Hinterlands

by Rambling Writer

7 - Cats and Mice

Sleep was not Catskill’s friend that night. She couldn’t remember resting at all, only tossing and turning. Amanita must not’ve slept well either; Catskill heard infrequent whimpers from her sleeping bag. And to top it all off, when the sun finally rose, Catskill felt sick to her stomach. She staggered out through the door to the street, wobbled around to the back of her house, and puked. Twice. Maybe the ritual healing wasn’t so great after all, or maybe the bandages around her trunk needed to be changed. She’d have to ask Amanita.

Once she stopped feeling like her guts had been crushed into a blender, Catskill climbed up to her roof and looked north. She didn’t like what she saw; the blizzard had started moving and was steadily advancing on Mystic. It was still several hours away, though. Catskill looked to the exit from the valley, towards the Crystal Empire. Should they walk during those few hours? She turned the thought over in her mind as she mentally examined what she knew about the area. Not too hard to traverse in decent weather, but barely any shelter. No, best not to let the storm catch them, then.

She jumped down from the roof and landed neatly on the ground. Amanita was just coming out of the house, yawning and rubbing her eyes. “Hey,” she mumbled. “Heard you get up. We leaving now?”

“Best not. Look,” said Catskill, pointing. “That blizzard I mentioned? It’ll be here in two or three hours, and if we travel, we’ll be caught in the worst of it.”

“Ah.” Amanita stood up a little straighter as she blinked sleep away. “But you remember the mare who’s chasing me, right? And any ponies she has? Don’t you- think that maybe-”

“No, it’s probably best to wait here. If they see the blizzard coming, they won’t want to move, either.” Catskill glanced sidelong at Amanita. “Unless you think they’re pretty close behind us and every second counts.”

Amanita swallowed and looked away. “N-no, that’s… pretty unlikely.”

“So we’ve got several hours to kill,” said Catskill. “Might as well go back to sleep.”

“I don’t think I can sleep knowing that… a storm like that’s coming,” said Amanita. “And I, I’m not that tired, anyway.” She bit her lip and said, “This’ll… probably sound weird, but… could you, uh, show me around Mystic?”

Catskill turned very slowly to look at Amanita, who was shuffling in the snow and staring at the ground. “Show you around Mystic?” Catskill repeated.

“Y-yeah,” said Amanita. “I’ve… I’ve never been in a ghost town before and I… kinda wanted to see it. I-I mean,” she added quickly, “as long as I’m not, y’know, bringing… up… bad memories or something.” She quickly looked away and folded her ears back.

“…You know what, sure,” said Catskill, surprising herself. “Mystic’s a big place, and I wouldn’t want you to get lost in the blizzard.” She wasn’t sure what the excuse was for.

“Thanks,” said Amanita quietly. She pulled at her collar and said, “So, um, where would you start?”

“Well, uh… That house?” Catskill pointed to the next building over. “One of my best friends lived there. A mason. She helped build a lot of the houses in town, but you wouldn’t know it. She was quiet and gave away a lot of her money to ponies who needed it.”

“Sorry she left,” said Amanita.

Catskill shrugged. “She still visits, when she has the time. Why don’t I show you her favorite project? It’s just down the road…”

And so it went on, with the two of them wandering further and further into the valley, even crossing the river. “I helped build that mill downstream. That was a piece of work, let me tell you.” Catskill found herself getting lost in her memories and Amanita hung on every word. “The post still arrived on time out here, believe it or not. Those postmares were the biggest badasses in the world.” Catskill wasn’t even sure if she was talking for Amanita or herself; it’d been a long time since she’d truly thought about Mystic. “A friend lived in that house, and it had a broken window to the cellar I could climb through as a foal. I often met her down there when she was supposed to be grounded.” It was like she’d shut out most of her life, maybe to forget Taconic. “An old stallion spent almost a decade carving that statue. He died a few weeks after finishing it. Good, ain’t it?” Amanita looked more and more thoughtful with every word Catskill said.

