//------------------------------//
// Chapter 16: Who are you, and can you fix things? 
// Story: Fallout: Equestria - Memories 
// by TheBobulator 
//------------------------------//


Chapter 16: Who are you, and can you fix things?


“And just what do you think you're doing?”





“…tasted kind of like deodorant.” 

“Hm?” I asked, snapping out of the daze that I had slipped into. Tangerine had elected to explore a bit more while I continued to browse the record store. At some point I’d apparently fallen asleep standing up, and I hadn’t noticed her coming back in. “What? I wasn’t paying attention.”

Tangerine groaned. “I should have known. No wonder you didn’t say anything.”

More importantly… “What does deodorant even taste like?”

“Regret.”

I blinked. “That implies you ate a deodorant at some point.” The thought of Tangerine munching on one made me giggle.

I’d never know because Tangerine raised an eyebrow and asked, “A deodorant?” 

“What?” Usually a dive through a cloud usually freshened me up just fine, so I didn’t really care enough about it. That, and I didn’t really know what the proper wording was.

Tangerine decided to drop the subject. “Okay, I’ve taken a quick look around the place and it looks like Rumcake and Sparkle bugged off already. We might be a day or so behind them, so it’s probably best to get on the road before they get any farther.”

If only we had some way to make contact. “Any ideas?” 

Instead of unfolding her map, Tangerine magically yanked my PipBuck closer to her, which also dragged me along with it. She tapped a few buttons and dragged her hoof over the thing, all while ignoring the face-planted pegasus attached to it. “If you ever learned how to use your map function, you’d know that there’s not much else around.”

“I vote we go back to the place with the things to rest up, then,” I mumbled into the surprisingly clean tile. 

Tangerine used my hoof to tap her chin, which also dragged me across the floor a little farther. “You mean Perma? It’s not a bad idea, granted. We can stock up again, and maybe somepony there knows where I can find a long-range radio to contact base.”

Now we had our next stop. “Can I have my hoof back?” I continued to mumble into the ground.

The glow disappeared from my hoof and I happily retrieved it so I could stand up. “Oh, yeah. Sorry?” 

“You’re not sorry,” I grumbled.

“Shh.” Gala Frosty appeared beside me, ears perked in alert status. “Hear that?” 

I crouched down low and made sure to keep my claw off the tile to reduce noise, straining my ears to catch any sounds. Thankfully, Tangerine knew the universal “shut up” motion and immediately closed her mouth. Sure enough, multiple hooves clip-clopping on polished tile slowly became louder and louder.

“Sounds like they’re coming from below,” Gala soundlessly whispered. 

Using my claw, I signed the motion for “watch this position” as I three-leggedly tiphoofed to the stairs and hazarded a peek. I managed to catch a glimpse of the rear half of a lightly armored pony disappearing past a pillar. It looked a lot like typical mercenary patchwork gear, but looks could be deceiving.

My E.F.S was having trouble tracking the group due to the concrete surrounding us, so I closed my eyes and tried to make out the different hoofsteps that echoed through the station. None of them sounded like power armor, or else the floor would be cracking. Unfortunately, that also meant that it wasn’t Rumcake either. There wasn’t much clanking either, so that meant light armor. 

“Three, maybe four contacts,” I guessed, scooting back to Tangerine as quietly as possible. “Light armor, probably no heavy weapons.”

Very quietly, Tangerine coughed. “I’d like to use this time to tell you I don’t really have a lot of offensive spells.” 

“Just do your laser pistol thing,” I muttered back. “Follow me, be quiet, and don’t trip on anything. We’re going to try and get behind them.” 

“What if they’re hostile?” All I had to do was wiggle my talons in her face. “Oh. Duh.” 

Like the total badass I was, I ignored taking the stairs and jumped over the railing, using my wings to muffle the sound of my perfect three-point landing. There wasn’t even time for me to have a moment of self-satisfaction when I heard a surprised squeak and a cacophonous thud behind me. 

“Ow…” Tangerine coughed.

“I said be quiet!” I hissed at her, my ears picking up faster and louder hoofsteps. “Damn it, I think they heard us.” 

From Tangerine’s coughing and choking noises, she probably had the wind knocked out of her. “But you also said to follow you.” 

Unfortunately, I did. “Do what I mean, not what I say,” I groaned, faceclawing.

But now we had new problems. Without knowing if the little yellow dots on my E.F.S. were aggressive, I couldn’t decide whether to attempt talking or not. Maybe it was smarter to just leave, see how they acted, then figure out a plan from there.

Or we use the scribe as bait! Delicious, delicious bait.

Well…

Just do it! It’ll be funny!

“What if she gets hurt?” I half-whispered to myself. 

“Don’t do it.” I felt Gala’s smouldering glare on the back of my head.

There wasn’t much more time—hoofsteps were right around the corner. I leapt into the air and firmly planted my armored hooves on the ceiling, being sure I was being hidden by the pillar holding up the balcony-ish bit that I’d just jumped off of. This was also the same pillar that I’d seen a butt go behind, so I made sure I was ready to pounce.

“What are you doing here?” Angry voice shouted at the still-gasping mare on the floor. 

Slowly, Tangerine staggered to her hooves. “What?” She looked left and right, and not seeing me anywhere, groaned, “Where did—what the buck?” It also occurred to me then that non-pegasi never really looked up.

The three—yes, definitely three—ponies slowly closed in. They weren’t close enough to drop on; the only one I could see clearly was their pointpony. Well, something less than a pony—a damn zebra. Spiky mohawk, stripes, the whole package. Its armor consisted of nothing more than a light ballistic vest and a bundle of rags that barely passed as a sort of cloak. As I studied it, I noticed the pair of short-ish swords sheathed on its belt, also noting the zebra only had half the package. The black stripes stopped halfway down its body, fading out to a sort of shimmery gray. 

Oh good, a half-breed. That only left me twice as annoyed as before.

“Hooves up,” the twiggy, probably female creature snapped. Also the owner of angry voice, as I realized.

Tangerine immediately sat down on her haunches and threw her hooves in the air, almost as if she just didn’t care. In doing so, she rolled her eyes and saw me crouched on the ceiling. I grinned and held a talon to my lips, throwing on a wink just in case.

The group cautiously moved closer, and I noticed that they all had matching scarves. However, I was more curious about their third member. He was tall, almost taller than Rumcake, but something seemed off about the earth pony. Maybe it was his lanky limbs, or his strangely misshapen yellow-orange moustache, or maybe it was just because I could see the top of his yellow-orange head. Bald ponies bothered me a lot, especially if they had facial hair. Did their mane just decide to migrate to the front of their faces?

Get back on topic.

Right. Weirdly enough, this one had decided to armor up a ratty old pre-war suit. I still couldn’t put my hoof on what made me feel uneasy about him, so I decided to stop trying to figure it out and focus my attention on the last pony.

These collection of ponies had an unhealthy obsession with cloaks, as the third pony was also covered with one as well. I could barely make out the profile of a laser rifle bulging under the fabric, so I mentally noted to steal it later if things got aggressive. The pony’s hood obscured his face, so I couldn’t see anything else. I mentally assigned them names—Thing, Scrawny, and Hoodie—in order of introduction so I wouldn’t get confused looking at tops of heads.

Thing took two steps forward and eyed Tangerine. “You’d better have a good reason for being here.” It looked her up and down, probably trying to sense fear, regret, or some other zebra weirdery. 

Tangerine glared at me while still addressing the half-breed monstrosity. “I’m just passing through. With my friend,” she flatly suggested, narrowing her eyes at me. 

Hm. This situation was starting to give me déjà vu. 

“H-hey, Senior Steward Oleander? Maybe we should leave her alone. My heebies are getting jeebies and we both know that’s not good,” Hoodie nervously piped up. “And we’re going to miss snack time…” 

And then Scrawny opened his mouth and blurbled something unintelligible. It sounded something like “I like snack time”, but it really confused me that I couldn’t actually make out the separate words. 

“Orion, I swear to all things Hydraulic, I will buckin’ end you if you complain about snack time again. You too, Bubbles,” Thing snapped, pointing at the two ponies behind it with one of its short swords. 

Scrawny pranced in place. “But they’re going to be out of chiiiiiips…”

“Yo, just shut it about the chips. I want some buckin’ chips too, but nooo. Somepony opened their big fat mouth and now we gotta come back here and recover shit that those Talons didn’t already take,” Thing shot back, putting an end to the lack of chips.

Just slightly confused, Tangerine decided to cough and ask, “So, since you three are a little bit busy with more important matters, I’ll just go on my way now.” She began to stand up and dust herself off when the zebra’s sword appeared against her jaw.

“I don’t think so.” Thing looked pretty silly with its outstretched leg with the stupid zebra sword stuck on the end. “Explain why you’re here.”

Step in. Now.

Fiiiiiiiiine.

I pushed off the ceiling and silently landed behind the half-breed, pulling it into a chokehold. “If you so much as touch a hair on her chinny-chin-chin, I’ll gut you like the freak you are.” For emphasis, I squeezed my talons against its neck hard enough to draw blood.

Like every inconvenience in the Wasteland, somepony decided they needed to be a hero. “Uh, let the Senior Steward go!” Hoodie squealed, just barely drowning out the whine of his laser charging up.

I roughly yanked my meat shield around to face him and faltered. The sides of Hoodie’s cloak floated in the air, suspended by what could only be wings. He was a pegasus, and I really wasn’t expecting a pegasus. Why would he be working with a half-breed zebra? It didn’t make sense!

“Why would you willingly work with a zebra?” I snarled at him, giving the zebra a good shake for emphasis. Wait. The way he’d said “Senior Steward” reminded me of how every good little pegasus addressed a higher ranked officer. “Hold on, is this half-breed your superior?”

“Yeah, w-what’s it to you?” Hoodie stammered back. 

Unthinkable! Of course, that kind of thinking meant one thing… “You’re one of those Dashites, aren’t you?” I groaned. 

Thing was restless in my grip, clearly in distress but unwilling to struggle with the claw of a crazy pegasus around its neck. “What’s your problem with zebras?” Thing choked out.

If there was a stupid question for this meat shield, this was probably it. “What’s my problem? What’s yours? Your kind ruined Equestria and turned it into this death pit I’m currently holding you hostage in,” I quipped into its ear. “I mean, in context, you created this situation for yourself.”

“You’re crazy!” Thing cried out.

I continued, unfazed. “I know I am, but what are you? Because the only thing worse than a zebra is half a zebra, which means somepony did the frick frack with a zebra, which makes you twice as traitorous as a normal one.”

"You're a bucking hypocrite,” Hoodie cried out, eyes suddenly burning with defiance. "You're a Dashite, like me. The only 'traitors' in this room are us two."

"I'm nothing like you! There’s two kinds of Dashites: political, and your kind.” My eye might have twitched. “Don’t group me up with you social justice haytards."

“My type? You’re the ones that refuse to change anything,” Hoodie replied angrily. “And look where that’s gotten you. Down in this shithole with the rest of us.”

So we were going to have a fight about ethics here, huh? “The Enclave keeps our society alive. The things they do for us keep us alive. If you’re about to harp on about saving the Wasteland like all the others, save it. Saving the Wasteland just isn’t feasible—have you even thought of the immense amount of resources it would take to accomplish it? 

“The Enclave could try!” 

That one made me laugh. “The infrastructure we have barely holds up as it is. Risking our entire existence for a sliver of a chance just isn’t worth it.” The freak in my clutches began to whimper and choke, but I didn’t really care nearly enough.

“Risking our existence? What are you talking about? The Enclave doesn't need to throw everything away, it just needs to provide support. And we can trade with settlements for scrap metal and other stuff we need. It's a process, not something that happens all at once. But instead, all the Enclave does is squirrel away in hiding, refusing to take the steps that would help everypony in the long run."

"Are you kidding me? You really think that starving Wastelanders would actually trade with us, considering our reputation? Heck, do you really think the Council will open up some kind of trading arrangement with your everyday Wastelander?”

“Uh, Frosty? I don’t want to be that mare, but… why are you defending the Enclave?” Tangerine hesitantly piped up. “They did sort of try to kill you a little bit ago. And, you know, they’re also the reason why you’re, uh… a few apples short of a pie.”

Thanks to Tangerine, Hoodie had new flak for me. “See? See what I mean? They don’t actually care about our well-being as long as the status quo never changes. It’s all just a game to the Council as they keep their mindless followers from thinking too hard.”

I didn’t have a snappy response. Nothing came to mind, and I couldn’t think of anything that necessarily refuted it. All I could do was growl and silently stew.

“You think you’re so clever, don’t you?” Hoodie continued, the sarcasm incredibly obvious in his voice. “You think you’ve got everything thought out.”

“I do.” I was getting angry, and I didn’t want to drag this along any longer than I needed to. “I don’t want to deal with you, so this is where we part ways.”

Strangely enough, Hoodie chuckled. “You know what? I’m not shocked at all that you’re going to run,” he scoffed. “You’re nothing but a coward and a traitor.”

Said the coward and traitor, in true irony. “Whatever gave you that idea?”

Hoodie irritably flapped his wings, which comically displaced his cloak. “It’s like you’re a little sheep without a dog to keep you in line.”

“You’re in no bucking position to say anything, zebra-hugger,” I shot back. “You’re a traitor to the Enclave, and your friend is a traitor to Equestria! Whatever grand ideals you think you have mean jack shit when all you do is become yet another freeloading mercenary going about the Wasteland!”

“I’m not a mercenary! I serve the exalted Train Gods, who…” He might have begun to preach, but I stopped listening to cuff the half-breed shield who wouldn’t stop squirming. 

I’d had enough of these two. “Look, I have places to be and better things to do than stand here and listen to you,” I interrupted. “Let’s make this brief.”

