Revenge

by Teq

Chapter 10

Chapter 10

“Alright, stop!” I stamped my hoof into the ground hard, demanding Wraith’s attention. He halted, but did nothing else. I was… I suppose I could say extremely angry. And frustrated, and tired. When you walk for a day without substantial rest periods, or any sleep, you start to get like that. Wraith had said very little, but now I needed to know what was going on, and why we couldn’t stop. Wraith turned to look at me.
“What?”
“We’re stopping here,” as in, the arse end of nowhere. “You’re going to tell me what’s going on, and where we’re going, and I’m going to sit here and not move until you do.” True to my word, I fell back onto the ground and waited, silently. My leg (the one that had been wounded) was starting to ache again, and I was glad of the rest.

Wraith was quiet for a moment, before sighing and saying, “I suppose now would be a good time.”
“Yesterday would have been a good time.”
“Alright, fine. I trust you remember Francis?” I gulped, inaudibly. It wasn’t cheating, I’d been drunk at the time, and it was only a kiss! “Well, I was speaking to him a bit when you went out. I told him about our plans to bring down the Scavengers. He said that those that he worked for would help, and then he told me where to go in order to find them.”
“So he gave you the location of his headquarters?”
“Well… no, not exactly. He gave me the location of a rendezvous point. If we go there, and then wait for a while, then somepony on patrol will come and pick us up. From there we will be escorted to their headquarters. That’s all I know.”

A lot to take in at once, but at least it was something. I processed all that Wraith had said, before reaching my own conclusions. Basically, he’d made a decision about my future without consulting me first. How did we know Francis could be trusted? How did I know Wraith could be trusted? Despite how much I wanted to ignore it, I couldn’t shift the feeling that he was betraying me. I wasn’t going to voice my concern, in case he turned on me, but from now on I was going to keep a very close eye on him. Maybe I’d catch him whispering into a radio set or passing notes with a spy. Maybe. I went on to ask, “So we’re headed for the rendezvous point now, then?”
“Well…”
“For fuck sake, there’s more?”
“You see, it’s not quite as straight forward as that. The only rendezvous point within reasonable distance happens to be… Well it happens to be in the territory of the Factory. And to get there we need to pass through the Ruins.”

I could do little but look at Wraith with a look of incredulity on my face. To sum things up briefly for you, the Factory would utterly annihilate us if given the chance, and the Ruins were a no-go area for anypony who wasn’t in the LRSA or the Scavengers. Even then, the average life expectancy for a fresh soldier was one week. The Ruins, for those who don’t know, are the remains of one of pre-revolutionary Equestria’s diplomatic hubs, Ponyville. It started as a small village, but then it started growing and growing until it became a metropolis to rival Canterlot. Then, post-revolution, it was taken over by the NSA, before being lost to Scavengers. Turns out that the NSA in the area had forgotten to lock down the heavy artillery guns that were kept in the sector, and the Scavengers nicked them. Then they proceeded to reduce the city to rubble, before taking it over themselves. Now, it’s heavily fought over by battle hardened Scavengers and units from the Equestrian, French, and Russian LRSA detachments.

Quite simply, it was suicidal and stupid.

“You haven’t thought this through very well, have you?”
“It didn’t sound so bad when he pitched it to me.”
“Right, from now on, I make the calls, okay? Good. There is no way I’m going to the Ruins. I’m rather against getting myself killed. Do we have any other plans?”
“Um… no. I don’t really know where we are. I’ve never been this far south. I only know how to get to the Ruins, and I also know that this area is prized Scavenger land. This is a small path carved by Wanderers, and the Scavengers tend not to actively patrol it, primarily due to manpower restrictions, but also because the Wanderers defend this route well. Or, did, anyway. They also tend not to use this route, because of it's exposed nature. There's nothing really here until we get to the Ruins, and if they strayed in here then they'd be easy targets for Wanderer patrols. Straying off in any direction, however, could prove catastrophic. We’re likely to get picked up by a patrol pretty quickly. And we can’t really go back to Refuge.”
“Why not?”
“Because the Scavengers are already in the process of capturing it, and I don’t think they’d be too keen to open the gates for us again. We leaved so quickly we probably looked like spies.”
I laughed, marvelling at the hopelessness of the situation, “So we’re fucked if we keep going, and fucked if we go anywhere else? Oh, how brilliant! No, really, good job Wraith. Good bloody job. You have, for all intents and purposes, royally fucked up! What were you thinking? How was this plan ever going to work? Where you high when you made this decision, or just drunk? Okay, I’m never going to let you make the decisions again, because evidently you just cannot be trusted to think things through! Typical stupid stallion.”

