the zebras. The soft pffts of my rifle made all the more quiet by the resounding crack of the revolver. The zebras were equally stunned. May screamed and roared and yelled as she fired, although I could only make out snippets of anything intelligible. As fire began to ring out, there was a series of yelps and frantic whinnies from the assembled zebras, coupled with shouting in that unfamiliar tongue. The rest was guttural screaming and nonsense. “Not again! Never again!” “Better wiped than striped!” “This is for Buttercup! This is for Buckbright! This is for Mirror! This is for Shoeshine!” Each calling of a name or phrase was punctuated by a shot from one of the two guns, although the last I managed to hear had only an empty click. I forced myself to my hooves, pulling myself forward. I didn't want to see the carnage, but I had to stop May. My eyes went wide in horror at the scene I witnessed. May had already killed five zebras and wounded others, emptying both guns in the process. Those uninjured ran to retrieve their spears, but with a horrible display of her magic, May ripped all of them from the ground at once and hurled them in every direction. Three zebra stallions charging her fell, while two others, their weapons lost, turned and fled. Another spear caught the hind leg of a retreating mare who stumbled, pinning a filly beneath her forelegs as she tripped. The filly tried to skitter out from under the mare, who was struggling to her hooves. May approached with a spear floating alongside her, murder in her eyes. I kicked off with my hind legs and, even though I was still gasping for breath, threw out my wings and tackled May hard, the impact dropping every weapon in her magical grasp. Every part of my gut wrenched, both from the impact with my friend and the pain of what I had witnessed her do. May and I rolled over each other numerous times before we came to rest with me on top, pinning her. “RUN!” I shouted to the zebra mare. Whether she understood me or not, the zebra mare began to hobble away as best she could, keeping herself between us ghouls and her filly. Unexpectedly, I was flipped over by May, who proceeded to try and pin me as I had done to her. She glared down at me, and I realized that was it. Her eyes were dull, any glimmer of hope or shine of intelligence I would have once seen there gone. My own strength left me as my mind raced, trying to find some other explanation than the one I didn't want to face. May pressed down on me with a strength she didn't normally exhibit, gnashing her teeth at me and snarling wickedly. I gave a fierce kick of my front legs, pushing May off of me. She crashed into the bonfire, sending flaming logs rolling and setting many of the zebra tents ablaze. I stood, panting, looking at May, desperately trying to reach her. “May! Please!” If I could just get her to listen... My words didn't reach her. They couldn't, not now, nor ever again. She slavered and shrieked and gave a wicked whinny before lunging at me, teeth bared and eyes hungry. I didn't have time to think as my own survival instinct kicked in. With minimal consciousness of doing so, I grabbed one of the spears in my teeth. There was a sickening sound, a splash of warm blackness, and a sudden, dead weight atop me. Then everything faded away to nothingness. Footnote: ...