Fallout: Equestria - Rolling Bones

by Honey Mead

Chapter 3-3: Baggage

Fallout Equestria: Rolling Bones
Chapter 3-3: Baggage

I enjoyed most of my dreams, preferring them over the grind of day-to-day life. In fact, I made it a habit to sleep as much as possible, taking naps anytime the opportunity presented itself. Waking up, then, tended to be a long, drawn out affair that involved a great deal of moaning, groaning, and out right complaining as I, or somepony else, forced me out of bed. Never before had I found a way in which I enjoyed being woken up.

Gray’s lips departed mine, leaving a chill where there’d been a moist warmth just seconds before. It was an invigorating sensation, one that tasted of strawberries oddly enough. I immediately wanted more, not that that was enough to get me out of bed.

“Good morning, Love,” Gray said, a mirth to her tone, presumably based from the expression I was likely wearing due to my waring desires.

I hummed airily through a smile, my eyes still lightly closed, putting a slight inflection at the end to make it a question.

“Still sleepy then?”

The next hum, a single, flat, uninflected note, was accompanied by a slight nod of my head and a hopeful twitch of my right ear.

“How’s this then?” she asked, rejoining for a second round. It was soft and tender, her tongue brushing my lips. The heady passion of the previous night was gone, replaced by a more complex mixture of emotions and desires. It was the kind of kiss that only comes once the fire has burned out, but the embers still glow, radiating a comfortable warmth. “Better?”

I opened my eyes, and she filled my vision. I breathed in, and all I could smell was her scent. I licked my lips, and all I could taste was her tongue. I was awash in her presences, drowning in everything that was her, and I was content. We laid there, nose to nose, staring into each others eyes, not a single thought between us.

Then she touched my cheek, and I winced at the contact, the bruise a nice shade of brown through my coat. Gray cringed back with me, pulling her hoof away, muttering an apology as I cupped her hoof in my own, kissed it, gently set it back against the welt, and let out the corniest line I could think of.

“The stiffest of kicks from you would be naught but a healing balm.”

Gray’s expression cracked with a wry grin and a roll of her eyes. “You’re incorrigible.”

“And yet, here you are,” I said, letting my hoof brush her cheek, run along her neck, and trace a line down her chest, “laying next to me after a night of hot—” her hoof crushed my lips, muffling me, but not stopping me as I waxed poetic the different positions we’d tried, until she gave up for giggling “—that say about you?”

She didn’t say anything, just shaking her head and trying to control her laughter. Eventually things did calm down, and her eyes inevitably returned to the bruise. “He really just walked in, decked you, and walked out without so much as a word? And you didn’t do anything to deserve it?”

I rolled my eyes and shrugged, it was the third time she’d asked the same questions. “No. Nothing. It’s been months since the last time I pulled anything, well, anything on him at least. I know you don’t believe—”

“No, no, it’s not…” Gray stopped, obviously rethinking what she’d been about to say. “It’s… I know how you two are. You aren’t exactly nice to him.”

“That’s not true,” I said in mock outrage. “I’m nothing but nice to him.”

“Really?” she asked, giving me a disbelieving look.

“Really.”

“So, you didn’t and don’t intentionally hit on him constantly just to make him uncomfortable.”

“Since when is ego boosting not a good thing?”

“And the fits of giggling that follow?”

“It’s not my fault that he is adorable when he’s embarrassed!”

Gray shook her head in exasperation. “Just promise me you’ll fix it.”

“I’m not worried about it,” I said with a shrug as I rolled onto my back and stared up at the ceiling. “After all, we’ll have plenty of time to sort it all out while we’re gone.”

The magelamp wavered to and fro overhead, stretching and compressing the shadows in imitation of a slow dancing candleflame. I didn’t like my situation. Not my immediate situation, that was awesome. No, it was the thing with Hurdles that was confounding; mostly because I honestly had no idea why he was mad at me. The last time I’d pulled any prank on him was months ago. He hadn’t seemed angry the day before. With the expedition and all, he’d been downright chipper, even managing to crack some half-decent jokes at dinner.

Gray’s silence caught my attention. Looking back, I was surprised to see tears in her eyes and her ears limp.

