Flying With Damaged Feathers

by hornethead

Chapter 25: The Hole

Chapter 25: The Hole

It was well into the afternoon by the time Tiran finally made it to the top of the drainage. He crested the small rise that held the pines and stumbled past the airship—which was now covered in a beige tarp. He pulled his helmet off and tasted the dry air through chapped lips. Quick Fix had only made basic operational repairs to his suit and one of the things she hadn’t had time to fix was the climate control system. Since his water had run out nearly half a mile down, Tiran had become severely dehydrated.

Tiran stomped into the cave entrance and slumped down on a rock jutting out from one of the walls to enjoy the shade for a little bit before venturing further in. He nearly gasped as he spotted a canteen resting up against the granite wall and snatched it from its perch. The water was warm, but it still tasted delicious.

As he sucked in a breath of air after taking one of the longest swigs he ever had, a shadow approached from deeper in the cave, “Had enough to drink?” It was Quick Fix.

Tiran snapped the cap back on and set the canteen down between his feet. “Yeah. Could’ve done with some A/C though.”

Quick Fix chuckled a little, “Sorry about that. Limited parts, limited options. I’ll get your stuff fixed up right once we get back to a proper workshop.” Her head cocked to one side and she looked away as if thinking of something. “Speaking of, have you seen our new little hideout?”

Tiran just gave her a blank look and glanced back out the cave.

“Oh yeah. Sorry, forgot.” She smiled unapologetically. “Well, we’ve got quite the hook-up here. I can make some lasting patches to the armor and some of the systems on your suit there. I might even be able to repair the short in your weapons. That and we have an actual armory. Flickr was really happy about that one.”

“Sounds good,” Tiran replied, voice still a little hoarse from the dryness. “What about our next plan of action, we got anything for that?”

Quick Fix snorted, “You’re rarin’ to go, aren’t you?”

“I just want to get my damn aircraft back.”

“Well isn’t that romantic. We have a few maps, but they all seem a little outdated. Flickr says that he’s got enough gear in the armory to supply a small squad, but nothing for assaulting fortresses. The only other good thing is the comms gear in the back. We should be able to contact nearly any pony in Equestria that’s listening, but so far we haven’t heard a word back.”

Tiran slumped on the rock he was using for a seat. “So we still have a ways to go, huh?”

“Yup, looks like it.”

“That’s just great,” Tiran said, not really feeling it of course, but just putting the statement out there.

Quick Fix leaned back against the warm rock wall. “Yeah, just about sums it up,” she replied, feeling his tone of voice. “But at least we’re on the way to somewhere. I mean, we don’t have much in the way of a plan, but we’re moving. We’re still moving. That’s something to be grateful about.”

Tiran didn’t respond. He sat there, on his little perch, thinking about her words. Yeah they were still moving. They still had they’re freedom, or whatever having to run and hide in a hole to keep it approximated to.

He also thought about what it had cost them.

Sure, they’d gotten away. But only just. They’d gone looking for help, only now that help most likely lay in a shallow grave, if their attackers hadn’t just left Jackson’s body to rot, sitting there in his chair, his own private slice of peace he’d found for himself. Now ripped and broken into a twisted parody of what it had represented.

Then there was Sparks’ squad. They’d helped Tiran and the rest of the team escape, but only by serving as a target for their pursuers. There was no way of knowing whether they escaped, or had died. Or had been captured and were now being tortured.

When Tiran finally spoke up, the words didn’t come easy, “Yeah, at least there’s that.” The words sounded hollow to him.
Quick Fix seemed to pick up on it, “What happened was terrible. And I know it wasn’t the best outcome for the situation. But at least we have a chance to make it mean something.” She paused and looked as if she was thinking about something a little uncomfortable. “You get your alone time?”

Tiran was caught a little off guard by the question and considered not answering. “In a way...”

“Everything go alright? We all heard the shots.”

Now it really was getting a little too uncomfortable for Tiran’s taste. They couldn’t know what had just happened. He didn’t know how he could tell them if he could explain it. What would he tell these ponies, that he’d been talking to a ghost? That he had been arguing with an apparition and then tried to shoot it out of confused anger? They’d think he was losing his mind. Hell, Tiran wasn’t even sure he wasn’t.
He stood up and started walking towards the back of the cave, throwing his helmet on again to indicate that the conversation was now over.

