Chapter 22: Did I do something wrong again?
Chapter 22: Did I do something wrong again?
”This is your chance to fly with the winners!”
“Sparkle, as your Paladin Commander, I order you to tell me how mares work.”
To my right, Sparkle Cola cocked her helmet at me and sighed. “There are a few things in this world that you don’t want to know, that’s one of ‘em. I understand how mares work and trust me—just don’t bother.” She vaguely gestured at me with the barrel of her grenade launcher. “I think you just need to learn to deal with mares without being an obsessive creep.”
The deserted landscape around us hadn’t changed in the past half hour, so I kept a wary eye on my E.F.S. because I was getting too complacent. “I am not a creep.” A quick look at my map told me we were still a few blocks away from the designated area of operations as per the extermination job.
“‘Obsessive’ is the key word here, actually. There’s a reason Knight Habanero broke up with you.” I’d gotten over her months ago, but Sparkle wasn’t helping at the moment. “Of course, it probably didn’t help that you eloped with her sister.”
“They look the same!” It’s a good thing she couldn’t see me turn red under my helmet.
“How? One of them is orange and the other is green!”
“Well, in the dark they do!” Not to mention they even took the effort to style their manes and tails in the same exact fashion.
“See, the problem is you’re a dumb stallion.”
I stopped in my tracks and stared down the Junior Paladin behind me. “I could have you demoted for that remark,” I threateningly snarled.
“You’re not petty enough to do that,” Sparkle instantly answered. “I’d also like to remind you that you thought I looked like Violet just because we share mane colors.” Unfortunately, that had been one of my dumb moments. “You have zero tact when it comes to deciphering the mysteries of Frosty and her infinite emotions.”
To think of a reply, I turned away and continued walking. “But I’m keeping her safe!” I finally shot back after a few steps.
Still following closely behind, Sparkle pointed out, “In the most controlling way possible, sure.” There was an edge of unfriendly sarcasm there, but I wasn’t going to nitpick right now.
“If she’s going to do something reckless—which is inevitable, by the way—it would make me feel a lot better if somepony was with her.”
“You put a collar on her.”
“For safety reasons! So that she can’t recklessly rush into situations without help.”
Sparkle made a noise that sounded somewhere between a snort and a chuckle. “I’m not sure you noticed the implications. Not only did you restrict her freedom, but this is literally the second time you’ve done it.”
“It’s for her own good.” Keeping Frosty close would dramatically lower the odds of her doing something stupid.
“Yeah, but that’s not what Frosty thinks. She’s probably thinking you just want an obedient little funfilly for when you need a little ‘stress relief’.”
Where would she even get that idea from?! I whipped around and harshly snapped, “I do not!”
With a simple shrug, Sparkle brightly replied, “Hey, that’s my two caps on the matter.”
We began to trudge along in silence, Sparkle finally giving me time to think. Why would Frosty even get the idea I wanted to take advantage of her? She should have known by now that she was too confident for her own good. I was simply giving her a reality check. I’d told her how much I loved her, how much I cared. She knew it, right?
“Maybe I did something wrong,” I lethargically grumbled.
“Maybe you did.”
So I found a tight-fitting collar and had gotten a skilled mage to enchant it, giving it the ability to chain the wearer to whatever—or whoever—I chose in order to keep them safe. And I’d tied it to the mare I loved and cared about, binding her to my will. Again. “I overreacted.” Realization dawned over me. “I’m stupid.”
“Yeah…” Sparkle trotted a bit faster and pulled up alongside me. “You’re what—zero for three on relationships, including Frosty? Maybe you should consider something more open. I mean, it’s working out for me.”
Pointedly, I responded, “But you’re a slut. I don’t want to be Paladin Commander Beefcake.”
“Rude.” As if to glorify the matter, Sparkle turned up her nose with a huff. “I prefer to call it… morale padding.”
Depending on how much faster that mare was getting around since the last time I’d heard, I made a quick assumption. “That means contingent morale should be at an all-time high.”
Haughtily, Sparkle huffed. “You’re just jealous.”
A low-pitched buzzing hum began to creep into the background static of my helmet speakers. Just to make sure they weren’t just malfunctioning, I gently tapped the side of my helmet and listened again. Yup, still there. That only meant that the radwasp nest was nearby, and there were a lot more of them than Stronghold’s job mare had told me about.
The map wasn’t giving me a more precise location than “somewhere within these five hundred meters or so”, marking the buildings around us inside a huge green circle. “We’re here. Keep an eye open for patrols, try to minimize noise. We’ve just entered their territory and I’d rather not corrode to death, got it?” Taking on a much more serious tone, I slowly treaded onward.
“Roger roger.”
Evidence of radwasp activity increased with every step we took into the ruined maze of buildings. Holes melted in walls, burnt corpses, holes melted in burnt corpses nailed to walls; the works. The barely standing acid-worn billboard advertised this place to be some sort of storage complex (Affordable! Cheap! Spacious!), but the overgrown insects had converted it into a breeding ground or something.
Alarmingly enough, my E.F.S. still didn’t register any hostiles save the errant radroach. I didn’t even dare rev Decrusty in case the noise would attract unnecessary attention. My armor was still damaged, so that was the only possible cause.
I manually raised my mic’s receive volume and whispered to Sparkle, “Is your E.F.S. working? Nothing’s coming up on mine.”
There was a muffled sneeze from the other end of the conversation before she replied, “Colors on mine are broken and the compass still doesn’t work. I’m using my standard-issue optical observing devices for tracking.”
That left one partially functioning E.F.S. between the two of us, but at least Sparkle had the power of area of effect grenade damage to make up for any failures in accuracy. Still, I had to ask: “What?”
Muffled snort. “Eyeballs. I’m using my eyeballs. Use your standard-issue memory storage unit.”
Of course. I groaned and turned my attention back to watching my E.F.S. and ignoring the ever-increasing buzzing. They were around, but why couldn’t we see them?
“I’m talking about your brain.”
“I wasn’t going to dignify that with a response, but I got it. Don’t worry.”
“Are you su—stopstopstop, on your three o'clock!” Sparkle urgently hissed. “Bug butt.”
The two of us froze. Sparkle had indicated a direction that must have meant the other side of the corner I was approaching since I couldn’t see anything. E.F.S. didn’t pick up anything either, which probably meant it was broken for the time being. Damn cultists and their spark battery traps.
A wickedly curved stinger stretched into view from around the acid-worn shed to my right. It shivered in the air, droplets of green slime dripping off of it and sizzling on the pavement below. With a deft twitch, it disappeared back around the corner. Moments later, the rest of the mutated insect crawled up over the storage shed and buzzed its wings.
Unconsciously, my breathing had quickened and I was fighting the overwhelming urge to either bolt or open fire. I’d seen firsthoof what radwasp acid did to ponies. Armor barely helped once the acid landed on it, and once it burned through the same would happen to the pony inside it. It was a painful death, one that I’d watched several initiates suffer a long time ago.
Very carefully, I began to spin up Decrusty—starting at low velocity—and watched for a reaction from the radwasp. The low-pitched whine of her motor was thankfully drowned out by the much louder buzzing in the background. She was suppressed, so hopefully if I had to kill the bug it wouldn’t attract more attention.
Thankfully, the radwasp didn’t seem to find the frozen Steel Rangers very interesting. It swished its wings and buzzed into the air, seemingly attracted to something. Once I was sure it wouldn’t be coming back, I released a sigh of relief.
“All we need to do is plant your demolition charges on their hive, then we can get out of here,” I muttered to Sparkle. “If we follow the buzzing, we’ll eventually find it.”
The grenade launcher on Sparkle’s armor folded up and retracted. “But what if the buzzing finds us?”
True to what Sparkle getting at, the low buzz was slowly becoming a cacophonous noise in my ears. “Uh… we go sit in a corner and cry.”
I kept Decrusty spun up as I rotated myself around to face the loudest of the buzzing. As the horde of radwasps descended on us, I belatedly realized that I should have switched to the incendiary rounds first.
X~~~X
“Would you just stop that already and find us a way out of here?”
“I’m having a great time.” For a ruthless killer, I was having an excessively good time rearranging the body for my own amusement. “Look, he’s trying to rub one out!” I just couldn’t stop laughing!
“He’s dead!”
“You don’t know that!” I breathlessly choked out.
“You gave me his larynx! He bled out two minutes ago!”
“Is that what it’s called?” I hiccuped, then continued to chuckle and choke. “Not like he was using it.”
“Do you even know—no, I’ll come up with a plan.”
Gasping for breath, I gleefully sighed, “Ahh, it hurts to breathe.”
While I laughed about repositioning the dead merchant so that he looked like he was trying to lick his butt, Tangerine was trotting back and forth from shelf to shelf searching for things. For now, I was having a disturbing amount of fun posing a corpse for my personal amusement. At least my spirits had been lifted, right?
“Uuugh. UUUUGH! Why do you make everything so dif—” I stopped trying to tuck the merchant’s leg around the back of his head to observe Tangerine staring up at the ceiling. “Wait, that’s it!” she exclaimed.
On a spur of the moment, I had a better idea what to do with this guy. “You’re a genius!” I seized the forelegs of the merchant and raised them in the air, turning his body to face her.
“I… I haven’t even told you the new plan yet.”
I enthusiastically wiggled his floppy legs in the air again. “Genius!”
“Just…” Tangerine took a calming breath. “Okay, do you see that vent up there?”
Sure enough, there was an air vent in the ceiling between the hanging light fixtures. I wasn’t sure exactly what the plan was, but I hoped she knew that air vents usually led to air conditioners rather than secret passages. Looking at the size as well, I noticed that I probably wouldn’t be able to fit into it. Regardless, I replied, “Yeah.” For comedic effect, I tilted what’s-his-face’s head back to look up as well.
“Okay, here’s what we do. If you can rip the vent cover off, then we could probably get away with framing somepony else with this whole ordeal,” Tangerine rapidly blurted. “Put the body right next to his caps and I’ll figure out a few things that’ll be missed.”
It was a good plan as any, but I really didn’t see a problem with simply nonchalantly strolling out. “Alright. Let me see what I can do.” Gently, I slumped the corpse onto the counter. I spared a second to scoot the body’s foreleg so that it looked like he had died while furiously humping the tilted soda machine’s coin slot. “Pfft. Perfect.” I chuckled, then flapped into the air to talk to a vent.
Tangerine was still trotting back and forth in a hectic frenzy, so I looked on in amusement instead of doing what I should have been doing. She seemed to have an odd fixation with wires on the walls and she kept muttering muttering half-baked plans to herself, frantically searching for something.
“If you dropped a contact lens, you’re probably not going to find it.”
“I’m a little worried about the guards outside executing me for your insanity. Just get to work on the vent—carefully remove the cover and hold onto it, okay?”
I rolled my eyes. “Got it.” Hovering higher up to the vent, I noticed it was already on the verge of coming off. Using the very edge of a talon, I squeezed it into the gap between the vent cover and the vent itself and used the leverage to twist and break the flimsy metal tabs holding it in place. Unsure of what to do next, I allowed myself to drift closer to the floor with the vent cover in claw.
Tangerine trotted up to me with a small box trailing frayed wires clutched in her magical aura. “Okay, okay. Just drop that right on the floor over there, and, uh—” She stared at my claw in disgust. “And clean that blood off of your leg. They’re gonna know what’s up if they see that.” She left the computer parts with me and quickly trotted around the soda-machine-counter and through a door I hadn’t noticed before.
Maybe the tacky coating of blood slathered all over my talons was actually a problem. Belatedly, I realized, “Wait, with what?” And then I felt a rumbly in my tumbly and the answer came instantly. “Never mind. I figured it out.” I licked my chops and inhaled the sweet scent of blood.
As I ran my tongue over the first talon to “clean up” the deliciousness stuck all over it, Tangerine trotted back in—presumably to ask me something—and recoiled. “That’s not… do you even know what kind of potential diseases you can get from blood?”
Undeterred, I kept licking. Some of it was actually starting to congeal and stick, which forced me to gnaw at it until it broke free. “I’ll be fine. Besides, we can’t get in trouble if I eat the evidence.”
“You don’t… I… that’s actually not a terrible idea,” Tangerine muttered in bafflement and exasperation. “I’m not even going to argue with that…”
“Crime tastes like forks and sugar.” I satisfactorily nodded. “I’m smart.”
Tangerine pointedly looked away from me as I kept cleaning myself up, moving onto the next talon. “Here’s the plan—there’s a Talon Company crate in the back that I took the liberty of emptying. Made a mess and everything, so all we need to do is walk out like we own the place and make sure the guards don’t decide that coming in is a great idea.”
I looked around at the stocked shelves and hummed thoughtfully to myself while I gnawed at a particularly thick patch of chewy blood. “Can we empty the place out?” I asked, genuinely curious whether I could carry everything I wanted out of this place.
“Can’t. They’ll notice that everything’s missing. We could probably get away with restocking some ammo and a reasonable amount of food.”
“How about his caps? He’s not using them,” I thoughtfully replied as I continued to lap up the evidence.
“Don’t even think about it. They might know what’s up.”
“Uugh. Fine.”
The whole time, Tangerine hadn’t stopped staring at me and my licking. “Okay, that’s actually starting to bother me a lot. Here’s a rag—just wipe off the rest of it.” A questionably clean shirt followed that remark into my face.
“But it’s delicious!”
“It’s unhygienic. And disturbing.” And then, while she turned away, I managed to hear her very quietly mutter to herself: “To think I wanted to kiss that mouth.”
Hold the homoerotic fun train! “What was thaaaat?” I singsonged at her.
The mare froze, and I could almost see the little hamster wheel whirr to life. “NOTHING!” A red-faced Tangerine hastily trotted off, complaining, “Why is my thinking voice louder than my whisper voice?!”
As the very embarrassed scribe trotted away, Gala Frosty appeared at my side and whispered, “Hey, I just realized something.”
“Yeah?”
“Does Tangerine know that we’re not, uh, open to her advances?”
Wasn’t I making it obvious? Hadn’t I made it obvious? “…I think so?” I hesitantly answered.
“You’re thinking of Broken Parts.”
“Am I?”
“Yes.”
Uh oh. “Shit, does she know?”
We shared the same panicked look. “She might?”
“It’s not like I’ve been hitting on Sparkle or anything, so she souldn’t have gotten the idea,” I muttered.
Gala thoughtfully tapped her cheek. “Well, Enclave standard policy dictates that all relationships are fair game. And to be fair, most pegasi tend to ‘play for both teams’ as it were, and because of it, she probably thinks you’re open to it.”
Out of nowhere, Toasty settled on my back and blurted, “That’s racist.”
Gala looked taken aback. “How? It’s stereotyping at the worst.”
“You’re a stereotyping.”
“…What?”
To drive us back to the point, I blurted, “I still think it’s cute how she’s smitten about us.”
“You’re shitty at relationships. I’m shitty at relationships.” She threw her hooves in the air. “Who’s even driving this ship?”