Before Catskill knew what was happening, hours had passed. They’d crossed half of Mystic, going an inch at a time. Finally, a casual glance north made her flinch. The blizzard had moved a lot while she wasn’t watching. “We should go back,” she said. “The blizzard’s less than half an hour away. Come on.” She turned and set off for her house.

“Wait.”

Catskill stopped. Amanita hadn’t started walking, but was slowly bouncing from hoof to hoof. “Listen,” she said. Deep breath. “You… You really ought to know… I’m a ne-”

BANG-srk.

Something whizzed through the air between them and flung a few stone chips from a wall. Amanita yelped and clapped her hooves to her nose.

“Down!” yelled Catskill. She dive-tackled Amanita to the ground and pulled her around the corner of a building. The echos were dying, but the sound of the gunshot was unmistakable.

“Son of a-” squealed Amanita, pressing her hooves to her muzzle.

“You okay?” Catskill was shaking and her mind had shut down all tracks, bar one: she had to run. She’d never been shot at before.

“I’m fine,” Amanita said. She pulled her legs away; her hooves glistened with a small amount of blood, blood that was still trickling from a wound on her nose. “Missed the headshot.” Her voice didn’t even have the clogged garble of a bloody nose.

“Good, good.” Catskill thought like she’d never thought before. How to avoid getting shot? Stay out of their line of sight. Bullets could only go in a straight line. So where was the gunmare? The bullet had come from the same cliff they’d come down from, right? Probably. “Wait here.” Catskill edged for the corner, wishing she had her spyglass. She peeked around the edge of the building and looked up at the cliff. She could barely make out a cluster of ponies there. Three? Four? It was hard to tell. Something- BANG. -flashed and a bullet whistled by her ear. By the time she pulled back, snowflakes were already flying through the air from the impact.

“The jealous mare’s trying to kill you?!” said Catskill breathlessly. “Why didn’t you tell me? I thought they were- gonna rough you up or- or something!” Catskill was too frightened to feel betrayed by the lack of information.

“So did- So did I!” gasped Amanita. “I- I didn’t think-”

“Whatever.” Catskill risked a second for another look. Four ponies, it seemed. At least one unicorn. No shots came her way. Hopefully, they only had the one arquebus. “Okay. If we can get to my house, we can hole up there, wait out the blizzard. I know this place, but those guys-” She jerked her head towards the cliff. “-don’t. They won’t be able to find us before the storm hits. Once the blizzard’s gone, we’ll-” What would they do? Make a break for it at the same time as the others? “-I don’t know what. We’ll see.”

“Better than nothing, right?” said Amanita, her voice stuffed with forced cheer.

“Sure. Alleyway there. Run.”

The two of them raced across Mystic, sticking behind buildings, slipping through alleys, narrowly avoiding infrequent potshots from the sniper. While the buildings were hardly close together, they made getting a clean shot awkward. The valley rang with the dying echos of gunshots. Catskill wished they could’ve taken a less roundabout route, but they’d be easy pickings on any main street.

But their escape came to a screeching halt at the river. It was too wide to jump over and too fast and too cold to swim through. They’d have to take one of the bridges. One of the wide-open bridges. Catskill and Amanita flitted from cover to cover as the former thought. “How’re you with shields?” she asked. “Or illusions?”

“Not good enough with shields to trust they’d stop a bullet,” Amanita replied. “Don’t know a thing about illusion.”

Which Catskill had expected. Worth a shot. (Ha ha.) They were at the closest building to the bridge, now. Twenty feet across. Catskill guessed the gun the sniper was using was single-shot, or else she’d fire more often. Which meant-

“Okay, here’s the plan,” said Catskill. “I stick my head out, get her to shoot. While she’s reloading, we run across the bridge. Good?” No. Not good. This is stupid. Why am I doing THIS?

“Not really, but what the hay,” muttered Amanita. She swallowed. “Ready when you are.”

Catskill nodded. “Three… two… one…” She whipped her head out, looked up at the cliff, and immediately pulled back. Half an instant after she was gone, a bullet zipped by.

Amanita bolted across the bridge; Catskill followed a second later. Her legs pounded at the ground as she sprinted. Her entire body was tense, waiting for a gunshot that never came. She reached Amanita, passed her, looked for the best cover on the far shore.