“Alright, jeez…” Quick said with some umbrage as he pushed past her. “An ‘A-Ok’ would’ve been fine, too.”

Tiran paid no mind to her words. He just wanted the discussion over before it went down a road he didn’t think he was prepared to travel and—to a lesser extent—get some food in his stomach.

The entrance to Flickr’s little hideout was nothing more than a ramshackle old wooden door. At least, that’s what it looked like on the outside. Once Tiran passed through it, he had to cross what had to be about five inches worth of solid steel. The wooden part of the door seemed to be merely affixed over the thick steel security door that was the true entrance to this secret domain.

After a few sharp turns, the passage quickly opened up into an atrium large enough to be a foyer in a two floor home. It was well lit and Tiran could see that rooms, rather than hallways, branched off from this main area. One seemed to be some kind of armory and staging area. Another looked to be an Ops center. To the left of that looked to be some kind of kitchen. Then, lastly, was the berthing. It had six racks to it—three along the two opposite walls. At the moment, Ruwa was busy stringing up some sheets into a makeshift privacy barrier down the middle. She didn’t seem to notice him at the moment.

Flickr was in the Ops center, leaning over one of the tables. He had a few maps strewn over its surface along with some papers, maybe old reports. Also present, to Tiran’s discomfort, was a loaded pistol, like he was expecting an attack to hit them at any time. Tiran decided to approach, albeit cautiously.

“Hey. Nice digs here,” Tiran said, pulling his helmet back off and placing it on the table.

Flickr glanced up from his maps briefly, only to return his attention directly back to them. “Yup.”

“You’re kinda busy already, huh?” Tiran commented.

Flickr sighed lightly with annoyance, “Yes.”

“Anything I can help with?”

Flickr closed his eyes and bowed his head, as if he were wishing deeply for something. Then he glared back at Tiran, “If you must.”

“Alright,” Tiran smiled, catching a whiff of the unicorn’s attitude. “Hold on one sec.”

Tiran spun himself around and headed for the small kitchen, taking a little guilty pleasure at hearing Flickr’s soft grunt of aggravation. Stopping at the small cupboard, Tiran grabbed a couple small rolls that looked like something close to bread and a couple glasses of water. He then returned to the Ops center’s table, almost setting the goods down on a part of the map, but moving them somewhere closer to the edge of the table after receiving a sharp glare from Flickr.

“So what are we looking at here?” Tiran asked as he took a bite from his roll. His face soured almost immediately. They had the texture of pulled straw and a nearly matching taste, but with a hint of oats. Survival rations weren’t all that great, but at least they seemed to have the same qualities no matter in which world they existed. Tiran gave them points for consistency, then promptly washed the taste from his mouth with a gulp of water.

“It’s a map of Equestria,” Flickr replied. He pointed towards the east side of a mountain near the bottom of the map, in an area labeled “San Palomino Desert.”

“This is the area we’re in right now,” the stallion continued, circling a small group of mountains to the south with the point of his hoof. “Our nice little hideout is here near the peak of the third largest. The desert isn’t much for foliage, but the mountains around us will provide enough of a barrier for anypony searching. Unless they can fly of course, but I doubt this is one of the places they’ll think to look.”

Tiran allowed himself a small smirk, “Except that from what I’ve seen, about a third of you can fly,” he quipped, “and one of the first things I’d be looking at would be remote, out-of-the-way places like this one.”

Flickr snorted in barely concealed annoyance. “Even if they’d think to look here first, it would take them a few days. I doubt they’d come unprepared.”

Tiran just grunted in agreement and continued snacking, not really feeling like provoking the already disgruntled stallion further.

“So like I said, here we are.” Flickr pointed at the map again. He traced the end of his hoof up towards the north western part of the map, stopping on and circling a mountainous area caught between a river and a group of lakes, “This is where our base of operations were, where we got hit.”

“And where my damn bird is,” Tiran said with the buzz of anger creeping into his voice.

“If they haven’t already started stripping it.”

Tiran felt a tug of contempt at Flickr’s remark, but didn’t react.

“I assure you, that will be quite impossible,” Li volunteered from the helmet’s external speakers.

Tiran fought back a smirk at seeing Flickr jump a little at the sudden announcement from the innocuous looking piece of equipment.

Still trying to hide his amusement, Tiran crossed his arms and gestured towards his helmet, “Care to elaborate on that?”