Before either I, I, or I managed to answer that question, Tangerine calmly returned tugging a small wooden box behind her. “Okay, I took the liberty of getting a reasonable amount of supplies. Can you move the body a little?”
“But he’s in the perfect position!”
We both stared at the dead body, still doing its best furious humping impression. “No. Seriously. You can’t do that.”
“Fine.” No sense of humor on that mare. “How about…” Since I wasn’t allowed to have any fun, I decided to trot over and push the body off so it was on its back. “That?”
“It’ll do, I suppose.” A heavy-bladed knife floated out of the box by its handle and rocketed into the corpse’s gaping neck. “That’s probably as good as it gets.”
The gleaming Talon Company logo stood out on the knife’s hilt. “Did you get that out of the box? It’s a really high-quality knife.” I didn’t actually know—I just wanted one because it looked really cool to have.
“Just the one. Contain your excitement until we’re out of here—I think you’d like what was in that box.” Tangerine winked at me, giving the box a hefty shake. “Here, carry it.”
Grudgingly, I lowered myself so that she could shove the box onto my back. “Gah! My spine!” I mockingly cried out.
Unfortunately for me, Tangerine had gotten used to my sarcasm. “It’s not that heavy. When we walk out of here, just let me do the talking. Please.”
I rolled my eyes. “Fine.”
~~~~~
Somehow, maybe with the help from a lunar miracle, Tangerine managed to bluff us past the guards outside the shop and get our guns back from their lockup. They were none the wiser, and we were halfway to the library where Violet was still undoubtedly reading when I couldn’t hold it in anymore.
“Pfft… Hahaha! They’re going to have the biggest surprise when they walk back in there. Can you imagine the looks on their stupid faces? It’s gonna be good. Can we hang out and wait for the reaction?” Since I hadn’t had to do anything but stand there with a box earlier, I was having a great time.
On the other hoof, Tangerine was a nervous wreck. “I thought they wouldn’t buy it. Thank the powers that they didn’t look inside. My heart is literally in my ears right now. This is not okay. I. Hate. You.” Those last words sounded like they could kill.
“You don’t mean that. I’m too adorable to hate.”
The only reply I got was a shaky, angry glare.
For some reason, I couldn’t understand why. “What?”
With a fire I wasn’t expecting from the little scribe, she cried, “I’m still not over the fact that you tried to kill me earlier!” Oh. Right. That’d been a thing.
Maybe it was my outstanding record for heart failure or maybe it was guilt, but a pang of something shot through my chest. It immediately faded however as I snarled, “Oh, and I’m not allowed to be upset about being called a dog?” Then sarcastically, I continued, “But I’m a pet now, and everypony knows that animals don’t have feelings.”
“I—”
“Or am I property? Because this—” I yanked the dumb collar. “—doesn’t make me a pony, now does it?”
A weaker tug on the back of my collar made me stop short and whirl around. “You made her cry, meanie-butt.” Filly jabbed my nose in response and tugged my ears until I was facing Tangerine. She was trying to remain stoic, but she looked away as a small tear rolled down her face.
I decided that shutting up for the moment was a good idea.
As we began to navigate the multitudes of shelves in the library once more, Gala Frosty piped up once again. “In all seriousness, maybe an apology is in order.”
“Why? I didn’t do anything.”
“You killed a stallion in cold blood.”
“To be fair, it was self-defense. Slightly premature self-defense, admittedly, but still. I murdered him in warm blood.”
“Warm blood?”
“I don’t know. I mean, it’s not really cold blood because there was a reason, right? Or that we’re all warm-blooded? Pretend I’m making sense.”
Gala rolled her eyes. “Just apologize—It’ll at least make her feel better. Look, she’s a mess.”
“Do I have to?”
“You’d be less of a monster if you did.” It was difficult to ignore the disapproving glare coming from her, so I arbitrarily took interest in the surprising number of intact books lining the shelves, then the sudden lack thereof as we wandered into the section where we had left Violet in.
With a disgusted and frustrated sigh, Tangerine trotted the last few feet and collapsed onto the floor beside a neatly stacked pile of books. “I’m going to pull a Frosty and take a nap because of how stressed I am right now.” Seeing as we were in the right place, I leaned over and slid the box of stuff off my back and onto a table-looking thing.
The top of the closest stack of books to me floated away to reveal Violet giving the two of us a bored, utterly nonplussed stare. “Took you two long enough.”
“Frosty killed somepony again.”
Violet simply blinked. “Hardly surprising, really. It was bound to happen.” Without another thought, she levitated another book to her and threw it open to a bookmarked page. “Oh, also I finished research on—” In one smooth motion, she rolled her eyes and sarcastically flourished her hooves in the air. “—the thing.”
“Did you? Omigosh! Tell me, tell me, tell me!” Suddenly, Tangerine didn’t seem so tired anymore.
Once again, Violet slowly blinked, probably contemplating a decision. “This is the most difficult and most impractical spell that I have studied. I don’t see why you couldn’t just ask the pony yourself.” Several ink-stained scrolls levitated into view, dropping into Tangerine’s eagerly waiting hooves. “You know what, I’m going to bill you for this. Yeah, I’ll figure out a going rate.”
“What?!” she cried, distraught and with scrolls in hooves.
“What’s the average pay scale? Frosty?”
It was my turn to blink. “I don’t know. Do ponies still get paid? I mean, Riverbed makes money from her ‘services’”—I made air quotes to push the emphasis—“but I don’t think she mentioned anything about getting paid. Though, I wasn’t really paying attention when she was talking. No idea.”
Violet facehoofed. “I don’t even know why I bothered asking.”
Which reminded me! “Oh, by the way, Tangerine…” I turned to face the mare in question, somewhat reluctantly. “Look, I’m sorry about causing all that trouble earlier.”
“Tangent much?” Violet sighed and returned the small stack of books to where it had been before, blocking her from our line of sight. “I’ll send you the bill. Continue.”
“Uh. Anyway, yeah. Also sorry about giving you that guy’s throat. Probably shouldn’t have done that.” Weakly chuckling, I scratched the back of my foreleg and awaited the inevitable reply. “Sorry?”
A few expressions crossed Tangerine’s face—anger, compassion, frustration. “You need to consider other ponies. It’s just really infuriating when you impulsively just… do things.”
“I can’t. Hubris is a pegasus thing.” An angry glare from Tangerine and an equally questionable look from Violet’s eyes peeking through a gap in the book stacks made me immediately respond, “What?”
“Frosty, you nearly got us both killed when you attacked that merchant. No, actually, let’s go a bit farther back to when you tried to kill me.”
The disembodied voice of Violet added, “What do you have to say about that, anyhow?”
Why was I the bad guy now? “Well, I wasn’t really trying to—hey, she started it with the bucking dog jokes!” I pointed an accusing talon at Tangerine. “It was justified. Considering what’s happened to me recently, no.” Daring Tangerine to try something else, I gently shook my red collar, making the little bell on it jingle. “I think not de-throaterizing her was already letting her off easy.”
For a second, Tangerine looked frightened, then regained her furious look. “You killed a merchant for no reason!”
“He was going to kill me!” I roared.
“This isn’t like you, Frosty.”
“Oh yeah? You think you know me better than me?” I challenged, closing the distance between us until I was nearly close enough to lick her eyeballs.
“Yeah, because you don’t even know yourself!” Tangerine snapped, which actually made me take a step back. “You argue with yourself more than you used to, and you just keep getting… weirder. And more violent.”
“I...“ What could I even say? “You don’t…” It hadn’t gotten that bad, right? Wasn’t it just my imagination?
Gala appeared beside me and gently stroked the side of my wing. “You’re in denial.”
“No, I’m not!”
Triumphantly, Tangerine pointed and declared, “There, there you go again! Frosty, do you hear yourself?”
So she wanted a fight? Two could play that game. “Do I hear myself? Yeah, I bucking hear myself all the time. In fact, I can’t stop hearing myself.”
“I—”
“Do you know what it’s like to have your own running commentary on all the time? Conscience is one thing, but the voice that says ‘kill your friends’ also happens to enjoy the idea of it.” I clutched the side of my face with my claw. “Every time I make a bucking choice, consider options, or even just think of something, one of them is there to throw in their own opinion.”
“You can ask us for help, you know,” Tangerine quietly replied. “Instant’s good at mental health things, and the rest of us are still your friends.”
Ha, what a joke. “Rumcake. Friend. Ha, don’t make laugh.”
“Frosty, he’s trying to help you, but you’re not letting him.”
“Yeah, the bondage isn’t helping.” I violently shook my head and made the little bell dingle again. “And that’s super annoying.”
“Frosty, you tried to kill me earlier. What would have happened if you had a gun? What if it was Sparkle or Violet? Or Rumcake?” Tangerine asked concernedly. “What then?”
“I don’t… I… I’m sorry?” I lamely whimpered.
With one last exasperated sigh, Tangerine buried her face into her hooves. “I’ll take what I can get. Let’s just calmly sit here and learn, maybe reflect on our mistakes.” As she began to unroll the first of Violet’s three scrolls, she paused and pondered out loud, “I wonder what’s taking Rumcake so long?”
X~~~X
Rounding a corner, I punched a hole in the bottom of the first storage shed’s gate and yanked it up and open. “Move it, Junior Paladin! Get in here!”
Wild-eyed and shaking, Sparkle tumbled past me and collided with the far wall. The second her tail cleared the threshold, I threw the gate shut and hit the emergency stop on Decrusty. Even though it didn’t do anything, I held my breath as the radwasps swept past us.
As the buzzing died down to an uncomfortable hum in the distance, I sighed in relief and took a step back to check on Sparkle. It was unfortunate that she had been forced to ditch her helmet, but at least now her face wouldn’t melt off. Her left eye was still shut from the gash dripping blood into it and part of her mane had been singed off, but we’d been lucky not to have taken much more than that.
“Am… am I…” Sparkle sat up and touched her forehead and weakly chuckled, “Am I missing an eyebrow?”
Good to know she was fine. I allowed her to patch herself up so that I could tend to myself. A few patches on my armor had been splashed by acid, but most of it had been auto-repaired. Since we’d been running from the bugs rather than fighting them, I still had plenty of ammo for Decrusty. I switched to the special incendiary ammunition I had been saving for a special occasion, which this had suddenly qualified for.
“Wow, you really weren’t joking about these wasps. Good thing I was wearing a helmet.” Little did Sparkle know, she was going to be in deep trouble once we got back to base for losing that helmet. “Aww, and all the mods on it! Why, Celestia? WHYYY?” Sparkle leaned backward, shaking a hoof at the ceiling.
“Keep it down!” I urgently hissed. “Those things are still around.”
“Sorry…”
On the topic of helmets, I realized, “I should be making Frosty wear her helmet.” If Frosty didn’t want to wear hers, I could make Sparkle wear it instead.
It seemed like Sparkle was ready to move again, at least. She had patched herself up and donned a pair of well-worn and unnecessarily pink sport goggles to cover her lack of helmet. Amusingly enough, she had also decided to tie up her vibrantly purple mane into a ponytail using a zip-tie. Unfortunately for her, she’d missed a bit.
“You’ve got a little, uh…” I gestured at the top of my helmet for reference to the errant spike of mane gracefully arching forward on her head. “You’ve got a little antennae going on,” I snickered.
Sparkle gave me this weird look that screamed “I don’t believe you”, but she passed her hoof over her head and found it. “Whatever. I think it’s cool.”
Now that she had said that, I desperately channeled my inner Frosty for a witty response. “It gets all the channels, right?”
“Huh?”
“Antenna. Channels.” Giving up, I sighed. “I tried.”
“Gold star, Rumcake. Gold star.” Sparkle stamped her hooves and stretched her forelegs with an audible groan. “Alright, so what’s the new plan? We rushin’ bums now?” Immediately losing interest without a snappy reply, she began to dig through the crumbling cardboard boxes packed against the walls and floor.
Getting caught had almost melted Sparkle’s face off, but as long as the bugs didn’t spot us we’d be okay. Normally, if it were a few of them, fighting them head-on was the best method. Unfortunately, we were dealing with a nest full of these things with unconfirmed numbers and there were only two of us with very limited ammunition. I glanced at her again and grimaced, realizing that the only chance we had was to hopscotch from shed to shed until we found the hive.
Sparkle interrupted me by blurting, “Ooh, I found a box of bobbleheads. Is Frosty still collecting these?” Gingerly gathering several of them in her hooves, she presented the largest of the group to me.
The only one that I found interest in was of the leader of ponykind herself, Princess Luna. Once again manufactured by Schtable-Tec, the younger princess had barely been able to escape ridicule by bobblehead. From the neck down, she looked exactly how pre-war documentation had described—elegant, stunning, vibrant, even. But for some reason, Her royal regalia had been replaced with gaudy red sneakers and a clock on a chain. An upended three-tier cake had replaced her crown, but she still seemed to be having a laugh about it anyway.
Maybe bringing this one back for Frosty would cut me some slack. Using some of the packing material inside its original box, I stowed Princess Luna (or, as the base proclaimed, “Princess Moonbutt”) into my armored storage boxes and patted myself on the back. “This’ll get me out of the weeds. Thanks, Sparkle.”
Apparently Sparkle wasn’t even listening because she was busy packing away the rest of them—presumably for herself. I did note that Frosty already had a few of them and the box held several duplicates anyway, so I didn’t bother trying to get any more. Curiously, there was a Ministry Mare Rainbow Dash bobblehead that sported a pitch-black coat instead of her familiar bright blue, but I didn’t snag it. Frosty probably didn’t want a miscolored one anyway.
Finally finished packing her loot, Sparkle clanged her hooves together and stated, “Okay, let’s not get melted and we’ll be in the clear.”
The plan was as followed: I’d peek outside since I was the only one with a helmet, give the all-clear, then one of us would break into one of the sheds to hide when the bugs showed up to investigate the noise. After nearly an hour of this pulse-pounding nonsense, we’d managed to locate the radwasp hive nestled in a junction, spilling out of one of the storage sheds. Two heavy-duty demolition charges later, under the assurance that a bug house wasn’t as strong as a casino, we cleared the area and added a brand-new crater to the Wasteland.
We parked ourselves in a burned down ruin so that we could rest and re-gear. While Sparkle desperately tried to fix her acid-shortened mane, I elected to lie flat on my back and stare at the clouds, praying to never see another radwasp again.
It was even becoming somewhat peaceful, just having a moment mostly to myself to relax, when I saw a pony fly by overhead. I blinked in surprise and willed myself to see farther. They began to make lazy circles in the sky, seemingly uncaring of who was watching. What was another pegasus doing out here?
I squinted at it. It had a familiar white tail and an even more familiar single whitish foreleg. Immediately realizing who it was, I yelled at her, “Damn it, Frosty, was it too much to ask you sit still for once?!” Not only did she dare defy me again, she wasn’t even wearing her armor anymore either! “Get down here right now and explain yourself!”