“I’m sorry,” she said, her voice a cracked whisper, before burying her muzzle into my chest, clinging to me like a she feared of being torn away. I didn’t respond, partly because I didn’t know how, but also because I could barely breathe for the death grip she had on my barrel. And then she was gone, galloping out of the tent, her last words seeming to echo in my ears. “I can’t do this.”

“What the fuck?” I shouted, jumping out of the bed. Only to get tangled in the covers and crash. I fought my way free and galloped out of the tent, flared my wings and pulled a perfect ninety degree lateral turn. My left hooves dug grooves in the dirt and barely anchored me to the ground. An empty path greeted me. A quick one-eighty left me looking down another similarly empty road.

“Gray!”

An earth pony or unicorn might have been out of luck at that point, but I was just getting started. My wings went to work and carried me over the tents.

What in Tartarus had that been? Sorry for what? Can’t do what? I—No! Not again!

Something in the air was making it hard to see, a low cloud or whatever. Scrubbing my eyes only seemed to wake it worse, so I stopped and strained to see through the murkiness, hoping I could still find Gray. It was futile. Between whatever was fogging my eyes, the distance, and her coloring, I couldn’t…

Hundreds of little lines slid across the edge of my Pipbuck’s hud as I moved. Whatever was affecting my eyes wasn’t giving that thing any trouble, it was as clear as ever. I ground my teeth. Even that utterly useless radar/sonar… thing was working like a charm. Hundreds of little tabs were zipping this way and that, as though I gave a flying fuck about any of them.

“What the fuck good are you?” I screamed at the glossy screen on my pastern. “Who the fuck cares about all those other ponies? Tell me where Gray is!”

I punched it. As spark fizzled off where my shoe connected with the metal. I punched it again. And again. I wailed on it, sending a stream of sparks into the air, smashing in random buttons, and spinning the dial against the side of my hoof.

Stable-Tec™ Crusader Mode activated
Loading Active Crusades…

Expedition EvasionGray DaysJumping Gates
I stared at the words typing across the screen, the fog seeming to lift as a smile crept across my lips. Finally, this thing was going to be useful. Turning the dial, I selected Gray Days. The screen flashed.

Gray Days: Find Nurse Gray and discover the reason behind her sudden change in behavior.

I clicked it again. The screen flashed. Nothing changed.

“Oh, come on!”

After another round of beating and cursing the pastern mounted computer of utter uselessness, I flew straight to Gray’s tent. All of ten seconds later, I came to a cantering landing, trotting straight into the opening.

As I feared, it was as abandoned as my own. I stood, half inside, just staring at the walls and furniture. My mind was a complete blank. I couldn’t seem to form a complete thought, everything slipping away like the wind between my feathers.

I couldn’t help but stare at the bed. That it was not designed for more than one pony hadn’t hindered us in the least that night. Every movement had been a balancing act to keep the other from falling to the floor. The covers hadn’t lasted long. Now… now it was perfect, pristine even. The sheets hugged the mattress without a single wrinkle to be seen with the pillow resting plump and ready to comfort the next head to rest upon it. It was almost like nothing had ever happened.

I turned away.

Only for my eyes to land on the only picture in the tent. Mounted in an crude plastic frame, the photo was probably the most expensive thing Gray owned. Taken and bought so long ago that I don’t even remember the event. No more than two years after my adoption by the Watchers, Gray didn’t really look all that different, maybe a little thinner about the flanks with a slightly shinier coat. The other ponies though… Aloe, Hurdles, and myself… I’d forgotten that I used to be taller than him.

Crusade ‘Gray Days’ updated: Speak with Aloe to find clues about Gray’s actions.
Crusade ‘Jumping Gates’ updated: Speak with Aloe to find clues about Hurdles actions.

A grin found my lips. So, maybe it wasn’t completely useless.

Aloe was a rising star in the Watchers. Her natural affinity for healing spells made her invaluable. Unfortunately, she had a deep seated aversion to seeing anything that was meant to remain inside a pony. It was so bad that she had trouble wrapping a bandage around a paper cut. For a few years, they’d believed that immersion therapy, or as I liked to call it, The Crimson Carnival of Carnage, would cure her. It didn’t work out.