She spotted an empty window frame on the closest building. She vaulted over the sill and rolled through the decaying remains of tables and chairs. Amanita jumped through and landed awkwardly on her stomach, but the gunshot that cracked through the air missed her. She rolled onto her back, away from the window. “I’m okay!” she gasped.

“Good.” Catskill stood up and brushed the dust off of herself. “There should be a door on the far side. And if there isn’t, we’ll make one.”

There wasn’t, so Catskill simply shouldered her way through a weak wall. She grinned. Not far now. They-

“NO!”

Catskill whirled at Amanita’s scream. Amanita was frozen, staring up into the sky. “Oh, no no no no no,” she whispered, and pointed a shaking hoof up. “L-look.”

A pegasus was circling above them, barely visible. She made no attempt to drop down on them and simply watched.

After cursing under her breath, Catskill said, “Can’t be helped. Let’s keep moving.” Her thoughts rushed by: now that the shooter had a spotter on them, would she keep shooting? Or would she try to get closer? Could they get the pegasus down somehow? Could they lose her?

There were no more shots as the pair kept ducking and running, but it was a cold comfort with the pegasus circling like a vulture and following them easily, almost lazily. Catskill began taking more risks, going for more direct and more vulnerable routes. Still no shots. It wasn’t long before they were back at her house. But by then, Catskill had had an idea.

“Wait here,” said Catskill. She bolted for her house and cleared the street at a sprint. She banged through door, nearly splintering it, and skidded to a halt next to her blunderbuss and bandolier. She slammed a shell into the blunderbuss’s breech and ran back outside. The pegasus was- There she was. “Alright, you spineless coward,” Catskill whispered. “Let’s see how you like some of your own medicine.” She pointed the blunderbuss straight up and fired.

BOOM.

Catskill swore she felt the earth shake. She didn’t have a chance in Prance of hitting the pegasus, but that wasn’t the point. The pegasus probably didn’t know that, and a flying pegasus was an easy target. She’d get scared and ground herself. No more aerial recon. Easy.

The pegasus’s flight suddenly turned erratic; her wings flailed and she zipped out of sight, towards the exit of the valley. Catskill smirked and brushed a few snowflakes off her muzzle.

But as she waved Amanita over, a sinking feeling dropped into her stomach. “The pegasus isn’t following us anymore,” she said as she nudged Amanita into the house, “but I bet she knows this is where we’re staying. We have to move. Yes, through the blizzard, but no, not out of town. Remember the mill? On the river?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Amanita said, nodding jitteringly.

“We’re going there.” Catskill pulled her bandolier over her head. “It’s big and solid and it’ll keep the storm out. Start packing!” She rolled up a sleeping bag and pushed it into its pouch.

“Sorry!” Horn-glow cast dim shadows throughout the room as Amanita telekinetically gathered up everything she had.

Deciding to hedge her bets, trying not to think about what this entailed, Catskill added, “And if we get separated for- for whatever reason, follow the river once the storm clears. It’s not the fastest route out of the mountains, but it is the easiest. Once you get out of the foothills, it’s a straight shot across the plains to the Crystal Empire, so just run. Got it?” Catskill left out that Amanita would be running for a day or two. No need to worry her even more.

“Okay, okay.” Amanita was shaking as she haphazardly stuffed her supplies into her bag. “I- I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

“Not your fault,” said Catskill. She pulled down her balaclava and goggles. “Don’t worry about it. Move.” She poked her head out into the street. Left, right: nothing. Up: nothing. She squinted at the far cliff, but couldn’t make anything out through the light snowfall. Maybe the sniper had changed position by now. Maybe the blizzard would spontaneously vanish. “You done?”

Amanita hoisted her saddlebags over her back. “Yeah.”

As Catskill led them down narrow alleys, she wished she’d seen where the pegasus had gone to ground. She briefly thought she saw a tail vanish around a corner, but it was just a bush waving in the wind. She swallowed and scraped snowflakes from her goggles. She could do this.