“What? Frosty’s here?”
Pointing at the sky for Sparkle’s benefit, I continued to yell at my defiant pegasus. “You’re going to have to land sometime, and once you do I’m going to kick your butt!”
Beside me, Sparkle had pulled her goggles down around her neck and was squinting as well. “Do you even know how far up she is? I don’t think she can hear you.” With a groan, she rubbed her eyes. “Some of that stuff might have melted through my goggles. Can’t see shit.”
Frosty abruptly stopped circling and began to hover, only to glide away. “She’s headed back to town, seems like. I’m going to clip her wings when I catch up to her, and you’re not going to stop me. I should have done it weeks ago.” I looked over at Sparkle. “Cut the gawking and double time it. Looks like Frosty thinks she’s hot shit, and that’s exactly what she’s gotten into.”
X~~~X
For the third time in the last ten minutes, I groaned. “This is boring.” Lounging on my back with my limbs haphazardly splayed was getting uncomfortable, especially since power armor wasn’t designed for extended periods of lying down. To entertain myself, I had been keeping one of my discarded feathers aloft by blowing at it when it got too low.
My time could have been better spent on armor maintenance or cleaning my guns, but I just didn’t feeeel like it. The collar around my neck was tight enough to be a nuisance, which only reminded me about being a slave to the Rangers again. Now it wasn’t too different, just lighter and with less boom.
I’d made myself sad, and I couldn’t pull myself out of that rut. At least I hadn’t broken down into tears yet. That was always embarrassing. Stupid emotions.
What I needed was another distraction. Lazily, I clapped my hooves together and caught the feather. “Puppy needs walkies,” I bluntly announced. If I was going to wear a collar from now on, I was going to passive-aggressive the crap out of everypony. Spreading the guilt around would slowly make me feel better.
From somewhere behind Skyscraper Bookfort, a particularly heavy tome slammed shut and was immediately followed with an exasperated sigh. “Tangerine, would you please entertain the pegasus? I’m trying to do your work.” Several books inched their way out of the gargantuan stack and neatly arranged themselves on Tangerine’s head by color.
“I’m not doing damage control if anything happens,” Tangerine flatly responded. “Why don’t you go get some fresh air with Frosty? Goddesses know you need it.”
Using the most droll voice I could muster, I groaned, “I’d go take a walk myself but we all know I need a hitching post.” Now that I needed to be chaperoned everywhere, I was also going to start making myself the biggest inconvenience possible as revenge.
“Ha. Fresh air. What a joke.” The giant stack of books shifted, allowing Violet to crawl out of the nest she’d made for herself. “Fine. Don’t blame me if you turn yourself into a turnip.”
“What?!” Tangerine exclaimed, halfway through one of the scrolls that Violet had made for her.
Lightly brushing out her mane, Violet replied, “Everything works in theory, but I didn’t bother testing.”
The two unicorns were silent, then I noticed that they were both looking at me. “We could test it on Frosty.” Tangerine brightly suggested.
Test subject? Nope. “Nuh-uh. I hate turnips.”
Turning back to Violet, she whined, “How are you sure it works then?”
Mockingly, Violet tilted her head and tapped her chin. “Oh, I don’t know. Math. Logic proofs. Research. More math. You know, just things that you’ve made me do that you could’ve easily done yourself.”
“Hey!”
“And the aether manipulation conservation formula hasn’t failed me yet. In theory.”
“Wait, will this spell really turn me into a turnip?”
“Only if you mess it up. I also can’t guarantee if you’ll be able to change back even if it works.” The stack of books shifted again and a thick leatherbound book launched itself at Tangerine’s face. She barely managed to snag it in her own magical field a mere inch from her face. “That one has reversals and counter-spells in it. You’re looking for something around chapter nine, but ignore section five.”
“Why?”
“Hexes.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” Violet turned to me and humorlessly told me, “If you’re on your best behavior, I’ll take you to the birdbath.” Before I could come up with a witty response, she smirked and flipped her hood up. “If you behave yourself, I’ll even buy you some cotton candy.”
“Cotton candy? That’s not even possible here.” I was actually more bothered that Violet had emotions that weren’t disdain.
As Violet trotted away from me and my lackluster reply, she teasingly shot back, “Not with that attitude.”
I rolled my eyes and galloped after her. “That attitude my ass.”
Unfortunately for me, there was neither birdbath nor cotton candy anywhere in the, what, “main square” area. Actually, for the middle of a town, it wasn’t as busy as it had been earlier. With Violet lazily following me around, I opted to hover over and around the ponies in my way. Every now and then I would perform a carefree loop, just because I was bored.
After deciding that the bandage situation on my wings were outdated and useless, I quickly landed to shed them before hovering again. I’d forgotten how calming it was to just fly when nopony was shooting at us. I pulled short of another loop and hovered so I could think. Somewhere in the trashed pits of my mind, a list of combat maneuvers floated to the surface—one of which I wasn’t sure that I could perform anymore. It involved a lot of exploiting natural pegasus agility and abusing the way physics didn’t apply to pegasi.
Once I made sure I had enough room to dash back and forth, I limbered up and practiced swishing my wings back and forth rapidly. In mid-neck roll, I noticed Violet curiously staring at me. This time, I wasn’t going to let her make me look like an idiot. “Have you heard of the Ground Blitz?”
Slowly, Violet levitated her book open and flipped it open to a page bookmarked with a little blue triangle. “With a ‘the’? No.” Her Frosty-feather quill floated out of the inside of her robes, followed by an inkwell. “Elaborate.”
“It’s a mobility maneuver that scouts and recon personnel are expected to learn for close quarters.” To demonstrate my point, I half-opened my wings and planted my hooves like I was about to take off. “This is about as far as I’d be able to safely spread my wings in a tunnel or hallway. The idea is a strong half-beat with a launch, and as you’re in the air, punch downward to stop momentum and do it all over again. It looks dumb, but it covers distance.”
Even after I’d finished explaining, Violet was still violently scribbling, even bringing extra sheafs of paper form somewhere in her robe. “I don’t believe you because that’s not how momentum works.” Apparently, I was going to be the one to make me look like an idiot.
I fixed her with a determined glare and snapped, “Look, it works in practice.”
Smugly, Violet allowed her book to close and she neatly stacked her writing supplies on top of it. “Prove it.”
“Okay, I will!” Without taking my eyes off of the doubtful unicorn, I pawed at the ground and smirked. “Easy peasy.”
With the practiced ease of a million takeoffs, I launched myself forward into the air. I rapidly pumped my wings twice, opening them just barely. Now the fun part—this trick depended on weight and momentum, but I was more used to using my now nonexistent left foreleg for the drop. All I knew was that my claw was “light”, but it didn’t feel the same.
My wondering was going to have to wait, because I collided face-first with another pony.
With my face full of surprisingly well-toned flank, I tried to regain my bearings through the haze of dizziness clouding my brain. Violet trotted up to us and asked, “Are you okay?” I was about to reply, but then Violet completely ignored me and went to assist the pony I’d collided with instead.
At least Gala Frosty appeared to help me up, holding out her hoof. “Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks for asking.” Ignoring Violet, I took Gala’s hoof and let her pull me to my hooves.
Upon observing the other pony, I almost thought that I had knocked all the color out of him. All that was left was two varying shades of gray on the earth pony and bored-looking red eyes. There wasn’t really anything about him that stood out, besides his saddlebags and lack of any sort of armor whatsoever. And what kind of cutie mark was a security camera, anyway?
“At first curiosity, he’s probably a local, but…” Gala trailed off, looking at the pony intently. “I just have the most peculiar feeling about him, I suppose.”
“Hm.” I kept her words in mind, mostly because she usually wasn’t wrong about much.
“Sorry about my friend. She’s not that bright,” Violet apologized to the stallion, even politely helping him up.
After brushing himself off and making sure that his saddlebags were still secured, the stallion simply responded, “No, no, I wasn’t paying attention. It’s my fault.” He furtively glanced around and cleared his throat. “I have somewhere to be. See you around, Frosty.”
Still slightly peeved about Violet, I was more busy hovering and practicing the last portion of my move rather than paying attention to the conversation. “See ya,” I distractedly replied, only hearing my name.
While I was trying to reverse the Ground Dash so that I could use my right hoof instead of my much lighter claw for momentum-canceling exploitation, Violet was making confused-sounding noises. I wasn’t really sure what she said, but at least I came to the conclusion that I currently lacked the technique to Dash until I figured out how to righty it.
As I was rotating myself to tell this to Violet, a familiar helmet beside a slightly less familiar-looking mare in the distance caught my eye. “Rumcake!” I hovered higher and waved at him.
The second he saw me as well, he tossed his helmet to the curiously un-helmeted and goggled Sparkle, and cried, “Frosty!” He began to gallop toward me, basically bulldozing anypony in his way.
He seemed happy to see me, which was a nice change in demeanor. “Rumcake!” Maybe he’d come to and wanted to apologize? Nevertheless, I glided to meet him.
“Frosty!”
What I’d thought was elation seemed to give way to incandescent rage. “Rumcake?” I slightly less enthusiastically called back, hesitantly flapping my wings to slow down.
With renewed rage, Rumcake bellowed, “FROSTY!” Somehow, he managed to speed up and stampede faster, determined to catch me and do… unspeakable things, presumably.
Fire burned from his eyes, and in that second I knew I’d done something horribly wrong. No doubt about it, that was definitely rage. With a fillyish scream that could shatter windows, I stopped all forward momentum with a flare of my wings and launched myself in the opposite direction.
I frantically beat my wings to build up raw speed, but right as I thought I’d made my escape, the collar around my neck heated nearly searing hot. “Ow! What th—” In the three seconds it took for me to realize that it hurt, the collar stopped right where it was. Physics demanded that I abide to its rules for once and the rest of me kept moving forward.
It was a damn good thing I hadn’t managed to make escape velocity while I was still freaking out, otherwise I would have snapped my neck from being stopped by the stupid magic collar. Confusion kept me aloft for a little longer until my wings gave out and I dropped to the ground.
Either getting suddenly stopped by my neck or hitting the ground flat on my back had knocked the air out of my lungs, leaving me gasping and confused. Sometimes getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air. At least the burning sensation from the collar began to subside as I tried to catch my breath.
A dark shadow loomed over me and blocked the meager light coming through the cloud cover. I attempted to choke out something witty like “You’re in my light”, but the only thing that came out of my mouth was pained wheezing. Weakly fluttering my wings, I somehow rolled myself over.
“FROSTY. YOU HAD ONE JOB.”
For some reason, Rumcake sounded really pissed. “Did I?” I coughed, hammering my chest to cough up the lung causing all my air problems.
“I TOLD YOU TO STAY PUT. WAS THAT SO HARD FOR YOU?”
“All I did was go sho—”
The backside of Rumcake’s hoof smashing into my jaw sent me reeling, landing me flat on my back again. When I tried to open my mouth to say something—retort, anger, indignation—pain lanced through the right side of my face. All I could muster was a shocked, frightened look.
What was happening? Did I do something wrong again?
A tongue ran up the side of my face and tickled the edge of my mouth. “You did sort of kill a guy earlier,” Toasty huskily whispered into my ear.
There wasn’t any way he’d already heard about it. What had I done?
Rumcake seized my collar and effortlessly lifted me up with one hoof, bringing me nose-to-nose to him. “At every single twist and turn, you ignore everything I tell you to do. Is this just another one of your harebrained excuses to do whatever you want?!” he viciously snarled into my face.
Still confused and frightened, I did the first thing that came to mind.
I gave his nose a quick smooch then innocently looked on, hiding a grimace behind my worried stare.
For a brief moment, all hints of anger vanished from his face. Brief being the key word, since he immediately regained his enraged gaze. “You think that makes everything better?” From my forced vantage point, I caught sight of Sparkle worriedly muttering something into a small hoofheld radio.
Without any idea what I’d done wrong, I desperately tried to defuse the situation at hoof. “We can talk about this, right?” Attempting to squirm away resulted in failure. How did he hold on so tightly with just his hoof?
“Who took off the collar? Huh? Did you threaten Violet to do it?”
What was going on? “W-what?”
“Drop the pegasus and nopony gets hurt.” I managed to twist my head to look and immediately confused myself. My savior, or rather, “savior”, was a slightly scrawny-looking black and whitish griffon with little to no armor, a sniper rifle strapped to his back, and some kind of cross-themed jewelry strung around his neck beside a tattoo of an “R”. Combat scars danced across the right side of his face, nearly obscuring an amber eye. An odd bird, especially with that black beak of his. Huh.
“This has nothing to do with you. Back off.”
“If you’re going to interrogate an Enclave agent, you should have done it in private.” I tried not to laugh as the griffon attempted to strike a stoic pose. “This is neutral ground, and I am obliged to take action.”
“Do you have a death wish, you dumb bird?” Rumcake finally dropped me to confront the griffon, which gave me ample time to regain my footing and retreat to Sparkle’s beckoning hooves.
She squeezed me into a sympathetic hug and patted the back of my head before letting me go. “I would have helped, but… you know, rank and stuff. You okay?”
“Uh. I’m actually just more angry and confused rather than upset. What’s the sitrep?” What was going on?
Both of us were distracted by a sudden outburst from the griffin. “Me an’ what army? Me and what army? Me and this army, bitch!” He snapped his talons and victoriously cried, “Say hello to the Ravenflight, asshole!”
Not much happened, thus ruining the built-up drama.
The griffin looked around and yelled, “I said, me and this army!”
A scattered squadron of griffins halfheartedly emerged from seemingly nowhere, a few even gliding in. They were all frighteningly armed to their beaks, one of the many trademarks of the Talon Mercenaries. Yet another griffin leisurely meandered up to the first griffin, sipping on the rubber tubing connected to the beer cans taped to his combat helmet.
“Duuude, you can’t like, assemble the Revengers every time it’s like, cool, man.”
“What happened to my ‘this army’, Blondie?”
“Chiiill, man. I, like, I don’t—” Blondie woozily chuckled. “—I just don’t even know, man.”
“I’ll… I’ll deal with you later.” The pale griffin groaned at his lackey, then pointed an accusing talon at Rumcake again. “Leave the mare alone or else your little Ranger friend back there is going to have to bring you back to your cave in a soup can.” With a fancy talon-twirl, he beckoned, “Maestro, if you would.”
Once again, nothing particularly impressive happened.
“Come on! Guyyys, you’re making me look like a scrub,” he whined at the rest of the decidedly bored griffins, most of which weren’t paying much attention anyway. “Is this what happens when Dad’s on vacation? All of you suck.”
“You suck!” one of the griffins crowed, which caused the rest of them to cackle and guffaw with laughter. “Nobody likes you, square.”