Then, about two years ago, a merchant had stumbled upon a book containing some small portion of the formula and process for making Healing Potions. Needless to say, figuring out how to make those would go a long way to helping everypony. Aloe immediately volunteered to help with the research. Some small progress had been made, but the most important parts were the ones that they were still missing. The key still eluded them.

More important to me, I had a good place to start my search.

It wasn’t a particularly large structure, just slightly more floor space than my own tent. The multitudes of tables didn’t help. Glass tubes of all descriptions, bubbling with many colored liquids, covered the metal tables that crowded nearly every inch of floor space, a plethora of gems and attunement, well, devices I guess—the minutia of magic had always eluded me, no matter how often Gray and Aloe tried to explain it—made seeing who was inside nearly impossible.

“Hey, Aloe,” I shouted from the entrance, “do you have a minute?”

An answer came via a loud sneeze from Doctor Humors as he stepped around one of the tables.

“Bless you.” I spouted by rote—Tracker and Gray would be so proud.

Humors sniffed, holding a kerchief to his nose with his magic. “Ah, thank you, uh, Lucky, is it?”

“Yeah, that’s me. Is Aloe around?”

The loud rumble of a blowing nose shook the nearest table, a bubbling green liquid sloshing dangerously close to spilling. “Ah, I’m afraid not, lad. Haven’t seen her in a few days, come to think of it. Odd that.” I started to ask how he could have not noticed his assistant's absences, only to be completely ridden over as he continued, “Are you excited about tomorrow, it’ll be the beginning of a… ah…” His kerchief swept in to cover his snout. “Achoo!”

I cringed back from the expulsion. “Uh, yeah, sure.” Retreating with the full knowledge that he was not going to be of any use, I said, “If you see her can you let her know I’m looking for her?”

“Of course, of course,” he said, waving the sodden cloth at me.

That was odd, Aloe was supposed to be the responsible one, always on time and ready to do her part. Her not showing up to work should have set off a few red flags, but I was oblivious, instead flying toward her tent, certain that she’d be there.

Trotting into her room was like entering a miniature library. Besides providing room and board, the Watchers gave out small allowances. Aloe spent almost all of hers on any book she could get her hooves on. The topic was never important, only that they were words saved and passed along by other ponies.

She wasn’t there, of course, that would have been too damned convenient.

Cross followed on Oracle’s heel as they left Dise, cutting through Parasprite Mound, headed toward a small gathering out on the plains.

A mile outside of Dise, they joined the other seven and one half members of the Arbitrors who had gathered around a deep enough to hide a full grown brahmin. A shovel shot out of the unfilled grave, arcing high only to land, with its haft pointing skyward, in the pile of dirt left from the work. Two grimy hooves followed the discarded tool, gripping the lip and hauling a bulky earth pony out of the grave, his brown coat masking any soil that covered his body. In spite of the situation’s gravitas, Appletosser wore a wide grin until he caught Locke’s eye, and his propriety asserted a firm stoicism in his expression as he joined the group.

Eight and one half mercenaries stood around their ninth and final member, Carmine, laid out on a small litter, covered from tufted tail to pointed beak by a dirty white bed sheet.

A heavy silence hung over the gathered equines as Oracle’s gaze took them in, matching Appletosser’s stoicism, both heavy with the weight of those who’d gone before. Solder Iron was not as reserved, with the deep set frown and uncertain eyes of a pony who’d lost a friend. Cross, Zefira—the zebra matriarch—and her companion called Knives, all wore blank, unreadable expressions, though whether to hide their emotions or because they lacked any, Oracle was uncertain. Carrot, an unmarked colt, had slipped by unnoticed to press himself against Cross’ foreleg, occasionally wiping at his muzzle. The twins, however, were who claimed most of Oracle’s attention. Stock glowered at the shrouded figure, his dark blue wing puffing and twitching at his side, while Locke struggled to maintain her composure, tears brimming as she watched Carmine’s corpse as though she expected him to rise at any moment.