Without warning, I brought my claw away from Thing’s neck and unloaded a shotgun shell into it, which made a surprisingly satisfying meaty splat. I ignored the liberal spattering of blood on my face and shoved the dead half-breed at the very stunned Hoodie. On a whim, just because I was angry and feeling smug, I threw a hoof-full of caps after it.

“Here. Buy yourself another one,” I snidely added.

I felt a catch in my throat when I saw the look of complete and utter devastation on Hoodie’s face, but I couldn’t doubt myself now. Victory required conviction, and dealing with the zebra had put a sloppy full stop on the whole mess. 

“C’mon, we’re leaving.” When Tangerine didn’t follow because she was too busy hyperventilating, I threw her onto my back and angrily stomped up the stairs.

…Wait, hadn’t there been three of them?

Screw it.


~~~~~


Even though tears were just barely starting to blur my vision, I managed a smooth takeoff from the street, even in the sudden downpour. I just needed to leave this place. Hoodie’s words had really rattled me more than I thought. Just about everything he’d said was getting to me, especially the traitor part. There was no way I’d be allowed to go back. Not now.

My brash movements must have betrayed my mood somehow. “Are you okay?” Tangerine carefully poked the back of my head. “Do you… uh… wanna talk about it?” 

“No. Keep quiet, and keep your mouth shut,” I snapped. Tiny raindrops started to leak from the clouds, slamming into my face like little pellets. Clouds I wouldn’t walk on again. Maybe it was just nerves, or maybe it was the rain. I let out a choked sob and the tears started to run. The only solace I had was the fact that I still had Rumcake somewhere in this forsaken wasteland. I pumped my wings, pushing myself to go faster. Maybe if I flew fast enough, I could leave all my problems behind. 

A hoof gently poked at the back of my neck. “I hate to interrupt…” 

“Didn’t I tell you to shut the buck up?” I yelled, jerking to an abrupt stop. “I’ve been a good sport for a long time, and I think I deserve angst hour.” We hovered in midair, staring at each other. Tangerine shrank from my angry glare. “Well?”

“We’re going to Perma, right?” she finally answered in the tiniest voice possible.

Damned if I knew. “Sure.” Now that I’d stopped, I finally realized that I was tired. My wings ached and my fur stuck to the inside of my armor in some places from all the sweat.

“Uh… we passed it.”

I stayed silent for a moment. Had I really gone that far? How long had I been flying, exactly? “How far?” I asked her over my shoulder. Tangerine thought about it, then consulted her map. She looked around, then decided to consult my map as well. “Ahem. May I help you?” I growled, now somewhat annoyed by the intrusion of personal space.

Tangerine squeaked. “Sorry! It’s that way.” She pointed behind us. “About ten minutes at previous speed, I think.” As I turned around, I caught a glimpse of her downcast expression. Maybe I’d been too harsh on her. 

War isn’t the only thing there’s fallout from. 

“Shut up.” Anticipating the response from Tangerine, I immediately added, “Not you.” 

After several minutes of unsteady silence in the rain, I sighed and realized I’d been getting mad at Tangerine for no reason. She’d done nothing wrong. Hopefully stress was to blame, but I couldn’t be sure. My nerves were stretched and shot to hell. Luckily, I looked down just in time to make out Perma’s big dim sign. “Oh look. We’re here.” I circled down to a somewhat choppy landing. Damn power armor.

Right on cue, Sergeant Airhead pointed his obnoxious laser right into my eyes from his very comfortable spot between the ‘M’ and ‘a’ in Perma’s sign. “Oh. Y’all back already? Lemme open up the barn fer ya.” He turned off his laser and presumably gave the signal to let us in.

I touched down, rapidly blinking my burning eyes. “Thank you, Airhead. Now get the buck out of my way. I don’t have time for your games,” I shouted at his prone white form. Tangerine slid herself off my back and followed me into the city-building. “Anypony home?” I called out. When I reached the store, I was surprised to find it empty. All its wares were unguarded and clearly displayed on the shelves behind and in the glass cases. Resist… urge… to… steal…

“I hope you aren’t thinking what I think you’re thinking,” Boss growled from behind me. 

I immediately tried to make myself look as innocent as possible. “Nope! Not at all.” I performed an about-face and saluted. “Got beds for rent?” He stared at me impassively. “Uh, sir!” I added.

“I might. You leave your weapons with Tracks, and don’t cause any trouble.” He climbed up the side of a shelf and yelled, “Corporal Tracks, your presence is required at the commissary. Double time!” Heavy stomping accompanied an affirmative response from somewhere out of sight. “Hey, good work with the job, by the way. Heard you sent ’em out with a bang.”

Even if I didn’t know what he was talking about, I went with it anyway. “Yeah, no problem,” I smoothly replied, still confused.

Boss chuckled. “I knew you were the mare for the job.” Oh right, the extortion thing that he was dealing with. I’d take the credit for it if it meant being allowed into Perma.

The armored stallion from the shop skidded to a stop in front of Boss. “I’m back, sir. Thanks for watchin’ my post.”

“Told ya those beans were bad,” Boss chided.

“Shaddup. Sir.”

Tracks retook his spot behind the glass display cases. “What did you want from me, sir?” He performed a hasty inventory check, probably glaring at me as well. I was too busy trying to wrap my mind around the events of the past few days. Betrayal, horror, and the nagging feeling that Ice was probably up to something wouldn’t stop bothering me. 

“Weapons, now.” Tracks held out his hoof. “Today, missy.”

Against my better judgement or will, I hoofed over my anti-machine rifle, submachine gun, and Philomena’s Touch. “There. How about now?” 

Boss shook his head. “That too. We just discussed this.” He prodded my armor’s chest plate. “I can’t risk having that that bucking tail knife in there too.” Part of me felt naked and completely exposed without any of my weapons. I had to remind that part of myself that I still had my ballistic claw still attached to my leg. With a bit of Tangerine’s assistance again, we managed to remove the armor from my body and deposit it next to my weapons. 

“Anything else?” I huffed, shaking out the unfamiliar dull sensation out of my limbs. Not soreness, but just a strange feeling in all my limbs, minus my metal leg. Noses around me sniffed the air and immediately wrinkled. Boss eyed me with slight disapproval. There was no delaying it, huh? “Yes. I am completely aware I need a long, warm bath.” I sighed, adding a note of exasperation to my voice. 

Boss sighed. “Against my better judgement, I think there might just be a place for you. Follow me.” He sauntered over to a steel door and carefully pushed it open. “Stay behind me, just in case. We normally don’t use the residential zone entrance.” Behind the door, there was a short corridor ending with another door. “Pardon the security, but there’s a very good reason for it.” He looked at me, then Tangerine, and mumbled, “A lot of Rangers passin’ through here today…”

A wet splorch noise behind me made me jump. “Hey, dickwad, it’s raining mighty hard outside. Ah’m not bein’ paid enough to sit out there in th’ rain.” I turned around and did my best to not laugh. Airhead had come down from his rooftop perch sopping wet and looking like a pile of soaked toilet paper. Tangerine, on the other hoof, couldn’t help herself. “Gal, why don’tcha go eat a dick sandwich,” Sergeant Airhead spat. 

The door at the other end of the hallway finally opened up. “Language, asswipe. Ladies are present,” Boss growled to Airhead.

“Ah apologize that yer fragile little ears cain’t handle real stallions’ talk,” Airhead sarcastically apologized. “Outta the way. Ah need to get this dried off.” He pushed past us and advanced into the large warehouse-sized room beyond. He somehow managed to flap his way to the top of a heavy duty storage rack where a bunk was located. A weapon rack and a large hooflocker were neatly arranged next to it. Note to self, bug him later. 

It was plainly obvious that Boss didn’t approve of Airhead. “I swear, all you pegasi are all the same. Too arrogant for your own good.” Must. Not. Punch. “But at least you’re good at what you do,” he admitted. 

“Damn straight.” I grinned, following Boss into the warehouse. “Better than the rest.” The warehouse’s interior was cavernously large, to say the least. Hundreds of old wooden pallets, broken crates, scrap, and the occasional trash heap were piled up along the walls. Arranged around the rectangular room were dozens of industrial sized storage racks, each four floors high. All the racks had been reinforced at one point or another, and ladders connected each floor to the next. Each individual floor of the racks seemed to have its own living space built onto it. Against the lower floors, some ponies had set up little stores in an attempt to peddle their wares.

Huh. The inside of this place was nothing like the outside made it seem like.

Boss pointed past the center of the room where several workbenches had been set up, instead gesturing to a small curtained off area. “There are the showers. Latrines are on the right side over there.” 

I wasn’t really paying attention to him. My attention was fixed on a Steel Ranger’s ass. Not the ass itself, per se, but the pony it was attached to. Her helmet and greaves were lying on the table beside her, next to some miscellaneous parts and tools. Her purple coat showed severe burns and recently bandaged wounds. “Why does she look so familiar?” I mumbled to myself. “You would think…”

“What the buck are they doing here?” Tangerine said in surprise. “Hey, Sparkles!” she shouted across the room. Wait. Sparkles? Oh wait, Sparkle Cola! That’s where I knew her from.

The Ranger in question whipped around, nearly scorching herself with the arc welder clamped in her muzzle. She dropped it onto the table and yanked the welding goggles off her face. “Domo! Sup, Grapefruit!” Sparkle Cola replied.

Tangerine groaned. “Not this again.” We cantered up to Sparkle. “How many times do I have to tell you?”

“A whole lot, Kumquat.” Sparkle grinned, then nodded at me. “Sup, Frosty. What brings you to the neighborhood?” 

I cocked my head at Tangerine, who was absolutely fuming. “Escort mission. Sort of,” I replied. 

“I’d like to know where you guys came from. I mean, we lost contact with you two days ago! What gives?” Tangerine burst out.

“Calm down, Fruitbutt. We got here, like, a few hours ago.” Before Sparkle added anything else, she turned around and made sure that the welder was safely off. 

Tangerine gasped. “Your back!” Indeed, most of Sparkle’s back was covered with healing bandage that was soaked through with dried blood. It didn’t look good, but I couldn’t tell if she was fine now or if she was toughing it out. Most likely the latter.

Sparkle turned back to face us. “Yeah, I’m back. Hi again.” 

“No, I mean what happened to your back?”

The little medical experience I had told me that she’d probably be fine, but it was still worrying. “Yeah, what happened?” I also asked.

“Grazed by a laser,” Sparkle casually replied. “But again, why are you two here?”

I opened my mouth to answer that, but Tangerine once again felt the need to say it herself. “Your trackers went down, so Frosty here decided to come after Rumcake because she was so paranoid.”

“Speaking of which, where is he?” I looked around the room, searching for another Steel Ranger in the room. 

Sparkle’s shoulders clanked as she shrugged. “No idea. He’s somewhere around here, that’s for sure.” She peered into her helmet to check the time. “He should be back in an hour or so.” Thunder boomed overhead. “Sheesh, you’re really knocking out a storm, huh Frosty?” 

“Ha ha. Very funny,” I grumbled.

“How’ve you been? You look and smell like total cr—”

“Yes, I know,” I flatly stated. “And I intend to fix that real fast. Watch my stuff?” 

Sparkle lit the arc welder’s pilot light again with a little striker on the edge of the table. “Sure. Not like I’m going anywhere for a while.” She promptly took my saddlebags and placed them at the foot of the table. “See ya later, then.”

First things first, I needed a shower. After looking back to double check that Sparkle and Tangerine hadn’t stolen my belongings, I proceeded to the communal showers. A small box on a stand next to the curtain opening had an equally small sign that simply read “Showers. Twenty caps a run”. There wasn’t anypony enforcing the exact payment, so I tossed in a small pouch of what felt like maybe seven caps. Nopony would notice, right?

Ah, how I missed the barracks back in the sky. Cloud showers were nothing like what… this… was. The floors were grimy and damp, covered in the accumulated filth of hundreds of showers. At least somepony had attempted to clean them off, as evidenced by the trashed sponge in the corner. There were eight showerheads all mounted along the left side by exposed piping, divided by random bits of scrap welded into partitions. The two showers on the end were occupied, so I picked one of the middle ones. And that better be dried shampoo on that wall.

Either it was my good luck, or maybe it was just the rain, but the water wasn’t made of mud. I gripped the cracks in the partition on my left with my claw. With a little more difficulty, I managed to disengage the safety clamps on my arm using some very creative gnawing, and then simply sidestepped to unplug it. Standing on three legs was unfamiliar to me, but I managed to make do by leaning against the opposite partition. I hobbled my way under the showerhead and allowed the water wash everything away.

Funny story, I used to absolutely despise washing up at seven in the morning after flying millions of laps around the base. It would usually be cold in the morning, but then I’d warm up during the flight from all the exercise. Then after all of that, we’d have to finish off with an ice-cold rush shower that left everypony frozen to the bone. But after a month without a nice refreshing shower, even this freezing downpour felt amazing. For the first time in a long time, I felt clean. I turned my head to rinse out my ear when I caught sight of somepony I wasn’t expecting.

“Uh. Need some body soap?”

My heart nearly froze, but I managed to remember to cover myself up with my tail as I prepared to confront the intruder. I whipped around so quickly that part of my wet mane flopped into the right side of my face. Even with my vision somewhat obscured, I recognized him, even without his armor. 

Blood rushed to my cheeks as Rumcake continued to stare at me, slack-jawed. I mentally composed myself, cleared my throat, then calmly and quietly replied, “I would love some soap.”

Rumcake continued to stare, reminding me that I was still very wet and very naked. His normally poofy pink mane was plastered to his head. I wasn’t sure what annoyed me more—the fact that I was being ogled, or the fact that his mane was actually longer than mine by a few inches. 

I cleared my throat again. “Soap?” I reminded him. 

Finally, Rumcake closed his mouth. After searching for words for a good minute, he finally decided on, “You look so hot right now.” 

That comment made me even more annoyed than before, especially because it reminded me of that stupid griffon. I carefully lifted my right hindleg and held it in a threatening bucking stance. “You may want to think carefully about your next few words, because they might be your last.”

Rumcake eyed my raised hoof, and did exactly that. “Right. Soap.” He placed the soda bottle sized soap bottle on the floor next to me. 

When I lowered my leg and reached out to for the soap, I realized a major problem. A major, major problem. “Uh…”

“What? What did I do?” 

So… embarrassing. “I need you to, uh, wash me,” I shamefully mumbled.

Rumcake was taken aback. “I thought I was intruding.” 

“You are,” I flatly replied.

“…Then…”

I groaned. “I have tasted the ground on many occasions, and in many places, but this floor is not something I’d like to taste.” I explained, idly waving my stump at him. “Washing up suddenly got much more difficult with only one foreleg.”