“My name is Rhombus! A rhombus is not a square!” Ignoring it, the birdcat—Rhombus—raised himself on his hindlegs and threateningly unslung the rifle across his back. Unfortunately, he didn’t come off as imposing because of how much scrawnier he looked next to Rumcake. “Back off the mare and you’ll be free to go, if you’re lucky.”
Rumcake simply chuckled. “Do you really think that you can intimidate me? A commander that cannot be respected cannot be feared.” Taking advantage of the griffon’s hesitation and confusion, he continued, “And what I do with my Rangers is my business. We have no quarrel with the Talon Company or their subsidiaries, and I would rather you not ruin that relationship.”
“Is that a threat?”
“You tell me, pentagon.” The sound of shit-eating grin positively ooozed out of his helmet. “Is it?”
Muttering mostly to myself, I wondered, “Is it just me, or is Rumcake a lot dumber than I thought he was when I met him? The shape he’s looking for is a trapezoid, not a stupid pentagon.”
“Not a trapezoid,” Violet off-hoofedly chimed in.
“He’s a little slow sometimes, but he’s not stupid,” Sparkle remarked. While I processed and pondered that statement, she hopped on her hindlegs, trying to get a better look at the argument. She flashed a worried glance in my direction. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
I grumpily replied, “I told you already—I’m just confused and angry.”
Sparkle suddenly grabbed me by the shoulders and pulled me away to examine my glum expression. “What you need is fun and energy.”
I arched an eyebrow at her.
“What we need is Dash.”
Using the opportunity given by Sparkle’s disturbingly ecstatic expression, I finally managed to break away from her and irritably flap my wings. “What I need is answers. What’s going on? What happened? Did Tangerine tell him about the guy I blew up?”
“You blew someone up?”
“Well, not literally.” Not technically a lie. “What’s gotten Rumcake so cheesed?”
“He saw you flying in our airspace earlier.”
What? “But I’ve been here the whole time.” To make my point I tugged the collar around my neck and grimaced. “Not like I’m allowed to go anywhere else.”
Sparkle tilted her head at me, then stared off after Rumcake. I followed suit, only because his argument with the griffon seemed to be escalating rapidly. They were arguing about the nuances of shapes and domestic violence when the huffing and puffing of a very fruitlike and out-of-shape scribe trotted up to us.
“Whew… okay… Sorry, I got… a little… lost,” Tangerine panted, pulling up the edge of her hood from around her shoulder to wipe her face. “I heard what… whew, what happened. Is Frosty okay?”
“I’m right here, you know. What am I, invisible?” Throwing my head back in disgust, I groaned, “Ugh. Thanks, guys. I feel so appreciated.”
At least Tangerine knew I was being overly dramatic, since she playfully tried to shove me. “Hey, we care. I care, at least. Woah, what happened to your face?”
A wave of déjà vu washed over me and I nearly forgot about firing back a witty remark. “Wow, your face is funny-looking too, thanks,” I hastily snapped back.
Surreptitiously, Sparkle leaned over and loudly whispered, “That’s why I didn’t point it out, Tangie.”
Completely ignoring the remark, Tangerine levitated a tiny bag-looking thing out of her saddlebags and bashed it once against Sparkle’s armor. “You’ve got a shiner of a bruise forming on your face. Here, at least let me put some ice on it.” The little bag slowly floated up to the side of my face and forced me to realize exactly how hard Rumcake had hit me. The cold from it stung as it gently rubbed against my face, which was only making me more angry.
I snatched the cold pack from Tangerine’s aura and mashed it against my face for maximum pain relief. “Thanks, I guess,” I muttered, wincing.
“What happened to you? I literally left you alone with Violet for ten minutes.” Sparkle, Tangerine, and I all glanced at the mare in question, who had sat down and had been preoccupying herself with whatever she normally did with her book. “Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised.”
Even I wasn’t exactly sure exactly what had happened. “Rumcake discovered the wonders of having an abusive relationship.” I lazily flapped my wings to shrug since I was still holding onto the cold pack. “If he thinks he’s going to be able to sweet-talk me away from that, that’s gonna be a paddling.” The side of my face had gone slightly damp and numb, which only contributed to the slightly soggy anger building inside me.
“Seriously though, what happened?”
“Uh… long story short, Rumcake saw Frosty flying around our area of operations when she shouldn’t have been, so he whacked Frosty,” Sparkle quickly summarized. “And now here we are.”
“But Frosty’s been with me all afternoon.”
“Apparently not.”
“No, she was being a pain in the ass all afternoon. There wasn’t time for her to slip out at all in that time window.” Tangerine angrily glared at me, which I answered with a bashful grin. Returning to Sparkle, she asked, “Wait, did you see her?”
“Sort of. I think I got some acid in my eyes or something back there, because everything’s blurry as shit.” Pushing up her goggles and rubbing her eyes, Sparkle groaned. “My face hurts.”
Two black-armored griffons shoved Sparkle and Tangerine away from me, disregarding their cries of complaint. “Take a step back, Steel Rangers,” one of them growled, brandishing his assault rifle. The other weilded some sort of rocket launcher, which probably wasn’t a good idea considering the distance.
Rumcake and the dumb shape-themed griffon stomped up to me, both with looks of displeasure plastered on their respective faces. “Well? Are you with them?” Rhombus demanded, who obviously didn’t believe it.
I could capitalize on this for my own amusement. Maybe even get a little revenge while I was at it, if I played my cards right. Right on cue, Filly Frosty eagerly scooted into my mind and took over, all while thinking mischievous thoughts. Using the best frightened little puppy face she could muster, I looked the griffon right in the eyes and whimpered, “P-please don’t m-make me go back with him, m-mister.”
That was all it took to win Rhombus over, his gaze softening and the hints of a wry little grin forming on his beak. On the other hoof, Rumcake was going ballistic. “What kind of new bullshit is this? Frosty, cut that out right now! You’re a Ranger, damn it!”
Whether it was Filly’s foalish charm or being a damsel in distress, Rhombus sprung to my aid. “That’s all I needed to hear. Get these Steel Retards out of here, on the double!”
“You’re going to believe her?!”
I let my hold on the cold pack falter, showing off the shiny new bruise on my face to both parties.
Rhombus grinned. “Yep, I am. Scram, ‘tards. Unfortunately, seeing as you haven’t done much more than abuse this unfortunate pegasus, I don’t have enough reason to force you to leave Stronghold.”
“Just because she’s a mare doesn’t mean she’s not lying!”
“And I should trust you? You?” Rhombus doubtfully responded. “Yeah, right.” Looking over his shoulder, he shouted to the remaining griffons, “Make sure these idiots clear out.”
Taking the opportunity to rub it in, I victoriously sneered at Rumcake. Served him right. The victim card always won. Goody four-horseshoes “heroes” loved saving mares in distress, even if they weren’t as innocent as they appeared. So, as Square the Talon Merc gently ushered me away muttering reassurances, Rumcake, Sparkle, and Tangerine were being shoved in the opposite direction by the rest of the heavily armed griffons.
And of course, Violet hadn’t budged. Because she wasn’t paying attention. Great.
“Boss! Bossbossbossboss!” A griffin that looked decidedly different from the others raced to catch back up with us. Some sort of huge boxy radio-looking thing was strapped to his back, and all manner of devices and wires were haphazardly secured all over him. A pair of headphones sat on top of his reversed hoofball cap (Go, Oceania Otters!) and he didn’t even have a single weapon on him.
How’d I miss this guy?
“Dude, you’re making me look small-time here,” Rhombus groaned. “What could you possibly need this time?”
Completely ignoring him, this new griffin blurted, “Remember that Raptor that Delta team spotted?”
“Soundwave, I already told Hamshank that we’re not stealing it.”
“Shit’s goin’ down, yo! Pon-3’s on it, yo—here, listen!” The griffin—Soundwave—yanked off his headphones and presented them to us. He fiddled with a few knobs and dials on a nearly PipBuck-esque thing strapped to his arm and moved a few plugs. Eventually, a radio broadcast began to blare from the impromptu speakers.
“—ight and roll of thunder that a lot of you reported from the vicinity of Splendid Valley just over forty hours ago? The one a lot of you said was like a megaspell going off? Turns out it was a megaspell going off. Right in the heart of Splendid Valley.
“Now I don’t have a lot of details. But I can confirm that a whole mess of alicorns fled the valley less than half an hour before the detonation. And I can now confirm reports that our Wasteland Heroine was on the Ponyville side of Splendid Valley earlier that day. Now I don’t know yet if there’s any connection, but if I was a betting pony, I’d say our Bringer of Light had her hoof in what happened out there.
“Not really the light I was talkin’ about, Stable Dweller. Our prayers go out to you. I hope you’re okay. If you… or anypony has any further information… please let me know. Right away."
“Shit’s goin’ down!” Soundwave squealed.
Rhombus smacked him over the head. “Shh!” We all leaned in closer to hear better.
“As for reports of odd behavior from the alicorns in the wake of this occurrence, or claims of seeing odd black ponies flying through the sky, I can only…”
BZZZzzzzzzzzzzckht!
The broadcast abruptly cut out, and Soundwave muttered, “What the shit? Hold on, I can fix it. It’s probably just th—”
“Greetings, citizens of the Equestrian Wasteland. This is the Grand Pegasus Enclave. We have commandeered this broadcast to deliver an important message to all ponies:
“Do not be afraid. We are here to save you!”
Silence.
First thing that came to my mind was, “Oh shit.”
“Aw sheeit!” Soundwave was taking the news slightly more in stride. “We’re gonna have so much fun! Think of all the free shit and stuff…”
Rhombus ran his talons through his head-feather-things. “Uh—okay, okay. Uh. Soundwave, get Thundercane on the line. No, round everybird up, then contact her.”
The radio birdcat toggled a switch on one of the boxes strapped to his chest. “Roger that, beacon’s on.”
“She’ll want to know what’s happening and why she might not be getting her sapper team back.” After receiving an affirmative nod from the other griffon, he nodded to himself and added, “Oh, and call my dad.”
In mid-adjust, Soundwave gave him a weird look and cautiously asked, “Are you sure? I mean, the old bird did sa—”
Clearing his throat, Rhombus recited, “And I quote, ‘I don’t want to be bothered unless the sky itself falls or a balefire bomb blows up Tenpony.’ I think this qualifies as a little of column A and a little of column B.”
Why were the Enclave coming down? Hadn’t the permanent plan been “sit around and ignore everything” or something? With my security clearance, all I could remember was the periodic Wasteland Check to make sure nopony was trying to get into the Enclave with a rocket or something. A change of power, maybe? Had the goody four-horseshoe right-wingers finally decided that enough was enough?
While I had been panicking, Gala had been thoughtfully looking up at the sky. “Hadn’t desertion rates been steadily increasing? Maybe they’re trying to get all the rebels and Dashites back? Or do you think they’re here for something else?”
“Like what?” I tried to come up with anything worthy of coming down for, but all I could think of was a supply run on a galactic scale. None of this made sense!
“Wait.” That outburst made me meet Gala’s suddenly terrified gaze. “What if they’re here for us?”
What? “Why?”
A memory flooded to the surface, unbidden.
—
“So… like, you want me to shoot her, guy?” Riverbed ventured.
“Uh.” I paused. Weeks ago, that could have been me. Heck, as far as I knew this exact scenario could have happened to me. Empathy kicked in. “I think we should let her go.”
They looked appalled. “What? What if she gives away our position?” Riverbed objected. “Or even better, what if she grabs reinforcements, guy?”
I’d make sure that didn’t happen. I confidently strode up to number five and yanked her visor open. “What’s your name?”
She stayed silent, regarding me with angry, teary eyes. I didn’t blame her. Three insane maniacs had just destroyed her squad and their commanding officer in under three minutes. Months of psychiatric help wouldn’t even dent what she’d witnessed today.
“Alright, fine. I get it. But I’ve got my own plans, and you just happened to be in completely the wrong place at completely the wrong time.” I sighed. “I don’t expect an apology, but I do expect this: tell the Council what happened here today. Take your commanding officer’s recorder or whatever as proof.”
Tangerine levitated Major’s gauntlet to the pegasus. “The data should still be intact.”
—
"Oh, shit. They’re here for us.”
“Relax, relax. There isn’t a reason to send the whole military after us, is there?” Gala rapidly blurted. “I mean, it’s not like the Enclave to use such excessive force. Maybe they’re just here about the megaspell? I mean, they might think there’s more.”
Or maybe it was a way to flush me out. Panic, do something stupid, and fly right into a trap. That’s what they wanted, right? “So what, do we ignore it? Hide?
Toasty materialized on my back and snarled into my ear, “The backup finally arrived. You should have killed that bitch when you had the chance! This is why empathy is dumb, assface.”
Damn you, hubris. Now there was an army descending on the Wasteland, and it was probably all my fault. I’d gotten sentimentally cocky and let that mare go with all the evidence she needed to crucify the shit out of me, and she’d brought back all the fire and brimstone in the world.
And just when I thought things couldn’t possibly get any worse today, somepony I hadn’t expected to ever hear from again trotted up behind me and brightened it back up a little.
“Haven’t seen you around for a while, guy! Like, small world, right?”
Footnote: Level up!
New Perk: Intimidation (Level 3) – There isn’t a problem that can’t be solved with violence. New speech options to certain characters have been unlocked. You gain a damage bonus against NPCs that are terrified of you.
Current Sub-perk: Foal at Heart – Growing up is overrated. You gain additional dialogue options with foals.
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Aw yeh
I must say again I love Frosty and her psycopathic tendencies. Love her in a way that does not interfere with her current relationships.
She left the Steel Rangers? Really?
Yeah Mythbusters!
80% sure this is a The Avengers reference.
75% sure this is a TF2 Meet the Demo reference.
Yep nothing better to do than just look for references in this chapter.
But the collar?
I'm quite wondering how the OCs will be used... Hmm...
Eureka! They'll all play nerd games in a basement!
5119600
Welcome back!
-Yeah, looks like these Rangers are morons then.
-And yes, timing is a problem for me. No idea what I"m doing.
-"Why not just slip it on? Or would it get in the way of using the rifles?" I was under the impression that having it on would make using a rifle cumbersome in this case.
-"This would mean something if those terms had ever been used before this." This is me trying to make the world a bit more realistic- not everything is ever explained fully or context given the first time you hear it.
-"Why? Why not use that attachment?" Can't see at very long distance without the scope attachment.
-I think I forgot which alicorns did what when I was writing this thing, so that's an oversight on my part. Retroactively covering my ass with "That's why Frosty got away with it".
-"Last time we saw, she was placing the weapon in her bag."-I forgot! AAAA THIS IS UNKNOWNLIGHT'S FAULT FOR NOT SEEING IT EITHER
I did my best. Hopefully Act 2 won't be nearly as dumb.
I liked Rumcake up until this chapter. I still like him, it just feels weird for Rumcake to all of a sudden be really dense/stupid/etc. I feel like his part could have been done better.
Otherwise, though, great stuff as usual.
5120167
It's partly me trying to be clever and me being bad at writing relationships. Bear with me here.
