There was a pyre for all the dead ponies of the camp, set ablaze mere minutes after the battle had ended. Everything felt a bit odd right now, I was still a bit fuzzy from my... emotional outburst earlier, so it could have been hours just as well. The only reference point I had was an argument between the leader of the Sparrowtan unit and Angel, about how to take care of the ponies' corpses. I had learned that Angel - strangely enough supported by Gingerbread - believed in burying them, while the griffins insisted they didn't deserve that, resulting in the two parties arguing and arguing until the griffins finally gave up. A strange thing to think, I hadn't thought either of the parties were capable of doing that. So they agreed that just burning the corpses would be sufficient.
I couldn't remember ever being at a cremation burial. I know I had been - I had to have been to at least one - my mothers - but I couldn't remember. Neither the smoke nor the disgusting smell of burnt flesh, not the behavior of the pegasi around me and not what I was supposed to feel. Right now, as I watched thirty ponies burn on the pyre, I just felt empty.
It would have come so either way, if it wouldn't have been by the griffins' talons, some other pony would have put them down and now, for the first time since I was trapped in the Equestrian wasteland, I could accept it.
"Are you feeling alright, Feather?" a female voice asked. And due to the lack of female companions, I wasn't surprised as it turned out to be Gingerbread. And floating next to her head was her red book. "I have to admit, I'm not quite sure what to do now. You seem... different from yesterday. You look... buck it, I can't say what you look like! A bit like a mixture of Angel-Bunny over there and that one Ranger whose power armor's air filtration we once connected to the sink. That's how you look. Except for the water. And the grenade machinegun. But still... is there anything I can do? You want another portion of..." she nodded towards her book, "...this?"
"No, I don't... I mean, I don't need any of it." I answered quickly, shoving away the book next to my head with my wing. "I'm basically okay, just a bit stressed right now. It's just that I can't...ha!" I called out loud. I finally got it!
But apparently Gingerbread wasn't getting it, since the red robed unicorn mare raised her equally red blunt weapon, her eyes darting over the surrounding cliffs.
"What the buck is wrong with you?"
"I just remembered when I was at a cremation the last time. It was when the last president of Lunar Rock died and..."
*Thump*
"Don't! Ever! Scare me like that again, poultry!" the scribe shouted, swinging the tome at me again and again, while I tried to protect my head with all accessible extremities. The attack lasted for almost a minute, but her blows grow weaker and weaker over time. Another thing I had learned about magic: apparently it wasn't all effortless.
Coughing she sat down next to me, her book floated into its casing in one of her saddlebags. She looked somehow even more exhausted and tired than I did - at least if I looked how I felt - and that had to mean something. I mean, she hadn't been really doing anything for the last hour.
"And what about you? Are you alright, Ginger?" I asked hesitantly, but much to my relief, the book stayed in its saddlebag.
"Of course. Couldn't be better. I'm alive, I've got a nice bottle of water and a two hundred years old daisy sandwich in my bags, the guys are collecting the bodies and for once, I'm not the pony who caused all this unnecessary trouble. " The tone in her voice somehow bugged me. It sounded... reproachful. But why? And to who?
"You...?"
The orange mare slowly rose again and turned her head to me.
"For once I'm not the pony who doesn't listen to others." She took a step closer to me. "Who doesn't care about consequences, even if they're made clear to her." Her face was now dangerously close to my own. And it didn't look pretty anymore. "For once I'm not responsible for thirty ponies getting slaughtered by Celestia-damned griffins - oh, excuse me - Sparrowtans, just because somepony thought it wouldn't come that way! What were you thinking, Feather! Tell me!"
Within a single eye-blink, Gingerbread launched herself at me, knocking me over and pressing my forelegs to the ground with her own while I could feel something like a thin towel being wrapped around by throat. The unicorn mare's horn was lit, that meant... by Celestia's cake ceremony, she was actually trying to strangle me!
"Tell me what you thought when you said you wanted to go with them! When you said you trusted them! Did you know this would happen or did you not?! Tell me!" I could feel the invisible cloth around my throat tighten.
"I... I had no idea..." I grated, tears in my eyes and barely able to breath, "I just thought it would be alright... I didn't knew the griffins would... would actually kill them just because of... because of whatever they did. I didn't knew!"
"But you trusted them?! Why, when you didn't know how they would behave?! Why did you say you'd trust them?!"
"I didn't know..."
"So why did you trust them?!"
"I don't know!"
"So why did you go with them?!"
What did she want from me? Admitting that I had somehow made the griffins kill those ponies? Those bandits, to be correct. Would it have made any difference if I had chosen to wait a few miles away? Well maybe... maybe if they wouldn't have found the sack of caps they wouldn't have made whatever mistake Toll Token had made to convince the Sparrow he and his allies needed to be killed. But on the other hoof, before I had vocally intervened, the griffin had seemed as if his decision had been already made. Whatever I would have done, it wouldn't have changed a thing. It was painful to admit that, but it was the truth, I saw that. But Gingerbread apparently didn't.
"What do you want me to say." I finally said between two heavy breaths, "That I made a mistake by accompanying them? That I trusted them for not being hostile towards you or me? I don't know if you noticed, but mind reading isn't exactly common among the pegasi and neither is fortunetelling. Do you want to hear that I'm sorry they died?"
I saw her eyes widen, but unfortunately her magic grip around my neck was still tightening. Suddenly a piece of text appeared in front of my... inner eye? Or wherever my new management tool's messages were projected.
Magic Disruptor: charging... 25%
"If that's so, then: yes. I didn't want them to die. I would feel good if they were still alive, but what happened happened and if Angel doesn't turn out to be one of his cults angels, we can't bring them back to life. If we could I would do it, but we can't."
Magic Disruptor: charging... 50%
I wouldn't touch her, I wouldn't kill her. I would just repeat what had happened back then in the Stable-Tec storeroom. Before I had burnt Silver Tongue's eyes out of course, I didn't want to do that. I would just mess up Gingerbread's unicorn magic and then continue this talk on eye-level. "I'm really sorry for that, Gingerbread..."
Magic Disruptor: charging... 100%
Magic Disruptor: ready
With a feeling not unlike the one caused by hearing chalk scraping on a blackboard, the so called magic disruptor discharged and for one brief moment, my own vision went white. And just as I asked myself if the thing implanted into my foreleg was actually able to kill its - what was I? Bearer? Host? I really didn't know what to call myself, but bearer sounded a bit more epic and somehow I liked that - the sensation of the magic field around my throat disappearing, followed by a scream, that undoubtedly belonged to the unicorn mare pinning me down right now, showed me that it had worked. I quickly opened my eyes and saw Gingerbread cowering over me, her hooves holding her apparently not working unicorn horn. With a strong beat of my wings, I launched myself towards her, knocking the orange unicorn mare up and slamming her to the ground a few feet further away. Now our roles were switched, I was the pony pinning her down, dragging her forelegs away from her face and looked deeply into her confused eyes.
"...but obviously you're not listening to reason. So let it put me this way: I didn't want those ponies to die. I don't want anypony to die. Even still I wish I could've somehow rescued Toll Token and his companions, I wished there would've been the possibility to spare Silver Tongue and his associates, dammit! I wish I could've talked those raiders and the rogue Sparrowtan into leaving without getting vaporized first. But sometimes, this isn't possible. I know that now. All of those were adult ponies, who decided for themselves to take on this kind of job. They decided for themselves to risk their lives and sadly the odds were against them. If you think what happened was wrong, I'll go along with you. If you wish there could've been another way to resolve this problem, I agree. But don't ever ascribe to me that I wanted them to die! I won't feel guilty for that! Do you understand me?!"
For what felt like eternity I stared at her confused face, tears slowly forming in her eyes, but I didn't let go. When had I been that angry before? I couldn't remember. Even as I had talked myself into killing the raiders who were attacking Tulip's town I hadn't felt how I felt now. Back then there had been nothing on my mind, I had shut down my conscience to pull it off. And now... what was it I wanted to achieve right now? What did I want Gingerbread to say? That she was sorry for what happened? That she didn't mean it?
Her mouth was moving as if she was saying something, but the only thing I heard was a distant squealing noise that grew louder and louder and with each second I could feel my anger fading bit by bit. I blinked and suddenly the whole world looked a touch more... bright. Gingerbread was still looking at me pleadingly, but she almost seemed a tiny bit less terrified and whatever was the source of the squealing noise, which now reached its pleasant climax, I could hear it was now directly in front of me. I rose my head and there it was again: the bright white alicorn with a sky-blue mane and golden eyes. And those eyes were looking at me.