Rumcake glanced at the bottle, then back to me. “Oh. Well, this is going to be super awkward.” 

Thank you, mister subtlety. I hadn’t actually noticed. 

He squeezed a small amount of pinkish soap into his hoof and gently rubbed it onto my back. “Uh, like that?” 

I shivered a little at the touch. Oh no, was I enjoying this? Part of me thought so. “Yeah. Careful with the wings, though. I’ll have to preen them later.” I sighed, enjoying his strong touch along the base of my neck. Since the right side of my body was pinned to the partition by my body, I could only stretch out my left wing to allow him to wash under it.

“Preen?” He continued to pleasantly massage my body, periodically adding more soap. Oh, why did he have to be so good at this? “The heck is that?”

Silly, silly earth ponies. “I’m going to lick my wings until my feathers are straight. Get it?” I impatiently groaned. “That, and they’re partially erogenous zones, so there’s the explanation for any random erotic moans that come out of my mouth in the next few minutes.” Just shut up and bathe me, already.

“Oh.” Rumcake continued to lather me up in silence. “I need you to, uh, move or something. I can’t wash your right side if you keep leaning against that wall.” 

If I even tried to stand normally, I’d immediately tilt left and fall over. There was only one remaining option. “Then I need to lean on you. I have terrible balance when I’m disarmed. Get it? Disarmed? Okay, that was bad.” That still got Rumcake to chuckle, at least. With a little difficulty, Rumcake and I managed to rinse the left side of my body.

“Here. Lean on me.” Rumcake grinned. I intended to carefully hobble to him, but I lost my balance and ended up heavily colliding with his big, broad chest. “Oof.”

“Sorry.” I apologetically mumbled. 

“You aren’t anything I can’t handle.” Rumcake chuckled. He was so lucky that I couldn’t punch him out right now. “Stop squirming, already.”

Needless to say, the rest of my—our shower was unnecessarily boring. Yeah, let’s go with that. Nothing else needed to be explained. At all. Absolutely nothing interesting happened. Nothing at all. Nada. Except some very vibrant language when I had to re-connect my claw, of course.

All parties involved were equally surprised when Rumcake and I stepped out of the showers together. “Hey, Rumcake! Nice to see you found your marefriend,” Sparkle called out. “Still no luck on the launcher, though.” 

Tangerine looked up from the grenade launcher she was trying to repair. “Whatever you idiots did, this launcher is trashed. Good work.” She threw back her hood in exasperation. “And I don’t even know how you managed to dent every possible spot on the casing.” 

Sparkle quickly pointed at Rumcake. “He did it.” 

Just as Tangerine was about to fix Rumcake with an angry glare, he quickly changed the subject by asking me, “Didn’t I tell you to stay home?” Oh yeah. I’d forgotten about that. “What happened to that?” 

“Instant Noodles sent us to come find you two because of something or other,” I told him. “Apparently there’s something wrong with your armor, I think.” What was it, exactly? I didn’t remember. “And that’s why I brought Tangerine.”

An exasperated sigh from the mare in question got everypony’s attention. “Gaaah! How the heck did you two manage to short out half of the spell matrix? Tracking’s down, repair’s down, targeting is barely working.” She levitated out a small device and a screwdriver. “I’ll reset your helmets first, then do the armor right after. I don’t think I’ll be able to fix the repair spell without an entire fabrication suite. Sheesh, you two are the worst.”

Rumcake pulled his armor out of the very large duffel bag he’d brought with him from the showers. “For the record, I have no idea what happened.” He dropped parts of his armor onto the workbench next to Sparkle’s armor pieces. “I didn’t think it was that bad.”

He sure had a strange idea of “not bad”. Aside from all the various dents, scratches, and scorch marks, the damage looked quite bad. The metal was torn and gouged in several places, and bullet holes riddled the surface. 

“You look like hammered shit,” I teased.

The two Rangers simultaneously glared at me with looks that practically screamed “No shit, Frosty”. As tempting as it was to add something else, Sparkle replied, “Could’ve been worse. We’ve had a shitty time out and about. Some crazy cult didn’t like the mercs we sicced on them.” 

“At least you didn’t have to deal with her. I’ve got nightmare fuel for months,” Tangerine whined. “And damn it, I’m not qualified to do repairs of this magnitude. I can reboot the tracker and reload your E.F.S. As for the auto-repair talisman, I can’t do much with just this.” She waved her little device at both of the Rangers. “We need somepony with more experience.”

I looked around the room for somepony that looked like they could help. There weren’t this many workbenches here for no reason. Nopony in the immediate vicinity appeared to have any kind of mechanical or magical know-how. Wait. Somewhere behind the storage racks, right next to the outer wall, a pony wearing a very familiar set of robes was hastily searching for something. “How about that scribe over there?” I suggested.

All three Rangers craned their necks and scrutinized the pony that I’d pointed out. A rounded brown muzzle poked out of the front of the hood, along with a few locks of dull violet mane. “What the buck is a lone scribe doing out here?” Rumcake asked. Upon closer inspection, the robes had definitely seen better days. It was partly held together by patchwork repairs and partly by sheer will alone.

“Beats me,” Sparkle nonchalantly muttered.

“Hey, she looks a little like you.”

“You callin’ me a killjoy?”

“I’m just saying that you look similar. Look at that silly purple hair!” 

Wrong move, Rumcake. “So the only basis to this is that we both have the same mane color?” 

Both Rumcake and Sparkle sat there and continued to argue with each other while Tangerine decided to ignore the both of them. “They’ll be at it for the next few minutes, so if you’re really that curious about what she’s doing here, go ask the mare yourself. Otherwise you get to go find some bunks or whatever for us.” She put away her tools and stuff. “I’m tired, dirty, hungry, and nauseous, so I’m ready to pass out in a bed. The last thing I want to deal with is cross-company diplomacy crap.” 

The mystery scribe intrigued me far more than the idea of finding somewhere to sleep at the moment. “Can you go figure out where to get a room or something?” I shyly grinned. “Buying stuff isn’t really my thing.” 

Rumcake kept insisting that Sparkle looked a lot like the mystery mare, which Sparkle kept denying. Both of us shook our heads in disappointment. Tangerine hefted her small bag and looked around the room, letting out an exhausted sigh. “I’ll get right on it.” She headed toward one of the stalls, groaning, “Scribe. Needs. Food.”

I cautiously approached the robed mare who was still furiously tossing aside bits of scrap and junk looking for something. “Lose something?” I asked. 

“Yes! What’s it to you?” the robed mare shot back. She was a unicorn, I realized, taking note of her horn. “Actually, hold this for me.” She raised a large wooden pallet and glared at me expectantly. Out of curiosity of her identity, I shouldered my way underneath the pallet in the hopes that it would help me gain her trust. She tossed aside more bits of junk and things. “Grrah! It’s not here either.” She stormed off, leaving me partly trapped under the pallet. 

I let it fall with a crash. “So. What are you looking for?” I followed her up a ladder to the second floor of one of the racks, presumably her living space. For future reference, she didn’t have anything really special. Just a mattress, some candles, a desk, lots of old books and various writing implements. I hovered beside her as she kept searching. She looked a bit younger than me, so maybe middle-to-late teens.

“None of your business,” she flatly replied. 

Being the nosy mare I was, I firmly replied, “I’m making it my business.”

“Fine. I’m looking for a book.” I soundlessly pointed at the piles of books. “Not those books. A special book! It’s mostly purple and it has my name on it.” She slammed her hoof against the ground. “It’s more important than whatever you’re bothering me for.” 

Great. Just great. I didn’t really have the patience to put up with her, so I cut to the chase. “Who are you, and can you fix things?” I asked in exasperation.

She glared at me angrily with her orange eyes. “Violet Dusk, and yes I can. Why? What’s it to you?” 

Thank the goddesses! Somepony useful! “Yes, yes you can!” I happily clapped my claw and hoof together. “As a Steel Rangers scribe, you are obligated to assist a Ranger in need.” At least I thought so. I actually had no idea how their pecking order went.

Violet took one look at me and snorted. “You’re a pegasus. Nice try, idiot.” Urge to kill… rising. “And anyway, I’m not a bucking scribe, so why would I want to help you? Oooh, hey. There’s that old color changing spell I was looking for.” She yanked a loose page out of a seemingly random book and set it aside. “Even if I cared, I wouldn’t be able to help without my book.”

My right eye might have twitched. “What.”

“All my spells are in my book. Find my book, and I might decide to help you.” Violet continued to look for that damned spellbook that she was so desperate to find. 

“But you’re a unicorn,” I mentioned matter-of-factly like it was an obvious solution.

“Yeah. And?” 

“Why do you need a dumb book if you know all your spells?” 

Another note to self: don’t make Violet Dusk angry. She grabbed me out of the air with her hazel-tinted magic in the blink of an eye. “Books. Aren’t. Dumb.” I struggled to escape her ridiculously strong telekinesis. Flames burned in her eyes as she shook me violently. Up. Down. Up. Down. Gonna hurl. Up. Down. 

“I’m sorry! Sorry! Please stop the shaking!” I cried. It felt like my brain was going to fly out of my head if this continued any longer. 

A very irritated Airhead from another rack higher up shouted, “Y’all ‘r makin’ too much ruckus down there!” 

Without letting me go, Violet yelled back, “Oi! Airhead!”

“What?!” Airhead bellowed. He swung his rifle to bear down on her, its laser flashing into existence.

I flapped my wings as hard as I could in an attempt to escape, with no luck. “Shut up, ya butt!” Violet responded. 

Airhead roared in frustration. “Tha’s it. Ah don’t care anymore. Ah’m goin’ to make you a new pie hole, bitch!” 

Ka-clack. I knew the sound of a bullet being chambered anywhere. My struggling intensified as I tried to escape, lest I became a pony-shaped shield.

Wait, what’s that? What is that?

What’s what? My heart rate suddenly spiked, and I felt Raider Frosty eagerly pushing and fighting for my body. There wasn’t even time for me to shout a warning to the others around me before I lost control. 

But for once, Raider wasn’t after blood, violence, or senseless murder. Her predatory gaze instead locked onto the little red dot wavering on the floor. “Get off me!” Raider snarled, giving Violet a sharp jab to the ribs. 

“Ow, shit!” Violet wasn’t expecting such a strong hit and released us immediately, which allowed Raider break free and slam my claw over the dot.

“I have you now!” Raider triumphantly exclaimed, which quickly turned to confusion when the dot wasn’t where it should have been. “Wha—?”

It had moved a bit over to the right, which made Raider slam our hoof over it. “Gotcha!” 

Of course, it wasn’t that simple. Undaunted, the dot darted left and right in front of us. “I’m going to rip your little red pelt off and feed it to you!” Raider waited for the dot to slow down before clamping both claw and hoof over it. “Ha!” Which was quickly followed by, “Shit!” 

Why was this happening now? Why hadn’t she done this sooner? Buck!

Time and time again, the dot kept evading us and refused to be caught. I wasn’t surprised, but obviously Raider Frosty was. I was more concerned with how stupid I probably looked to everypony else. My tail kept whipping back and forth, and every time I was about to pounce, Raider would shift our weight from hindleg to hindleg. Before Raider could humiliate me any further, somepony thankfully stopped us.

“What in the name of the goddesses is going on here?” Boss yelled, drawing the attention of the entire room. “Are we fighting again?” he sighed, rubbing his eyes. “Who started it this time?”

Everypony in the room pointed at either Airhead or Violet. 

“You know the drill, you two. It’s almost after hours, and some of us need our sleep.” Boss groaned. “I don’t care who started it, just don’t kill each other.”

“Ah hear ya.” Airhead turned off his sniper rifle’s laser and disappeared out of sight.

“He started it,” Violet mumbled. I managed to wrangle control of myself back from Raider and I righted myself on Violet’s mattress. Before I could slink away, she seized my claw and hissed, “What the buck was that?”

“What was what?” I nervously shot back. 

Violet rolled her eyes. “Your exceedingly feline-like actions back there, that’s what.”

Uh. Quick, leave the scene of the crime! “Well, I guess I’ll just take my leave then… and if I find your book, I’ll be sure to tell you.” Before she could protest or reply, I strolled off the edge of her living space and glided to a gentle stop next to Rumcake. “You see a funny looking book around?” 

Rumcake gave me a blank stare. “Huh?” 

Yay for collective confusion. “Yeah. It’s a long story that I’d rather not explain at the moment, but basically we’re looking for a weird purple book that has ‘Violet Dusk’ written on it. She isn’t helping until she gets that book.”

Tangerine returned with two big tags attached to a loop around her neck. “I got our room things, guys.” She tossed one of the tags to me, and the other to Sparkle. “We’ll be on flat four-three. You two lovebirds—” Referring to Rumcake and me, of course. “—are on four-two. Feel free to catch up on anything you didn’t already do so in the shower.” She slyly grinned at me.

I must have turned bright red, judging by the heat accumulating in my face. “Uh, thanks.” Everypony gathered their things and followed Tangerine up to the storage rack numbered “4”. She and Sparkle clambered up to the second level. Flat four… three. Ah, Fourth rack, third floor. Logic dictated that I was on the floor below that.

Our flat was as simple as it got: one mattress in the center of the room, a really short table to one side, and most of a candle. Rumcake dropped his bags on the floor next to the table with a sigh. “Ugh. I’m tired.” My saddlebag joined his on the floor. “So, ready for round two?” he quietly whispered into my ear.

I gently pushed him away. “It’s been a long day, and I’m ready to pass out.” Rumcake attempted to use my patented big sad eyes against me. “No, really. I think I’ve had enough today.” He whimpered and continued to stare sadly at me. “Don’t look at me like that.” Quick, change the subject! “So, what was your adventure like?” 

Tangerine’s head appeared from around the edge of our ceiling. “I’d like to know too, come to think of it.”

“You might as well get comfortable. This is going to take a while.” Rumcake laid down across the mattress in such a way that he managed to take up all the space available on it. “It all started in a galaxy far, far away…”

I shoved him off the mattress and reasonably occupied what I felt like was my half of it. “That can’t be how it starts.” I snorted, making myself comfortable. “Start over.”

Rumcake looked hurt. Emotionally hurt, of course. Falling four inches off a mattress probably wouldn’t hurt. I settled into the slightly lumpy mattress and prepared for a wonderful adventure filled with action and suspense. “Fine, fine. So, we start our story with Sparkle not being able to shut up…”


~~~~~


“Wake up, you lazy waste of space,” my own voice coldly commanded me. “I’m ashamed to be using your image in the first place.” I cautiously opened my right eye a crack, and immediately regretted it. Yet another Frosty glared down at me in a disappointed manner from underneath her fancy officer’s cap. Her uniform was not standard Enclave-issue formal dress, but custom fitted and actually gilded around the edges. General’s pins were attached to her lapels and epaulettes. 