After a solid three minutes of silence, Oracle acted, horn lighting up and enshrouding Carmine in a magenta glow. Cross, Irons, and Locke soon followed suit. Ice blue, auburn, and carnation mingling with his magenta in a rainbow aura as Carmine was lifted from the ground and lowered with care into the grave. A single sob escaped Locke’s control, her horn winking out as she covered her mouth with a light blue hoof.

The next break in the silence came from Zefira, the aged zebra’s voice deep, rich, and lyrical as mournful chant of indecipherable words flowed from her lips. None of the ponies had ever asked the meaning, content to allow the melancholic aria stand upon its timbre alone.

As the last note faded, no one moved, eyes locked on the open grave darkening in the fading sunlight. One, two minutes passed before Appletosser moved, taking hold of a shovel and hoisting the first clod of earth in its metal spade. He held it over the grave for a moment, his eyes staring into the depths, before emptying it. A dull thump echoed up from the grave.

“He was a right foul mouthed fowl,” Stock said acidly, earning a scowl from his sister.

“Aye,” Appletosser said around the shovel haft, the levity despite the bass of his voice, “but his mouth was only half as foul as his breath.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Locke said, looking away with a pout.

Irons huffed, his magic taking hold of another shovel and joining Appletosser in covering the grave. “Tell that to that poor sod in Saddlesprings. I hear he still can’t smell anything.”

Appletosser dropped a second load into the hole as he chuckled. “Remember when he found that copse of wild onions?”

“Dear goddesses,” Locke groaned, “don’t remind me! It took a week to get the taste out of my mouth.”

So it went, the four of them going back and forth with tales of their former companion, recalling the fights and battles with friends and foes alike, giving voice to complaints and praises in equal measure. Each memory led to another, all filled with embellishment, but honest nonetheless. Oracle, Carrot, and Cross spoke as well, though far less frequently as everyone—save Zefira—lent a hoof or horn in covering the grave.

Eventually, the tales ran thin and the grave was covered, only the freshly turned earth and a few pieces of twisted rebar, with dog-tags woven between them, to mark the grave.

In the silence that followed, two-by-two, every eye turned to Oracle who met each in turn until he had everyone’s attention.

“In two days, we will be leaving Dise, escorting a Watcher caravan as it heads out west. By the end of the week we will have left NCA territory and crossed into the Palomino Wastes. Our contract with them is open ended, extending indefinitely until they have returned home.” Oracle paused, letting the words sink in. All knew of the contract, though only Irons, Zefira, and himself were fully aware of its details. As he expected, the others nodded, accepting his decision without question. Then he continued, “I will not be returning.”

That caused a stir. Irons, already informed, grimaced, but said nothing. Appletosser, Locke, Stock, and Carrot were not so silent, their responses all varying degrees of surprise and shock.

A raised hoof silenced the voices. “The Watchers want to make with contact other cities, ones outside the NCA’s reach. Once a suitable place is found, I will pass my command to Irons, and the rest of you will finish out the contract and return home.”

“You can’t do that,” Appletosser said, his deep voice sounding almost plaintive. “You promised—”

Oracle’s glare, cold with an old pain turned raging storm, cut off the much larger stallion, driving him to take a full step back and bow his head. “You all have your orders. Tomorrow at sunrise, we will meet outside the Watchers compound.”

With that, Oracle turned and left. All watched him leave without so much as a word, save Cross, who followed at his heel.

Or maybe it wouldn’t be.

As I turned to leave, I spotted Aloe trotting my way. Things were finally looking up.

With a boost from my wings, I cleared the distance in a single leap and stopped at a hover right in front of her.

It was only as I pulled up that I noticed the droop in her neck and ears. “Uh, hey, Aloe? Are you okay?” She looked up, and my wings stopped, dropping me to the ground. That look in her eyes dusted off memories, nights of consolation and chocolate and the mental gymnastics required to comfort somepony as they railed against their special somepony and lamented their loss at the same time. “Oh, sis, what happened?”

She made a noise somewhere between a nicker and whiny, her jaw tightening as sadness lost ground to anger, and I found myself on the receiving end of a fiery glare that should have set my feathers aflame. It wasn’t the first time I’d gotten that look, but usually I at least knew why. Her lips moved as though she was about to speak.