I knew I was imagining this, I knew this alicorn wasn't there, just as it hadn't been there all those times before. It had to be. It simply wasn't possible for an alicorn to be here, left alone one existing at all. But while its body and mane and wings and horn were easy to think of as a trick of my own mind, looking into those golden eyes made me feel different. I simply wasn't able to believe that those were not real. And I was fully aware of how that was impossible.
I blinked again and the alicorn disappeared. But the sound and the feeling of ease that had come with it didn't. Without knowing why I turned my head to the right and there was it again, standing right next to me, its head lowered to be on eye-level with me. Its face looked all that different from anything I had seen of the princesses. While the only word on my mind to describe it, the cheeks, its nose, even the ears was "perfect", the facial features of this alicorn seemed... sharp. There had been photos of both the princesses in the Museums of Pre-Enclave History and compared to them this face looked... male? No, not really male... but definitely not as female as Celestia and Luna had looked.
Then the bright white alicorn moved one of its... his... forelegs towards mine and... gently shoved away my hoof from Gingerbread's foreleg. At the same moment as our hooves parted, the alicorn disappeared, the squealing was gone and the world was a bit darker again, but my anger was still far far away. And I was staring again into Gingerbread's confused eyes. Her mouth was still moving as she whispered: "Please... I didn't mean it. I just..."
"I'm so sorry." I muttered.
Suddenly I could feel what had to be talons grabbing me from behind and pulling me away from Gingerbread as one of the blue-armored Sparrows landed next to the pale orange unicorn mare and gave her a leg-up. And then Angel's face appeared in front of me.
"What was that about?" he asked with a frown. I honestly didn't thought he was going to take "nothing" for an answer.
"It was nothing." I could hear me say, still a bit dizzy from what had just happened. My vision had... touched me. And had moved my limb. Now I was sure that the surface was doing crazy things to my mind. Scratch that, not only my mind apparently. I could swear, if any of Angel's former friars had ever experienced something similar, the thought of founding a cult dedicated to just this phenomenon didn't seem that crazy to me anymore. "She didn't like what happened to those ponies, I didn't like it and we became a bit emotional. Really, it was nothing."
"Well, it didn't look like "nothing" to me. It looked as if you were about to kill her with that... that thing in your foreleg."
"Then why didn't you do something earlier? If you were that worried that I would injure her, then why did you wait all this time to get us two separated. And don't tell me you and the..." I nodded towards the griffins, "...guys were placing bets again."
For a moment, Angel's looked just as confused as Gingerbread's had. "We didn't... wait, what do you mean with earlier? The griffins went into the air the moment we heard you yell. It weren't more than a few seconds before they dragged you asunder. So what do you mean with "earlier"?"
Okay, now that was weird.
"Nothing... I meant nothing with that..."
"Feather, please, you don't really except me to buy that, do you?"
"It's just..." I sighed, "...but it sounds crazy."
"You're talking to a stallion who spend his cutie mark and a whole year of his life in a monastery dedicated to some fictional alicorn ponies, where we were constantly told how worthless and sinful we were until we would one day have the honor to step into a chamber filled with radiation. If we managed to die we were cleaned of our sins and the ponies who survived were... that's another matter. But I think I made it clear that there's a lot of crazy I can take. Everything less than Princess Celestia talking to you won't even surprise me."
"That's the thing." I gulped, "Do you... remember that I said something about seeing an alicorn two days ago? The night when we were at the storeroom after the battle?"
Angel nodded. "A white one. Haven't heard of that color before. But the wasteland is more creative than any pony when it comes to invent new things to make our lives even more difficult."
"I saw it again. Just now, before the griffins took me away from Gingerbread. It was right there." I pointed a wing to where Gingerbread and I had been struggling a few moments ago. "It just stood there and looked at me. And it looked so real, its body, its eyes, it even touched me..."
"Feather, there was no alicorn whatsoever. If so, we wouldn't be talking now, but fighting for our lives. Alicorns don't just "stand there". You...oh..."
"That's what I wanted to say: I see things that aren't there. I can't say when it started, but since I'm down here I often feel... watched. But there's nopony there to watch me. It... it has to be connected to me being down here. I don't know, maybe it's some kind of stress syndrome or something like that, I don't recall the feeling, left alone things like the alicorn... getting into my mind so that I loose track of time, back home. Wandering around aimlessly, the stress of finding food and safe places to stay, room-sized pony-eating critters, ponies wanting to kill me, ponies hating me for what I am, killing ponies for being a threat, seeing ponies be killed even if they're none and now there's an imaginary alicorn spying on me. Angel, I think... I think I'm loosing my mind down here."
Silence.
"Now tell me that's nothing to worry about, Angel. At that rate I'll turn into one of those slavering- and blood-dripping raiders before we even meet another enclave pegasus. I'm going crazy."
"No you won't!" Angel interrupted me in a harsh tone, "You're not crazy and you won't become crazy in the future! It's just all a bit too much for you right now. The last few days were especially rough and for a pony like you, who's relatively new to all this, it's only natural that your mind won't wrap around life in the wasteland instantly. It's pretty much the same when Stable ponies ascends to the wasteland every once in a while.They're all untainted, but the wasteland won't let you get away that easily. A... friend of mine was exactly the same. She thought she could see some of the dead ponies moving. Your mind is just adjusting to the wasteland, that's all. Seeing dead family in the corner of your eye, hearing whispering voices at night..."
"...being touched by an alicorn..."
"...seeing strange things, it's all the same. You don't need to worry about it, it'll go away. At least when we deliver you to your flight back home."
I nodded. He had a point. I knew that what I saw wasn't real, and didn't insanity mean that one couldn't distinguish reality and madness-caused illusion anymore? I knew the alicorn wasn't real, but to look into those eyes... it felt even more real than looking into Angel's eyes. Probably my mind coping with what had happened the days before, just like Angel said. Nothing to worry about. We sat there in silence until Gingerbread trotted over to us, the calamitous bag of caps floating next to her head. She didn't say a word as she put it down in front of us and shoved it towards me with her magic.
"It's your's, Feather." the orange mare finally said after sitting there for quite a while, just being silent together with Angel and me.
"I can't..." Was she trying to makeup for what happened earlier? "Look, Ginger, I'm terribly sorry for what has happened just now and..."
"No, Feather, I'm sorry. It wasn't your fault that those ponies died. But that's not what this is about. This..." she nodded towards the caps, "...is your's. I'm not gifting it to you as some kind of apology, but as payment for saving me back then, in the storeroom. I said I would find a way to repay you and that's it."
But how...? Did I really want to take money the origin of which was more than just dubious...?
"I didn't steal it or anything if that's what you want to ask, Feather. It's money from Silver Tongue, basically my money, the money of the Steel Rangers to be exact. We founded one half of this expedition after all. Those were the caps the business-bastard used to set you free. Or rather the pawn he gave the townsfolk. Two thousand caps if I'm not mistaken. As his business-partner I brought you back, so that they could do their funny griffin-trial-thing and then had to return the pawn. You see, perfectly legal. Now take it already!" she shoved the sack even closer.
I relaxed a bit. So at least the origin of this money wasn't connected to robbery, theft or something similar dirty.But still... "Two thousand caps are..."
"...a lot of money, I know that. But you saved my life and the expedition wasn't a complete failure. I can still observe our "treasure" and although it won't be of any use for the Rangers, it's at least fun to see. A bit less fun to feel although." She rubbed her horn. "That's something I would like to have an apology for."
"Only if you apologize for trying to strangle me!"
"Wait, you what...?" Angel started, but both Gingerbread and me shouted in unison: "It was nothing!" and he closed his mouth again, muttering something closely resembling "mares".
So Gingerbread and I exchanged apologies while the griffins and Angel cleaned up what mess had been made in the most respectful way possible. The pyre would burn for a few more hours, but we couldn't afford staying here. From what the griffins said animals ofrraiders would most likely be attracted by the fire, creatures we didn't want to encounter right now and most certainly not in the dark.Much to both Gingerbread's and my relief, Angel didn't want to scavenge the dead and if it was just because our bags were heavy enough without a dozen guns being added to the mix as well. We took only a few caps he found in some kind of treasure chest inside Toll Token's tent, the "Fund" if its labeling was to be believed. And when I said "a few" I meant over two hundred of them. But right now I still felt the weight of my own bag of caps weighting me down. Quite literally, since most of my remorse about the money was gone after the revelation that it had been earned legally.