At least I made the imaginary rank of General, I guess. “Uh… Officer Frosty, I presume?” 

“You are to address me as General Winds.” So, how far was this rod shoved up my ass? Officer Frosty it was. “And our first order of business is for you to turn yourself in.”

That seemed like a totally bad idea. “How about no?” 

“That’s an order.”

“How about you say that to my face, tough guy?” 

“I am.”

Smooth, Frosty. Real smooth. “Shut up.”

Gala Frosty cantered to my side. “You know the rules, Officer. Stay out of our territory, and we’ll do our best to do the same.” Hold on… what was going on? “I don’t care that you look like us now, but this needs to stop. Get. Out.”

On total reflex, I stood up and crisply saluted to Officer Frosty on her way out. “So… who was that?” I asked Gala with a sidelong glance. “How crazy have I gotten?”

“Oh, that’s nopony new. You remember that memory-blocking officer-shaped monster from a while back?” 

My mind flashed back to the unkillable Enclave Officer that had put up a nightmarish fight against Ice Storm. Wait, what?! 

“Yeah.” Gala shrugged. “That’s a new development.”

I thought back to the ambush in front of the cave. With only a few key words, I suddenly had to comply to every one of that Enclave officer’s orders. “So… when I was…” Gala Frosty nodded, knowing exactly what I was thinking. “That bitch.” Both of us wandered into the living room, possibly out of sheer boredom.

The living room was a completely different story. Everything was filled with an air of lazy calm and complacence. A new change was that Drunk Frosty was lounging under the couch, and Filly Frosty was taking a nap on top of it. Ice Storm and Raider Frosty were quietly sitting at the table, absorbed in a very hectic game of chess. 

Very curious. Why were those two getting along so well? And since when did I have a chess set in here? I decided to take a better look at the game while Gala attempted to pull Drunk Frosty out from under the couch. At a glance, Ice appeared to be ahead by several pieces. I slowly realized that Raider had sacrificed most of her pieces in order to get better positions on the board. “Question,” I started, looking to Raider. “Why is your king on the other side of the board?”

“Anypony with power knows that excessive force is the only solution,” Raider replied, moving her bishop directly into a knight’s range. Ice Storm immediately took the bishop without a second thought. “It may seem reckless, but it’s the only way.” She picked up her king and placed it two spaces away from Ice’s king. “Your move, bitch.”

Out of options, backed up against the edge of his side of the board, with Raider’s king bearing down on his own from the front and her last rook in the midfield keeping his king’s left path guarded, he had no choice but to retreat into the corner of the board. The pieces that stood a chance of preventing it had overextended too far and were in no position to come back and help.

“Now that’s not fair.” He frowned.

With her king in place, Raider moved her rook all the way to Ice’s edge of the board and grinned. “That’s checkmate.”

“What? I can still move my king forward to… wait…”

Raider chuckled. “No, you can’t, because if you did that you’d place my king in check, and a king can’t check another king. You’re out of moves, buster. Unless you can kill that rook, it’s over.”

Ice Storm frantically looked over his remaining pieces, and found that all of them were still in no position to help. “Buck. Well, crap. You win this time.” He knocked his king over with a swipe of his hoof. 

“It’s all about that offensive king,” Raider gloated.

As I looked away from the completed game, I noticed something strange about Raider Frosty’s room. Not only was the door shut, but she’d spray painted “Trespasserz will B violated” onto it. Blood seeped out from underneath the door, staining the clouds red. Talk about new developments.

I shakily pointed at the blood with a talon. “Do I want to know?”

All three of us sat there and watched the blood slowly crawl out from under the door. Raider stared at it for a while, then finally answered, “Probably not.” Oh good. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about it.


~~~~~


I was roused out of sleep by yet another poke to the ribs. “I think she fell asleep.” Why the hell did everypony need to poke me all the time? I yawned and rubbed my eyes. What time was it? According to my PipBuck, it was only eleven in the evening. 

“Did you know you drool a lot when you sleep?” Rumcake asked. “That’s kinda adorable. In a sort of messy way.” I self-consciously wiped the drool off my face, blushing the entire time. “So, how much of it did you miss?”

“Uh…” I bashfully stammered. “Most… of… it?” 

Rumcake and Tangerine facehoofed. “Really?” Rumcake sighed. “Really?” 

Maybe it was just because today’s events were too much to deal with, combined with the fact that I was exhausted from a marathon’s worth of flying. “Sorry.” I rubbed my eyes. “It’s been a long day.”

“Now I have to start over…” Rumcake glumly sighed. 

He didn’t have to do that! More importantly, I didn’t want to bore Tangerine with things she’d already heard. I waved my hooves in the universal ‘no, it’s okay’ motion. “Just continue where you left off! You can tell me what happened before that later.”

Apparently Tangerine agreed. “Yeah! It just got interesting, too!” 

Rumcake arched his eyebrow at me, then dismissively shrugged. “Well, whatever. Back to the story!”

As entertaining as it was to watch Rumcake speak of his wild wasteland romp without me, I just couldn’t stay awake. The day’s events had finally caught up with me, and I was beginning to nod off the second I closed my eyes. I tried a few times to keep them open, but eventually I gave in and fell asleep.

Rumcake yawned so loudly that it actually jolted me awake. “I’m tired, Frosty’s conked out, and Tangerine’s been writing on the same line for the past five minutes.” Tangerine snapped her eyes open and stared intently at the scroll she’d been writing on. “Let’s just get to sleep. I need rest, you need rest, she needs rest.”

Against my will, I decided to make myself as comfortable as possible. “At least you got to be a hero,” I grunted as I punched a lumpy spot in the mattress. 

The mattress bounced as Rumcake sorted out a lump on his side of the mattress. “Hm? What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked, a hint of concern in his voice. “You save ponies too.”

“Not enough,” I muttered. Visions of my massacre of the Enclave soldiers rose to the surface of my mind. Oblivious soldiers, not knowing who they were dealing with, had been slaughtered just trying to do their job. Unexpectedly, the zebra-thing flashed into my mind too. Weird.

Realizing the mood had drastically changed and storytime was over, Tangerine silently retired to her shared flat with Sparkle. Rumcake’s strong foreleg pulled me into his warm embrace. “It’s the thought that counts, I suppose. Even if we can’t save them all, well, we just do our best I guess.” He sighed. “And besides, you’ll always be my half-minute hero,” he purred into my ear. 

My cheeks burned and blood rushed to my face. “I’m not always like that!” I hissed back.

Rumcake giggled and nibbled at my ear. “That’s ‘cuz I’m that good.” At least he couldn’t see my face from behind me, or else he would have taunted me further. “Mmph. Nighty-night, Frosty.” 

“Sweet dreams, Rummy.” I drifted off to sleep, finally at ease for once. 


~~~~~


Just because I was at ease apparently meant I still wasn’t allowed to actually sleep. “Aww, come ON!” I complained at the walls of the cloudhouse. “As cool as this is, I think I’d prefer some actual sleep at some point this month.” I hopped out of bed and meandered into the living room once again.

A cork bounced off my nose. “Haaaay~” Drunk Frosty called from the couch. “Got shomethin’ on our mind?” Cue horrific flashback of gruesome mauling of several Enclave soldiers. “Have I gotsh the cure-all fer ya.” She held out a nearly empty bottle of absinthe. “Speshul, just for you.” 

I took the bottle from Drunk Frosty and tucked it under my wing. “Thanks. Now stay out from under the couch. It’s bad for you.”

“But the cheese poofie things!” Drunk Frosty protested. I walked away before she could add anything else to the list of things under my imaginary couch. The only other ones in the room were Ice Storm, Gala Frosty, and Raider Frosty. All three of them were sitting at the table playing some sort of board game involving dice, books, lots of paper, and apparently lots of yelling.

Gala happily scribbled things down while looking through one of the books. “Whaddya mean I can’t punch out the manticore?” Raider yelled. “That’s horseapples!” She rifled through the three papers in front of her. “I took the skill for it!” 

Whatever they were doing, I didn’t get it at all. “I cast fireball for…” Gala rolled a few pyramidal dice. “Seven damage.” 

Ice Storm consulted the book in front of him, then rolled his own pair of dice. “It resists the fire damage. Manticore’s turn.” He picked up the knight piece on the table and advanced it toward the little red plastic unicorn model. “It takes its three melee attacks at WS four.” He rolled several six-sided dice. “Two hits.” He picked up two of those dice and rolled them again. “Totals out to eleven damage. Ouch, that’s unlucky.” 

By the way everypony reacted, that had to be bad. “What’s going on?” I asked, still completely confused. 

“I may have accidentally killed off Li’l Red here,” Ice sheepishly replied. “Whoops.”

Several sheets of paper flew into the air. “No! Wait! I think I can survive this one,” Gala exclaimed. “I’m allowed to have two spells prepared a day. That means I can have shield and pitfall spells on standby, right?” Ice nodded. “Then I roll an eight-sided die for a bonus to my armor class value.”

Both of them consulted the books for more information. Raider punched my shoulder hard with her claw, leaving behind shallow little cuts. “You’re such an egghead. Games like this? Come on.”

I rubbed my shoulder while I tried to think up a response. Where’d they get these from, anyway? “I don’t remember any of this,” I said. Hmm… “Yo, Icy!”

“Hm?” Ice looked up from the dice he was about to roll. 

Assuming I was right… “This stuff yours?” I pointed at all the books and dice on the table. “It isn’t mine.” At least I didn’t think it was. Something about all of those multi-sided dice, though…

Ice rolled the dice he was holding. “Well, you survived the manticore attack.” He mentioned to Gala. Turning back to me, he simply replied, “Oh, all this stuff is totally yours. I did a little negotiation with your little officer problem and nabbed us an opportunity for something potentially useful. And your old ‘Oubliettes & Ogres’ collection, of course.” 

My jaw dropped. “Bwuuuuh?” No way. I was a badass markspony that doesn’t afraid of anything! It just wasn’t possible that all this stuff was mine. And dealing with that traitorous backstabber, too? What the heck?

“Yeah. You had an egghead phase, remember?” Nope. “Long nights in the rec room with your friends, gaming the hours away?” Nope nope nope. “That one time you got a critical success on a charisma check and talked your way out of a boss fight and made him off himself?” Okay, that felt familiar enough. “You look like you remember.”

That bit of my memory came rushing back to me. Lunchtime gaming sessions during our breaks, midnight dungeon crawls to pass the time. “Holy crap.” How could I have forgotten hours upon hours of adventure with some of my closest friends? Lightning was there, Shadow was there, even Cloudy and Lurky from Bravo Two. Hell if I could remember who started it, but it had turned into a bi-weekly event at one point. “I’m an egghead.”


~~~~~


I awoke with a start, which also woke up Rumcake since he was holding onto me like I was a pegasus-shaped body cloud. “Gaaah buck me, I’m an egghead!” I wailed despairingly. 

“Mmnph. I’d still buck you,” Rumcake sleepily mumbled. He shifted a bit and hugged me tighter. “Go back to sleep.”

“Everything I know is a lie.” I glumly rested my head on Rumcake’s foreleg. “It’s really depressing.”

Rumcake whapped my ear playfully. “Don’t be sad. You’d be cute with glasses.” That was supposed to make me feel better? For that comment, he earned a bruise to the nose. “Ow! Hey, that hurts.”

I tried to get back to sleep with new revelations weighing heavily on my mind. Cute, huh? 

Aww. He called you cute. 

Yes. Yes he did, Ice Storm. 

It’s been a long time since somepony called you that. 

Okay, now that’s just insulting. 

Do you remember? 

What, the time of my life? Of course not. 

What?

It’s nod to a cool song. Laugh, damn you.

…Whatever. Well, come on back in and maybe I’ll show you. Raider Frosty got tired of Oubliettes and Ogres.

Rumcake poked the back of my head. “Psst. Can I have my leg back?” he whispered. I shifted in my spot in order to comfortably stare at him blankly. “It fell asleep.” 

“No,” I snickered. “It’s mine now.” He attempted to pull his leg back from under my head. “Get your own.”

“But this is my own!” Rumcake hissed back.

“Too bad.” 

“But I’m getting the tingles!”

I had a bit of fun by keeping Rumcake from having his foreleg back for a minute or so. He’d resorted to tickling me until I was forced to get off his leg to protect my stomach. What a cheater! 

Once I’d gotten my breath back, I settled myself against his big fuzzy body and went back to sleep. Time to find out what Ice Storm wanted me to see.