5120201
I suppose I can bear with it then.
5120167 I disagree; Rumcake's not really being stupid. Think about it from his perspective: Frosty has nearly died multiple times because of her recklessness; Rumcake tries to stop her the only way he knows how (really, as much shit Rumcake's been given over the collar, there's really no other option because you know Frosty ignores instructions); then he finds that, despite all his effort, Frosty still somehow escaped and flew off on her own (he's actually seeing the changeling from Intermission 2, but he doesn't know that); and then when he goes back to town to confront her about it, she lies to him (from his perspective), and then pretends that he's some stranger that's been abusing her.
He's not being stupid, he's just being emotional. He's trying to protect someone, but nothing's working out and Frosty seems determined to kill herself somehow anyway. It's a stressful and discouraging situation to be in, and he has very justified anger toward Frosty.
5120357
Sorry, I suppose I wasn't being very clear. You're exactly right, Rumcake was justified in being angry. I liked that about the story, that he was legitimately being angry and that there were consequences for Frosty's actions (the collar). What I meant with my comment was that it feels like everypony is acting as though Rumcake is the one in the wrong- even himself, in the first part of the chapter (where he says "I messed up" or something to that effect). It felt different enough from the previous chapter(s) -- which had Rumcake as kind of the rightfully-angry one -- that this most recent one --which had Rumcake portrayed as the one in the wrong/stupid/etc -- felt off, like I described. Hopefully that clears up how I feel.
5120386 Oh, I see. Well, a few things to keep in mind then. One: Rumcake is worried that he did the wrong thing, but only when he was away from the others besides Sparkle. Because it really is a cruel thing to do, especially to someone who's supposedly your girlfriend. Even though there probably weren't any other options, that doesn't stop him from feeling like he failed for not thinking of a better solution.
Two: Group dynamics. The reason the others are sympathizing with Frosty and not Rumcake is because people naturally sympathize with the victim. Frosty's the obvious victim here, and Rumcake's the one with the power. Everyone let Rumcake do it in the first place without complaint so they clearly logically agree, but it feels unfair emotionally. Plus, Rumcake's the only male around; the other girls will sympathize more with the depressed girlfriend.
Three: This whole story is from Frosty's POV, and from Frosty's POV of course she's in the right. As readers, we can see otherwise, but the narration is biased by Frosty's perceptions.
5120491
Those are some pretty good points. Not much I can really say to that, except I'll probably re-read the chapter while keeping that in mind and see if it was just me being derpy the first time around.
Cheeki Breeki iv damke!
Okay, given I reached the end of act one, overall thoughts so far.
...... Pretty good, yet also pretty flawed.
The overall story, the major plot, and a lot of the ideas in the story are great. And it has some really incredible moments and just overall could be a really awesome and epic story. Except, the flaws keep puling it down. Plot convenience abounds, and while yeah ultimately every story has that, this one does a really poor job at hiding it a lot of times. Here you can tell something is happening just because the story needs it to happen rather then feeling like a natural part of the story. Inconsistencies with details, or just totally glossing over details which take the reader out of the work. When things don't make sense, or aren't described, it makes it harder for a reader to really get into the story, to accept it as happening, see it as a story, rather then just words on a page/screen. And a major issue with learning to show, not tell. Which adds to the pacing being way to fast at times. The story just skipping over stuff that really should be explained or elaborated on with a few quick lines of narration or dialog telling what was going on to rush to the next plot point.
All of these keep the story from really being as great as it could be, from feeling like a grand, epic tale and just, making it frustrating to read at times because of how great it would be, baring these small details always cropping up. But it's only because, outside of these issues the story is so damn good that they stand out all the more.
Now the good stuff. First, the humor, yeah overall this is a more lighthearted, fun story that is more about getting some laughs and just having fun, and it works. And yes you can be rather serious about stuff too, which the story overall does handle the mixture between comedy and serious rather well. And some of the issues above are mitigated by the more comedic nature, but not a lot of them. If the story was just going for insane, nonsensical, laughs before all comedy, the narrative structure issues would be nowhere near as big a problem, but in trying to be serious at times as well, they do become issues.
Second Characters. At least the main ones. They, are all pretty awesome, each one feeling unique and easy to identify with. Though secondary ones tend to be either really bland/generic, or just be so all over the place they are hard to pin down. But the main ones, Frosty, Doc, Rummy, Baked. All amazing. Okay, Tabber isn't bad as a character either, but definitely the one I like the least just for the shit he's done and his overall attitude and is the hardest of them to really pin down.
Frosty herself is by far the best thing about the story, and one of the most well done things. She's sympathetic, insane in the best possible way, funny, tragic, and overall comes off as a really good, and compelling character I want to see make it through and overcome the obstacles before her. To figure out what happened to her, and just love seeing what she does. The Head!Frosties are a great idea and very well used. Just, yeah despite the narrative issues, I enjoy reading the story mostly for her.
So, overall so far, a story with a ton of promise, some amazing characters, a great sense of humor, and yet still able to be serious and emotional at times, and has all the makings to be a truly epic and amazing story. That is sadly hampered by a lot of trouble with the narrative. Poor pacing, Telling not showing, inconsistencies, (Which are really bad because it removes any real chance of subtly to the story. Since a lot of time you can never be sure what is a subtle hint to something not being right, or is just a goof in the writing. Like her team in the memory being attacked by something using a gun. Since all the Hellhounds ever used were Energy Weapons. Hint that there was more going on and somepony else was involved in that debacle, or just a goof? Or the Dream Guard that confronted them the second time, is the fact he didn't show up the first time significant, was there a reason for it, or just an inconstancy?) And a massive ton of plot convenience that never even tries to hide it's just there because the story needs it to be there.
Generally I care more about the what of the story then the how. What is going on, what the story is about, the plot and characters, the facts of the story. Over how it's told. Baring when the how interferes with figuring out the what. But this story, is close to a line where the how being flawed is making it hard to really get into the what. yet the what is good enough that, were I not doing the whole in depth review/commentary thing I would be annoyed by it, but move on and get over it. And I do overall like the story, and LOVE Frosty. And it's only because of how damn GOOD so much of the story is, that the minor flaws stand out all the more and are so glaring.
So yeah, a great story, with some rather significant flaws in the storytelling, but with enough humor, fun, great characters, and heart to look past it and still want to read more.
Hope you've been enjoying the commentary, even if it does tend to be mostly snarky bitching.. I only get hung up because the rest of the story is so damn good, and I really do want the story to be amazing.
FINALLY! I'm up to date!
Although I' curious; what the heck is Frosty's level cap?
5125407
Would you believe... 800?
No? How about 93 and a helicopter?
50 and a platter of crabcakes.
A rational number.
Yeah, let's go with that.
5122450
More than likely I'll go ahead and do ANOTHER rewrite once this mess is done. You have no idea how much I value your input and reviews, and I'd like to thank you greatly for it.
"Goddamn it, I am such a goofball." *Casually throws cigar away*
5130970
5130474
To be fair, I had no idea that "Contains PH" needed to be a trigger warning. This is the only chapter it shows up in, and let me get to why in a second. The original version of this chapter was a load of shit, so I had to change it out and write a whole new one. This intermission was supposed to make a few things more clear.
Here's the problem: Yes, I also do hate post-34 PH with a passion. Problem is, pastBobulator hadn't gotten to the shitty part of it yet and ingrained the raider virus into the story a bit harder than necessary. When the rewrite came around, there was no way to actually remove it or alter it in a way that didn't sound contrived, dumb, or simply a ripoff. This is how I dealt with it, and I'm sorry that you didn't like it. If you think you have a better idea, by all means go ahead and pitch it, but this is how it'll have to be for the sake of plot integrity.
5131731 Well the "You should have told warned me" was directed at Unknown not you, since he knows how.. badly.. I react to that.... document.
I've calmed down and, yeah like I said and you've seen I have, a really bad reaction to that story for, several reasons. Some with the story itself, some with Somber personally.
And two things right off, of many, that I despised about PH are the Raider virus, undermining just what Raiders were and, well, just what it is. And his completely at odds with all facts from the real story take on the Enclave. Well the two that matter here, there are many more.
But, knowing this ISN'T taking those events from PH, but rather using something similar but , hopefully, not in a way that runs counter to everything the original stood for like PH does. Or even taken aspects of it and making them not deplorable, can totally get behind that, still want as many fics as possible to include stable 99 as a perfect, no issue, everything went great stable. Yeah, let's just go back and look at it in a non colored by some other story light.
The virus being what created raider Frosty...
Even disconnected from... that... I don't really like the idea, but I don't hate it either. I really liked the idea of raider!Frosty being, just a part of Frosty she didn't want to face, being her deeper, animalistic, primal side. The part of her the reveled in battle and fighting. It being, like the other Head!Frosties, just one more aspect of her personality that she had to face did exist. On the other hoof, some of the shit Raider!Frosty was getting up to, just HOW violent bloodthirsty, all if she was, did paint a really bad picture of Frosty that that was part of her. To an extent a side like that makes sense and is in everyone, but Frosties was, a but to strong to really work as just that. And her giving into her like that in the last chapter. The virus thing does make that bit more palatable, and it also opens up other possibilities for the story.
So on that I am, neutral at the moment. It has it's downsides, and it's upsides, and anymore will have to depend on just where the story goes with it from here and how ti's used.
The intra-Enclave factions and what not.... yeah that is the bigger aspect of "Oh fuck no!?" in regard to it being based on PH. Since his idea on those was utter BS and a slap to the face of everything we knew about them in the real story. BUT, ignoring any of PH's baggage, it MIGHT be doable, depending on just what the details are of what is going on. Not really a fan of the idea, but don't know enough about it to know just what to feel. it could be really good and lead to something interesting, or it could be utter shit that is an insult to the name FoE.
That said, the one line there that, really goes to far towards the "totally this is PH" direction for no apparent reason is...
that. The corps is an even bigger load of horseshit Somber invented and crammed into a place it had no spot then the rest. So why even mention that? bad enough involving the surface at all, but in that manor? bringing up THAT idea? That makes it really hard not to take this as saying 'this is canon with PH' unless that means something utterly different then anything else it seems to, why is it even there? All it does is bring up one of the worst ideas about the Enclave PH infected the greater FoE gestalt with.
And the issue, well an issue, with massive anxiety problems. I logically know and assume that's meant straight. But can't help but have a little voice saying it might have been in a "Lets see you do better" type thing, but, that's also due to the PH debacle coming up making those anxiety issues come to the fore.
No I don't really have any better idea right now, since I don't know enough of the details about what is going on and how this plays into the story. And, really don't hope this comes across as "this is shit you should totally do it MY way." Cause that's really not what I'm trying to go with.
Sorry for the PH rant.....
Oi, Bob, how would you feel about adding this story to the Cyborgs Everywhere group? Just thought it would fit, but also figured It'd be polite to ask before i did it.
5133509
I dunno... sure, I guess? I don't really know how groups work here.
This chapter was great, like the other chapters. I mean, yeah. Took me a while to get round to reading it, but whatever.
I loved the Madagascar reference, but thinking about it maybe Madagascar was referencing something else originally? I have a vague feeling... I dunno, still funny.
I don't get what all the hate PH gets is about really. I really like it, though I agree it gets a little far-fetched. I don't mind the raider-virus thing, it seems to work fine. It really is Frosty that shines in this fic and makes it good, she's just a hilarious character.
But the griffin called Soundwave... if that was a Transformers reference I am a little disappointed, because Soundwave is definitely not like that.
Good job!
5156212
Oh shit Soundwave was a guy huh
Alright, so let's start this review. A little late, but I'm kicking my butt out of lazy and into second gear now!
The chapter started out rather interesting with a good line catcher to bring the old reader back into the story and be like, "this is interesting, I still wanna read!" You know, that's something I personally don't think about often, starting every chapter off with something catching. And I guess you should always try and strive to end every chapter off with something interesting to make them want to read the next chapter, or a good conclusion to a story arc of some kind. Still, even then you need a good ending. Chapters are supposed to be segments of a smaller story that each have a little story they tell. Well, in this chapter I got the role was the escalating down fall of Frosty's relationship with just about everyone in the group. Except Violet, Violet don't give a fuck. Violet don't care. Eeww, Violet's reading a book, look at that Violet read a book...
Tangerine's personally still kind of urks me some because at first I was thinking she was going to be this cute timid girl, but at the same time she's not completely Fluttershy timid and has been standing up for herself and asserting herself. I mean, it's good character development to have her grow up and be more independent, stronger in the face of her fears and bullies and Frosty. But still, I miss timid Tangerine stumbling over herself and stuff... It was cute. Though the part where she mumbled how she wanted to kiss Frosty at one point did make me laugh and go aww. I guess now she's turned into that character who is just so exasperated by Frosty that she's the easy to tease and fun to pick on sort. Ya know what I mean, or have I lost you? I'm not even sure where I was going...
The radwasps was an interesting bit and the only think I think that could have really made the section better was if you had Sparkle and Rummy actually sit and watch the fireworks, describing them in beautiful glory! Or perhaps slowly walk away from them in a slow motion of awesomesauce... you missed your opportunity there man! XD
From talking with you on skype while also reading this, the question of whether or not that was changeling Frosty in the sky has already been answered. I'm glad to see Tabatha out and about doing shit again. I mean, Tabba, I mean Tabtab, I mean Tabbers, I mean, Backstabber! Gosh, whatever her, his name is. I'm looking forward to when Tabbers and Frosty meet up and they have an epic show down! Or possibly even a scene where Frosty is thrown into a chrysalis in cannon, and have her saved! Or have her ruin it somehow, because Frosty is one of those characters that would manage to just ruin being turned into a changeling like. Like, blowing up or something because the royal jelly content in her chrysalis was a little to much. I don't know what I'm talking about, I'm just excited to see our changeling and I wanna see more of him soon!
The griffins were really stupid and like, clowns basically. I'm glad they quickly fell into the background when the scene started and focused on Frosty. That way you didn't shove these humorous idiots onto us, but had them there for us to snigger. Rummy beating Frosty up scared me, and I swore he was going to break her wings... Even though he's staying in character and I love that he's got a solid character, his asshat side is showing out pretty bright no matter how much he might 'regret' it later! No, it is official, I do not want these two staying together. If Frosty lives, please, send her away from him. They aren't doing each other any good and just need to find someone else that'll be better suited for them. And I guess, a lot of authors tend to shy away from making the main couple not work out. This would also be an interesting time to throw in a new guy for Frosty or something... Trying your hand at a little bit of a love triangle. but I don't think love is going to be the focus of the story anytime soon.