But when she glanced up the street to the bridge, she cursed and backed up. At the very, very far end of the street, three ponies were running towards them, one of them with an arquebus. If she crossed that bridge, she’d be easy pickings. An indistinct yell from them already told her they’d spotted her.

“We’re going to have to cross another bridge,” she whispered to Amanita. “When I say go, you run across the street-”

A shadow suddenly passed over them. Catskill looked up; rushing clouds were covering the sun. The snow grew thicker. The wind picked up. And then the blizzard fell on the town like an avalanche.

---

Something poked Bitterroot. She waved it away. It poked harder. She smacked at it. It dumped a pile of snow on her head. The shock jarred Bitterroot to wakefulness so hard she could hear her ears ringing. She wiped some of the snow out of her eyes and squinted up at her assailant. “I’d say you could’ve just said something, but that’s not really an option for you, right, Gale?”

Gale scowled down at Bitterroot and began working on a snowball.

“I’m up, I’m up.” Bitterroot wrestled her way out of her sleeping bag, did a short lap of the miniscule campsite, and rolled her wings: left three times, right three times, left three times. “Thanks for getting me up,” she added.

Gale tossed the snowball away from the campsite and nodded.

“Be back in a few.” And Bitterroot flared her wings and was away.

Bitterroot was one of those rare pegasi who didn’t love flying. She enjoyed it, true, but flying wasn’t a joy to her any more than swimming up or down was a joy to a fish: it was just something she did. Still, after being forced to stay with groundbound ponies for even a few days, being able to stretch her wings like this felt like getting out of a carriage after an excruciatingly long trip.

The sun hadn’t risen on the ground, but Bitterroot climbed high enough that it poked above the mountain range, bathing her and the clouds in light. She took a deep breath of the air and looked north. The blizzard had unfortunately started moving and their little team had a few hours before they were caught in it.

How far could they get in a few hours? They needed every inch they could get. Bitterroot looked in the vague direction they were traveling. There seemed to be a valley ahead, which might provide a little bit of extra shelter. She squinted at the mountains around it. There was a dip near them, a small pass that led directly into the valley. It was definitely something somepony would see, and if the additional pony with Amanita was a ranger, she’d know about it. And Trace had said a large part of tracking was the land. But it would take some time to get to and from the valley, so-

You know what? Screw it. She wanted to stretch her wings. She could be back soon enough. Bitterroot pumped her wings and threw herself forward, the shadowed ground streaking by below her. Artemis would probably complain about this extra detour, but she was a whiner anyway.

She arrived at the valley in a few minutes, sunlight just beginning to creep down into it. An abandoned town sprawled below her, covering most of the valley floor. It was hard to make out details in the darkness, but many of the buildings were still technically standing. It wouldn’t make a bad place to hole up for in the blizzard, to be honest. They’d have to leave quickly, though, if they wanted to make it in time. (Assuming Amanita had gone for the town, but Bitterroot was willing to bet on that.)

Bitterroot zipped back to camp and landed on the outskirts. Trace and Artemis were already up, making toast over the fire. Artemis looked up when she heard Bitterroot, her face twisted with anger. “Where’ve y’been?” she snarled. “Y’were only s’pposed t-”

“Trace,” said Bitterroot, “we’re going that way, right?” She pointed in the direction of the valley. “And we’ve been heading that way for a while.”

Trace looked off, then trotted out of camp to examine something. She trotted back and asked, “Yes. Why?”

“There’s a valley over there, one with a ghost town that could provide us with some shelter from the blizzard. The blizzard’s moving, but won’t be here for another few hours, so we can make it if we move.”

“I say we do it,” said Trace promptly. “I’d hate to be caught out in the open.” She looked suspiciously at Artemis.

Artemis scowled at them and turned back to the fire. “Sure, sure,” she mumbled. “Jus’ lemme finish breakfast first.”

To her credit, once she was done with breakfast, Artemis was arguably the quickest packer. As soon as camp had broken, Trace set off on a swift trot — nose down, as always. Nopony spoke as they walked. Bitterroot kept glancing north whenever she could catch a snatch of the blizzard through the trees. It crept nearer and nearer, but not so quickly that it’d overtake them. They’d reach the valley in time, easily.