Two thousand caps.
I wasn't exactly familiar with currency and the value of things down here, but when I remembered that getting my crash- and Sunshine-caused injuries taken care of, being held warm, healthy, fed and guarded for almost five days with an additional pain-killer supply for the post-treatment costed around five hundred caps, two thousand felt like I could buy a vertibuck with. If there had been one down here of course. A damaged one probably. And if that damaged one had been for sale...
It was still an awful lot of money!
The sun was slowly starting to set as we were finally able to resume our journey. Gingerbread remained quiet for most of the time, just as Angel, but this wasn't a big surprise. So the only one left I could talk to while we walked was one of the Sparrows, the one that had accompanied me on our journey through the toll station. The one that had given the order to attack it. His name, as it turned out, was Vergil. A strange name in my opinion, but on the other hoof, how had I expected griffins to be named? Razor Strongwing? Or Bill Dreadtalon?
"It's not the name I was born with," Vergil said after a while of silently trotting alongside with me, while his fellow Sparrow apparently scouted the area and the captain marched a hundred feet in front of us, "and it's no usual griffin name either, but it is the name the Nest gave me."
"Kinda like Angel, hm?" I said, "From what he told me he left his former life and name at the portal of a monastery too."
"Oh no, you're getting something wrong, my little pegasus." Vergil said with what sounded like a smile. A Sparrowtan's features were still pretty hard to make out under their helmets, but I discovered that if the looked directly at you, you could see their beak and eyes quite good. They were still intimidating but at least not that faceless anymore. "I don't left my - as you might call it - former life behind. It is still existent, as is my real name, but for the time being an active Sparrowtan, those are secondary. While a life in the order demands many things, giving up your identity isn't one of those. Taking on another name, a sword name as the older griffins like to call it, is just a part of tradition from long before the war. Some don't like their names, some love theirs, but we all accept them as a part of our life. Imagine it like... you were in the enclave military, were you?"
"Would I be wearing those mutilated remains of an officer's uniform otherwise?"
"I'm sorry, it was a stupid question. But what I wanted to say: imagine it like when you achieved the rank of..." he looked at what was left of the chevron on what was left of my epaulettes, "...lieutenant. Or becoming a piece of the enclave military at all. As soon as you're a part of it, you're not Whirling Feather anymore; as soon as you join the military you're suddenly Airpony Feather. And when you reached the rank of lieutenant you became Lieutenant Feather. It's the same with us, just that our names don't represent our ranks - we've got our ribbons for that - but identify us as a part of the Sparrowtans."
"That sounds a bit... too easy to work." I answered hesitantly.
"But it does. Or if something's going wrong it doesn't go wrong enough for it to have an impact on the overall organisation. Just like your system."
I huffed. "So let me sum this up: there's a militaristic group of griffins out there, some of them wandering even the Equestrian wasteland, who slash things in half with swords to prevent evil from spreading... kinda... " I added before he could correct that statement, I hated it to be corrected when I tried to talk about things I didn't really know about, "...an the only system of ranking and structure of command they have are a few of them wearing slightly differently colored accessories and the only way to distinguish the bigwigs from ordinary grunts is by knowing each of them personally and by name?"
"That pretty much sums it up." Vergil answered and I could swear I could hear the gears in his head replaying what I had just said. "Yeah, pretty much."
"And that works?"
"Yes. I know that Archy..." the red-armored captain's head span around almost instantly, despite him standing about twenty meters away from us. Even from here I could see - and even more: feel - his eyes glared at the younger griffin. "I mean Archimedes, is the one to talk to if there's something wrong with my gear or if there's something I don't know about our current patrol routes; if there are bigger problems concerning my overall duties, there's our Strategist.... ahem, the leader of our Nest... and if there are any trivial questions, we've got our Seniors to go to. They're basically retired Sparrowtans, whose job is to know things. But despite what it sounds like, there're not that many griffins in our Nest. Quite a lot of names in the beginning, but that's what my time as a Sparrow is for, getting to know all this stuff."
"Vergil, are you spilling the secrets of our organisation to an enemy spy again?" I heard a voice saying from behind. Turning my head around I looked into the helmeted face of the second Sparrow, the one who had disappeared due to scouting the area. The only more strange thing than a griffin hovering next to me without his talons slicing me open - I just couldn't stop myself from thinking that; prejudices die pretty hard - was that his face, or rather he himself, was upside down. Looking to my hooves I made sure I wasn't the one defying gravity that hard at this moment. I knew some pegasi could fly upside down, I had tried it a few times myself, didn't work although, but seeing a griffin do it... I hadn't even expected they could actually fly in this armor; fall from the sky for sure but... okay, I detected my fallacy. It still seemed highly unlikely for crude armor like this to be light enough for the griffins to fly in. Aw, physics!
"No, no, of course not. Just giving a bit of advertisement. She does seem interested in the whole order-stuff and wouldn't having a sister-Nest of pegasi be a nice thought? International understanding and so on?"
For a few seconds, the two griffins just looked at each other, from what little I could see, their faces totally straight.
"You were telling her the secrets of our organisation."
"I totally was." Vergil said with an audible smirk, "But I doubt she's able to use what I told her to destroy the order." he waved his talons in a spooky manner. "Or maybe I told her that really you were the mastermind behind the whole organisation so that enclave assassins can take you out and finally I get to rule the Griffin Kingdom."
Without saying another words, but with his head shaking reproachfully, the flying Sparrow changed his alignment, dashed over to his leader and landed next to him almost silently. Another thing I had thought to be impossible with heavy armor like this.
Vergil sighed. "You see there are Sparrowtans and then there are Sparrowtans. In my opinion, griffins like Theo shouldn't take this whole order-business that seriously. A few jokes here and there never killed anyone."
"Except those ponies earlier." I heard Gingerbread mutter in a sore tone.
And apparently Vergil heard her too. "Yes, that..." he said, obviously feeling uneasy, "...I'm really sorry you all had to see that. But our laws say that an assumption of authority like that, especially when it is used to harm anyone, cannot go unpunished. That's a degree where jokes shouldn't be made anymore and even I wouldn't. If they had remained silent about who was supposed to authorize them, I would have let them go. If Theo or Archy would have been in charge... they would have cut them down after Toll Token finished his first sentence. As I said: there are Sparrowtans and then there are Sparrowtans. Believe me, I wish people were different, but unlike in the old days, just complaining to them doesn't make them stop anymore. Our order was much, much less violent before the war. But nowadays, violence is oftentimes necessary."
I nodded silently. I too wished ponies would be different. But they weren't and I had to deal with that. Coming to think of it, how was Gingerbread able to keep her non-acceptance for that long? From what she had told me - indirectly at least and it was most likely too - she was at the surface for much longer than me. For a years maybe. And I had lost my clean conscience after a week and my qualms roughly three days later. If I would ask Angel he would say it was better that way, but what was left of my untainted-pre-surface-me told me the exact opposite.
Luckily Gingerbread either didn't felt the urge to start and argument or really didn't see a reason - I didn't know what to wish for - I really had no clue what was going on in her mind. But the mood was ruined all the same, so I appreciated the following silence. Silence that remained until we set up our camp for the night in a small cave in the hillside next to the street. And by cave I mean a small recess in the hills, basically nothing more than a natural rain shelter. Not the most save location, but the griffins assured they would make it save for us.
On the bright side, we didn't had to worry about the smoke originating from our campfire. The light on the other hoof... the griffins said they would keep watch over night. To be honest, what I was looking forward to the most was what the griffins were about to eat. I simply doubted sharp beaks and talons were needed to hunt down pre-war daisy sandwiches or canned beans. Two of the griffins - calling them Archimedes and whatever Theo stood for seemed kinda wrong to me - had left to "take care of the food issue", leaving us alone with Vergil. To be honest, he would have been my favorite too. Even if he was a griffin.
I wasn't in the mood to start another talk with Angel about my visions or with Gingerbread about the rights and wrongs of killing ponies. I knew the outcome of each of this talks right from the start and wouldn't be wiser once we would have finished. Vergil on the other hoof... if there was one thing he was good for it was telling stories, even if those stories were reality and not more than history and rules of his order. But as long as it didn't concern the here and now - well, my personal here and now - he could tell me whatever he wanted, as long as I wouldn't have to sit silently around the campfire with the two unicorns staring at me in worry.
So... the question of all questions: asking him about his food or waiting to see it with my own eyes?