Then she just turned around, spinning in place and smacking my muzzle with her tail before she started trotting off.

I didn’t know what to do. My jaw went slack even as my ears perked up and pointed forward. What. The. Fuck?

In the time it took me to recover, she’d made it a good ten lengths back to wherever she’d come from. I launched into the air, did a one-eighty, and came to a perfect four point landing in her path. She yelped as her horn glanced off Dash’s wing and fell back to her haunches.

“What the Tar, Aloe?” She still didn’t say anything, instead just glaring at me from under her forelegs as she massaged her horn. “Talk to me, sis.”

“No! I’m not talking to you,” she growled through the moisture pooling in her eyes.

I blinked. This was worse than the time I put anesthetic in her perfume bottle. “What? Why?”

Not answering, she rolled to her hooves facing away again and began trotting away. That wasn’t going to fly with me. I repeated the my aerial show, this time landing a little further away and giving her time to pull up short.

She glared at me standing in her way, her eyes narrowing as though she could scare me off. When I showed no sign of moving, her horn lit up, surrounding me in magic as she attempted to force me out of the way. The magic tingled over my coat, sapping the weight from every cell, and I started to rise, my mane and tail wafting as if I were floating in water.

That was really not going to fly. My expression hardened into a glare every bit a match for hers. I stretched out my wings, focusing on them and tensing the muscles, holding them just on the edge of flapping, as though I were about to take off. A pressure built at the base of my pinions, almost becoming painful before I gave a single push. The spell collapsed, shattering around me. The weight of gravity reasserted itself, and I dropped back to the ground.

“Goddess damn it! I’ve fucking had enough of everyone's fucking attitudes to day!” I shouted, taking a steps closer until our foreheads pressed together, my wings still spread wide. “You’re going to Goddess damn well tell me what the fuck your problem is, and you’re going to do it right the fuck now!”

She tried to match me, straining to push me back, but I held my ground. We stood there for what felt like an hour before her tears became too much, and she blinked, breaking away to the side. “F-fuck you, Lucky! F-fuck you and that old whorse!”

It was my turn to fall back a pace, wings wilting halfway to my side. “Wh-what?”

“I hate you! I’m glad you’re going away. I hate you and I never want to see you again!”

“Wh— Aloe? Don’t say that.” She ignored me, galloping away as I called after her. “Aloe.” I should have chased after her, but I couldn’t. My hindlegs gave out. “Aloe!”

I stared up at the magelamp hung above my bed. It looked no different than the more common firefly lamps, a brass bottom and top with a glass like orb in the center, but it wasn’t glass; it was a crystal of some kind or another with a multifaceted surface to cast its light in a hundred directions at once. Or it would if it was turned on, which mine wasn’t. That would have required getting up, and I really just didn’t feel like it.

Nor did I feel like acknowledging the pony who’d just walked in, but ignoring him completely would have caused more problems.

“How ya doin’, colt?” the gravely, dusty voice that could only belong to one pony… or well, one pony who I actually knew, asked.

I glanced briefly toward the ghoul as he sat beside the bed. I didn’t bother to sound interested. “You here to yell at me too?”

“Ah talked ta Gray.”

“So, that’s a yes.”

“No, yer old ‘nough to make yer own mistakes.”

I snorted, failing to sound affect amusement, and turned away. “Since when?”

“Since Ah won’t be ‘round ta hold yer hoof no more. ‘Sides, Ah don’ fancy havin’ ya leave while we’re on bad terms. Ah gave Gray a piece of my mind, so that’ll have ta suffice for the both of ya.”

I hummed, once again failing to sound like I cared. Picking Dash up with my wings, I stood her up on my collar, looking up at her as she stood defiant on my chest. The indefatigable hero. “Aloe doesn’t share your pragmatism.”

Tracker clicked his tongue. “Aye. Ah was afraid of that.”

Another hum was already halfway out before I stopped and turned to stare at Tracker. “Wait, what?”

“You wanna close yer eyes ta what’s plain as the nose on yer muzzle, that’s yer choice, colt. Tain’t why I came by anyhow.” He dipped into his saddlebags, coming back out with what looked like a thick belt of leather, and placed it almost reverently on the mattress beside me. “Call it ah goin’ away present.”