Because the Enclave has arrived and man you had goose pumps rising up and I was like, YES!!! Got to that part right after you went to bed and I really wanted to hound you with excited comments. God, that has been such a long awaited moment for so long. I find it stupid and humorous that Frosty thinks they're coming for her... No, she needs to think a little. Balefire bomb, deserters all over the place, secret program where she's a sleeper agent and doesn't know it, and ect. No, they're not coming for just her, but I'm willing to bet she's on the list. I'm really excited to see where you take this story now that there's some legit progress coming along. Or we can jump into a couple of chapters of running and hiding and just more general stuff, but come on, I wanna see some epic build up and conclusions here now! I'm feeling an ending coming along now, and I'm pumped for it.
The question rises now, will Frosty stick with the Rangers? Wait, she has to because of her collar... Will Riverbed make it worth wile though and cheer her up? Is she going to find herself pregnant. How much time does she have left on Death's clock. We haven't heard much about that lately... Is it going to come back up soon? You've got me, and I'm sure plenty of other readers, on the edge of their seat now! (Or going, pfft, this story sucks and is stupid!) No, well, I really fucking like it and I wanna know what happens next! Argh, give me chapter twenty three now buddy. >.<
*Sighs* Now that I'm done squirming and writhing in agony over here in anticipation, I guess I should move onward. Writing, reading, mowing the lawn, job finding... Yup, time to get shit down.
Word count of 'review.' a thousand something words...
Quaver Ava
5160130
Welcome back!
-"I was holding a strangely familiar laser rifle in my hooves." This works off the thing where guns can still be hoof-held and the 'trigger' is a button on the side. No idea where I go that from.
-"Or maybe it was just the Volunteer Corps taking all of the slightly out-of-date food and giving it away to the Wastelanders." FKKDSDJKL I FORGOT THIS WAS ALSO A THING I'M SO SORRY. More seriously, this drives the dumb thing from the intermission because it needs to make sense. Again, something else could have done it but I didn't want it to sound too rip-offy. A reference works a lot better just because it's such an integral part of the story.
-"a morning after." It's an allusion to a hangover, but now I'm not sure whether this is a common expression or not.
-“Have a souvenir. Or thirty." Okay, this didn't actually get changed up in the rewrite.
-“I’ve removed your need for Med-X"- It only does cost like, 100 caps. Remember, this is a game because I find it funny.
-Holotags are the Brotherhood's version of dog tags. Didn't bother checking whether this was a thing.
-Someone pointed out to me that "Frostivus" sounds sort of guy-ey.
-You can actually go read what happened to these Rangers in Souffle's side story here. 'Rejects' covers it pretty well.
-"but at least he’d finally gotten around to removing the steel bar in his neck."- It's a cute little play on how nobody remembers anything. ((Like how neither me or my editors noticed it))
-"And Umm, might want to append "Except the slaves we are here to save" to that."- It's... uh... implied?
-"Need a Broadcaster attachment for that" Was not aware of that. Pretend it's magic!
-“Cue in yo face!”- Get it? It's a quicktime event! Ha! Ha. ha. okay.
-Ice Storm is the Mysterious Stranger. For plot reasons. And because Frosty finally picked up the perk for having him in combat too.
Thanks greatly for the feedback! See you next chapter.
5161283
Eh, making pony guns work for ponies is always tricky and really need to be detailed better overall.
I'm hoping hat it's not what it sounds like cause, yeah the very idea of them is, completely at odds with everything about the Enclave. If you went below the clouds, you were a Dashite, period. The only exception were official Enclave scouting patrols.
Not really, only time I here "Morning after" is "the morning after pill" It is something you could more or less work out after a while but, really feels incomplete.
Eh, some of it works, some doesn't. This, isn't so much that it doesn't work at all and more "If he could do it that easily, why didn't he do it sooner?"
Yeah don't think Ponies had that level of tech to make holo-tags.
Going to have to do that.
It should be implied. With some of this group, never hurts to make sure that as much as possible is explicit rather then Implicit.
Well she never actually usd it to transmit. Just, blamed it on no-mic.
Eh makes a bit of sense, though it's more then him interacting with her outside of when the Stranger should show up that is rather odd and interesting. That is just a "Hmmm, okay what is going on, can't wait to find out." Type deal
5184937
My favorite joke, not Bobulator's. It's not a reference, and I know it's not laugh-out-loud funny, but I still really really like it for some reason.
5185022 Meant that towards you, yeah should have specified that.
And fair enough, sometimes something just really hits a funny bone just right.
5184937
Jeezums cheezums! I've been distracted and procrastinating for the past few days since I got back from vacation. Let's get started then!
-Regarding DJPon, I'm still not sure whether I like having her being part of the story. Reporting on every single renegade hero is a bit much, yeah?
-Originally I'd hoped to bring Cherry back, but it didn't really pan out.
-“Sure. Let’s go, Termineightor.” C'mon. Laugh, damn you!
-"Recon Force Blizzard was gone, and the Diamond Seekers were nearly gone, too."- Yeah, that's just me being terrible. Should have expanded, but I couldn't come up with anything that worked.
-"It’s a radhog and lettuce sandwich"- Or as I like to call it, a BBBBBBL. With extra B.
-"Which kills the immersion of the story."- Ha, immersion. This story can't take itself seriously, so it's fiiiiiine.
-"But seriously, what about that would give her a cutie mark?" Okay, this is me poking at the idea that everypony has a really super duper unique skill. Somepony's gotta be the filler 'normal talent' ponies.
-Can love bloom on the battlefield?
-"hat's why you kept calling her 'Enclave whore'?" Okay, maybe it's just me forgetting to mention that he had to keep up appearances. Whoops.
-"Where did this come from?"- Source material is lewd.
-"Wasteland Breaburn"- Reserved for Mach, 10/10.
-"callfilly" Callgirl. Work with me here, the puniverse isn't very nice.
-"He was wearing a trench coat with the letters “NCR" on the back, overtop a bluish pre-war suit with a red tie." I was told the New Canterlot Republic was a thing when I wrote it, so I went with it. Also, it's a reference to Kurt of FLoB, whom I find endearing.
-Most of the PoV swaps have different breaks and I did my best to give little hints at who's talkin' before they're intro'd.
-Frosty's Ballistic Claw works by magic, ingenuity, and a lot of elbow grease. Don't think too hard.
-"Stables are that common?"- Working off 'Rangers know how to work one' sort of thing.
-"Also, why is demise in quotes?" You know, like an 'accident'.
-"'Magical Energy Weapon', not a 'Laser'" I REJECT REALITY AND SUBSTITUTE MY OWN.
-The whole Cult of the Train is just a dumb joke because it made me giggle repeatedly. It doesn't have much referencey stuff, I don't think.
Having this new Rumcake POV was a blast to write, and it gave time to throw random tidbits and cute thinkery stuff at the wall. Glad you enjoyed it!
ONTO THE NEXT ONE.
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Welcome back! I've been 'writing' in the meantime. By writing I mean playing XCom Long War and Hearthstone. And Civ Beyond Earth. 'Writing'.
-AAaa and you missed the Indy reference! Aaaaaaa
-"sudden but inevitable betrayal"- Curse it!
-The Friendship City thing is literally brought up something like once or twice, and not for very long. I blame me being lazy and forgetful.
-Crazy Frosty is best Frosty. Fun to write, too.
-I have no idea if armor tags are actually a thing. I've taken a bunch of liberties with canon since I'm too lazy to check.
-"Again, that much issue with just a few singed feathers?" Didn't fact check. Too lazy. My bad.
-"is this new, or did nopony notice before this?" The world may never know. Because I'm a lazy shit.
-"Okay, so not taken off, just broken.. yeah really really REALLY poorly described above in that case."- I'm here all week. Heh.
-"the book was last seen in Horseshoe Tower." Cool? Yes. I took the measured risk without knowing the full in-depth canon. I tried, but I think I sort of resolved everything just fine at some point.
-"But, can't she just fly up to the bottom of the clouds and grab a bit to use as a bed?"- I can't remember correctly but I think there was something about it that I couldn't do that. Something along the same lines of why Frosty can't just go right back up, I think?
-Don't worry about Icy! He's friendly. "Friendly". Ah, you'll see.
Sleep be damned, get back to reading! Glad to know I've gotten most of everything not messed up, so that makes me feel better. I recommend you take a look at "H for Heresy" at some point, since that's Souffle's cute little perspective on the prequel-ey bit of Memories. (And then go read all the other silly things that Frosty's in! All of it's in the description!)
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Yeah, like I tried to get across, that's not really an issue with this story on it's own, but one that's endemic to FOE stories that take place around the same time as Littlepip. And this story doesn't do that bad a job, keeps it brief, doesn't make a big deal about it. Just, how to Handel DJ is one of the big issues any FOE fic faces.
Ha, ha. But, yeah it's not really that bad. Just, not one I really like. On it's own it's great and nice pun just, when a reference like that feels out of place for the story, it takes me out of things a bit and, I don't really like when that happens.
MMMMMMMMM, making me hungry. So want one of those.
Hey stop selling yourself short. Yeah the first few chapters had some issues. But the overall story is pretty damn good. And it is getting SO much better. And yeah the story is good at not taking itself TO seriously, and at having fun, but it doesn't go to ludicrous extremes with it, and still able to really deliver the feels and be a really engaging story in it's own right.
"Just because you're having fun, doesn't mean you can't be serious."
True, that does have to happen and, likely does but, there still has to be a moment where they realize that is what they are meant to do, that that is their talent. It's not about her not having some super special unique talent, it's about how it happened.
.. Now that would have been hilarious. Her calling him out on saying that. Him trying make that defense. Yeah, that really would have been hilarious.
Oookay then. Was more taking about why she just came out and said it more then the reference itself.
Never heard of it and, yeah the NCR wont be a thing for at least a few more months.
It worked rather well. Was just surprising the first time to actually be going into somepony elses head.
Don't think to hard? Have you met me? Just, ask Unknown how likely that is to happen.
Eh, fair enough
Okay, yeah rell need to read that side story.
<Insert mean spirited, petty, spiteful crack and a certain other writer that does that here> <Followed by lecture about canon of existing narratives and tying stories to them>
Alright, they are still rather hilarious in a really creepy way. Yeah definitely like these guys so far.
Yeah it did come out pretty damn well. Loved it.
It's been a really really long time since I've seen those.
Wow, just went back to find it and, yeah it is. Just, way back in chapter 2 so yeah, it was there just, kind of forgotten about for awhile.
All Frosty is best Frosty.
Not sure it ever came up, but it should be there logically, and, if not, how were they tracking them to know they lost their signal?
Yeah most times I snark or have an issue it's relatively minor that one... yeah really really huge mistake to make it seem like Psycho was going THAT far and just.. yeah did not like that goof. More a personal issue with that kind of thing.
Can't wait to see that then. Again, yeah got a detail wrong but overall, really well done attempt.
Huh, yeah she can't go back up above them without getting caught but, really no logical reason she couldn't just grab a bit off the bottom of the clouds if she wanted that I can think of.
Sure.. suuuuureeee. And, yeah mystery is good just.. bleh already ranted about m issue with him so no second course.
Yeah, the story has really gotten a LOT better in the second act. Well the story itself (As in the plot) is about as good and same overall ideas just, the overall writing quality has gone way up.
Totally going to do that at some point, just not sure when.
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And here I am again at 2am. Not like chapter 24 needs to be worked on or anything....
-"And now for something been thinking about for awhile."- The creation of that specific intermission chapter was a stroke of genius by everyone involved. Sure, it's information that you know and not Frosty, but it adds a cute little level of intrigue to the story that I like. As the scene stood on its own, it seemed a bit too jarring.
-"Track Quest Objectives."- Like Frosty will ever figure out how her PipBuck actually works. She doesn't even know how to use the map.
-"Or one of the other hers can take over."- This works off the idea that RaiderFrosty cares not for the mental conditioning. That, and it was all part of the plan. Totally.
-"That is so sick.. and yet..... rather awesome"- Memories, as directed by Quentin Tarintino. Someone posted that once, but I'm too lazy to go find the source.
-"But, why pump with her muzzle? " Uh. UH. Whoops. BLAME KKAT AND MOUTH BASED WEAPONRY.
-This chapter is one of the few that has feels in it. And yeah, Riverbed literally has stopped caring and she badly needs the caps to buy up her farm.
-"Fon't you nee that to use the weapons, or, any on board system?" A) No idea. B) But she looks so AWESOME with her dad's officer's cap.
-"Ummm, taking the tech to use is only ONE reason the Rangers horde it ans steal and kill for it." Took a few liberties here, sorry. Made sense to me.
-"Hey she just killed ponies she really didn't want to" And also keep in mind that Riverbed is probably pretty dense.
-"now where did he get it?" Probably from home. It's where you tend to get accents, last time I checked.
-"how many pegasi are we expected to believe are down here?" HAVE YOU SEEN THE NUMBER OF SIDE-STORIES WITH PEGASI? Just work with me here, because they'll all be robot princesses pretty darn soon anyway.
-"Yes, you should. Though, why brand and not just kill?" For plot convenience, of course!
-"Wow.. that was some accident." Of course, this is an 'accident'.
-"How are you able to do it at all?" Work with me here.
-"that idea... is freaking hilarious." Imagine Sparkle going, 'T-touch butts.' *bumping noises*
Intrigue! Suspense! Praising autocorrect! Anyway, good to know I actually did do good with this chapter. Hey, stay tuned for the next chapter in about 16 hours or so!
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re: Riverbed. She, really was an interesting character and, the just not caring anymore part... that really does sum her up. After everything she's been through, the implication for just how badly Firewing treated her. Her saying she was 'drafted' just adds a whole new level of twisted to it. And after that just.. excepting her place as a whore for the Gryphons. Yeah some other duties, the pony to pony stuff, but how often does that come up? And dealing with the mocking for being a pony in a Gryphon outfit, can't fly, has to run to keep up with them. No Talon outside those in her troop ever believing her. Just, likely years of dealing with it. Just.. stopped caring, just pushed it aside, grew callous, tried to ignore any feelings. Just get through day by day, working up the caps to buy that farm. The one thing she's holding onto.
Yeah the more I think about her the... more amazing she gets and, all done so subtly. It's all there but, not really shoved in our faces or explained. But still... yeah she was a really well done character. Not as hilarious awesome and crazy as Frosty or Doc. Or as solid and lovable as Rummy. But still a really well done and intriguing character.
The Branding vs killing for plot convenience thing. Yeah I get he wasn't outright killed because then he wouldn't be here but. Letting him live just.... yeah really think it would have made more sense for Harbinger to try and have him killed, him either realize it was coming, or survive the attack and either way say 'Screw this I'm out of here!" and head below on his own.
The rangers giving away tech they should be hoarding... well we have already established this chapter of the Rangers is really really bad at being Steel Rangers, so guess I can go with it. And she did have a practice reason for it that makes sense.
5201219
Another review, and this time I'm not tired! Yay!
-"and how she knows what deodorant tastes like" It tastes like regret!
-"And it would be hilarious if the Enclave signal for that, meant something totally different"- how about "Move my wash into the dryer"?