"So, Vergil..." I started hesitantly, I wasn't even sure I was speaking loud enough for the griffin sitting in front of our cave. Actually, this was the first time I saw him without his helmet, which he had set down in front of him. "...there's a thing I'd like to know." I was really surprised that he looked... just normal. White feathers around his neck and face, a dark yellow beak and a set of violet eyes staring into the distance.The only thing that truly make me wonder that there were a few longer, almost horizontally lined-up feathers at the top of his head that looked as if he hadn't even worn a helmet at all.
"As long as it doesn't involve vital information about our order, you can ask anything you want." he answered as I sat down next to him. "And I would prefer not to do any gossiping, Archy's going to rip my wings out if he finds out or even worse, challenge me to a duel on the spot. He doesn't got all those scars from preening. I went through that once and I really don't feel the urge to do a second dance."
"No, it's nothing like that. But I'll keep in mind not to provoke him."
"Don't worry, you are safe." he chuckled, "I mean, you're basically everything that can't ever be challenged. You're not a Sparrowtan, not a griffin and female on top of it all. And while the first two might be a bit... flexible, the first is adamant for probably over five hundred years now. Come to think of it, for the time you're around I'll be safe too, since there's this no-dueling-in-front-of-females-rule. But I don't think you want to know something about us turning our swords against each other, do you?"
I wasn't really sure what to make of that. On the one hoof, being treated specially just because of my gender was somehow... strange, since it almost never had happened back home. Although I had to be thankful for that rule. At least I wouldn't die a death by dueling a sword-wielding griffin. But on the other hoof, did I really care?
"Indeed I don't," I answered, taking a look at the beautiful night sky, "actually it's quite simple. What I wanted to know is..."
Sadly I never got to finish the question. I was interrupted by a purple flash, which I was pretty sure I had imagined, followed by ... something apparently exploding only a few meters away on the road. Well, not technically exploding, there was no shrapnel or fire anywhere, but since I severely doubted a vertibuck or something similar heavy had just dropped from the sky, an explosion of some kind was the only thing coming to my mind to explain the loud noise and all the whirled-up dust.
Sitting there, my mouth open, I said something among the lines of "My mind didn't just make that up, did it?" to nopony -or griffin - in particular as I pointed a hoof at whatever had...done what had just happened. Exploded maybe.
Vergil, his white feathers now darkened from the dust, looked just as surprised as I felt. In fact, hadn't he been that dusty at the this very moment, he would have looked as if he had just been watered. At least that was how I remembered ponies looking after Sunshine had watered them.
"I... I don't think so..." he muttered slowly, "I think something just exploded over there..."
"I would really like to see what just "exploded". Because..."
"I've seen that coming." I heard Angel sigh from directly behind me and only seconds later, the grey unicorn stallion had passed me, his pistols - not the black ones this time, those were still holstered at his forelegs - floating in front of him. And Gingerbread was there too, looking both a bit scared, baffled and curious. Just as everypony - and that one griffin - else. "There's nothing I can say that would stop you, right?"
Probably not.
Shaking my head I slowly rose, taking out the gun on my foreleg. Vergil unsheathed his sword and we made our way towards the "thing". Since we hadn't been vaporized as it had hit the ground - in fact I felt as if it had become a bit colder since that thing had dropped - I could exclude it being a meteorite. Good thing, since meteors were boring. They were just rocks after all. But if this wasn't a meteorite, there were a ton of things it could be: something coming from the Enclave for example.
Drawing closer I could almost hear my inner school-filly squeal in suspense. That was exactly the kind of innocuous thing I needed right now. Just some odd piece of wasteland world that didn't bring any moral dilemmas with it. Just something to look and maybe point your hoof at, with no consequences for an innocent living being. And whatever it was, it was glowing softly in the night. Maybe it was some kind of satellite, sent by an extra-terrestrial race of ponies trying to contact us. In movies, those things always glowed.
Maybe there even was an alien-pony in there, maybe this was some kind of spaceship. I guess the squeal my inner school-filly uttered was audible for everyone around me, but I didn't care at this moment. Stepping closer to the small crater in the road, I looked over the crater's rim...
...only to huff in dissapointment after I had looked at the thing closely for about ten seconds: because it was a just rock. A foal sized and with some kind of lamps studded rock, but a boring rock nonetheless. Yes it was glowing, but this didn't seem like spacecraft at all, it rather looked like the science project I had once seen at a Lunar Rock junior science competition. Well, back home a rock had been something rare, but down here I didn't really see any reason to be excited anymore. There were tons of rocks around us, this one might have been big, but there were bigger in a twenty meter radius around it.
Stupid rock, playing with my expectations!
"That's not exactly what I expected to see." Vergil muttered and lowered his sword.
"To be honest, me neither." Angel said as he hid his weapons in his coat's pockets again. "And I've seen a lot of crazy stuff. This seems..."
"...kinda boring?" Gingerbread finished his sentence, joining the circle that had formed around the crater. "I had expected at least an alien or..."
A purple flash again, this time much, much brighter. And right in front of me. Or around me. I couldn't really tell, since it was bright enough to blind me for a few seconds. And that made me scream and throw myself to the ground. Stuff that blinded a pony was never good and to make things worse I felt as if I were jumping down the main staircase of the Lunar Rock academy. Normally I was no pony who got airsick but that... I felt ill. Really ill. And confused.
"I didn't just scream and throw myself to the ground for no reason, did I?" I asked from the ground, my eyes still shut. "Or just because I imagined that purple flash, because that would be really embarrassing."
No answer.
"Is anypony around?! Angel?! Gingerbread?! Vergil?!" I called out.
Still nothing.
When the ground - or my brain, it is all relative - felt stable again, I finally dared to open my eyes. Hey, the rock was still there. "Stupid rock! I don't like it anymore." I muttered in frustration. But it was still dark. Even if I could barely see anything, that at least meant I hadn't traveled through time - which would have been a pretty whitewashing way to say I lost conscious and was therefor "indisposed" for the rest of the night and the next day. But I doubted Angel would have left me lying there. So I was pretty sure it was still the same time than before the purple flash. The ground was still somehow sandy, a bit of gravel here and there and, but stone-wise luckily nowhere close to where I had went down. I liked my face.
As I raised my head I could see that they were still standing. Okay, Angel and Gingerbread were still standing, while Vergil was lying on the ground like me, curled up into a ball of metal, fur and feathers, his claws covering his eyes in the most un-awesome way possible. This guy had sliced ponies' throats not a day ago and now he lay curled up in the dirt, shivering in what I would call fear if this didn't seem that unlikely. Yes, I was one to talk.
"Is it over? Can I open my eyes again?" I heard the griffin whimper.
The two unicorns standing upright looked taken aback too. I rose, my eyes fixated on Angel, who was... just looking into the darkness around us. What was so exciting about that? Wasn't... I don't know... the bright purple flash or whatever had caused it more interesting?
After I had trotted over and now stood next to the grey unicorn stallion, I hesitantly tapped him on the shoulder. "Ahm... Angel, do you know what just happened? Please don't tell my I imagined that whole purple flash thing, because it so..."
"Can't you see it, Feather." I heard Gingerbread whispering from behind.
"See what?" It was dark, Celestia-dammit! "I'm a pegasus and not a cat! So as long as no unicorn around here cares to make some light, I don't..."
"We've moved."
Of course we had... wait what? Moved? But that was impossible, not to mention highly unlikely. I mean, how? But just before I could say anything, there was another flash and a single purple sphere appeared in front of us, lighting the area with a soft purple shine. And there was it again: the alicorn. Well, not the alicorn, this one wasn't white and it wasn't accompanied by the usual relaxing squealing noise. This alicorn was of a dark purple and from what I could see, it looked much more female than the white one. Almost like princess Luna had looked like on the photographs. Apart from the obviously not matching color of her hide. Well, but apparently my brain was still functional enough to vary the hallucinations, I wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing. The only thing I was sure about right now was, that I would consult a psychiatrist once I would be back home. Seeing alicorns that often couldn't be healthy.
I decided not to say anything. The whole scenario was already crazy enough, I didn't see any reason to throw even more craziness into the mix. By Luna's crescent moon, I might not have been able to see Gingerbread's face, but I could swear she was looking at me again as if she know what I thought right now. Or maybe those were Angel's eyes, my psychic powers weren't able to tell one from another. Maybe if I just looked into another direction, the imaginary alicorn would go away, just like all those last times. As soon as I didn't see it anymore, it usually vanished.