I ignored it, instead glaring at him. “What they hay are you talking about? Close my eyes to what?”

Tracker pushed his stringy forelock behind an ear and sighed, sitting back on his haunches. “Ah’ve done mah darndest ta stay outta yer love life. Ain’t a pony e’er born who didn’t learn ‘bout love the hard way. Tain’t nothin’ I could do ta save you, nor anypony else, from the heartache an’ I ain’t in the business of wastin’ mah breath.”

“Way to deflect.”

“Lucky—”

“Don’t, Tracker… just don’t. Between getting socked by Hurdles, abandoned by Gray, and Aloe telling me to go to Tartarus, I’ve had one fucked up day. All I want is to figure out why everypony I care about is suddenly treating me like I’m a goddess damned leper!”

Tracker signed and placed a cracked hoof on my canon. “If Gray’s half the mare she plays at, she’ll speak with ya on the morrow. As fer the others, Ah ain’t certain what Hurdles’ is on about, but if Ah had ta guess, ah’d say it was ta do with Aloe’s crush on ya.”

That got my attention. I turned a look of total confusion on him. “Aloe’s what?”

“Ya heard me jus’ fine, colt.”

“Aloe does not have a crush on me. That is completely ridiculous.”

“Right, like Ah said, ain’t wastin’ mah breath.” He unrolled the bundle, unraveling straps to reveal a glistening pistol seated in a leather holster. “This is mah li’l life saver. Picked ‘er up durin’ mah first foray in the war.” I groaned and tried to hide under my wings. “Damn it, colt. This here’s important! There ain’t nothin’ Ah can do fer yer lover life, an’ since you ain’t doin’ squat about it neither, ya might as well listen! Now,” he paused to take a breath and calm himself down, “she may be more than two hundred years, but if ya treat ‘er right an’ she’ll do right by ya.”

I rolled my eyes but lacked the gumption to do anything else. Tracker fell right into his ‘teacher mode’ as he went over every last facet of maintaining and using the magic-pistol, and I listened… sort of. After what felt like an entire day, he finally shut up about the thing and made me try on the belt, the holster sitting snug against the front of my wither. The lecture then turned to the expedition itself, focusing on the more important survival techniques he taught me over the years. I paid about as much attention to that has I had to everything else.

It was nearing dinner time when he finally started to wind down. He sat back on his haunches and stretched, letting out a gaping yawn with no consideration for my eyes or nose. “Well, colt, Ah think that’s about all Ah can do for ya. Ah’d been hopin’ ta git more time with ya, but it’s been a hectic month.”

I started to nod but stopped short. “Month?”

Tracker nodded as he stood. “Seemed like somethin’ kept croppin’ up everytime Ah thought Ah had ah moment ta spare.”

“What do you mean a month?” I asked, getting to my hooves and glaring down at the ghoul from atop my mattress. “They only decided on who was going a week ago.”

“Ponyfeathers.”

It was getting late, or so I assumed from the progressively dimming light outside my tent. I was laying on my bed, staring up at the PipBuck held above my head. The screen was open to that Crusades thing that had popped up earlier. Its incessant glow hurt my eyes a little, so much brighter than anything else in the tent. Selecting one of the Crusades, I completely failed to read any of the words that popped up.

I’d been depressed before, so I was fairly certain that I wasn’t that. Every other time I’d been depressed, it had been accompanied by a mixture of sorrow and anger. Not so much together as on a cycle, switching from one to the other with little apparent reason. The last time, and most of the times before that as well, was when my coltfriend dumped me, or, rather, left without so much as a goodbye.

I twisted the knob, selecting one of the other Crusades. The PipBuck clicked.

Gray Days: Fix relationship with Gray before leaving Dise.

Then again, maybe it was depression. I wasn’t a trained psychologist after all. If it was depression, than it was a whole new level for me. There was no pain, not that I noticed at least. Nor was there a fog of emotions vying for my attention. Everything was perfectly clear in my head. I just didn’t care, couldn’t make myself care.

Click

Jumping Gates: Re-establish friendship with Hurdles.