I would have carried on ranting, going on to talk about how I knew something like this was going to happen, and about how I should have just taken the risk and gone alone after my initial escape, and how I should never have trusted a Scavenger. I would have done all that, if Wraith hadn’t started crying. That was honestly the last thing I had expected him to do. I had expected him to throw himself at me and try to hit me, or even to point his rifle at me, or to reveal that he was, in fact, a traitor, and all of a sudden for a contingent of Scavengers to appear from nowhere, ultimately leading to a massive battle in which I would escape by the skin of my teeth, coming back to take my revenge with the backing of the LRSA against the Scavengers, of which Wraith was now the leader, finishing in one huge crescendo where I have one final showdown with Wraith to determine the fate of Equestria. Actually, that’s a pretty good plot line.

But no. None of the above. He just stood there and started to cry. I stood there and just looked at him. What does one do in this situation? I don’t know, I’m not a mother! He wasn’t making any sound, but his eyes had glistened over and there were tears adorning his face. In a very quiet, rather pathetic voice, he murmured, “I’m not stupid.”
“Okay, well, maybe you aren’t stupid, but… but you still should’ve asked me about it first.” I tried to maintain a strong resolve.
“You hate me now, don’t you?”
“No, no. I don’t hate you, I’m just… angry and tired and really frustrated, that’s all.”
“Don’t lie to me. I know you hate me. Don’t worry about it though; everypony does.”
“I’m sure not everypony hates you. It’s just because you wear the uniform of a Scavenger, that’s all. It’s nothing to do with your personality, or your looks, or anything like that.”

He shook his head, gently, then more vigorously. I could see him barring his teeth and soon I could hear him growling, “No. No, you don’t understand. I’m a Scavenger because everypony hates me, not the other way around. You don’t know what I’ve seen. If you did, you’d understand.”
“You’re right,” I wrapped my fore legs around his neck, pulling him close, trying to calm him down. “You’re right, I don’t know what you’ve seen. I suppose I don’t really understand. But you can help me to understand. Tell me why you became a Scavenger. You say it’s because everypony hates you. Why do you say that?”

Wraith growled at me angrily, before he calmed down enough to be able to make more placid sounds. After a very long period of silence, during which I contemplated whether or not he was actually going to say anything, he started speaking in a voice that was hard to hear, even in such close proximity, “I suppose I’ll start by saying I wasn’t born a Scavenger. Some are. Their parents are both Scavengers, so they are born to be Scavengers. Not me. I was a Wanderer for most of my early life. My parents were both hard working earth ponies, and they both lived in a small agricultural community that grew wheat. As such, most of my early memories are of the wheat farm my parents tended to.”

“Naturally, being the only son of two farming ponies, they had me working hard to teach me the essentials of the work I was to do. Every morning I was to be awake by five, and I never went to bed earlier than eleven at night. In between those hours there was never any time for play. Whilst my father showed me how to sew wheat seeds or taught me how to fire a shotgun, all the other colts and fillies of my age would be busy running around and playing with each other. Not me. I never had any friends. Nopony ever spoke to me, so I never spoke back. My parent’s didn’t like noise very much, so I was never allowed to talk unless ordered to. Most of my time I had my lips sealed.”

“That wouldn’t have been so bad. I could have dealt with that. But my father was quick to temper. If I made mistakes, or spoke out of line, I would be punished. Punishments were nothing new in the community, and the residents used a wide variety of different techniques to discipline their foals, but my father took no prisoners. If I did have to be punished, he would hoist me up onto a cross and tie me in place, leaving me there for the rest of the day and overnight to act as a scarecrow. Other times, when it was more convenient, he would just hit me or yell at me. He forbade many things, including chocolate, any drink that wasn’t water, any book that wasn’t about farming, but most of all, he forbade me from ever talking to mares.”

“Naturally, there came a point when I was fourteen when I wanted to start meeting a few of the fillies of the community. Most of them were nothing special, but I did really like one of them. She was an only child, like me, and she was a very gifted craftspony. She was the same age as me, and she would always stop at my father’s farm every Thursday to mend anything that needed mending. I started to eagerly await her visits, but, as I said, my father would never let me speak to her. In fact, I wasn’t ever allowed within ten feet of her. He said that I shouldn’t like a mare for her looks, and that I should save myself for somepony who would be able to help on the farm, sewing seeds and harvesting crops.”

“But I was intent on getting my way. I began to dream up fantasies, and I took up drawing. I taught myself, stealing paper and pens from my mother to work with. Every Thursday, when she arrived to fix the broken things, I would sit on the little section of roof outside my bedroom window and draw her in some pose or other. I had my dreams as well. When I went to bed every night, I was kept awake thinking about her. I can remember coming up with an extremely detailed plan to kidnap her, steal some supplies and then run off with her somewhere far away where we’d never be found and where we could be alone together. I can still remember the secret code that I came up with to keep my writing from looking suspicious.”