That sounded like a good idea. Just don't pay attention, Feather!
"We sought you!" a female voice rang through the air. It was definitely not Gingerbread's voice, so that meant... the alicorn was speaking? Well, that never happened before. How was this better then hearing voices again? Coping with wasteland horrors or not, that wasn't good. I had never thought that my mind would be that creative when it tried to drive me insane.
Just ignore it, featherbrain!
"And as We predicted, We found you. We knew that if We would toss in something that glitters even a bit, you lesser beings would be drawn to it just like moths to the light." the alicorn continued, its mouth moving. So it was definitely her... them... it speaking. And if just hearing voices wasn't crazy enough, what she said actually made some kind of sense. At least it was connected to something real, even if it was the stupid rock. Well, of course it was. It was my imagination after all, about what should it talk if not about what I knew and experienced rock-wise.
"What do you want?!" Angel shouted, light grey magic fields wrapped around the holsters on his foreleg.
My heart skipped a beat. He could see it too?
"Angel, are you talking to my hallucination?"
"Silence, foolish pegasus!" the booming voice choke me off. "We are no hallucination! We are as real as this poisoned lands and you, minor ones, will serve Us, your true goddess. While We have no particular need for those two unicorns, the winged one and the impure one might be of use. There is a cave, an ancient facility, abandoned so long ago that even We struggle to remember. We are interested in this cave and in what lies deep within it. And it will be your task to satisfy Our curiosity."
"And why would we do that?"
"Because We say so!"
Things just grew weirder and weirder at this moment. Not only was I apparently not imagining this alicorn - or I was imagining the same stuff Angel imagined right now - which - come to think of it - was more likely than meeting an alicorn, but this incarnated deity was also sending us on some kind of mission. And that sounded much more noble than it felt. I mean, being on a mission from a goddess wasn't something to be ashamed of. From a goddess that viewed us as minor beings, moths. On the other hoof, given that she... it...she was actually a goddess, the alicorn had every reason to do so.
Then Angel spoke up:
"And if we refuse?"
"You won't. Because if you even think about it, you will suffer the wrath of the Goddess!" the alicorn shouted and by saying that I mean it's almost unbearably loud voice grew even louder. And then more orbs of light started to appear next to the purple alicorn. Two of them purple and another pair of green ones. And each of the balls of light was located above another alicorn, all of them almost identical to the one that had spoken to us moments ago.
I gulped. Refusing was out of the question. Those were alicorns after all, if anypony - if I could call them that at all - was able to transport us from wherever our camp was to wherever we were now, it were those goddesses. Or this goddess in singular as he called them. And who was I to question them? It... whatever?
"What's so special about this cave that the Goddess can't access it?" Angel asked bluntly and if I wouldn't have been sure he knew what he was doing, I would have shut his mouth with my hooves. Teasing a goddess was even less healthy than seeing them again and again.
"Don't question Us! We have our reasons!"
Angel sighed, finally doing the sensible thing and giving in to what they demanded. "If that's so, I guess we have no choice but to accept." he said, turning his head around to us.
"You are right, you don't have a choice. We are almost pleased you understood this. Now go, We would suggest fulfilling your task as fast as possible." One of the alicorns - or all of them? - I really had no clue - said. "While We are immune to this land's poisons, We know fragile beings as you aren't. This crater is irradiated."
It is what?!
"It is what?!" Vergil gave a voice to my thoughts and before I could do anything or even take a closer look, he had already sheathed his sword and was charging towards the crowd of alicorns. "Do you want to kill us!"
We were doomed.
"We will let you feel Our wrath." the circle of alicorns said in unison as Vergil's entire body was wrapped in a magic field. He was slammed into the ground with a noise that sounded as if bones were breaking. I just hoped it was just the sound. Up and down he went, the gruesome cracking-noise repeating each time he hit the ground. "These lands will be cleansed..." Up and down. "...from un-equine filth like you, who doesn't see Our divinity. Feel Our divine power!"
In the light of their magic fields, I could see blood dripping from Vergil's armor and the griffin doesn't even scream anymore.
"Please, stop!" Both Gingerbread and me cried out in unison. Dashing to the griffin's side, we tried to hold him down. "Please, your Highness, please stop! We will... we will do whatever you want, just don't kill him!" I screamed, tears in my eyes. I might have known this griffin for only a day, but he didn't deserve being crushed like this. Apparently this somehow... dazzled the alicorns, because the magic aura that had surrounded Vergil's body evaporated, but reformed around our bodies.
"You all already agreed to fulfill Our wish, pegasus." the voice of the alicorns said, "Why should We stop?"
Because... because...
"Because you are the Goddess!" I said, without even knowing why. It just came to my mind. "You don't need to kill him, we already believe in your strength. And after you turned this strength against him, he won't deny you anymore either!"
After a short while of nothing happening, the magic fields around Gingerbread's and my body vanished. The five alicorns turned around simultaneously and then their voice rang over to us once more, this time much quieter. "You are a true believer, We know that. No go, this environment isn't healthy to you." And with another flash of purple, they were all gone, revealing an ruined gateway behind them.
As soon as they were gone, my eyes darted over to Vergil again. Both Gingerbread and Angel were already kneeling by his side, discussing furiously what to do with the griffin.
"I can't... I can't feel my wings..." Vergil sobbed and my heart almost stopped as I saw his wings dangling to the ground, twitching weakly from time to time. "They... aren't moving, are they? Those damned things..." He tried to sit up, but was immediately press back on the ground by Angel, who rammed at small syringe he held in his magic grip into the griffin's neck. Almost instantly, Vergil's whole body eased as he apparently lost consciousness.
"What... what did you...?"
"Blackout. It's a modified version of Med-X. Eases the pain, ensures a stable coma." the grey unicorn stallion answered and threw the empty syringe into the night. It was a good thing he had kept one of them close, because the biggest part of our medical supplies were in our saddlebags, which we - with the exception of Gingerbread, whose saddlebags seemed to be a part of her robe - had left at the campsite. Which was somewhere in the wasteland, but not here! "And it'll give us time to think about what to do next. And what to do with him."
"We have to help him of course!" Gingerbread screamed, her eyes still wet with tears.
Angel's face darkened. "And how? You're a Steel Ranger scribe, you certainly know the basics about healing potion. And that they can restore damaged flesh with ease, while they can't heal broken bones. Would we give him one of our potions, we would most likely cripple him for the rest of his live. He would never be able to fly again and it's not even sure we would abate his pain if we would "heal" him and his wings."
"So what should we do then? Just kill him for good like the tribals do it with their sick and elderly?"
"I'm just saying we can't heal him now! It would be much easier..."
"He'll need a real doctor!" I interrupted the two unicorns' argument. "A medical pony or a griffin with that kind of expertise. Maybe another Sparrowtans."
The stallion's head turned around to me, his eyes saddened again as he looked at me. "Yes, he needs a real doctor. But there is none around here. We don't even know where we are. I would be surprised if he survives the next two days, given a set of broken wings would be the mildest consequence of what the alicorns did to him. And even if he isn't injured internally too, I would be even more surprised if a real doctor could restore him to how he was five minutes ago. I'm sorry, but this..."
"We won't leave him behind!" I stomped my hoof on the ground. "And if we have to drag him out of here, we won't leave him. Nor will we "put him out of his misery", if it's that what you wanted to say. I'm sure there are things we can do for him. The two of you seem to know quite a bit about treating injuries and I happen to know a few things about wing anatomy. This isn't a lost cause!"
The two unicorns looked at me in silence, Gingerbread's mouth was wide open and her eyes wide. It was not until I had ended my last sentence that I realized that I was screaming louder than I had thought myself to be capable of.
"So... what's the plan?" Angel asked quietly, his eyes avoiding contact with mine.
"First we have to get him and us out of this crater. I spotted the entrance the Goddesses spoke about over there" I pointed a wing at the ruined gate, "and I firmly believe it'll be at least a bit safer in there. And when it comes to Vergil: we'll brace his wings and then...is there any medical equipment that heals slower than the potions? Or just locally... healing bandages! Anypony got any?"
"A few, basic first-aid amount, not enough I fear." Angel shook his head.
"But maybe, just maybe, we'll be able to find more in there. From real first aid kits. You said most of the pre-war buildings were filled with them. And given the "Goddess" is curious about this place, maybe nopony has been here since the war ended." I said hastily.
"It's better than no plan at all, I guess." the grey stallion muttered, "Maybe... we have a chance. I guess this could work."