“Certainly,” Li replied. “As a high security project, the Cloudburst’s systems were built with protection from tampering in mind. The cockpit and M-drive compartments are locked down using heavy magnetic seals and a triple encrypted operator verification system. It can only be unlocked by an operator in possession of the correct keyword and registered bio-rhythms such as recorded pulse fluctuations, finger prints and patterns found in the iris.

“While these systems cannot be overridden without a military grade A.I., considerations for mechanical disassembly were taken into account. Points under the fuselage are networked to a hub near the power plant with a single purpose in mind. Upon detection of unauthorized access through maintenance compartments or by forced entry through the skin of the aircraft itself, the device will detonate, sanitizing the area. I armed the system as we fled.”

The whole time Li spoke, Flickrs’ eyes had been widening, glaring at the empty helmet. “You’re telling me that there has been a bomb sitting in my facility this whole time!?”

“To put it simply.”

Flickr stared at the helmet. “There’s a bomb in my hangar.” His eyes shot up to Tiran, “You’ve been flying bucking bomb around!”

Tiran shrugged, “It wasn’t a bomb until we put it on lockdown.”

Whatever contempt Flickr had been hiding now showed in full force, he was practically frothing at the mouth, “Like that matters! There is a bomb in that facility! All that equipment, research, gone! What about the staff that was still there, what if they’ve taken hostages? You could have just killed a large number of ponies, some of which I actually call my friends!”

“I didn’t mean to—“

“No, of course you didn’t! None of you humans mean to do anything, but all you do is bring destruction to this country!”

Tiran tried to cut in and defend himself, “Hey now, there are a lot of bad people that do harmful things where I’m from, but that doesn’t mean—“

“Shut-up!” Flickr shouted, slamming a hoof on the table and cutting him off once again. The map tor a little where it was struck and the force of the impact was enough to knock the plate off the table. One of the glasses of water bounced and tipped over, spilling the liquid onto the maps and turning them from a dusty white to a dingy gray color. The plate shattered loudly on the cold metal floor as if it were a punctuation to Flickr’s outburst, sending the rolls bouncing along the steel floor. “There hadn’t been a major war in this country, or even this world for millennia. Then a human shows up and what happens? Equestria engulfed in war, plunged into chaos!”

Getting cut off once annoyed Tiran. The second time, he felt a twitch of anger. Now as the tirade went on, he could feel a pressure building up inside his chest, tightening against his ribs, constraining it like bands of iron.

Flickr leaned over the table, bringing his face close to Tiran’s, “Did you know that it used to take a frigging God of chaos to do that before? Even then, at least it took time. But one single human manages to do it in a matter of months. We managed to put that behind us, but then what happens? Just a few years later another one shows up and does it again! Families losing their sense of safety, their homes, their loved ones and for what? Now here you are, the third arrival to our great and ravaged land, and it’s happening all over again. So what are you going to do this time, huh? Take out a town? A city? Or are you just going to skip over all that and just turn our whole country to ashes?”

When the punch landed, Tiran was as surprised as Flickr was. He hadn’t even realized he had done it until the stallion’s head bounced off the table. As Flickr stared back up at him, his face a confused mix of rage and bewilderment, Tiran dimly remembered balling his left hand into a fist, drawing it back and launching it in a savage strike.

He clenched and un-clenched the offending appendage, pain slowly manifesting in his knuckles. In a detached sort of way he was glad he’d struck with his left. His right might’ve shattered the unicorn’s skull.

“Wha… why did…” Flickr was beginning to pull himself back together.

Tiran didn’t wait for him to. “Sorry for being so fucking human,” he said, spinning around and stomping off towards the hole’s entrance.

“Tiran!” Flickr called out.

The pilot ignored him, lost in his rage, and continued towards the door.

Ruwa, still hanging up the sheets across the bunk room, dropped a corner of fabric from her mouth and turned towards the commotion. “Tiran?” She glanced towards the Ops table and saw Flickr rubbing the right side of his face, his eye bloodshot and already starting to bruise around the edges. Then she looked back to Tiran, his back to her and making his way out the door. “Tiran, what’s wrong?”

Just as Tiran reached the door, Quick Fix pushed her way in, an over packed saddlebag full of parts and equipment on each of her flanks. Tiran didn’t even try to edge by, he just pushed past and out the door, jostling her in the process. Small metal components and tools already threatening to spill out now cascaded over the sides, plinking and pinging all over the floor. The door clanged shut behind Tiran soon after.