~~~~~
 

He was waiting for me. However, instead of appearing inside the cloudhouse like I normally did, I was standing outside in the street next to him. “Wait, what the hay am I doing out here?” I wondered out loud.

Ice Storm tucked his revolver into the folds of his trenchcoat. “I’ve taken care of all the little details so we won’t have to mentally damage you any harder,” he calmly replied. “All we need to do is look for the start point.”

I had a bunch of questions. “Won’t Officer Frosty get really mad?” I asked in puzzlement. “Don’t you remember what happened last time?” The last time we’d attempted to delve into my memories, Officer had gone into severe rage mode afterward. Now he was still using my image as a disguise underneath his uniform, but all of us knew that he was still the mind-controlling Enclave officer. “What makes you think this time will be any different?”

By the smug grin on Ice’s muzzle, he had obviously thought of this beforehoof. “We actually settled this days ago, believe it or not.” Days? Wait. The only time that would have been possible was… I started to put facts together, and suddenly it made a lot more sense. “While Officer Frosty was in control of you, she was forced to show herself and lower her guard.” 

“Then Raider took control when an opportunity opened up?” I finished for him, recalling my sudden urge to spout corny combat dialogue before I destroyed that Enclave squad. “And judging by why Officer Frosty is having a bit of R&R time, I assume you and the rest of me opened a giant can of whoop-ass.”

Ice stared at me blankly. “Sure, that’s close enough. As long as we stay out of heavily restricted areas, we should be fine.” He sighed. “That means no mission logs, no debriefings, et cetera and whatever.” 

All I heard was more along the lines of “absolutely nothing of actual use at all”. I needed to know about what missions I’d been on before all this had happened instead of… uh… “What are we going to find, exactly?” I asked, genuinely curious. 

“A party. Don’t look at me that way—it was literally the only thing I could get him-slash-her-slash-it to agree to. Maybe we can also find something useful there, too.” 

…A party. Just great, we were going to visit a party that I may or may not have passed out at, or maybe even done something embarrassing that I didn’t want to relive. 

“Lacking that, it might help you keep your mind off of the more, uh, depressing stuff,” Ice explained to me. “A party never hurt anypony.”

Without any previous recollection to use as proof, I reluctantly agreed. “A party only stops when there have been two deaths and everypony is disillusioned with the jazz age as a whole.” When Ice didn’t even blink at my reference to classy literature, I sighed. “Fine. Let’s find this thing.” 


~~~~~


I didn’t feel like talking to Ice Storm as we casually strolled around the imaginary streets of Cloudsdale, free from an imaginary angry Enclave officer chasing us. At the edge of the city, our surroundings blurred out and morphed into a military base. Even though it looked familiar, I couldn’t recall what the name of it was or where it was supposed to be. It didn’t help that the ground had been replaced by irregular metal plating instead of the clouds that it was supposed to be.

Both of us looked around. “There’s a good chance we’re looking for something in the barracks or mess hall,” Ice said, breaking the silence. “Where do you want to look?” 

Truthfully, I had no idea what I was looking for. “You said something about a party, right?” I asked, trying to come up with something that could help. Logic dictated that large social gatherings would need to take place in the mess hall, but unauthorized ones would need to take place in the barracks. After a moment of consideration, I decided to go to the barracks first. “There’s a good chance we’ll find whatever it is there.” Since I had no ideas where the party was, I just needed to hope that I brought back a souvenir. 

So to the barracks we went, quickly realizing that neither of us knew where we were going at all. Identical squat buildings each labeled with miscellaneous numbers, letters, and emblems laid themselves out to our left and right. “So, which one’s yours?” 

I stopped. “Wait, you don’t know?” 

“I only know as much as you do,” Ice replied. “So I’ve been following you and hoping that you just so happened to remember where your bunk was.” 

Uh, what? “But I was following you.” 

Silence. “Oh. Well, that’s awkward. So, uh, do you remember yet?”

“No.”

Our surroundings looked frustratingly familiar, however. I was willing to bet that the base’s layout shouldn’t have changed, even if I didn’t remember it at all. Officer Frosty shouldn’t have changed anything about it, sans the floor if I was right. “I’ve got an idea. Maybe if you go through the steps, we’ll get there eventually,” Ice suggested. 

Hmm. He had a good idea, even if it was a bit flawed. “Like I can remember what I did on a daily basis instead of where I live.” I rolled my eyes. “We’ll need to come up with something better than that.” 

Ice tapped my forehead with his hoof. “It’s all about muscle memory. If you just imagine you’re going to take a nice, long nap after afternoon drills.”

“Not possible. I have cleaning duty at the research labs after dinner.” I absent-mindedly mumbled. “After that I’m free.” Woah. Where’d that come from? More importantly, why was I doing the cleaning? 

“Fine, fine. After that, then,” Ice dismissively waved. “Point is, you need to remember the path you would normally take back to your quarters.”

That was going to be much more difficult than Ice made it out to be. “Fine. Got any suggestions?” I had no idea where to start at all. There must have been hundreds of buildings here to search, and that wasn’t counting the rest of the base.

The sound of sandals flopping behind us was accompanied by the clinking of ice cubes in a glass. “You live in ‘B’ Block, first building, Maggot.” 

Ice and I turned around and were greeted by the sight of Officer Frosty. Well, there was nopony else it could have been. In lieu of her standard issue uniform, she now sported a bright multicolored floral patterned short sleeved button-down and a pair of massively oversized shades. “Scram, before I decide it was a bad idea to take a break.” She took a sip from the mug of tea in her hoof. When neither of us moved, she added, “Maybe I’m starting to regret it right now…”

I picked my jaw off the floor and took off to my left. Clattering of hooves behind me let me know that Ice was still following me. “I don’t remember owning anything like that!” I blurted to him.

“It’s the other way,” Officer Frosty singsonged. I skidded to a stop and turned the other way, breathlessly mumbling my thanks. “You’re welcome. There you go.”

Just follow the letters, Frosty. Aha! I caught a glimpse of the letter “G” passing by at high speed. Several buildings later, “F” flew by as well. I spread my wings and took to the sky to cover more distance.

When I got to the “B” buildings, Ice Storm was already standing there waiting for me. I was winded and a bit out of breath by the time I skidded to a stop in front of the first building. Okay, maybe I wasn’t in nearly as good shape as I thought I was. “How… the hell,” I gasped. “Did you… get here…” I paused for breath. “…first?” 

“You’re out of shape.” Ice surveyed the area. “Did you know this isn’t the normal layout of these buildings?” 

What. Well, that probably explains how he’d gotten here before I could fly here. 

“This place has been rearranged for one reason or another, but I don’t really care.” He pushed the door open. “After you.”

After casting Ice my best sardonic glare, I poked my head inside the dimly lit room. There were eight bunks inside, two double stacked bunks on each wall. The wall space next to each bunk was covered with the owners’ personal effects. Instinctively I knew that the second bottom bunk was mine, even if it didn’t have my name on it. The other ones had assorted posters and mementos taped to the wall, but mine was simply adorned with a pair of shiny dog tags on their tiny little chain and a short strip of extra ration tickets pinned to the wall with a combat knife. 

Upon closer inspection of the tags, I realized they weren’t from anypony in my squad. However, the name stamped on the tags did in fact ring a bell. “This guy,” I growled. “To think I forgot about you.” I closed my eyes and attempted to focus on the hazy memory forming in front of me. “This better be a damn good party.”


<~~~>


Cupcakes pranced through an obnoxiously bright grassy field and the sun happened to be a giant haycake. My mind could not comprehend what I was seeing, but I was starting to think that I might have had too much to drink at the party. I was about to dismiss the entire thing as a drunken haze when a very energetic blueberry muffin bounced up to me. “Psst! Hey! Wake up!” it squeaked.

“But you look so delicious…” I found myself whimpering. Great, I was having a food dream and I just told somepony they looked tasty. Great work, Frosty. “Just one bite?”

The muffin headbutted my leg. Headbutt? Does a muffin have a head to butt me with? “Wake up, silly. How can you sleep when there are so many wonderful things to do?” the muffin squeaked, much louder than before. “C’moooon. I know you can hear me.”

I ignored the muffin, which continued to nudge my leg. I scooped it up in my forelegs and caressed it with my left hoof. An actual left hoof! I’d forgotten how it felt like, even if it was just a dream. “I know, I know. Maybe after a snack then.” I licked a blueberry on the imaginary pastry. “And I think I’ll start here.” I opened my jaws wide and took a huge bite out of the top, expecting a deliciously warm and toasty treat. Of course, that’s what I was expecting. What I actually got was a mouthful of inedible soft plush material.

Confusion didn’t even begin to describe what I was waking up to. Well, I was waking up to a mouthful of standard issue bedding. Lightning Chaser was leaning against my bunk, laughing her ass off. “That w-was—hic—amaaaazing!” She fell on top of me and continued to giggle. Judging by her speech and actions, she was completely smashed off her face and at least four mint-als into the night. I extracted my pillow from my mouth and blearily glared at her, hoping the darkness of the room would cover my reddening face.

“What the hay d’ya want, Lighty?” I demanded, also trying to be as quiet as possible. Other ponies, other normal ponies, were still trying to sleep. I squinted at the clock on the back wall. “It’s three in the morning!” I hissed at her. “We have drills in two hours, then I have target practice, and then—”

Lightning shut me up by replacing my pillow into my mouth. “Aww, don’t be like that. There’s tons of fun to be had! There’s a super duperly awesomely radical party happening in the ballroom right now. Let’s go!”

I removed the pillow once more and rubbed the sleep from my eyes. “You do realize it’s shit like this that gets us in trouble, right? Like the fact that none of us got rations today because you decided it was a great idea to add LSD to the mess hall’s water supply. And the potatoes. And the hay fries. And the carrot chips. See a pattern here? Where did you even get that many chems, anyhow?” My stomach growled in agreement. 

The only reply I got was more giggling. “Magic.”

“Wait, didn’t you eat the hay fries too? And the potatoes?” 

“So?” 

Cue double facehoof. “Well, I’m awake now.” I sighed. “Let’s go outside where we won’t wake up anypony else. I’d rather not lose any more rations over anything else silly.” I hopped out of my bunk and rearranged the sheets. After pointing Lightning in the general direction of the door, I grabbed a small satchel off the floor under my bunk and looped it around my neck. “I’d like to be back in bed in an hour.”

“Maybe you’ll find somep-pony else to be in bed with.” Lightning staggered ahead of me, weaving back and forth along the street. “Le’s see…”

We trotted along toward the muffled sounds of music thundering through walls. “I’m just going to go out on a limb and assume we don’t have permission to use the whole ballroom for a party, right?”

Lightning snorted. “It’s actually totally legit! Some scout jock got promoted, and he’s pulled all the stops! Greatest. Party. Ever.” She lurched into an unsteady hover and continued to dangerously swerve above me. “Which is why you”—she poked my head—“need to get around more. Have some fun, little filly!”

“I’m going to point out that I’m still older than you.” 

“But my birthday was a few weeks ago!” Lightning whined.

I stared at her blankly. “Numbers are this big mystery to you, aren’t they?” Ah, the things I put up with. “I’m just going to assume you left the party only to get me to come, right?” 

“Ab-so-lutely!” Lightning popped another mint. “You gotta see this though—it’s no ordinary party.” As I opened the doors into the ballroom, I was assaulted by waves of impossibly loud music and the cracking of multiple thunderclouds going off all at once. “See?” she shouted at me over all the noise. “Best! Party! Ever!”

I scanned the guests of the party. Surprisingly enough, there were a lot of high-profile guests either hanging out at the bar or tearing up the dance floor. As far as I could tell, there were a few sergeants, a whole battalion’s worth of airponies, lieutenants, and a lone brigadier general, among others. “Well, I’ll admit, this is a really crazy party all right!” I yelled back to Lightning. Priorities first, Frosty. “Where’s the snack bar?” 

Lightning hovered over the crowd to perch herself on top of an unoccupied thundercloud and pointed to the tables next to the bar. As I made my way through throngs of dancing ponies, I noticed a blood-red pegasus sitting on a thundercloud at the edge of the room staring at me in a most disturbing manner. Of course, I stared back at him and shot him my best “what-do-you-want” face. I was about to storm over there and find out what that creepy buck wanted when somepony that was smashed off his face stumbled into me. I looked away for a moment to push him off, and when I looked back at the cloud, he was gone. 

Whoever was hosting this party really pulled out all the stops! There were hundreds of treats and snacks available to choose from, not even including all the drinks at the bar. As I helped myself to some apple thingies and a strange potato disc thingy, somepony approached me from behind and casually asked, “Have we met? Something about you rings a bell, but I can't quite place it. I feel like I'd remember a face as cute as yours.”

I whipped around, aforementioned apple thingie still in my mouth. “Wuh?” I blurted. Real smooth, Frosty. I mentally facehoofed as I failed to come up with a proper response. The red stallion from before was standing in front of me. “Who the hay are you?” I finally decided, swallowing the snack. “And I can’t really say I have.” The oak leaves on his lapel flashed at me. “Sir.” 

“Don't sweat it, I've never been big on rank between friends and family. That goes double for pretty mares,” he smoothly replied, still making himself heard over the deafening music. “Name's Mach. I don't suppose you've heard of me? I'm the guy that assassinated that asshole Ardent Vortex. My, uh… my dad is General Silverbolt, not that I care to repeat that fact to everypony I see.”

I felt the blood drain from my face. “Oh,” I quietly replied. “I didn’t realize, sir.” Icy fear gripped my chest. I’d just spoken out against a vastly superior officer without permission. On the bright side, I couldn’t pee myself in fear since I hadn’t had anything to drink in a while, thanks to Lightning once again. “And may I add that you are definitely looking much more familiar now? Sir.” I added, hoping that he wouldn’t do anything too excessive at such a casual meeting. But I didn’t simply say that out of fear—his name had actually sounded familiar to me. 

“C'mon, what's with all the formality? You're wound up like a stars-damned top. Take it easy, would you? The whole reason for this shindig was to get everypony to unwind for a bit. It's a party, lighten up and live a little!” Mach passed me a drink. 

I must have stared at that tiny cup of whiskey for the longest time before I threw caution to the wind. Besides, I was already in enough trouble as it was. “You only do live once. I should be more careful. Screw it,” I replied, downing the shot. “I guess everypony really needed something to lighten up. Especially after what’s been going down this week.” Mach. Silverbolt. Where did I know those names from? “Say, where have we met before, sir?” 

"You don't remember? Come on, you have to remember!” I continued to stare at him blankly. “You were only responsible for delivering the weapon I treasure more than anything into my hooves. I mean, uh, you didn't do it personally, but you did find it, after all. With a cache of other guns that my father confiscated off of you.” My poor little sleep-deprived brain couldn’t come up with anything. Mach noticed my look of complete and utter confusion and continued, “I tried to give it back to you, but you told me you didn't even want it, that all you cared about was the sniper rifle. When I found out he took a whole pile of guns from you I got pissed and dragged you off to talk to him about it. You weren't all that keen on ruffling the feathers of a general, but I took you with me anyway."

Boom. Sudden realization struck me. That’s where I knew those names! “You! Now I remember!” Visions of hasty excuses and a hazy meeting in an office appeared out of nowhere. “Do you have any idea how much trouble I got into? Heck, do you know how awkward it was to explain to everypony else why I had a meeting with a general and a captain?” I sighed. “Again, I appreciate the gesture, but you really didn’t have to do that. If it makes you feel any better, it would have been more paperwork on my end.” I shoved another apple thingy into my mouth. “Besides, my old man would have made me turn them over, anyway.” 

"Look, I don't think you realize just how important that gun is to me. I lost my first one on a mission early on in my career, and I thought I'd never get my hooves on such a fine piece of earth pony engineering again. Let me give you something to pay you back. Here, take these.” Mach yanked off his dog tags and presented them to me. “It's no sniper rifle, but it's all I have to give, really. I mean, uh, besides this bitchin’ party.”

“Uh, wh—” I started. Mach stared at me expectantly, still holding out his tags. “Screw it, sure.” I took the tags from him and examined them in my hoof. Nothing particularly interesting, just all the standard stuff. Once I shifted to the second tag, however, I was surprised by the single addendum stamped on it. “Allergic to acetylcholine, huh?” Words, why must you confuse me? And why didn’t I ever pay attention in chemistry?

“That—uh, I don’t want to talk about it. Let’s just say bees and wasps terrify me and leave it at that, alright?” Mach stuttered. 

I couldn’t help myself. “Aww, is the big important stallion scared of an itty bitty bee?” I cooed, giggling uncontrollably. 

“Yeah yeah, go on and laugh it up. Stars alive, even as a major I get no respect. I swear, years down the road ponies will still be giving me a hard time.” Mach facehoofed. 

Lightning stumbled into Mach. “Aww maaaaan, I’m sooo druuunk.” She unceremoniously climbed over him and wrapped her forelegs around my neck. “Teehee.” Even in her drunken state, she still managed to get into my satchel and rummage around for extra mints. “Fwooosty, where you keep my candy?” 

I gave Lightning a good slap on the hoof digging through my satchel. “Stop. I don’t carry any of that crap for you, remember? Last time you wanted me to carry your illicit goods, Dad caught me and pretty much tore me a new one.” 

Judging by Lightning’s somewhat lacking reaction, she might have expected as much. “Ooh, but who’s this big handsome buck?” She giggled. “Such biiiig wings.” Mach proudly stood there as Lightning stroked his wings.

“I think I’m going to bring my excessively inebriated friend back to her bunk. Thanks for the party, though. And the tags.” I smiled at Mach while I wrestled Lightning off him. “Have a great night. Morning. Or—Lightning, will you let go of him?” I yelled. She was still valiantly holding onto one of Mach’s outstretched wings, much to his chagrin. “Damn it, Lighty!”


<~~~>


The memory faded away like a dream as I opened my eyes. I stared at the dog tags in my hoof and wondered if Mach was still alive somewhere. By the looks of it, Ice Storm had been napping in one of the bunks until I’d come out of the memory. “Have fun?” he asked, quickly hopping onto his hooves.

I thought back to Lightning’s antics and smiled. “You could say that.”

Ice clopped his hooves together. “Excellent. Now go get some rest. You’ve earned it, and you certainly look like you need it.” 

Before I could protest or question, I felt a nap attack coming on. I was out before I hit the ground.