Finally, still following Amanita’s trail, they pushed through a dense copse and slid down a small slope to find themselves on a cliff above the valley. The village was spread out before them in all of its decaying glory. Trace whistled. “Wow,” she muttered. “Wonder what did this.”

“Betcha the land did ’em in,” said Artemis. “Get some ponies ’oo think they can strike it rich, land’s too ’ostile, drives ’em away. Trust me, you can’t last long out ’ere wi’out the princesses proppin’ things up. Why d’you think the Crystal Empire needs the Crystal ’Eart?”

“I don’t know,” said Trace. “It looks pretty big for-”

Gale’s eyes suddenly went wide and she started hopping up and down, dislodging her scarf a little. She quickly wrapped it back up and stabbed a hoof at the town like it was somepony she’d sworn revenge against.

“What?” asked Artemis. She gazed over the town, but apparently couldn’t see anything. “What d’you see?”

A flurry of movements so fast Bitterroot couldn’t follow them, then Gale went back to pointing.

“Slow down!” snapped Artemis. “I can’t unnerstand you when-”

Gale promptly turned to Bitterroot and shakily jabbed at the town again. She flared her good wing and pointed at her eye. Hoping it meant “you can see it because you’re a pegasus”, Bitterroot looked down and skimmed the buildings, trying to find something out of the ordinary, but it was hard to tell where Gale was poin-

Oh. That was what Gale was pointing at. It was hard for even a pegasus to see, but it was there. “Holy crap,” whispered Bitterroot. “That’s Amanita.”

Gale nodded energetically. Trace and Artemis both snapped to Bitterroot. At the same time, they asked, “What?”

“Look, down there.” Bitterroot pointed. “Halfway up main street, left side. Two ponies. The unicorn. Isn’t that Amanita?”

Trace suddenly had a spyglass out and peered down into the town. She grinned. “Oh, yeah. Definitely her.”

“Ha ha,” said Artemis. “Got ’er.” She walked right up to the edge of the cliff and leaned over, whispering, “Gotcha, you stupid little-”

“Gale,” said Trace, “do you think you can shoot her from here?”

Gale squinted at Trace and lowered an ear.

“I was simply thinking,” Trace said defensively, “that if we can kill her now, she won’t be able to get the drop on us with any thralls she might have.”

Gale shook her head and made some gesture at Artemis as she pulled her arquebus into position. “ ’Course she can shoot Amanita,” said Artemis. “She was wonderin’ why you think otherwise.”

Trace sucked in a breath through her nose. “Because I don’t know her skills and had to ask her.” Bitterroot sensed she was making an effort to not clench her teeth.

Rolling her eyes, Gale popped a short pole into the bottom of the arquebus. The pole itself, rather than the harness, carried the gun’s weight as Gale stared down the sights.

“Take your time,” said Bitterroot. Her heart was pounding in her chest. They were so close. “if you miss-”

Without blinking, Gale waved Bitterroot away so ferociously Bitterroot had to take a step back to avoid a broken nose. “Unless you are capable with firearms,” Trace whispered, “I suggest you let the sharpshooter handle the sharpshooting.”

Gale nodded at Trace and gripped the trigger bit in her teeth. She closed one eye. She shuffled her hooves to get a better position. She took a deep breath… and-

BANG.

She’d heard gunshots before, but Bitterroot still clapped her hooves over her ears at the sound. It was enough to get her heart racing. Gunshots didn’t always sound dangerous, but by Celestia they were loud. She blinked away her surprise just in time to see the two ponies scrambled behind a building, apparently unharmed.

“Y’missed,” Artemis said with a sneer.

As she pushed another bullet into the breech, Gale made a face at Artemis. Down below, a pony head poked out from behind the building. BANG. And withdrew unhurt.

“That didn’t look like Amanita,” Bitterroot said, frowning. “I think that was an earth pony.”

“An’ ’ow would you know?” Artemis snorted. “Could you see ’er?”

“Yes. Pegasus. Gale, why’re you shooting somepony who isn’t Amanita?”