“But, as with all good things, my dreams had to come to an end. It was a Thursday, like every other, and she’d come round to fix our water tank, which was leaking. After months of mental preparation and planning, I snuck out from the house and hid amongst the wheat, using it to conceal my movements. I navigated my way around until I came across the water tank, and there she was, crouched down with a determined look on her face as she examined her collection of tools. She started as I drew close, giggling and commenting on how she hadn’t heard me coming. I told her that I liked her. She said she’d never heard me speak before, and that she’d assumed that I was a mute. I chuckled in response, now extremely nervous and not sure what to do. I suppose she took the lead from there.”

“It was only a few minutes or so. Very nervous and very unsure of what to do, we both embraced each other tightly. I can remember her laughing as she commented on how tightly I was gripping onto her. I said that I was scared. She told me not to be scared. She ran a hoof through my mane, and as I calmed down and loosened my grip, she moved back slightly and kissed me. I had no idea what I was doing, but then again, neither did she, and so we ended up making a complete mess of our first kiss, but we enjoyed it none the less. We were about to kiss again, but then my dream come true was quickly shattered.”

“Needless to say, my father was not happy. He’d come to check on her progress with the tank, and instead he’d found us together, committing what he considered to be the greatest crime I could have committed. She was told never to return to the farm, and I was punished more severely than I had ever been punished before. My father ransacked my room, collecting everything that I had drawn and everything that I had written, piling them up outside and setting fire to them all. All of my dreams, and all of my passion, just… gone. Reduced to ash. And he’d done it as easily as he’d spat in my face and disowned me. From then on I was to sleep outside, and I was never, ever to leave the perimeter fence for any reason. I lived for two years like that, up until I was sixteen.”

“But then everything changed. The Scavengers came. The community had been pretty quiet for years. The Scavengers had never really bothered about it until now, and when they came, they came in force. The first we knew about it was the scent of smoke as they set fire to our wheat crop. Then it was chaos as bullets were flying everywhere and fires raged, ponies screaming all over the place and the Scavengers laughing maniacally as they slaughtered the populace. They stormed my house, and my father attempted to fight back with his shotgun. He took one down, before he was subdued by a blow to the head.”

“And then they found me. It was a sadist, and he was big and fierce and very frightening. He dragged me outside to the main plaza, where all of the survivors of the attack had been rounded up. They were all under armed guard, the Scavengers ready to put a bullet into anypony who ran. My father and mother were amongst them, and so, to my despair, was my only childhood romance. The sadist asked me whether I wanted to join my family, or whether I wanted to join the Scavengers. Without a moment’s hesitation, I accepted the garrison cap he held out to me and fit it onto my head. From that moment my fate was sealed.”

“There was a resounding cheer from the Scavengers as their newest recruit beamed with pride. The Wanderers being held prisoner looked on me with contempt, but as I realised that it was just the same look that they’d always given me, I turned my own heart into ice. They pulled forward my parents, and shoved them down before me. I remember growling at them and saying, ‘Who’s in charge now?’ The sadist laughed and pushed something into my hoof, before taking a few steps back and watching. There was silence as every Scavenger and Wanderer watched and waited, all staring at me and anxiously awaiting my next move.”

“I looked down into my hoof. I clasped the pistol tightly, the metal feeling cold and smooth in my grip. I looked down at my father, who looked up at me, fury in his eyes. He said one thing to me, ‘I always knew you were just a stupid young colt.’
‘I’m not stupid,’ I said, before I raised the pistol and, without even a shadow of doubt in my mind, shot him between the eyes. I remember my mother screaming before I cut her short, putting two more rounds into her head before howling in rage myself. Sixteen years of hatred had been released in those few seconds, and I felt powerful. I felt like I could do anything.”

“Then, before I could say anything, there was a series of resounding cracks as the Scavengers all cocked their weapons in unison. With a deafening roar they opened fire, gunning down every Wanderer that stood before them, including the only mare I had ever loved, and the only pony who had ever loved me. But when I looked into her eyes in her final moments before the Scavenger bullets pierced her flesh, I did not see fear, or hatred, as I had expected to see. I saw only sadness. But I did nothing to try and save her. I just watched her die, like all the rest. I saw her chest explode as she was filled with lead. I saw her eyes lose all life and her face lose all expression. As she crumpled to the floor to lie in a bloody heap, something drifted down to lay atop her corpse. It was something that she always had with her, at all times.”

“A black, homemade cowgirl hat.”

Comments

[Iron Comet]

Short, very short chapter but a important one I think in figuring out Wraith's motives. Bucky was in a cell with her homemade hat probably reminds him of the girl he lost. What I find odd is why the Scavengers only offered him a cap and not any of the others. Unless they saw something in him they liked. Wraith is trying to save the girl he failed to save before. Thats his motivation. As for the rest, yeah, I think it might be interesting to see what has become of Ponyville in the last years that has gone by. Hard to believe it might have grown into a city though.