""")_x_("""
After Angel and I had dragged Vergil trough the big gate and into what looked a bit like the foyer of the Stable-Tec storeroom, we left the unconscious griffin along with Gingerbread, who started to wrap the few medical bandages we had around his limps. The grey unicorn stallion and I started to search the close-by rooms for what Angel described as a "small box with pink butterflies on it". I had a hard time imagining such a thing. I assumed it was kind of an homage to the ministry mare of the Ministry of Peace, Fluttershy, the one ministry mare we were actually tought about in the Enclave. It still seemed strange to me to apply her cutie mark to each and every medical-box. But the ponies from before the world ended had always been weird.
The interior pretty much looked like a mix of the Stable-Tec layout and the furniture I had seen back then, in my first wasteland building I every set hoof in, the one we had met Steed in. All the drawers, all the lockers looked alike, as did the desks and doors. And not only the looks were the same, I could almost predict the way the desks and filing cabinets would be arranged once I entered a room. And this was the third building of this kind I had ever seen. Whoever had built this place and whoever interior decorator had... decorated those rooms must have had either a limited amount of both room and ideas or were just poorly minded when it came to make a room look nice. Seriously, even without all the debris, I doubted I would like to work at this place day after day.
I dared to look into one of the desks' drawers once, only to be rewarded with a hoofful of bottle caps. Pretty weird indeed.
And then my eyes fell on a grey... box that kinda looked like a stone, where it not for the really pale pink butterflies on it: the medical box we had been looking for. Dragging it out from underneath a table - why would it even be there? - I used my wings to open the box. It really felt like touching stone too.
Inside the case lay several vials of healing potion - not exactly what I needed - along with some squeezy bags with an orange liquid, of which I had no idea what they were, and a set of healing bandages. And by "a set" I meant barely enough to take care of a grazed knee. By far not enough for Vergil's needs.
"Did you find anything?" a voice - Angel, whose else? - asked from behind. He sounded... stressed?
"Very few bandages, two healing potions and this stuff." I put everything down in front of him. "I don't even have a clue what it might be, but knowing my luck it's not going to help Vergil."
Angel's eyes widened as he levitated the orange bags up to his head. Maybe this...
"Those won't help healing his broken back, but it will at least prevent us from melting on the inside."
...wasn't what I had expected. Wait, melting from the inside! How...?
"This stuff is called "RADaway"." the grey unicorn stallion said, "Remember when the alicorns told us the crater they teleported us in was irradiated? Well, these little bags hold everything we need to shrug this radiation off. Just a few gulps and everything's as back to normal as it can be. It's a good thing we found those, because apart from a whole box I found back there, I gave the last I had to you at the school. RADaway is pretty hard to find around those parts of the wasteland. It was a lucky shot."
"Hold on there a second, Angel." I said sharply. "You're saying me, that if we would've stumbled over any RADaway by accident, you wouldn't have had anything to fight the radiation we absorbed half an hour ago? When do you intended to tell me that I... we are irradiated?!"
"Uhm... not at all? Listen, Feather, I'm sorry, but there were other things you had to worry about. Vergil's wounds are the most pressing matter right now, so I decided it wasn't that important right now, not even mentioning the fact that I wouldn't have had anything to get rid of the radiation. So apart from making you or Gingerbread panic it wouldn't have changed a thing!" he shouted to drown me out. "So please, calm down! Everything's fine!"
"Everything is fine now, but if we wouldn't have..."
"But we did find RADaway!" Angel shouted back at me, his voice sounded angry, but his face showed only exhaustion, as if he hadn't slept for days. "Enough for the four of us! Enough for now and probably the next time alicorns teleport us into a pit of radiation! So please! Calm! Down!"
For a few seconds we both just stared at each other in an angry silence. I mean, he withhold the fact that I was irradiated! And if we wouldn't have found the... I could have grown a third wing! And he wouldn't have told me! I grabbed one of the orange RADaway bags with my mouth and with a huff I turned around on the spot and walked to the door at the other side of the room. What I wanted right now was find a quiet place and calm down. Maybe find a few more healing bandages on the way. But mainly to calm down.
Immediately after I kicked the door behind shut with a hindleg I could feel my body relax.Angel just behave... urgh! He didn't... just forget about it and calm down, Feather! It wasn't entirely his fault after all. He kinda was right, saying something wouldn't have changed a thing... But I wanted to be angry with somepony!
Sitting down on my haunches I lay down the RADaway in front of me. For all he didn't tell me, Angel had at least hinted that the... medicine I guess, by drinking it. It made sense, given the kind of straw sticking out off the side of the orange bag. And with a few sips all the radiation would be gone?
The concept sounded flawless to be at the start, but in reality it turned out to be a trial of tartaric proportions to get the damn straw ripped from the wrapping. Pegasus wings were only that useful when it came to precise micro-actions. I honestly couldn't imagine how an earth pony would get this medicine to work. How many of them might have died of radiation poisoning with an bag of RADaway right in front of their nose, but they weren't able to get the Celestia-damned straw out! With a unicorn this wouldn't have been a problem, but the only two unicorns I knew in an approximately two miles distance where either busy getting a griffin patched up or waiting for me to come back to him and confess that yelling at him had been a bad idea. And I would be damned if I would do the latter. Keeping me alive in this hellhole or not.
After trying what felt like hours of unsuccessfully trying to balance the bag of medicine with my wings for the straw to reach my mouth, I decided to screw all manners and common sense, put it on the ground in front of me and drank the orange fluid while lying next to it on the ground. The only thing that would have been more silly than how I felt right now must have been actually looking at me. But luckily there wasn't anypony looking, Angel had respectfully decided not to follow me.
Wise choice by him.
I had to say, for the RADaway being medicine, it didn't taste bad. Not good too, but I guess there could have been worse flavor-choices than stale carrot. Sweaty hood for example. Or rock-flavored, although I had no clue how that would taste. I just imagined it to taste really boring. And while I could almost feel a strange tickling sensation going through my body, I asked myself why that stupid PegasusBuck thing in my foreleg didn't tell me about my potential radiation poisoning. I mean, it was apparently able to sense when I needed lethal force and when I needed non-lethal force, and as far as I remembered, the had been a Body Mon...
Well, there it was. In front of my inner eye - I just decided to name wherever the device was sending its messages to my "inner eye" - the shape of a pegasus appeared, along with a four colored bar that was labeled RADmeter, which was set into focus with a mere thought of mine. What would have been a needle one any normal device was slowly passing the second, the green, part of the bar. Each new segment was crested with a picture of a pony apparently indicating the seriousness of the poisoning - from one broadly grinning and one normal smiling pony at the beginning and end of the first white bar, to a picture of a pony with a tentacle growing out of its eye socket. The end was marked by a simple pony head with crossed-out eyes. Right now, the normally smiling icon was highlighted, apparently indicating that I wasn't in serious danger of liquefying any second. That was somehow relaxing.
I banished the thought - and the actual display device - to the corner of my eyes and silently watched until the virtual needle had reached the zero-point again. It would be really nice to have some kind of alarm with in this thing. I knew there was a manual somewhere in there - yep, there it was; down, bad manual! - but other matters were more pressing right now, I could give it a read once I wasn't busy getting teleported around or irradiated by... radiation.
Or seeking medical supplies for the griffin with the broken back. I knew there had been something I had forgotten over being angry, frustrated and a little bit more angry of the sake of being angry. Vergil still needed any healing bandages I could find. As soon as possible. Now get your sorry flank of the ground and do something productive, featherbrain! There can't be that many rooms without any medical boxes in this building, can there?
""")_x_("""
Apparently there could.
A few corridors and rooms filled with desks, dirt and debris later the only thing new in my pockets were two more scrolls of bandages and a few more vials of healing potion. On the plus side, I had managed to create a replacement for my missing saddlebags. Basically a few pre-war cotton shopping bags tacked together at the tabs. It probably didn't look good, but in my situation, I shouldn't be picky. Not really that stable or durable either, but it would be enough to hold a few bandages.
Slowly but constantly my anger for Angel had died away alongside with my curiosity about what the next room or the next corridor would hold. The answer was always "desks". And if wasn't "desks" it was "debris" and "dirt". Although... those three words basically summed up the whole wasteland, but I had to wonder nonetheless, what this alicorn goddess wanted from this place in particular. Or why she couldn't - or more likely: didn't want - set hoof in here.