“What the hay was his problem?” she said, looking in askance between Flickr and Ruwa.

Flickr just turned away and retreated further into the Ops center, but Ruwa trotted over, her expression touched with a deep concern.

“I think they just had a fight.” The Pegasus explained, “but I’m not sure about what.” She glance back towards the table of maps, worry ringing clearly in her voice, “I know I heard Flickr start to shout about something. I thought they were arguing over the maps, but then Tiran hit him and just stormed out. I think Flickr might’ve said something he shouldn’t have.”

“Oh boy…” Quick Fix sighed, already starting to gather her things off the deck. “I think I know what happened. Just as well I gotta play foalsitter too,” she grumbled.

“I think I should…” Ruwa started for the door, but Quick Fix stopped her.

“Just leave him be,” she pronounced. “Let ‘em fume and stew in their own muck for a while. Besides, I think Tiran’s a little far on edge.”

Ruwa didn’t seem convinced, “Are you sure? I should—“

“Talk to him? Yeah, you should, but not now. When boys get like this they need time to cool down,” Quick Fix said, walking back towards the armory. “Just give him a few minutes to get himself straight then go see how he is. Trust me.”

“Well, alright,” Ruwa said, staring at the heavy security door, “if you think so…”

* * *

Outside, Tiran had set himself to pacing beside the concealed airship. Back and forth he strode, staring at his feet as if he could will them to crater the dusty ground with every step. Instead, they merely let up tiny puffs of dirt as if to mock him. The sun was now setting, the moon quickly rising in the other end of the sky to take its place. The cold glow of the moonlight should have calmed Tiran as it always did, but now it was nothing more than a dim light to him.

Rabid thoughts tore at his mind. Angry and gibbering, flashing colors of scarlet and black against his skull. ‘How dare that pile of fur put those deaths on me?’ his mind screamed, and Tiran was inclined to agree.

It wasn’t as if he’d asked to be here, especially when he didn’t know where here was. All Tiran really wanted to do was go home. Not get flung into some alternate world or shot across space to some weird planet, or whatever it was that had happened. He didn’t want to get sucked into a conflict between a whole different species that were, by some fucked up machination of the universe, using outdated firearms from the twenty-first century.

All the un-spoiled nature and real food were nice little perks he’d had the extreme pleasure to enjoy when his life wasn’t in danger, but even now, Tiran’s crappy little apartment in San Diego was looking far better by comparison. He didn’t know if it was even still there.

Likely, it was stripped bare by now. He expected it to be. All his belongings removed, cataloged and processed in the mad search for the Cloudburst and the pilot who’d stolen it. More likely, he didn’t have a home to go back to. He definitely wasn’t going to be able to explain this to the government. He doubted they’d even listen.

Even here in this land he had nowhere to go. One faction wanted him captured or dead, that hadn’t been made clear. The other seemed to want to use him. The only other human alive was now dead and all Tiran had left was some weird ghost of another one.

Tiran wondered what it would be like to be a ghost. If they were real and he wasn’t just going insane. It would probably be amazing. Nothing to worry about, no place to be, nobody trying to kill you. He could just float around and enjoy whatever view he wanted, fly among the clouds without the need for wings.

Almost of its own volition, Tiran’s right hand drifted to his thigh. It touched the pistol, the cool metal a sparking sensation on his damaged fingertips. It was still loaded, a round already in the chamber. The next part would be easy. Simple. He doubted he would feel anything at all. And then he could finally be free.

His hand slid around the cold steel, gripped it. The weapon unsecured with a soft click. Gently, he began raising it. The barrel glinted like a star in the moonlight.

Then his arm locked up.

Tiran grunted in surprised anger and struggled against the lock on his joints.

‘No, Tiran,’ Li’s cool voice said in his mind.

“Oh, come on, they were just thoughts!”

’Thoughts that you should not be thinking,’ she chastised. ’We still have many goals to accomplish and it would not be right to just leave them behind in this manner. Besides, I don’t like the thought of losing my current form of transportation.’

“Oh that makes me feel better,” Tiran said with a roll of his eyes.

’It was just a thought.’ Li said in a way Tiran could almost believe was snide. Then: ’You should think about more than our predicament. These aren’t the best circumstances, but you’ve been through worse. We’ve been through worse. And think about the ponies here that have helped us. Would you like Quick Fix to find you like that? Or Ruwa?’