-"Speaking off, the notes from last chapter"- Don't look at the holes in the plot!
-"Zonies are awesome"- Not according to Frosty.
-"Another one!? This... is getting ridiculous" They're going out of style!
-"Victory required conviction," This whole scene is one of my favorites because everyone's so used to happy-go-lucky goody-goody characters. Not everypony is going to be 'good'. Also makes me feel better knowing that I got the feeling of this scene perfect.
Yeah, Frosty being an asshole is great. Have fun with the rest of the chapter!
Okay back to the story, really need to get caught up before the next chapter gets up. Just, it's not just real life right now more, getting leery of the story. Frosty is getting shit on so much. Having such an endlessly parade of crap heaped on her. And, nothing seems like it'll ever get better. Nopony is trying to help her. She to apathetic, to worn down, to broken to help herself. And the story itself, doesn't feel like it's going anywhere besides circling Frosty's Despair Event Horizon. And hasn't felt like there's been a point to it since Frosty met up with Rummy at the one outpost. Since then it's just been farting around in the wastes with no clear goal, no feeling like there's anything going on besides justifying one random, meaningless encounter after another. The only 'mystery' that's even mentioned anymore... of the many there are, Frosty's amnesia, her deal with Death, her programming by the Enclave.. the only one that's even mentioned anymore is Ice Storm, and that's just to heap more and more and more questions about what the fuck is going on, without giving any answers, that don't lead to even bigger questions and make things even more confusing.
And, while the actual writing quality has gone up a lot, the enjoyment of the story has been plummeting. Mostly for the above reasons, and also for Frosty. I love her, want her to get over this, but at the same time, it seems that's never going to happen. She never makes and attempt to work out her problems. And anymore has only two modes. Broken, sad, beaten down, traumatized victim who nopony seems to realize needs help. Or berserker psycho.
And out of story comments about things aren't helping with that. Saying the Frosty isn't even going to be TRYING to get over some of her issues, especially the racism to Zebra's thing, and more so why. Yes saying that every hero has to be prefect and pure and utterly pristine is BS. Now, when it first came up I defended the racism, didn't hold it against Frosty, because I knew where it came from, this wasn't her making a choice on her own, this was her being programmed to act that way by a lifetime of Enclave propaganda. BUT even then I made the caveat that while at the moment I can't blame her entirely for it, I would hold her to blame if she doesn't try to get over it. To realize how wrong it is. THAT is the operative word. Try. Just, blindly accepting it, after seeing all the other lies she was led to believe? After all the crap the Enclave does to her. Still just blindly following party line about it. That's just beyond wrong, and rather stupid. To not even question it? I'm not saying get over it and become bestest best buddies with a zebra and braid each others manes with flowers and have a sing along with The Angels. Im saying she needs to at least make an attempt at seeing how wrong the view is, even if she can't quite overcome it, to at least try. And the reason why not, just as a kind of 'Fuck you" to certain people that want it.. that just seems petty.
And then I've got Unknown saying this entire act is supposed to be the stories version of "this Coming Storm." Which already explained my issues with that. 1. It was only a chapter not and entire act. 2. It came right after Littlepip's highest point so far. At a point where she was winning, where things were never better. Defeating the Goddess, surviving Canterlot, uniting her entire set of Ministry Mare figures, Overcoming the temptation of the Black Book, Finding her Virtue. It was at a peak, and then this happened, and things slid down fast. It went from a high peak, down to a valley, rather then just a slow steady declining slope, into a plunging abyss. 3. Even at the worst, when she came close to being broken by this, Littlepip had her friends. She had ponies there to help her, to drag her through this, to support her. Frosty? Everypony is treating her like shit. And the only pony that even seems to realize she might need a bit of help is the one whose so amoral and nearly sociopathic in how little a fuck she gives about other ponies, her only issue with an innocent merchant being brutally murdered in front of her for no reason, was how loud and messy it was, and it distracted her from her reading. And finally, Ditzy.
This is a I think at the heart of why I'm having such a hard time getting back to the story. Realized it while reading the latest chapter of Hooves of Fate. Kkat said she realized she needed Ditzy in that chapter, because without her, it get way to dark. Darker then she wanted it to get. That it needed some light. Something to keep it from drowning in a see of Misery. And well it's not about the comedy, not about the laughs themselves, bt something deeper. What I wrote in that commentary that made me realize this
That is what it feels like the story is missing to me. Hope. Hope that things will get better, that Frosty won't just get shit on and beaten down more and more, except the times she goes bloodcrazy psycho pony. Hope that some of these mysteries will actually get solved.
Wow that was a lot, just going to post this so you know why it's taking awhile. I'm not saying I'm giving up on the story, and I do want to get through the rest and see it through just, really hard to get up the.... power? something... to get this in depth this detailed, connect hard enough to a story to the usual commentary, when it all seems so hopeless.
Okay, try to get into this again, at least get caught up to what's published.... So Frosty's been shit on by all her 'friends' had a leash put on her that as far as she knows, will KILL her if she somehow ends up to far from said 'friends'. And just ripped out a ponies throat in the middle of town, granted it was before he could attack her for killing his friends, who did attack and try to kill her first. But in a fight that left it impossible to not feel a bit sorry for Frosty having to kill them... so... I know I'm supposed to be rooting for Frosty here but.. really hard getting behind anypony right now....
Okay, and over to Rummy trying to figure out something he is never going to understand. Yeah even if Sparkle has an answer, that is barely going to help with Frosty. She has a whole mess of issues beyond the usual mare stuff the stallions don't ever understand in stories.
Weapon safety? What's that?
Ummm where did this come from? One, he's never really been at all a 'creep' and the 'obsessive' part, again, not really. At least not without damn good reason. The number of times Frosty does stupid shit that ends up getting her ass nearly killed. He has a right to be worried about her. Granted the whole 'leash' thing is going a tad far, but it is understandable. So what the hell is she talking about?
Oookay.. ummm, are we using the same definition of 'eloped' here? Cause that's kind of ruining this jokes potential if he's trying to say he somehow ran off and got married on a spur of the moment decision without ever seeing the mare. And she agreed to it. So, really confused what is going on here.
To be fair, at this point, Frosty is so messed up, not even SHE can understand her own emotions.
Yes what you are trying to do is good. And it foes make sense, and it isn't wrong to want to keep her safe. And she does need some help in NOT getting pumped full of bullet holes every other day or so. But your way of doing that was all wrong.
Such as this. Again motives were good. Execution of those motives.. not so good.
It takes awhile. But he can actually learn. Good for you. But again saving my real enthusiasm for this actually having a beneficial payoff.
Wow yeah I'm WAY to biter about this. I mean it is great that he's seeing this, realizing the mistake. I do love that just.. again.. finding it hard to hope that this will actually have a payoff that doesn't somehow make things worse, or there won't be some random issue the story throws in to keep things 'tense and dramatic' or something rather then actually let something GOOD happen to Frosty.
And this is something I like. Yeah they bitch and complain, and deal with their personal issue and what not. But come action time, they drop it, act professionally. (Well as professional as these Ranger can be) and are all about business and focusing on the fight. Don't let the emotional baggage distract them from other stuff. That is a very good thing about them.
Ah the good old Mk I Eyeball.
Also, very nice way of limiting just how overpowered Power Armor can make somepony. No need to beef up the threats to some uber level. But have realistic damage to their armor limiting it's usefulness. Still giving them benefits, but not being to overpowered. And also rather a nice idea in general to show damage like that accumulating over time without proper maintenance. Granted this does then raise the question of how come Steelhooves armor was able to be so fully functional despite a lot of massive damage to it. And the inability to give regular maintenance due to large parts of it being fused to his skin and unable to be removed. But... wasn't there a remark about their repair talismans being damaged as well? that would explain it. And between Steelhooves, Calamity and Littlepip, pretty sure they had enough tech and repair know-how to fix any issues that might develop with his armor.
And of course we stop there. Well, at least Rummy realizes he screwed up, and why he screwed up. So, again, still not celebrating or letting the story off the hook for something good happening until this actually leads to something good, but at least it's effort.
Did somepony let Drunky take control? Well, this is quite the attitude change for Frosty. Granted randomly shifting moods is kind of her thing, and has a legit reason, but even then, this seems rather extreme.
Well, you do really need some kind of boost. But, did it have o be one so.....
Small, single building, common AC units. Another thing that just seems out of place to be that common for some reason.
Her playing with the body like that is really really disturbing. I mean, it's hilarious in a very wrong way when done right... but generally it's the villain, or at least the amoral token evil teammate doing it. Frosty doing it... ehh can't say I can't see her doing it really, but there are more important things right now. Then again with all the stress she's been under, all the crap she's dealt with last few weeks. Yeah I can hardly fault her for needing SOME outlet, any outlet, and jumping on the first one to show up.
Oookay. They made it down a vent shaft, past whatever caps the other end. Killed him quietly, without any sound loud enough to be heard outside. And got away. So how are you going to explain why it took you two so long to raise the alarm? To notice the guy was dead and say something?
Yeah... I'd say there's no way this could work... but there's something in this region that seems to have an adverse effect on pony intelligence, so might luck out with some really really dumb guards.
Just, give into the insanity.
Okay, I think I'm noticing another issue with my getting into the story. Tone. Just.. the comedy stuff is great, the more emotional stuff... I do think is overdoing the break her down stuff. But it's the balance between the two that's way off. It almsot feels like two entirely separate stories. When it's time for serious, emotional feelsy stuff, it's all serious, maybe an attempt at a joke or two, but not big ones. And then you get to areas that are silly, in a sick kind of way. And over the top enough to be able to just shut off the brain and go with. But not with the more serious issues still there and not addressed. Just, story doesn't do a good job of balancing the two things it wants to be.
We have this pretty damn serious situation, that's being mostly played for laughs. And yeah this could work as being comedic, if it wasn't for how serious everything leading up to it was. It's just jarring.
I am honestly surprised you did not add "S-M-R-T" after that.
Ah. So try to hope they assume he died after you left. Okay plan makes more sense. Just, not why he's ON the counter where he'd be easy to see at the smallest glance, rather then behind it, or even back in the supply room.
Why? Caps are easy enough to hide, impossible to tell where you got them from. And something anypony that snuck in would be likely to nab. And if they realize the caps are gone, they are going to realize the guy is dead a lot sooner.
Frosty's so sexy, even the mares want her.
When she's not being a creepy, bloodthirsty berserker-pony. Or just plain creepy.
DING! Oh wait this isn't Cinamare Sins. But on that.. most? The way Calamity talked about it, it came off as not-uncommon, but definitely the minority. Plus.. I don't think we came across a single proven bi pegasus in the original. They were all either straight or gay. (Then again I don't think we came across a single bi pony period. Though for some reason I was sure for the longest time Homage was.) But still, I don't see where the "Most tend to play for both sides" bit comes in. Granted given that there are apparently perks for being in a same sex couple while enlisted in the military there. Could see some ponies that really aren't interested in a family hooking up with others of the same sex to fake it and score those perks. And since they'd still be interested in scoring possibly. Come off as Bi, and just in a really open relationship.
Hmmm, but how would ponies on the ground know this? Some general details for the larger groups that would make it their business to know what's going on up there, like the Rangers I could see having some info. But info that detailed seems really really unlikely. But then again, not like Frosty would consider that.
Also... is now really the time Frosty!?
Also, point to Gala on that one.
You know I don't quite buy the "Most pegasi are bi" thing, but from experience so far here and in FoE, I would buy a "Most pegasi are kleptomaniacs" stereotype.
Well, it worked for now. Either she's got max ranks in bluff and scored a natural 20 or something, or they just have crappy Sense Motive rolls.
Wait..... Frosty and her gang get hired to track down the pony that killed him later, don't they?
...... Okay you have a point. Yeah not impressed by the story and not really liking the way it's going, and do wish you'd hurry up and get some development that isn't being crushed and broken... or somehow suddenly all better and making jokes like nothing's wrong. And actaully start trying to get some of the mysteries solved. Like you know, What you have to do to not die in less then a month.
But you are to adorable to hate.. or even to stay mad at.
Sad thing is.... I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not. Either way would make sense for her.
Annnnd there's the other horseshoe dropping. Yeah she might act all cocky and aloof and like nothing's wrong and not a care in the world beyond where to get her snack cake fix. But a lot of that is denial, and trying to avoid thinking about all the crap she's dealing with. To just ignore it and escape rather then deal with it.
And she does have a point Tan. Granted Frosty, you did go to far as well with the throttling. But she also knows you have anger issues, and the shit she pulled was uncalled for too. Nopony was without blame there.
See while the being throttled, yeah she didn't deserve THAT. And that was going to far. Getting weepy after having how WRONG what you did was thrown in your face and made to see what a bitch you were and how bad you hurt your supposed 'friend's feelings. She more then deserves this. Totally do not blame Frosty at all for this one.
I'm with frosty here. Tan more then had that coming for her "dog" bullshit.
Once again. Point goes to Frosty.
Okay, again, Tan is the one who should be apologizing. For the crap she pulled with the dog jokes. For not letting you explain why you killed him. Cause it was self defense. He was about to try and kill you. You took him out first. You really have little to apologize for.
That said, looking back, seeing where you bucked up. Opening up, admitting you were wrong.. cause you did do a lot of crap you should be sorry and apologize for. Yeah it's something you should do. Grow, improve. prove you AREN'T a monster. Just a lost pony trying to find her way. So while you shouldn't apologize for the killing, or the calling her out. Do apologize for the nearly throttling her to death.
Now, will this actually LEAD to something. That is another issue with the story.
(Yes keep bringing up 'issues' but it's because.. for all that last post said, it wasn't really detailed enough. The issue isn't JUST that. that's just the closest I could get to explaining it. It's a whole bunch of smaller, interconnected issues. Any one or two of which aren't really that bad. It's just all of them together that work to push me away from the story.)
Stuff like this keeps dropping. Frosty will have a little epiphany. Will start to look like something good will happen, she's going to work something out, going to figure out something she's been doing wrong, overcome some fault. That she's TRYING to improve, to develop. It gets SO CLOSE to having some real great character moments and development. And then nope, moment over, onto the next wacky adventure/load of crap dumped onto Frosty to deal with. It is great set up for something good, but the payoff rarely comes around. She just forgets about it a few minutes later.
That's part of the 'hope' thing. Not just in universe hope. Somepony like Pinkie of Ditzy to be a small, constant light that no darkness can eclipse. One firm anchor in the sea of misery and darkness. But also, out of verse losing hope that the story will actually start having a point. That things will start mattering. That we'll actually get some development that isn't forgotten by the next scene. Other then ones that just lead to her being more miserable and broken and ready to give up.