Numb: that’s what I felt. Completely and totally numb. It was an odd feeling, one I’d never had before. I’d always considered myself to be a fairly laid-back, carefree kind of pony, never taking things too seriously. But this, this was wholly different. If a raider chose that moment to barge into my tent and attack me, I couldn’t honestly say I would even put up a fight. Die today, die tomorrow, what did it really matter?

Click

Soothing Aloe: Repair relationship with Aloe before leaving Dise.

Existential crisis, maybe. I’d read about that somewhere.

Click

Expedition Evasion: Find a way off the Watcher’s expedition to the west of Dise.

I stared at that one for bit. A lot of thoughts ran through my head. I thought about my work, all the returning patients covered in the same wounds month after month. I thought about all the drug addicts who showed up to get clean, only to come back a few weeks later as high as ever. I thought about the casinos and the gangs who ran them. I thought about my friends, my ex-friends… I thought about Gray and Tracker. Lastly, I thought about my mother and the last time I ever saw her.

“Fuck Dise.”

Expedition Evasion: Find a way off the Watcher’s expedition to the west of Dise… Cancelled

“... nothin’ on him.”

“You shittin’ me?”

Blue Crush didn’t move. This wasn’t the first time that he’d woken up from being drugged. He’d learned quickly that it paid to let his captors think he was still asleep, giving him the opportunity to gather intelligence on them without their knowing.

“Naw, he ain’t got a single cap on him. He’s broker than we are.”

“Hey, that doc still payin’ for fresh organs?”

“Hey, yeah, I bet this fella’ll go for a pretty cap.”

Blue heard the distinct sound of a knife being pulled from its sheath and decided that it was time to act. His forehoof swung blindly at where he guessed the first voice should have been. He struck home and reveled in the distinct crunch of bone give way beneath his hoof. Using the momentum of his attack, he rolled onto his belly and stood.

Already, he could hear the rapid concussions of the second pony’s retreat. Normally, those sounds would’ve only spurred him into a chase, but not today. Opening his eyes proved to be a difficult proposition, crud and gunk holding the lids closed until he gave in and used a hoof to scrub them clean.

Blue Crush blinked in the dim alley light, moisturizing tears fogging his vision and making it difficult to take in his surroundings. Still, he could make out vague shapes and colors, and the weakness of his limbs was a far more pressing issue. It was almost as though they’d forgotten how to walk.

“Oi! Focker!” he bellowed at the unicorn groaning at his hooves. “‘Ow long ‘ave I been out?”

The nameless thug made wet gurgling noises as he tried to speak. Crush squinted, blinked, and rubbed his eyes a few times until he could actually see more than a dull green blob rolling on the rancid ground.

“Fock. I went an’ broke your jaw, I did. I’d say I’m sorry, but, well, dat’s what ya git fer tyin’ ta rob a bloak when ‘es down. Focker.” He kicked the unicorn’s ribs, making the attempted thief add side clutching to his repartee.

Blue Crush snorted and wandered out of the alley on wobbly legs, shaking them out every few steps to speed up recovery. His ear twitched at the increased noise as he trotted onto one of the main roads of Dise, the bright neon lights making his eyes water even more.

He stopped, noticing something was odd as his ears twitched about. Touching a hoof to the side of his head, it passed over the nub that used to be his ear.

“Fock!” he said, stomping for emphasis. “Fock, fock, fock!”

After a few more seconds of cursing, he turned into the street and started a canter toward the NCA headquarters at the east end of Dise, grumbling to himself about daemonic red mares and unfinished contracts.

*************************
Footnote:
Chapter 3 Progress: 100%

Level Up!

Current Level: 2

Skills Trained: Medicine, Speech.

New Milestone: Speech reached journeyman rank (50+)
        
Perks:
        Love and Tolerance: You’ve never been picky in love, nor abashed about showing it. Mares, stallions, griffons, zebras, they’re all the same in your book… as long as their cute of course. You gain special dialogue options when speaking with anyone attracted to stallions—bonus points if they’re into pegasi. (There is no combat bonus from this perk.)

Equipment:
        Tracker's Blaster: Due to constant, loving maintenance, this weapon might as well be fresh off the assembly line. (increased DMG and Durability)