But who was I that I wanted to understand a goddess? She probably had her reasons and as long as she didn't kill us - and we would manage to heal Vergil - I was fine with that. And speaking of Vergil, it was about time that I should return. If Angel had found as many - or few in our case - bandages as I had, it maybe wouldn't suffice to completely mummify the griffin, but it would definitely be enough to treat the most severe of his injuries without crippling his wings even more. Or at least I hoped so...
But in the exact moment as I decided to return to my companions, one last obstacle hit me: while the rooms and corridors of this facility weren't all that complex, I had traversed many rooms and even more corridors, all looking the same. Meaning: it would be quite hard to get... oh who was I kidding. I was lost. Well done, Feather. You are as incompetent as ever. Because a competent pony would have made a map in their mind or would have left markings when they entered a convoluted area or building. But you had to follow your urge to get away from your most loyal companion and life-saver on multiple occasions for the sole reason of you being stupidly angry. Well done indeed.
Wait a second!
I might have had no real map of this place, but I had something at least equally useful: I had my EFS. And with that I could at least track the others' movements - or lack of movement, since they were most likely with Vergil right now - meaning I would at least know the direction I had to go. Sometimes I had good ideas.
Grinning on the inside, I brought up my Eyes Forward Sparkle, but the moment I did it, my urge to grin imploded.
Yes, there were three neutral colored dots where I would have guessed my companions to be.
But there also were a few dozen other moving dots, almost all of them blue, but sill... How could we have missed a whole pre-war facility-load of whatever creatures those might be? There hadn't been any noises whatsoever and even if I had ignored them out of pure stupidity, I bet Angel wouldn't have.
Okay, Feather... just breath. Inhale... exhale... They weren't hostile, were they? I mean, they were marked as neutral on my EFS and however the device knew that, it was about a hundred percent accurate. So there was no need to worry. It were probably just... some... birds who got caught up in here. Yes, something harmless like that. They were neutral. They wouldn't attack me. But even so, I should take care not to startle them. Angry birds were probably no good.
I gulped and started moving back through the door I had came from. And here my mind's map-making abilities started to fail already. Three more doors, one at each wall of the room. I couldn't hear anything, I couldn't see anything - at least not directly - but the hairs on my neck felt as if I was being watched at any moment.
Choosing the door to my right, simply because a group of three was indicated by my EFS when I looked in this direction, I entered another room, looking almost exactly the same as the other room before had. Now I started cursing the pre-war ponies and their stupid interior designers. And whoever had built such a large complex. And whoever was responisble for bricking the whole thing and letting it be populated by what - knowing my luck - were probably giant RADscorpions! A curse upon ye!
I entered the next room. And the next. And another.
And I could neither hear nor see anything of those strange creatures that were apparently roaming this building too. There was just this odd feeling of being watched. But apart from that: nothing.
As I approached the next door, all I wanted was to scream, just to drive away this menacing silence, but the exact moment I laid a hoof on the doorhandle, somepony - or rather: something - took over that task: a piercing scream, both monstrous and horribly equine sounding at the same time, rang through the room and with a loud crack, the ceiling behind the door I was standing before collapsed and debris, dirt and some technical looking and flashing pieces of metal flooded the corridor on the other side.
Okay, Feather, no need to worry. Not yet. It was probably sheer coincidence with an accident on top. Whatever was screaming couldn't possible have collapsed the ceiling right in front of me. What kind of... pony would be able to do that? Maybe this Goddess, she... they were alicorns after all. And telekintecially strong ones on top. I mean, I didn't have a clue on how powerful alicorns were, but it seemed most likely they there capable of doing this. If you ignored the fact that the Goddess had sent us in here to... do something. But I would bet what was left of my tail that it wasn't getting buried by rubble.
So... probably not the Goddess.
Think less about what could have happened and focus on how you will get back to your friends, featherbrain! The direct way was out of commission as a small sign, that had apparently been tacked to the piece of arcane hardware that had been located above this corridor, stated. If this junk wouldn't have been blocking my way out of this tunnel of horror, I might actually have laughed right now.
Backing up slowly I let my eyes wander across the room. Three more doors. The one I had came through and another one also blocked by debris and a few filing cabinets. So there was only one way to go: the way that led closer to the other blue dots. I began to hate my EFS for that elementally weakness it had: showing enemies - or other living beings in that case - but not indicating any proximity. Whatever those screaming creatures were, they could be waiting around the next corner or sleeping hundreds of meters away. But I didn't know.
But you're a sneaky pegasus, Feather. You successfully out-sneaked a cave of RADsorpions. Okay, almost successfully. But as long as one of these creatures wouldn't out-sneak you again, you're save. Just don't make any noises, don't trip over something and be the Celestia-damned non-curious pony you were above the clouds!
I passed the door slowly, my head turning from one end of the corridor to the other, scanning for anything moving. Nothing moved. That was good. Stuff that didn't move was highly unlikely to eat me. And there was another pleasant thing about this corridor, apart from its emptiness: the end to my right was blocked by - you guessed it - dirt, rocks and debris. One the one hoof this maybe was a shorter way back to my friend, but on the other hoof, I didn't have to decide whether way to take. And I always had been an expert in making poor choices.
Pressed to the wall I began to advance through the corridor and as another door came into view, I stopped, checking both my EFS and my ears and last my own eyes for any indications of danger beyond said door's sill. And nothing was there. Just an empty room half filled with dirt and loose pieces of paper. No ways out. Good, that meant one less decision for me to make. I closed my eyes and sighed in relief, but as I left the room again to resume my expedition, my eyes widened in shock:
The white alicorn was there again.
Great, as if to add insult to injury, I was seeing my favorite hallucination again; I could have seen that coming. At least the pleasant whistling accompanying it calmed me down, as always. The tall alicorn just stood there, looking at me with its golden eyes as I slowly trotted away. And whenever I turned my head around to see if it had gone, it stood a few feed behind me, looking at me and emitting that calming sound. Under any other circumstances I would have been creeped out by the fact that I was followed by an unknown pony-thing, but right now, I couldn't care less. I had at least some company. Things could have been worse.
I proceeded to walk my way through the corridors, each just as empty as every corridor and room before. Slowly but surely I came closer to where I expected my companions to be, the foyer of... wherever we were. The - friendly mind you - blue bars on my EFS barely moved and as I entered the next hallway, I noticed with relief, that almost of them were located to the left and right of me, while the three dots indicating my companions were right in front of me. I had already passed the room I had left Angel in, but it was empty by now too. To be honest, I wasn't sure if I was glad about that fact or not.
One final obstacle - come to think of it, there had been many final obstacles on my way back - remained, but it was a rather small one compared to my overall lost-ness back in the beginning and my urge to avoid whoever was roaming this building: just another collapsed ceiling. But I had started to remember the way Angel and I had taken over an hour ago. And this collapsed ceiling with a cyan-painted filing cabinet in it had been blocking a corridor about three rooms away from our starting point. I was almost back.
I turned towards the entrance door of the next office, when a shot rang through the air. Given its relative proximity to my position and the loud noise, I had to assumed it had been fired by Angel and by one of his home-made guns. A gunshot meant trouble. Another meant big trouble! My eyes widened I grabbed my own pistol and rushed into the office.
Or rather tried to.
A big white wing spread in front of me and blocked my path. My gaze wandered along the wing and - as expected - that wing was attached to the white alicorn. What was I talking, it wasn't attached to it, neither was it there at all! It was a hallucination! I stepped forward, but stopped dead in my tracks as I had foolishly made eye-contact with the white alicorn-hallucination.
Those eyes just seemed so real. And so did the worry that I could see within them.
I knew they weren't real, but I wasn't able to believe it.
Snap out of it, Feather! My friends were in trouble and no not-really-there alicorn would stop me from helping them! I gathered myself and stepped forwards, despite the alicorn's panic-stricken face as it shook its head. I really was glad I wasn't stopped by the wing, because then I would have freaked out. The only thing I felt was a weak counterpressure as I passed through it, nothing to worry about.
Just as the white vanished from my eyes, I could see why the alicorn had tried to stop me. Goddesses, that sounded so crazy. It hadn't tried to do anything; it was my Celestia-damned subconsciousness! But I didn't have any time to complain to my mind about my mind, because all my mental concentration died away as I saw what was sitting in front of the door that lead closer towards the gunshots. My door.
The thing cowering in the office room looked like a pony. Four legs, a longer trump, a horn on its forehead. But it wasn't any more equine than the combat drones I had thought all this time ago in my last and first real combat maneuver: the "pony" in front of me had neither a mane nor a tail, or at least no amount of hair that deserved to be called such. And the same applied to its skin. I gasped. Unfortunately that lead to that... thing noticing me.