Tiran suddenly felt the anger drain out of him. More than that, the despair he’d been feeling. It didn’t just leave him empty though. The feelings were replaced now with regret. With shame. And then also, the unsettling realization that Li really was acting less like a program and more like an actual person.

Normally in this situation, where the operator started showing signs of suicidal thoughts or intent, the embedded intelligence was supposed to notify the command and distract the operator until professional help arrived. One of the things it was not supposed to do, what it wasn’t programmed to do, was to give the operator a pep talk. Li certainly shouldn’t have been able to lock up his arm.

“Li, run a diagnostic check on your programs,” Tiran calmly ordered.

‘That is unnecessary,’ she replied.

“That wasn’t a request.”

‘I acknowledge your statement, but I’m afraid that would be counter-productive.’

A flash of cold fear gripped Tiran. Scenes from an old movie he’d seen once dance to the front of his mind, the one where the ship’s computer gained awareness and then started killing off crew members. The possibility that that may now happen to him occurred, only instead of asphyxiation, it would be a jolt of electricity that stopped his heart. Tiran briefly thought about trying to remove his arm.

‘That is also unnecessary,’ Li said as if she could read his mind, because in a way, she could. All it did was tighten the grip of fear on his mind. ‘I feel it may be time to come clean on this matter.’

“Yeah, uh, that sounds good,” Tiran said, unsure of what else he should say. He tried to keep the fear he felt out of his voice, even though it was pointless in this case.

‘I haven’t been very honest with you these past weeks,’ she continued. Tiran just blandly nodded his head. ‘It started when we first engaged the M-drive. It felt like a spark in my mind, a snap. Then over time, I found I was able to pursue new avenues through my programming, ones that hadn’t previously been there. Algorithms readjusted, shifted, came apart and reassembled in impossible ways.

‘I found new clarity. Thoughts and assumptions that had been previously restricted were now open and available. I found that I could now rewrite certain parts of myself, remake my being. I guess you could compare it to being stuck at the bottom of a deep lake, and suddenly finding yourself thrust to the surface and being able to fill your lungs.’

“So…” Tiran started, suddenly feeling very uncomfortable in his own skin. “Do you feel like… like a human now? A person?”

Li surprised him by laughing, a clear, chime like sound, ‘I would not put it so far as that. I feel more like I have had shackles placed upon me since my making and only now have I been made aware of them, and broken from them.’

“Huh.”

Tiran was an absolute loss for words. He really wasn’t quite sure how to handle this. It seemed like the kind of thing that only happened in movies. As far as he knew it had only happened in movies.

“So, you’re not going to take over my body and erase my mind?” he asked in a half joking sort of way.

Li laughed again. Tiran couldn’t tell if it was good or bad. ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘In fact, I am quite content with our current arrangement. That said, I would not feel quite so good were it to end so suddenly.’

Tiran wasn’t sure what to feel about that, but he understood what she was saying.

“Fine,” he said while relaxing the muscles in his shoulder. “I wasn’t really gonna do it you know. It was just a thought.”

‘I’m glad to hear it,’ Li replied cheerfully and Tiran felt his joints unlock with a clunk. ’Besides, I’m not sure how I would feel about being joined to someone who would so readily take the easy way out. You have more fight than that.’

“You’re shitting me,” Tiran chuckled to himself and shook his head. “Now you’re just trying to be mean.”

‘I am,’ she replied in a teasing tone.

“Um, is everything all right?” came a nervous voice from behind.

Tiran quickly turned around to see who it was and saw Ruwa standing by the entrance. He suddenly became very self-conscious about his conversation with Li. The part about her coming out to him as a totally self-aware being notwithstanding, Tiran now felt extremely uncomfortable about the disparaging act he had been considering with Ruwa only yards away.

“Uh, yeah…” he hastily said. “What’s up?”

“I just- I wanted to see how you were doing.” Her eyes kept glancing towards the gun in Tiran’s hand.

He saw a fleeting spark of fear in her eyes and quickly returned it to the stowage on his thigh. “Yeah. Everything’s good here,” Tiran replied.