~~~~~


The rest of the night must have passed without incident, because I woke up in Rumcake’s comforting embrace. I opened my eyes a crack, only to be greeted by the relative darkness of the building’s interior. Dusty gray light barely made its way in through the grimy windows along the upper edge of the building’s walls. What time was it? I raised my PipBuck to check the time, only to succeed in searing the bright image of its screen into my eyes. 

“Ow, ow, ow.” I blindly fumbled for the backlight toggle before hazarding another peek at the screen. “Dah! Wrong way.” Somehow, I’d managed to turn on the flashlight function instead of turning down the backlight. Squinting against the burnt-in light in my eyes, I managed to turn off the flashlight with only marginal difficulty. It was eight in the morning, according to my dim PipBuck. The noise of ponies moving things and the sizzle of food cooking immediately grabbed the attention of my stomach. 

Too bad Rumcake was still asleep. And since he was asleep, his forelegs were still wrapped around my body. As much as I would love to have retrieved breakfast, I couldn’t escape his warm loving embrace. His very strong, impossibly tight embrace. In fact, when I attempted to squirm away he only held me tighter. 

Good thing that at that exact moment, Tangerine was climbing back up to the flat she shared with Sparkle. Behind her, a small tray of slightly charred assorted edibles floated upwards in her orange magical field. We locked gazes for a moment, then she suppressed a loud snort. She decided on, “You two are adorable.” 

I mouthed the words “help me” to her. With a nonchalant flip of her hood, she ignored me and continued up the ladder. 

I laid in bed with Rumcake since I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere. Every now and then he’d mutter something or happily rub his face in my mane. “Hey, fatso, wake up.” I prodded and pried at his forelegs, which only caused him to grab me tighter. A pair of heads belonging to Tangerine and Sparkle, respectively, poked down from around the edge of their level. “Aww. They are adorable,” Sparkle cooed. “Look at her struggle.”

“I’d love to actually get out of bed today,” I gasped. “But I’m in a bit of a tight spot.” Even flapping my wings was impossible—my right was against the floor and Rumcake was holding my left down. “How do I wake him up?” 

Sparkle retracted her head and reappeared moments later with a very crispy slice of… something. “Eashy,” she replied between bites. “Tickle h—dear Celestia this is disgusting—his ear.”

“And how do you expect me to do that?” I snarked at her, wiggling once more to demonstrate that I was still trapped. “Look at all this space!” At this point, I didn’t even try to be considerate by keeping my voice down. I just wanted to get out of bed for once.

“Can’t you use your tail?” Tangerine pointed out. I flicked my short tail in the direction of Rumcake’s face, then glared at her. “Oh. Sorry.” With that very unhelpful tidbit, she retreated. 

On the other hoof, Sparkle had this really stupid grin plastered all over her muzzle. “I’ve got a great idea.” She swung herself onto the ladder and down onto our flat. “Oh, this is going to be so funny.” She calmly trotted to my side and poked Rumcake’s ear. “Wakey, wakey! Eggs ‘n’ somethin’ or other!” 

To his credit, that stallion could sleep through the end of the world. “Can we pry his forelegs apart enough so that I can slip out?” I suggested. 

That appeared to be the only way I could escape. “Worth a try.” Sparkle shrugged. She managed to wrap her forelegs around one of Rumcake’s. She pulled at his leg with all her might, to no avail. I even added my own power to her efforts in the sheer hope that enough space would be created so I could squirm out. “Stupid… sexy… Rumcake…” she grunted. “Why… are you… so… strong?” 

For some reason or another, even with both of us exerting all the force we could muster, we still couldn’t budge Rumcake’s forelegs. I had, however, managed to reorient myself so that I was facing him. Sparkle was lying down on her back a few feet away, completely exhausted from our efforts. Why wouldn’t he just wake the buck up? In my new position, I could poke him in the stomach as much as I wanted to at least. 

“Hey,” Sparkle panted. “I got a great idea.” 

Not only did I really want some breakfast thanks to the deliciously tortuous smells wafting from below, but now I needed to use the little filly’s room. Any ideas would be great at the moment. “I’m all ears,” I responded, perking up my ears. 

Sparkle sat up again. “You cloudwalkers have fairy tales and stuff, right? Or is that stuff banned?” In all fairness, she was only partly right. Anything that was considered ‘too radical’ or the like had been removed some time ago, according to Dad. Huh. Thanks for remembering, brain. 

“I would assume I’ve been read the classics,” I cautiously replied. “Why?”

Without Sparkle directly saying it, I was somewhat sure of what she was about to suggest. “You know how the knightly stallion always kisses the damsel at the end?” I attempted to facehoof, forgetting that my right hoof was now stuck. Of course it was exactly what I was thinking. Sparkle gazed at me hopefully. “Maybe it’s time for a strong female lead?” 

I sighed. “Really? How long have you been saving that line?” 

Like the silly pony Sparkle was, she bounced in place eagerly. “Really long.”

“Better question: if wrestling and talking haven’t worked, then why would a kiss?” It was a valid question, after all. 

“It works in the books,” Sparkle simply answered. “So why not?” 

I resisted the urge to faceclaw as well. “Fine, since I really don’t have many alternatives.” Using the space available to me, I scooted as close as I could to Rumcake’s warm toasty body and wrapped my forelegs around his neck. I closed my eyes and gently kissed him right on the lips. “G’morning, sweetie,” I whispered. 

A loud snore completely shattered the poetic beauty of the moment. Rumcake was still fast asleep. 

“Well, that was anticlimactic,” I dejectedly muttered, glaring at his sleeping face. 

For a moment, Sparkle sat there and stared at us. I had to angle my head back in order to get a good look at her. “Maybe we can try the ear thing again?” she suggested. “Since Knight Charming is a really heavy sleeper.”

For future reference, Rumcake was impossible to wake up once he was asleep. Even though I batted at his ear multiple times, he simply ignored it like it was nothing. Since I wasn’t making any progress, I turned myself back over so that I could comfortably snuggle up against him. “That worked great,” I sarcastically shot back at Sparkle. 

Sparkle stared at Rumcake, then back to me. She grinned at me mischievously. “I’ve got an idea.” 

“Oh really? What other sort of—ow!” While I was talking, Sparkle had strolled over to me and yanked out one of my primaries with her teeth. “Hey! I need those!” I complained. Hopefully whichever one she took wouldn’t impact my flight too greatly. At least she hadn’t taken any of the really important primaries.

Using my stolen feather, Sparkle tickled Rumcake’s ear. He flicked his ear several times in response, but, just like all our other tries, he didn’t really move at all. “What is he, in a coma?” Sparkle complained. “Wake up, damn you. Don’t make me break out the bass!” 

“If he hasn’t woken up by now from all our commotion, what makes you think music will?” I pointed out. “Whatever you’ve got in mind better go to twelve.”

“I don’t think the locals would appreciate a rave at this hour,” Sparkle glumly sighed. “Whatever, you’ll just have to wait until he wakes up.” She spat my feather out of her mouth, where it lazily drifted downward. “But if you’re bored, I’d be willing to sit here and keep you company.” That sounded nice. Otherwise I’d get bored and probably fall back to sleep again. 

However, my feather appeared to have a better idea. On its way down, it happened to lightly flit right across Rumcake’s nose. He grumbled and snorted, reaching up to scratch at his nose. Wait, I was free! I launched myself away from him before he could decide to move his leg again. Currently, he was lying on his back, complacently snoring away. “Well, at least I’m not stuck anymore.” My carefree tone masked my rage at the fact that making him move was so much simpler than we had made it. 

Now that I wasn’t nestled in Rumcake’s strong embrace, I could finally move again! I arched my back and flapped my wings, pulling at my sore muscles and joints. I hadn’t felt this sore since basic. Maybe Ice Storm was right, maybe I really was out of shape. As I twisted my joints to work out any last kinks, my mind wandered into figuring out what I needed to finish today. Find a book, get my stuff back, get that crazy mare to fix the armor, and get some directions. Not necessarily in that order.

Sparkle winced when another particularly loud pop escaped my right shoulder. “Once you’re done rearranging your entire skeleton, feel like some breakfast?” Hmm. Breakfast sounded like an excellent plan. “I’m still hungry after those terrible donuts.” 

My morning stretching completed, I moved onto preening. “You head on down first,” I told her. “I’ll just fly down in a moment.” There were still a few ratty feathers that I had to take care of before I felt I was finally clean. When was the last time I had a nice, long preening? Apparently not anytime soon, based on Sparkle’s continued presence and impatient fidgeting. “If you insist on waiting for me, gimme a second then.” I did a quick once-over on my wings, smoothing feathers back into place and pulling damaged ones.

“Question.” 

I smoothed one last feather into place. Close enough. “Go ahead,” I grunted, shaking myself down. 

Sparkle pointed at my wings. “If your wings get covered in something, do you lick it off?” Out of all the potential questions she could have asked me, that definitely caught me off guard. I was expecting something more along the lines of why I was taking so long or something. 