And the in 'verse bit, good time to bring that up. I'm not talking comic relief. Just some idiot to laugh at who feels out of place. That ignores the drama and the seriousness and just cracks jokes or something. That's by no means what I mean by 'Hope'. that's that type of character done badly. (Granted you already have a good character to use for random jokes like that in Drunky.) I mean, as above. A character that, isn't ignoring what's going on. Isn't oblivious to the seriousness, the gloom. To how bad things are getting. But who knows it, sees it, and rejects it. Who chooses to not let it get her down, to stay optimistic. To believe things will get better that everything will work out. Or even if they know the odds are slim to nearly impossible, still won't admit defeat. Won't back down.. But will always try. Like Ditzy from FoE. Or hell a more well know example of what I'm talking about without any real huge comedic roll. Sam from LOTR would count for that to me. And, what makes it all the more glaring to me that this is lacking, is the story already has a character in it that could easily fill this role, but is only used for a joke now and then. Filly Frosty. It would add that spark of hope to the story, and give her a bigger roll. Give her some reason to exist beyond a childishness joke now and then.
It's the sex change spell the doctor used, isn't it?
Well, not quite what you should be apologizing for. But it's a start at least.
Violet... Shut. Up. Do not be a development-blocker.
Okay, Tangerine DOES have a point with this one. BUT in Frosty's defense, this wasn't some random whim, she did have a very VERY good reason to act lie she did.
Well to tackle the guy and take him out, not really to kill him. With that hold, could have just chocked him unconscious and explained things to Tan, so yeah Frosty could have handled it better.
Umm, you tried to choke a teammate to death maybe?
Yes you have. And it's about time somepony called you out on it. But, both sides have points here, however, Frosty, you are being WAY to defensive, and worried more about being 'right' then actually listening.
Well Instant isn't here, and I've been saying for the whole last act she needs to get locked in a room with that mare and not let out till something is fixed. And 'friends'? After the way you've been treating her?
To be fair, while his motives are good, how he's going about it... not so much. But he does also seem to be starting to realize this....
Okay story, this is a good try, and it's nice to see you making an attempt. But still not letting you off the hook till his leads to something. Till this isn't all forgotten about later and actually has some lasting impact. Till frosty drops the cocky "i'm right and you all are just out to get me" act and realizes they are trying to help.
That said. Tangerine..... yeah you made good points, but so did Frosty about how utterly uncalled for and bullshit the whole "Dog" thing was. And you really should fucking apologize for that. You lot aren't blameless in this either.
See it's back to that out of verse hope thing. This.. could be great, could be exactly what I've been feeling the story needs. But at the same time, the story's gotten so good at bringing stuff up, and then moving on. At having so much be pointless. Having great set ups that could lead to something get forgotten about. Attempts at development disappear in the next scene. I can't actually trust this IS going to lead somewhere.
It's a step in the right direction story... now just follow through on this.
And cut to him, and likely some form of "Ohcrapohcrapohcrapohcrap!"
...
Yup. So Sparkle took a blast to the face, and no more helmet. They are not going to have a single set of working power armor between them by the time they are done here, are they.
Yeah, shame on her, losing a helmet that was melting around her.
Oh right, her rave light, and who knows what else.
Those bugs are getting squashed good.
Ahem... 'make'? Rummy, think about what you are saying ans the implications thereof. Secondly, that's assuming Enclave and Steel Ranger armors are that compatible
.... ohhhhhhkay then. Granted collecting them was for some subplot that also seems to have been dropped since it requires getting back to town which I doubt is going to happen anytime soon, if ever.
Rummy... it'll help.. but you need to do a lot more then that to get over this fuck up.
And the one that turns out to be the rarest of them all and crucial for some other subplot later on.
I'm sure that worked.
Rummy..... fuck you.
Yeah clearly that's Tabber. But Rummy, fuck you.. now talking about fucking MAIMING your 'girlfriend'?
Fuck.... you.
Yeah his being protective is good, and it's one thing, but this is just going WAY to fucking far. And of course story starts to look like maybe something good might happen, maybe she'll start to see what's going wrong and improve. And then slam this crap on her. With asshole up there likely not even bothering to ask how the hell she got that far with her new leash, and that she was with somepony else the whole time.
Fuck... You!
See shit like this, is why I'm saying the damn story is getting pointless other then making her suffer.
Okay..... late, got two long ass workdays so not sure I'll get more done then. And already irritated at the freaking TV Tropes breaking and not letting me log in cause idiots can't make a new system that works, but want to replace the working old on with it anyway. Leaving it here for now to get something out.
Okay, so.. Rummy... yeah still, Fuck you dude. And this is a point about hope too. I know I know I'll knock it off you get the point already, but this is a slightly differnt take. See, The pegasus we saw, we know it wasn't Frosty. And now Rummy is about to rush home and punish her, in an overly harsh, bullshit, extreme and just plain, there is NO way to justify it at all manor. Now we know it wasn't her. Also, the pony they saw had no Power Armor on. If Rummy stopped for a few second to think, he'd realize she couldn't have even gotten out to them with the collar on. And she's been with the other two all day. All this leads to very very easily combating his idea of maiming her "for her own good." And taking half a minute to talk about it would make this obvious.
BUT, given the way the stories been going, it seems highly unlikely that will happen. No it seems more likely Rummy will storm in, refuse to listen to the evidence against it, just break Frosty down even more in a highly contrived way, just for the sake of misery. Because the story has gone to such lengths to make Frosty miserable, it seems likely that this will find some way to make it happen against. There's no hope that things won't go that way.
But... hopefully.. that's not how things go and the story surprises me.
Also, done with the whole 'hope' spiel for now. And that was more about just venting about how fucking WRONG what Rummy is planning on doing is... seriously, that goes beyond "Going to far" that's down right "Cross the line into antagonist" level of fucked up.
Or, maybe DEAL WITH these emotions, look at what is making you so upset, work on overcoming them, rather then just ignoring them and trying to get them to go away on their own.
Or not..... but okay, yeah.. can't complain about this to much since well.... it's Frosty, of course she'll try to ignore, repress and deny things she doesn't want to think about. But story, still shaking my finger at you for seemingly ignoring that chance for development.
Also can't blame her for this. Not healthy, not nice, but... yeah those assholes deserve it.
Good on you Frosty. Not quite to the level of telling them all to go screw themselves and take the damn leash off you and calling them out fully on their bullshit. But at least it's not just meekly accepting the crap either.
This works better. Yeah could still come off as harsh given, well her treatment, but coming from Violet instead of Tangerine, not so much. Cause you do feel like it really is a joke, and just her trying to make the best of this bad situation. Mostly cause again, she was the only one of her 'friends' to even realize Frosty was hurting and try to do a damn thing to help her. It's legitimately her trying to cheer up Frosty... in her own way.
And succeeding at making her forget her own depression for a bit as well. If only through giving her something else to wonder. Good going Violet.
Okay.. yeah and rubbing it in how totally fucked up, wrong, indefensible and just plain fucking evil what Rummy plans to do is. Great story, make sure what's coming has the maximum depression value.
Well, to be fair, physics has a lose grip on all ponies.
Yeah Violet is definitely the party member I dislike the least. Other then Frosty. Sparkle, is neutral. She hasn't done enough either way. The other two, their still on my shit list for how they are treating Frosty, with Rummy quickly dropping down to the "Considered to be a villain" list.
And not just for those reasons. Ponies breaking physics I can see. But I'm not even sure how she's supposed to be doing that.
That violating physics... it only extends so far.
Though, could just be psycho-somatic. She thinks she's getting help, so has an easier time getting up, but still..... the inner Frosties have a very... disturbing amount of ability to do stuff.
Hi Tabber. How are you going to be making Frosty's life miserable in this scene?
I still have no idea what she's talking about or how that maneuver is supposed to work.
Oh... joy... time for him to be a complete asshole. I've so been looking forward to this scene.
Yup, coat that cheese grater your about to try and take to Frosty's already fragile and on edge feelings with a nice layer of salt.
No, you didn't do shit. This is all on him being a fucking asshole.
Hence why you should have flown straight up. Also, okay so yeah it wa a joke earlier... but really as messed up as the story was being at the time, and as bizzare and full of things that don't make sense..... how were we supposed to be sure?
This one? Okay, not that bad an idea. Just freeze in place. Kind of curious how that actually works. How it powers the spell.. how long it can last.... wait, stop getting distracted by the shiny new thuamic details and focus on the incoming asshole.
Hey more reason to see Rummy as an asshole. Thanks for helping me get over that distraction. Granted nopony like thought about this... BUT THEY SHOULD HAVE!
Backhoofed... in power armor... for something YOU HAVEN'T EVEN PROVEN SHE DID AND HAVE PONIES TO VERIFY IT WITH!
Fuck you Rummy..... Fuck! You!
Frosty, just rip his fucking face off for that shit.
No you didn't. Fuck you Rummy.
An that makes it even worse, having the moment of not being a pissed off fucking lunatic.
Fucking TOASTY! Is more reasonable and level headed then you you asshole. And has more of an excuse for being so psychotic.. You, you are just fucking pathetic.
At least she's doing something. Possibly. Now how about breaking those two apart.
Hmmmmmm, okay this is odd. Gryphons knowing about the Enclave, yeah that's totally something to expect. But his reaction to one being down here. Calling the town neutral. Neutral in what? I mean might make sense but.. feels like there is a lot of information missing here and some things that just don't quite make sense to that wording.
Fuck that bullshit. "Rank" goes out the fucking window the moment he tried to rip off her jaw. AND when it was clear he was to fucking pissed off and psycho to be at all rational.
Ummm, okay more really odd wording. Why would she be saying both? Or, be saying that, then repeating the same thing in her head? The only reason I could see for that wording is to make sure the reader understood what "Sitrep" means. And, that was just a really poorly done way of doing so.
Somewhere off screen... "Hey guys you hear something?" "Oh shit that's our cue!" "Sit down, he can wait. We're not leaving till we finish this hand. Now, got any threes?"
Well this joke.... that totally does not apply to. This one.... okay, yeah I'm laughing so damn hard at that one.
Alright, semi-serious time. ANY troop of armed anythin. that act that lax, that "I don't give a fuck", that unprofessional. Are either complete and utter noobs who have never seen any actual combat and are just posing. Or total stone cold badasses you do not want to even consider fucking with.
And after this... I'm still not sure which of those option apply.
Ah, this is starting to make sense now. Utter total badasses. Who are screwing with the kid and don't take him seriously. Still props to the kid for standing up for Frosty.
Well, would be if this was about keeping a pissed off stallion from beating the shit out of a mare who wasn't even fighting back. Rather then some weird "this is neutral ground" stuff and he'd be fine with him dragging her off to beat the crap out of in a cave somewhere. Or maybe not.. still hard to tell.
Okay.... point to Rummy. But still, Fuck you!
Ummmm, when did he get his helmet back on? He tossed it aside while trying to charge Frosty into a broken mess.
It's not just you... yeah he's turning into a complete fucking idiot in the worst possible way.
What?
............... Sparkle, I was starting to erase you from the shit list for the whole not stopping Rummy crap. Since you at least are trying to protect her now and trying to get things sorted. Don't make me regret that.
And of course it devolves into a meaningless squabble over whatever random issue pops up while ignoring the topic that started it all. Yeah see that's the GOOD kind of Rummy is an idiot thing.
You assholes have a really odd way of showing it.
Violet's the only ones that actually DONE anything that comes close to trying to help her. rather then just stand around and watch her get the crap beat out of her. Or make jokes at her expense over something traumatizing. And STILL not apologizing for it.
Okay.. okay..... that's mostly the ire talking. Yeah it is clear they do care.. but they are really are very very bad at proving that to Frosty.
Plus, still not over the whole, mercilessly slaughter an innocent merchant thing.
Yeah. Really, the bigger surprise would be that you didn't come over to find a corpse... or twelve.
Here's an idea... kick his useless flank to the curb.
"What I'm doing is wrong. I know it's wrong, But I'm gonna do it anyway."
Well.. at least she's not just letting him walk over her... hopefully.
But he glued a toggle switch to it labeled "Friendly Fire." it's in the off position.
Okay.. I like him.
Oh shut up.
And Fuck you!
Yeah I definitely like him. Also, he's right Rummy. Deal with it.
......... not sure if
or 
wait.. Raptor? IS his for frosty? that... better no be. A few scouts you can get away with, but there is no damn way ANY Raptors went down below the clouds. Well not before..... ummmmm.... did we ever figure out just when this was relative to Littelpip?
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Oh shit.
.... great minds think alike...
well ummm.... fuck. This changes things....
Yeah... it kind of does.
Also... Oh shit.....
Hmmmm, logical. And, hmmm "Desertion rates going up" Would explain why there are so many damn pegasi under the clouds. That's a grey area, it's not outright breaking the story... but would be hard to make match up well. Doable, but tricky to pull off well.
that less so. A full on 'Announce ourselves to the surface and descend in force" incasion for one pegasus? No... unless there is something REALLY big hidden in he head. We're talking River Tam level shit.
Wait.... a memory? Why does that feel familiar.. but distant like it's been long enough to have almost been forgotten.
Oh, wait.. false alarm.
.................................
Gala aren't you supposed to be the smart, reasonable one? 'Excessive force" is the Enclaves first, last, and damn near only strategy.
But yeah, even then, and even for them, this is excessive for one pegasus.
Toasty, go away. We already have on psychotic asshole to deal with right now.
No, it's not.
BUT... even though, there is not one logical reason to believe so, this is widely out of place, and just.. even without knowing what is really going on there's no way this would make sense for being what she thinks it is.
... It does make sense for her believe that in a panic. BUT, hopefully it's something she gets over quickly.
HEY! one of her companions that wasn't an utter asshole to her. Things are looking up.
..... unless that's Tabber. That's Tabber isn't it?
Well... ummmm... Enclave is here. As if Frosty didn't have enough crap to deal with. Granted most of that crap is things that involve the Enclave anyway, so maybe this means the story will actually get going and have a point beyond just screwing around aimlessly in the Wastes, and making Frosty miserable.
Or it could just be another major issue that pops up... and gets forgotten quickly.
So overall thoughts on this are. 1. Hmmm, how long did the Enclave invasion take in FoE? Would be possible to track more or less how many days Littlepip was going along wouldn't it? But, also have no idea exactly how long she was trapped in Maripony after the bomb and the invasion started. Though doubt more then a week at most. Likely another week, maybe two before Fillydelphia and Neighvarro.
Which... does line up pretty well with Frosty's deadline from Death.
2. This is definitely an interesting development... but any more then that will have to wait to see how the story actually uses it.
Also, yes I did like Rhombus. Very much.
frosty is starting to become more like dog/god from the dead money DLC for fallout new vagis
I prefer sporks and lemons.
“Am… am I…” Sparkle sat up and touched her forehead and weakly chuckled, “Am I missing an eyebrow?”
LOLS
radio birdcat with DJ Soundwave
Holy Faust. Is that a moment of self-realisation I sense?
question the Heel Realisation.
Give the man a cookie for his efforts! He must have used up most of his power generated that one implication.
XD. Put it right out there why dontcha?
and she will respond accordingly~