I could barely keep myself from vomiting as I saw the zombie pony turning around to face me. What was left of its skin dangled down from its cheeks in lappets, it didn't have any lips, its rotten teeth gleamed at me menacingly. Even the eyes seemed rotten away, but not enough for them to be blind. The only thing that looked as if it was intact was the zombie pony's horn.
Why was that creature here at all? It shouldn't be here! It hadn't been here before, so why now!
Unfortunately the zombie pony wasn't as distracted by my appearance as I was by its, because as soon as it had completely risen, its horn was wrapped in a sickening green glow. It was about to do magic! Whatever it was, I didn't want to find out what creatures like this were capable of, so I spread my wings, got airborne and dashed past it, through the open door that was my door. But just I caught a glimpse at the corridor behind it, I heard the pony behind me scream.
It was the same scream as the one I had heard earlier, before the ceiling had collapsed.
I heard wood, plastic and stone crack even before the shockwave hit me. Spinning over again and again I slammed into the wooden door at the end of the small hallway, smashing through it in a rain of splinters. Pain rushed through my body, but what almost hurt me even more was the fact that the dozens of blue dots on my EFS turned red the second the zombie pony had uttered its cry. All but three...
My eyes watering, I crawled forwards, away from the creature. Or towards it. I didn't know. All I knew was that I was in deep trouble: I had lost both my ability to fly and my gun at once, my enemies number had just gone through the roof and probably the layers of stone and sand on top on it. And the one I had to face right now was a unicorn powerful enough to collapse ceilings and throw another pony - namely me - across the room.
I opened my eyes and found myself cornered, with the wall in my back, just as the slightly now glowing zombie pony passed the destroyed door. Wooden splinters, twisted metal pieces of filing cabinets, even a few chunks of the surrounding concrete circulated around it and whatever point end those items had, they were all pointed at me.
What to do now? What to do now?! Come on, stupid brain, think of something!
Close quarter combat was out of the question, being hit a second time by its shockwave would either instantly kill me or immobilize me for the zombie pony to... eat, I guess. It was what zombies did, wasn't it? And I couldn't shoot at it, because my goddesses-forsaken pistol lay on the ground in the opposite corner of the room. For a moment I thought about the knife I had, but realized quickly that I wasn't capable of throwing a knife, left alone mortally wound anypony by doing that, for one thing and for another thing, said knife was Luna-knows how many miles away in my old saddlebags right now. Only one choice then...
Magic Disruptor: charging initialized... Please stand by.
The zombie pony drew closer and with each step, new pieces of junk and metal were sucked into the telekinetical vortex that surrounded it, adding new weapons to its already fearsome arsenal.
Magic Disruptor: charging... 25%
The creature stood now directly in front of me. I could see deep into its rotten eyes.
Magic Disruptor: charging... 50%
This was taking too damned long!
The garbage projectiles in the magic grip shook and adjusted at their target one last time.
And then, a bright light filled the room for an eye-blink and as it had faded away again, the white alicorn stood in front of me. It stood tall enough for me to see, that the zombie unicorn wasn't affected by the alicorn's appearance at all. By sheer coincidence, it's eyelids twitched and it looked as if something had just snapped in its mind, but that was it. The zombie pony didn't stop.
Of course not, the alicorn was my hallucination after all. At least I had a bit of comforting noise in my final seconds...
Another bright flash blinded me and the second I closed my eyes, I could hear the junk projectiles launching.
No. Falling.
"Flee!" I heard a raspy and gummed up sounding voice calling out.
I opened my eyes. The alicorn was gone and only the zombie pony remained in front of me. The glowing was gone and it was surrounded by heaps of concrete, pieces of metal and shards of the door I had crashed through; the weapons that had been pointed at me just seconds ago. Foolishly curious as I was, I took a closer look at my... former enemy I guess: the equine figure was cowering in front of me, its shaking hooves pressed on its face. If two thirds of its skin and mane hadn't been missing and ignoring its size, it would have been quite easy to mistake the creature for a lost foal.
"Flee! Or it will kill you!" the zombie pony screamed again, staring at me with what seemed to be... different eyes.
I quickly stumbled back to me feet. There was no need for me to be told about that a third time, maybe there was some equinity left in this rotten husk after all. My eyes scanned the room for the right door. I didn't know if it was the way my panic worked but I suddenly remembered the few rooms and corridors that were my way back.
Taking the right exit, I entered the next corridor and started galloping. I could hear more zombie ponies scream from every direction, my EFS showed fast moving red dots and I could see and feel the still intact doors on my way bursting open or ripped out of their angles by magic shockwaves. Splinters pierced into my sides and wings, but by know, all I felt was numb thumping in my back. I didn't even think about flying, running away was the only thing on my mind.
One door, a room, a corridor, another door, another corridor, another door and... a wall?
I barely managed to slow down before I slammed into... something. I really needed to stop getting slammed or actively slamming into somethings. This particular something that was definitely solid, but by no way a wall concrete wall. Walls weren't supposed to lie directly behind doors and they weren't supposed to be green, transparent and pulsing either. And if anything, a tall-up standing goddesses alicorn with an illuminated horn wasn't supposed to stand behind that transparent wall.
This was no wall at all! It looked more like a solid version of the shockwaves the zombie ponies were emitting all around me. A shield spell. But this one was different in more than only the aspect of permanence, its caster was different too. Yes, it was an alicorn, closely resembling the ones that had sent us in here and all that different from my white one, but it looked more like one of the zombie ponies right now. Its skin might not have fallen off - at least for the biggest part - and its mane looked pretty much intact, just less floaty, but its bloodshot eyes lacked the look of supremacy and compensated that with a more scary kind of firmness.
"Come with me, little one..." I heard voices echoing through the room, "Join us in the embrace of the primordial beginning... Let all sorrow and harsh feelings go, just stay and be happy..."
No way! I didn't want to stay! I had friends I had to take care of, a home to return to, ponies I would have to apologize to! I couldn't stay. The shield in front of my vibrated and then it seemed to grow. Not in overall size, but small branch-like magic extension, just as green and transparent as their origin, grew slowly from the shield and towards me.
So this was why the Goddess alicorns didn't want to enter this building. Something happened to them in here, just like to everypony else.
"Let go. Just be happy..."
The way forwards was blocked by that branches-emitting alicorn shield thing, behind me was probably a gigantic horde of zombie ponies and even more of those alicorns and I couldn't see another accessible door in this room. I had to...
Magic Disruptor: charging... 100%
Magic Disruptor: ready
The words flashed across my EFS and I had almost whooped at their sight. Forget everything I ever said about you taking too long to charge, my dear Salvation, you're doing fine. You're the greatest hoof-mounted-weaponized-body-surveiling piece of arcane hardware I ever possessed.
Now I could only hope the disruptor would work the same way on a goddess - no, of course it would. And if this creature was defeated and had been subjected to the control of... something mentally even more powerful, then that wasn't a goddess. Not anymore. By now, this alicorn was a not different from the other zombie ponies and that meant, the disruptor would to work.
With the chalk-on-blackboard noise and feeling I had experienced before, I set the magic disruptor charge loose and watched with relief, as the magic bubble-shield, along with all it tentacle-like extensions, burst like a rainbow bubble. And with a high-pitched, not echoing and all-equine scream, the alicorn went down in the middle of the small connecting passage. With grim determination I dashed past the big curled-up ball of pony and began the final spurt, while gunshots rang through the air once more.
Angel, Gingerbread, Vergil... I'm coming and then we'll all get out of here.
"Please, just stay..." I could hear the green alicorn mutter, although the loud noises of screams and shots should have drowned them out.
""")_x_("""
Level up: Level 10
Skill(s): Survival 45
Perk added: Run'n'GunRun
"Just push yourself a little more and you could do a Sonic Rainboom...
Just kidding. You could never do a Sonic Rainboom."
The Equestrian wasteland is a dangerous place and you're not the most durable pegasus. But do you really need to be hard as steel if the dangers can't catch up to you? Your basic movement speed is increased by 5% and your sprinting ability is enhanced by 20% (Speed +15%; Sprint duration +25%).
Quest Perk added: An Angel on your Shoulder
"I really didn't see that coming."
The Equestrian wasteland is a strange place. That strange in fact, that you could swear your own hallucinations help you out from time to time. You should maybe consult a doctor about that.