“I’d wash or wipe it off,” I simply answered. “Why?” 

“But what if it doesn’t come off?” Sparkle countered, climbing down the ladder. I floated down beside her. Screw climbing, I can fly. “I mean, what happens then?”

“At that point, I’d rather not think about it,” I replied, ending that conversation right there. Onto a new topic! “So, what do they have for sale at breakfast?” We reached the foot of the ladder and cantered to the food stall with all the ponies clustered around it. Two of the workbenches had a large board placed over it, turning it into some sort of makeshift table setup.

Sparkle shrugged. “Stuff. Just all your standard food stuff. Boxed apple chips, boxed hay chips, boxed potatoes, boxed—no, wait, canned corn, boxed dandelions…”

“Yeah, yeah. I get it.” I sighed. Nothing fresh, then. Apple chips didn’t taste anything like the real thing due to its freeze-dried nature. All the boxed stuff, huh? “Wait… do they have cherry snack cakes?” I scanned the menu of the food stall, ignoring the two ponies working the counter. “Ooh, they do.”

“Oi! We don’ serve their kind here.” The orange-coated earth pony slammed his hooves on the counter. A few spots on his face lacked fur, instead showing dark scar tissue. One of his murky golden eyes was a touch off-center from the other one. His dirty grayish-yellow mane was shorn down to a few inches, which was covered with a manenet. 

Everypony stared directly at me. “What?” 

Sparkle jumped to defend me. “Yo, you got a problem with cyberponies?” Oh. Of course, the metal leg was probably somewhat disconcerting to most ponies.

The orange pony slammed his hooves on the counter again. “No, the bucking bird!” He pointed at me once more, for emphasis. “I don’t serve ya bloody kind.” My heart skipped a beat. Ouch. Just when I thought the Wasteland was much more tolerant than the Enclave was. “Now scram!” 

I wasn’t really sure what to say. I hadn’t been expecting it, and I stood there for a second not knowing how to respond. For once, I didn’t have any witty comebacks, no indignant replies. After this long, I really wasn’t expecting a reply like that.

I shared a doubtful, worried glance with Sparkle. “I’ll just dig something out of my bags,” I sighed, turning back to my flat. “You enjoy your breakfast, then.” Everypony else went back to whatever they were doing before. 

My emotions were in complete disarray. Discrimination wasn’t a new thing to me, but being the target of it certainly was. Normally, propaganda told me that non-pegasi were inferior and were to be treated as such. Maybe I’d just gotten lucky all this time and run into the open-minded ponies first. Being from a militaristic background, I was used to being stomped into the clouds, put down, and all-around insulted for being daddy’s little soldier. However, being the inferior, unwanted race was a new one for me. 

I felt a little bit like a zebra.

As I trudged away, Sparkle grabbed my tail. I halted in my tracks and looked back at her. Through my blurry vision, I could tell she was giving me her best sympathetic look. “Don’t feel bad. Just find us some seats. Whatcha want?” 

“Cherry cake thingies?” I sniffled. 

“Right, one—no, two boxes of Fancy Buck Snack Cakes, then.” Sparkle led me to an unoccupied side of workbench-table. “Save me a spot and I’ll bring ‘em back for you.” 

I wiped my eyes with the side of my claw leg, realized my error, and wiped them again with my right foreleg. “Th-thanks.” 

“Hey, no sweat. That’s what friends are for, li’l sis.” Sparkle patted my head.

Eh? Last time I checked, I wasn’t related to her. Also… “I’m somewhat sure I’m older than you,” was the first thing that came out of my mouth. 

“Not the point!” Sparkle brightly exclaimed. “You’re the new Square on the block, and that makes you the littlest sister.” 

There was a time and place for witticism, and I wasn’t in the mood for it right now. “I don’t get it,” I grumpily replied.

Sparkle comfortingly patted me on my hat again. “You’re a Steel Ranger now! Blood is thicker than water, syrup is thicker than blood, yadda yadda, blah blah, you’re family now—shut up and enjoy it.”

Gala Frosty decided to butt in before I managed to squeeze out another confused objection. “Actually, the saying ‘blood is thicker than water’ is quite out of context without its full quote. The original context says something along the lines of ‘relationships by choice are more meaningful than those of biology’, making the shortened version completely incorrect.”

Sparkle gave me a look somewhere between confusion and boredom.

After taking a moment to appraise her reaction, Gala sighed. “We read sometimes.” 

Once Sparkle had recovered from her stupor, she gave me another comforting pat and went back to the food stall to acquire food for us. I decided to go and grab a table in a dark corner so that I could sulk in peace.

A large, crispy-looking, greasy, lumpy misshapen mess on a platter greeted me a few minutes later. “What. The. Buck. Is. That?” I glumly demanded, scooting into a sitting position. “Sparkle, I never asked for this.” Since it still seemed like food, I gave it a cautious sniff. Oooh. Whatever it was, it definitely smelled heart-stoppingly good.

“That’s no way to talk to the stallion givin’ you free food. Shut your trap and be happy.” Boss plopped himself down to my left.

He wasn’t who I was expecting! “Gah! Sorry sir!” I prodded the mysterious confection in front of me. “But, with all due respect, what the hay is this?” I gave it another cautious sniff. “Is that… cherry scented?” 

Boss sighed. “I overheard my minions denying one of my esteemed guests hospitality. Even if I might share their sentiments, well…” He sighed again and waved a hoof in a dismissive gesture. “Just… shut up and eat the bucking fried cake.” 

“Fried cake?” Oh. Duh. It was a fried snack cake. Ergo, cherry scented. Fascinating! “What great wide wonder is this?” I gasped. “I need a fork.” There weren’t any nearby. “Buck it, I’ll just eat it the old fashioned way.” With that, I shoved my muzzle right into the fried cake and took a huge bite out of it. Molten cherry-flavored preservatives flowed into my mouth, accompanied by chewy pillowy soft dough in its crunchy outer edge. “Ohhhoho… tha’s sho goood!” I mumbled, mouth full of balefire-like flaming deliciousness. “It hur’s sho good!”

“Glad you like it.” Boss sighed, nodding. “It was a favorite of my…” He was staring off into space, probably reliving happier days. I paused in mid-chew and stared at him. He noticed me staring at him and narrowed his eyes. “Never mind that. Shut up and keep eating.” Boss was not somepony I wanted to mess with, so I intelligently decided to look away and keep chewing.

Actually, if Boss was the leader of this place… “Sir, any idea where I might find somepony’s super magical book of intelligence?” Maybe he knew where Violet would have left that book at. 

The moment Boss rolled his eyes, I knew this wasn’t the first time Violet had lost her book. “That mare isn’t really all there.” He sighed. “Tell her to use her magical location finder thing since she probably forgot about it. Celestia help you, she’s a real pain to deal with.” 

Sparkle returned and deposited a tray on the table to my right. “Oh. Uh… still need these cherry snack cakes then?” Whether she was joking or not, she slid the two boxes to me anyway. “How’d you get that?” 

“You’re welcome, ladies. Now if you’ll excuse me…” Boss stood up and left. I wasn’t exactly sure where exactly he went since I was too busy wallowing in the deliciously orgasmic joy of deep fried sugary confections. 

I was only into my third bite and my muzzle was already smeared with cherry filling. “I’s shooo gooood! Oohhhoho I looove cherry cakes.” While I stuffed myself with heart-stopping preservatives, Sparkle tucked into a small bowl of reconstituted mashed potatoes and a small piece of bread. Neither of us said anything as we ate our respective meals. 

After a while, once I’d finished off the fried snack cake and Sparkle was idly chewing on the last bit crust from her bread, she casually asked, “So… usually I wouldn’t intrude on another mare’s personal business, but I gotta know. Why Rumcake?” 

What was with all the surprise questions today? It caught me off guard—I didn’t really know the answer to that. “You should really mind your own business,” I hastily replied, dodging the question. I hadn’t thought about it, really. Something about him just drew me to him.

Thankfully, if Sparkle was offended, she didn’t care. “Gotcha. Not talking about it.” Instead, she changed the subject again. “So you figure out who that scribe was?” Oh right, she didn’t know yet. “And what contingent does she belong to? Tell me she has repair kits.” 

Since it appeared that Rumcake and Sparkle hadn’t even tried to figure out who Violet was, I had to fill in the gaps for them. “Her name is Violet Dusk, and as far as I can figure out, she’s not tied to any of our contingents or organizations or whatever. I don’t really want to figure out how your ridiculous hierarchy works, so don’t even get started.” 

Sparkle stared at me blankly. “Did you even read the memo? Everypony gets a memo on day one.” 

“Well, what have you been doing?” I shot back. “We’ve been here for a good amount of time by now.” 

I stood up and Sparkle followed suit. Both of us deposited our trash in the marked bin, and Sparkle returned the bowl and tray she had been using. “Mostly listening to music and trying to fix things,” Sparkle reluctantly admitted. “And trying to forget the creep factor of those ponies…” She shuddered.

Trying not to remember? “If there’s one bucking thing I’ve learned so far, memories are precious. I’d rather suffer nightmares of past deeds rather than question the things I’ve done, the things I’m not allowed to remember,” I snarled. There were things that I was sure were important to me that Officer Frosty wasn’t allowing me to know. Things that would have made me a different mare. “So shut it and be happy with what you have.” 

The normally formidable Steel Ranger in front of me stood stock-still. Without realizing it, I’d gotten right up into Sparkle’s face and backed her against a table. She was frozen in a combination of fear and indignation. I looked down and blanched when I realized I’d fixed my claw around her neck.

With a feeling of slight horror, I dropped my claw to the floor and slowly backed away from Sparkle. “I’m… I’m…” I stammered. She rubbed her throat, fear reflecting in her eyes. “Holy crap. I’m so sorry.” Hurting her hadn’t been my intention at all.

Sparkle held up her hoof. “Given your neurotic history and recent events, I’m willing to overlook that in the name of friendship.” She coughed. “You’re a soldier. You need to keep your emotions under wraps. Just some advice from a friend: talk to somepony. Sort out your issues if you’re not willing to forget them.” Tears welled in my eyes. What was wrong with me? “Aww, don’t cry. C’mere. Hug?” 

Without another word, I collapsed into Sparkle’s open forelegs. 

“Bleeeh,” Rumcake yawned. I jumped a little in surprise. Where did he come from? “The hay happened here? You okay, sweets?” he asked, clearly concerned about me. “Sparkle, what the hay did you say to her?”

I wiped my eyes dry once more. “It wasn’t her fault. It… it was mine,” I shuddered, remembering my talons wrapped around Sparkle’s throat. “I might have lost control for a moment.” She nodded in agreement. Yes, best not bring it up. “But I think we’re cool now.”

“Good to hear.” Rumcake sighed. He pulled one of two canteens off from around his neck and gave me one. “I’m a bit suspicious of this since I bought if from a pony named Burnt Toast, so…” Hesitantly, I accepted the canteen. “Uh. Have this canteen of nice hot coffee”

After a sip, I noticed several major problems with the coffee. “This is barely warm.” 

“This canteen of nice coffee, then,” Rumcake corrected.

Next problem: there was this unpleasant burnt acrid taste floating at the back of my mouth. “I know you mean well, but this is disgusting.”

“Canteen of coffee.” 

Was normal coffee supposed to be this thick? I tilted the canteen sideways and watched in horrified awe as the remaining liquid sludge slowly inched to the exit. “Enclave rations might have spoiled me, but I’m still somewhat sure coffee shouldn’t have two layers.” I tapped the side of the canteen and winced as the tip of my talon poked through the reinforced container. “And uh, I don’t think it does that, either.”

“Canteen,” Rumcake deadpanned. “You’re so picky and demanding, you know that?”

Demanding? The same acrid smell began to waft out of the top of the canteen. “I’m not demanding. You need a refund.” With a hiss and a gut-wrenching splorch, the entire right side melted out of the container. What the buck did I just drink, grease and liquid rainbow? I shook what was left of the canteen I was still holding. “And a new canteen.” 

“Damn it, and I just bought that.” Rumcake sighed. “Well, at least I still have one more.”

I eyed the other potentially volatile canteen around Rumcake’s neck. “You have more of that stuff? I don’t think that’s safe.” The very thought of more of that stuff made me panic just a touch. “Or healthy,” I added, acidic bile rising in my throat. “Just thinking about it is going to make me sick. Ugh. Somepony find me a sick bag.” And then it was gone. “Nevermind, I think it just corroded my gag reflex.”

All three of us stared intently at the remaining canteen around Rumcake’s neck, just waiting for it to melt and collapse. “You silly fillies, it’s just water,” he grumbled. “What, is the water going to burst into flames?” Hehe. Famous last words.

“I wouldn’t doubt that.” Sparkle eyed the canteen warily. “Better get a refund for that, too. While we’re at it, get a refund on Frosty as well.” I narrowed my eyes and flattened my ears at her. “What?” 

In my best quiet menacing voice, I asked her, “Are you calling me defective?” 

Sparkle thought about it for a moment. “I’m just hoping you’re still under warranty,” she replied with a snicker. Okay, maybe I deserved that one. 

Product cannot be returned since it has been tampered with. 

Interesting. Assuming I knew what I was talking about, did that mean somepony really had done something to me, and this wasn't some strange form of PTSD? 

“Back to the point,” I interjected, unwilling to pursue this topic further. “The only way Violet is going to help us is if we find her goddesses damned book.” 

Rumcake seemed confused. “Who?” Right. I’d forgotten to fill him in.

“Violet’s the scribe from yesterday, remember?” Sparkle explained. “She’s going to fix our armor and stuff.” 

I would love to get free repairs, but the deal I’d made with Violet probably wouldn’t apply to me. “All we need to do is find her magic book.” Which, frankly, would be nearly impossible given our current location. “So, what’s the plan?” 