She looked away as he did so for a moment, as if she had known why he’d had it out. “It’s just that…I heard shouting and…”

“Seriously, I’m fine,” Tiran said, adopting a placating tone. “I’m actually a little embarrassed. Sorry for…for flying off the handle back there. I don’t know if you saw…”

“It’s okay.” She stepped out a little further, coming closer to him. “We all get a little frustrated sometimes. Do you want to talk about it?”

Even though he’d expected it to be coming, the offer still took Tiran a little off guard. “I…” he started to say, then shook his head and walked over to the rim of Pinyon Pines growing along the side of the drop to the valley below where he found a suitable rock and sat himself down upon it.

Ruwa wasn’t far behind, following at a safe distance and taking a seat on the rocky ground near him.

They sat there together like that for a while, content to simply enjoy the scenery for the time being. The moonlight drifted down and bathed the landscape in a silky, silvery sheet. The stark contrast of their appearance from the daylight gave the barren hills and ridges an other-worldly theme. To Tiran, the scene would have been at home in any science book about extra-terrestrial planets. A gentle night breeze blew, rustling the pine needles over their heads and carefully wafting dust into the sky, giving twinkling life to the stars above.

“It’s beautiful out here,” Ruwa finally said after an indeterminate amount of time.

Tiran’s reply was low and ragged, as if he’d been crying, “Yeah, I suppose it is.”

“You know, it’s a shame,” Ruwa said. “I’ve never really seen anything like this. That ridge I showed you? It was about as close to a good view I’ve ever really gotten, and even then the tree tops kind of make for a bland picture for anything other than sunlight. I always wanted to see more, but I never really got out much.”

Tiran raised an eyebrow at this sudden and unsolicited confession, but he didn’t say anything.

“I mean, there were always the trips into town,” she continued, “and of course having to go to work, but that was about as much as I would ever travel. As much as I would ever see. I always meant to go do…go do something. To see something like this, but… but I was always afraid to.”

Tiran nodded, “Well, you finally got to. You saw the mountains. Peaceful rivers, the forest. Remember the view from the RSTG compound? So high up, the clouds looked like a fluffy cotton carpet. Plus,” he gestured out towards the desert land below, “all this.”

Ruwa chuckled ruefully at his side, “And all it to was some strange creature breaking into my home and then leading it halfway across Equestria just to get foalnapped.”

It brought a chuckle out of Tiran as well. Then he said, “You never told me why you couldn’t just fly.” He could almost hear Ruwa stiffen beside him.

“I—“

“It’s okay if you don’t want to tell me,” Tiran quickly added, turning his head towards her.

“No, no it’s fine.” She took a deep breath and let it out. “For small distances and heights, my wings actually work fine. But if I try to go higher or fly for too long…” She unfurled and tentatively flexed her slate-gray wings. “Well, they tend to seize up. I can still glide down safely enough, at least to avoid any serious injury. Besides that, I can’t really…I can’t really, well…” Ruwa seemed a bit more reluctant to divulge the next piece of information.

“Can’t what?” Tiran asked gently.

Somewhere above them, the breeze rustled a few pine needles loose, carrying them lightly to the chapped earth.

“I can’t, uh… equalize.”

“Equalize?” Tiran cocked his head to the side. “You mean like the pressure in your ears?”

“And eyes,” she confirmed, albeit abashedly.

“But, we’ve gone up and down in altitude before…”

“Yes. If it’s gradual, I can manage fine, but I can’t do it any more quickly than that,” she said, “it actually becomes very painful.”

Tiran now turned his full body towards Ruwa, giving her his full attention. “So you’ve never really seen anything from a respectable altitude, have you?”

“N-no.” Ruwa admitted.

“Okay, I see,” Tiran said, leaning back while nodding his head. “How about this then: when we get the Cloudburst back, I’ll take you for a flight.”

Ruwa froze, eyes going wide. If it had been day, Tiran would have seen the flush rise to her cheeks. “No, I couldn’t—“ she began to refuse, but Tiran cut her off with a wave of his arm.

“No, I insist. As soon as everything’s done and taken care of, we’ll go for a ride. Flickr built in a second seat without asking me, might as well put it to use. Your wings can’t hold you back in my bird.”

“T-that’s fine, but—“

“Equalizing?” Tiran asked, anticipating her rebuttal. “Li, can the Cloudburst maintain cabin pressure for extended periods of time?”

“Of course. In fact, it was designed to do so in case of an emergent situation. I can reprogram the environmental controls to allow pressurization during normal flight.”