Sparkle and I looked to Rumcake expectantly. “Hmm. Frosty, since she’s already familiar with you, see if you can get her to tell you where she left it last. Sparkle and I will ask around, see if there’s anything else we can do for these ponies.” Well, that sounded like a plan. “Meet back here in say… an hour or two?” 

“Got it,” I replied.

“Roger that. I’ll start with residential, then?” Sparkle decided. 

Rumcake nodded. “I’ll see if the important ponies know anything.”

All three of us split up to complete our respective jobs. I used my magical pegasus ability of flight to circumvent the bother of walking all the way back to Violet’s flat. When I got there, however, there wasn’t anypony there. The entire place was a huge mess—much messier than last time I’d been here. Books had been moved from their piles, and loose paper and quills lay all over the place. 

Wait, correction. There was somepony here. If I hadn’t been focused on trying to get around without scattering paper and books everywhere, I would have noticed the huddled-up weeping pony hiding in her bed. 

I was about to prod her when I realized that was probably a bad idea. Interrupting her while she was wallowing in whatever ponies wallowed in would probably end in my demise, if what happened last time was any indication of her mood swings. Instead, I settled on politely coughing to get her attention. 

The cloth pile shifted slightly. “What do you want?” Violet quietly and glumly demanded from somewhere inside her bed.

“It’s Frosty,” I told her. “I might have found a way for you to find your book.” 

Suddenly, Violet burst forth from the safety of her sheets. “Really?” she gasped. “Tell me, tell me, tell me!” The fur around her eyes was matted from recent crying, yet she stared at me with new hope gleaming in her eyes. 

“Your book has a tracking spell on it, according to the ponies I’ve talked to,” I reminded her, thinking back to what Boss told me during breakfast. Speaking of which… “Why haven’t you used that yet, exactly? It would have saved both of us a lot of grief and effort.” I cast a baleful gaze at our surroundings. “And a whole lot of cleaning up, too.” 

Violet stared at me blankly, her brow furrowed in concentration. “Um.”

“Hmm?” I arched my eyebrow at her. 

Whatever she was trying to come up with, she wasn’t succeeding. After several awkward seconds of staring, Violet finally spoke. “Okay, I think I remember the tracking spell.” 

I was slightly worried. “Wait, what do you mean by ‘I think’?” I thought unicorns were supposed to be super smart and stuff like that.

Violet sighed. “There’s a reason I need that book. I keep all my spells in my spellbook so I don’t have to memorize every single kind of spell I can cast.” Oh. That made a bit more sense. “And I may have overlooked the small fact that I haven’t really memorized the whole tracking spell. Well, I can still do my best.” 

Hopefully Violet’s best would be enough. I watched with slight fascination as her horn charged with hazel-colored magic. Slowly, tendrils of her magic drifted outward, searching for something. Since she was too busy keeping her magic under control or something, she didn’t see her magic extending to my direction. “Wait.” My chin tickled as the first few tendrils wrapped around my muzzle. “I’m not a book.” 

“I’m just searching. Relax, you little filly,” Violet calmly replied, deep in concentration. “Shut your face and let me focus.” While she was focusing, the magic tendrils emanating from her horn had encircled my muzzle and was working its way across my face and neck. On the bright side, at least they only tickled instead of something more uncomfortable. “Hmm. That’s interesting. I think I might have found it.”

I glared at her silently as the magic finished doing whatever it was doing. “Mmmph.” Even if the tendrils didn’t hurt, they still managed to keep me from opening my mouth. Great.

Violet exhaled in exasperation. “What are you mumbling about now?” She opened her eyes and paused. “Oh. Huh. That’s interesting.” I narrowed my eyes at her and pointed at my bound muzzle, trying to tell her that I couldn’t say anything. “So I may or may not have forgotten what my location spell is.”

Maybe my expectation of unicorns was too high. Violet dropped the spell she was maintaining, which freed me up to finally talk. “How the hay do you forget that? And if that wasn’t your location spell, then what was it?” I didn’t want to have to experience that again, if possible. It made me feel… violated.

.”If I remember correctly, if that wasn’t my locate spell then it was probably my detect-magic spell,” Violet replied, levitating a book to her. “That makes things much more difficult. But still, very interesting…” She flipped through a few of its pages. “Have you been in the presence of full-body magic spells within the past few days?” 

What did that have to do with anything? “Yeah, from you and the scribe I came in with. Maybe some more miscellaneous magic as well. Why?” I replied. “Wait, is this about the spell just now? Are my ovaries safe?” I’ll admit, I was panicking just a bit. Every single time somepony smart had casually mentioned that something was “interesting”, that never bode well.

“Hm. Seems to make sense. Find me a quill, will you?” Violet asked, presumably looking around for some paper. “To answer your previous question, your ability to reproduce should be fine. Probably. Find that quill yet?” I picked out a slightly bent quill that was sandwiched between a book and a stack of notes. “That won’t do.” 

“Well, what do you want me to–OW!” I yelped, jumping back. The second I looked away to find a better quill, Violet had quickly padded over and yanked one of the primaries from my right wing. “What was that for?” 

Violet gave me a you-are-an-idiot look. “Writing,” she flatly stated. “Duh.” As she quickly refurbished my stolen feather into a quill, I couldn’t help but realize I needed to somehow keep my feathers on my wings without everypony arbitrarily stealing them all the time. Once she finished the Frosty-feather quill, she quickly scribbled things down while glancing at me from time to time.

I did my best to control myself. Sure, murder isn’t the answer but it did make me feel better. Right? “Back to the point, please. If your book isn’t here, then when was the last time you had it?” 

We stared at each other for a while. I uncomfortably shifted my hooves on the floor as Violet continued to unerringly gaze into my soul for several minutes. “The old bookstore!” she suddenly exclaimed. “That’s where I left it!” 

Oh good. Hopefully the bookstore wasn’t too far away. 

“It’s only a few miles down the road,” she continued. 

I resisted the urge to groan out loud. Well, a few miles wasn’t too far by wing. 

“I was looking for a readable copy of ‘Advanced Teleportation and Pseudo-Locational Theory’. I must have left both of them there when the bloatsprites showed up.” 

Eh, I could handle a few bloatsprites. 

“Let’s go there.” 

Pause. “What do mean by ‘let’s go’? You’re not coming with me,” I said firmly. “You’re a combat liability and the last thing I need is a dead mechanic.” 

“Magical genius,” Violet corrected me. 

I rolled my eyes. Both ways, she wasn’t going with me. My PipBuck beeped at me, simply reminding me about something being updated. Sure enough, the location marker for “Flambe Frank’s Flammable Fiction” had been added to my ever-so-slightly expanding list of locations on my map. “A live magical genius is more useful than a dead one. Stay here, and I’ll get your book. Afterwards, you help fix my friends’ armor.” 

Violet nodded vigorously. “Of course. Find my book, and I’ll do whatever you want.” 

“Great! I’ll be back later.” Time to go find my Ranger friends. To adventure! 

I departed Violet’s flat and left her to her own devices. I glided down to the ground floor, thoughts of my friends and book-recovery in mind. Speaking of which, there was Sparkle right now! “Hey Sparkle!” I called out from above her.

One of the perks of being a pegasus was definitely the flying part, followed by the amazing ability to drop in on friends unannounced. Sparkle looked around in a very confused manner before probably realizing that I was the one calling her. “Oh. Hey, Frosty! Seein’ you a lot lately. Find anything useful?” 

“Yep. I’ve got a lead on where that book might be, since Violet suddenly decided to remember where she left it.” I landed next to her with a flourish. “You find out anything?”

“Nada,” Sparkle glumly replied. “She hasn’t left a terribly good impression on the neighbors, if you know what I mean.” Cue blank stare. “Or not. Anyway, what’s the lead?” 

I showed her the location on my PipBuck. It was only an inch or so to the northwest following a barely visible road. “Some bookstore, apparently.” 

“Awesome. I’ll get Rumcake, then.” Ranger backup sounded nice. 

Wait. 

My sad, unarmored Ranger backup. Right. 

Sparkle was about to gallop off to find Rumcake but I stopped her before she got very far. Hopefully she would break the news to him so I wouldn’t have to. “Don’t take this personally, but neither are you are coming with me.” Her disappointed and somewhat angry expression led me to believe she didn’t agree with my decision. “No offense, but without your armor, you’re useless.”

Sparkle opened her mouth to say something, then closed it. Then she opened her mouth again, then closed it again. Not as good as my own dying fish impression, but it was close. “You win this time, Frosty,” she finally said. “Next time I’ll have a nice snappy comeback. But isn’t it dangerous to go alone?” 

“Don’t worry about it. But seriously, I’ll just go on my own. It’s just a few bloatsprites. Nothing I can’t handle,” I reassured her. “What’s the worst that could happen? Anyway, I’ll be back in a few hours. But if you’re that worried, could you go fetch Tangerine and tell her to meet me at the entrance? I’m going to need some of her help.”

Just like any good little soldier, she ceased asking questions and did what I asked. Once I’d retrieved my saddlebag, I tromped back to the doorway that led to the store out front and calmly waited. While I was at it, how was I doing on ammo and supplies? Without anything better to do, I proceeded to look through all of my stuff.

Moments later, a familiar robed orange unicorn rudely shoved her face into my way as I was rearranging the contents of my bag. “So. I’m here.” 

“Oh good! Can you help me get into my armor again?” I hopefully clopped my hoof against the ground. “It’s hard for me to get into it on my own.” I sheepishly grinned. 

Tangerine sighed. “Oh. Is that all? Ugh, fine. Want to explain why you’re going out on your own without your bestie Rumcake?” We walked down the hallway and knocked on the door at the end, which Corporal Tracks opened. He took one look at us, then closed the door again. 

Wow. What an asshole. “Long story short, I’m finding somepony that’ll fix Rumcake and Sparkle’s armor,” I replied, hammering on the door. “Yo! Is leaving too much to ask?”

“What’s the password?” came the reply from the other side.

Really? A password? “What password?” I yelled, getting somewhat miffed by the whole situation.

“We had a meeting on this ten minutes ago.” 

It was Tangerine’s turn to be annoyed. “If the meeting just ended, then everypony out here doesn’t know what the password is!” she yelled.

The door opened again. “Heh, I’m just pullin’ your leg.” Tracks chortled. “I assume you want your shit back if you’re going out.” I nodded. “I’ll get them. Hold on.” We followed him to the front of his store. “So, leaving our hospitality for good?” 

I shook my head. “Nah. Running a quick errand.”

Tracks shifted his massive bulk in my way as he unlocked his safe. “Interesting. If it’s for the chefs, don’t bother.” The safe clicked, and he withdrew all my precious weapons and armor. “Those two goofs aren’t worth the trouble.” 

Thoughts of the questionably rancid coffee sloshing around in my stomach came to mind. “Who?” I asked him while Tangerine and I strapped on my armor parts. 

“Uh… Easy Greasy and Burnt Toast. Contrary to popular belief, Toasty actually knows what he’s doing. At least he didn’t try to deep fry a plasma mine.” Tracks plopped my anti-machine rifle in front of me. “So, what’cha lookin’ for? Radhog butts?” I shrugged. “Bigger?”

Once my armor had been completely reassembled onto my body, I quickly ran through a few simple test movements that I’d seen Powerlevel go through before going into combat. Tail, check. Hooves, mostly check. “Just a few bloatsprites. And a book.” 

Tracks stopped in his tracks. “I didn’t notice any fire weapons in your arsenal,” he notified me in a worried tone. “You sure you know what you’re doing?” 

I hefted Philomena’s Touch. “Fire weapon. And I’m pretty sure I know what I’m doing.”

No you don’t. 

Well, thanks.

“Suuuuure.” Tracks shut his safe. “If you get eaten out there, don’t say I didn’t warn you.” 

Tangerine thumped my wing plates. “You’re good to go. Have fun.” She wandered back into the confines of the building, presumably to keep fiddling with both Rangers’ damaged armor. 

As I checked the ammo count on all my weapons, claw gun included, Tracks dropped a small red large-barreled pistol next to my claw. Orange tape wrapped the barrel of the gun, giving it the appearance of a candy cane. I nudged it cautiously, confusion showing in my face. 

“It’s a flare gun,” Tracks said. “Two shots, free of charge.” Oh cool. I love free stuff! “If those bloatsprites give you trouble, this should hopefully get rid of them. Those things hate anythin’ that burns. Fires self-arming, manual detonation flares. Maybe… three foot blast radius?” 

That went into my bag. “Thanks.” 

“Don’t die. It’ll be embarrassing for us all.” 

I rolled my eyes. “I appreciate your concern.” 

“No problem. Now scram. You’ve got things to collect for no good reason.” Tracks nodded and shooed me at the doors.

Thanks to my mechanical leg, I could float away and flash obscene gestures at Tracks. However, the second I left, a very annoying, very strong laser zigzagged across the ground ahead of me and stopped on my nose. Of course, the beam was coming from Airhead, who was nestled on top of the ‘p’ this time. “Hey, dickbag! Where y’all goin’ this time?” 

“Doesn’t concern you, vaginaface,” I casually called back over my shoulder. 

Zing! 

At this point, I decided to ignore the lurking presence of his sniper rifle. There was no way he’d shoot me right in front of town. Right? “I’ll be back later.” Even with that thought, I mentally steeled myself for a bullet to the back of my head. 

The red beam disappeared. “Ah’m willin’ to let that one slide on accounts you’s a lady.” 

I opened my wings and shot into the sky, looking for a single book in the entire Wasteland buried in a bookstore. Just another day in the life of Frosty.




Footnote: Level up!
New Perk: Psychological Warfare (Level 2) – All the crazy. You now resist hostile mind intrusion spells. Active memories are now available for exploring without additional outside help. You can use the menu to view compatible memories that you have already seen.
Current Sub-perk: Mysterious Presence – Yeah, he’s still not being useful. You gain +8 to Pointless Conversation.