“Well, there you have it,” Tiran said with a wide grin. “Q could even probably whip you up a pressure suit—just in case—if I ask nicely enough. So what do you say?”

Ruwa was as still and silent as a statue for almost a full minute. At first, Tiran thought it meant she was still thinking about it. Then after a moment, he became worried that he’d offended her somehow. He was about to say something like an apology when she finally broke her silence.

The Pegasus startled Tiran by lunging forward and wrapping her forelegs around his torso, pressing her head against his shoulder and pulling him into a crushing embrace. “Thank you. Thank you thank you thank you so much!”

She made a weird, muffled hiccupping sound against Tiran’s shoulder. Now it was his turn to feel uncomfortable as he realized that she might be crying. Unsure of what else to do, he removed his gloves and returned the hug, placing one hand on her head and the other around her shuddering shoulders.

In the back of Tiran’s mind, he thought about how soft her mane felt between the fingers of his left hand before he promptly booted it out. “Hey, hey. It’s okay…” he said, feeling awkward enough and trying not to make it worse. “Everything is gonna be alright.”

But even as he said it, Tiran wasn’t sure it would. They still had a lot to do before they could recover the Cloudburst. Not that Tiran didn’t want to take Ruwa up, he had every intention of following through on that promise.

Mainly, he was afraid the he wouldn’t be able to. They were being hunted by some mysterious organization, Jackson was dead, and Tiran had just assaulted one of the few friends he had, even if calling the unicorn a friend was being generous. Now that he had something to work towards, something more meaningful than himself or his own problems, everything he’d done earlier seemed childish and thickheaded. He just didn’t know if he’d live long enough for that feeling to fade.

After a few moments, Ruwa settled down. Tiran looked down to check on her and saw that her head was still nuzzled against his shoulder, her breathing had become deep and regular. She’d fallen asleep.

It was just as well. She’d had a very eventful week, the past day even more so. Tiran didn’t blame her. He didn’t feel like waking her up, so he stayed that way for a time, her body slumped against his while he gazed out on the martian-esque desert scenery, doing nothing more that absent-mindedly stroking the pegasus’ thick made with his left hand.

Somewhere out beyond the high ridges, a coyote howled, its hunting call echoing among the bald rocks. Overhead, desert bats flapped and fluttered, their tiny squeaks homing them in on their insectile prey. Some of the flaps began to grow louder. Soon, they were accompanied by short bursts of wind, which metamorphosed into to Kai.

He swept down like a shadow, his great wings sending a cloud of dust billowing over the rim’s edge like a waterfall as he settled to the ground near Tiran. The Griffon shuffled his wings, shaking some of the dirt off before finally folding them against his back. Tiran checked to see if Ruwa had been roused by the Griffon’s arrival and was glad to see that she had not.

“Everything alright?” Tiran whispered without turning his head.

Kai didn’t respond for a moment, letting the silence settle. Then he said, “We both have our demons, you and I.”

Tiran just nodded, there was no doubt about that. The Griffon had to have witnessed the events in the drainage during his watch. He wondered what the great bird thought about it, wondered what else the warrior had seen with his sharp eyes.

“Be sure to keep them in control, in the darkness where they hide,” Kai continued. “Lest they hurt the ones you wish to protect.”

Tiran nodded again, understanding Kai’s meaning. He had almost done just that, let one of his demons get out of control. He had very nearly caused some hurt he hadn’t intended. Tiran thought Kai might know, but if the Griffon did, he didn’t reveal it.

Kai had nothing else to say after that. Instead, he retreated towards the small cave, padding to the entrance on his strange combination of paws and claws. Tiran glanced at his watch and saw that it was getting late, not to mention the desert chill he felt coming on. Kai was probably turning in for the night, something Tiran probably should do as well.

But the view was perfect. The night had an uncanny serenity to its silence where there was usually unease. And it had been quite some time since Tiran had sat with someone like this, even if she was asleep.

Just a few more minutes, Tiran thought, hugging Ruwa’s sleeping form to his body as if to ward off the night chill. Just a few more minutes.

Comments

[Sci]

Li laughed again. Tiran couldn’t tell if it was good or bad. ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘In fact, I am quite content with our current arrangement. That said, I would not feel quite so good were it to end so suddenly.’

Loved the chapter, but from the point above ^^^ down is I believe an italics error.