Artemis opened her mouth, but Gale clicked her tongue, drawing the former’s attention. Gale made a few motions and pointed down into the valley. Artemis nodded and said to Bitterroot, “Warnin’ shot. Make ’er keep ’er ’ead down.”

“Don’t kill the earth pony,” said Bitterroot. “She’s a victim.”

Gale nodded and adjusted her aim as the ponies scrambled down an alley.

Maybe it was interesting for Gale, but after several minutes, the rush began to wane for Bitterroot. The two ponies stuck to cover and stayed out of Gale’s sight as much as possible. Every now and then, Gale would zing off a potshot at them that would inevitably miss. And all Bitterroot could do was sit there.

Once they ran across a bridge before Gale could reload, Bitterroot had had enough. “Think I should follow them?” she asked. “Just, you know, loom over them. Track them so if Gale loses them-”

“No,” Artemis said promptly. Of course.

“Why not?”

“ ’Cause it’s too dang’rous,” said Artemis. She didn’t even look away from the town. “She’s a necromancer. You ain’t.”

“I don’t see why I shouldn’t track them,” Bitterroot said angrily. “I’m not stupid, it’s not like I’m going to land and try to take on a necromancer single-hoofedly. I’ll just-”

“Why’re you asking us?” asked Trace curiously. “If you simply flew away, we couldn’t stop you.”

Bitterroot opened her mouth, thought, and zipped away, leaving behind a swearing Artemis. She briefly considered grabbing a cloud to hide behind — it was her usual method of staying hidden during aerial reconnaissance — but gathering one would take time. Besides, it wasn’t like the ponies down there didn’t know somepony was following them. She spotted them climbing out of a building and began spiraling lazily over them.

They tried to evade her — quick changes in direction, blind alleys, taking vertical cover wherever they could — but Bitterroot knew all the tricks and followed them easily. Even if she hadn’t, the design of the town made tracking them downright trivial. Bitterroot barely needed to do a thing besides look down and flap her wings. Gale stopped firing, maybe because she was pinpointing their exact location all the time.

Suddenly, they stopped running. The earth pony broke away and ran into a decrepit house. Bitterroot smirked to herself as she stared down at Amanita through the falling snow. This was so easy, it was practically cheating. All she had to do was follow them while they had to stay on the ground and out of sight of Gale. And even if they split up (like now), Amanita was the important one, s-

BOOM.

The blast rattled Bitterroot’s bones. A pellet zipped by not a foot from her. She squawked and flailed all six limbs as she tried to get away. She hurriedly threw herself into a spiral and dove for the far end of the town. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She’d just heard the blunderbuss yesterday, hadn’t she? Yet she hadn’t found it. Of course the earth pony would use it.

Bitterroot landed on the collapsed roof of a building with less grace than she wanted to admit, sending out a puff of recently-fallen snow. Stupid. How would the ranger know they weren’t trying to kill her? Warning shots and missed shots looked the same. Even if she wasn’t enthralled, she was just defending herself.

Bitterroot hop-flew across the rooftops back the way she came, staying out of sight from the ground while not making much noise. She still had a general idea of where she’d been, so maybe-

There they were, flitting down a distant street. Bitterroot followed, unsure of whether she should jump the ranger and try to take or break her blunderbuss or just tail them. She settled for tailing them, at least for the moment. Praying the others were still up on the cliff, she gave a few jumps extra boosts with her wings and alternated between frantic waving at the cliff and pointing down at the street.

The wind picked up. Bitterroot pulled her cloak tighter around herself. And by the time she realized what the increased wind meant, the blizzard was upon her.

Comments

[Cross Lament]

Was the ranger enthralled at all? Probably. Why else would she shoot at strangers? Although this wasn’t Equestria; you couldn’t just assume that a stranger would be smiling and friendly to you. Still, to go straight for the gun…

"Someone we're shooting at shot back at us! That's crazy!" - Bitterroot, 2019

[DiscoPanda84]

Why else would she shoot at strangers?

Hmm, could it maybe be because your group shot at theirs first perhaps??

[FanOfMostEverything]

I'd comment about Bitterroot's questionable logic, but I see others have beaten me to the punch. In any case, the blizzard should definitely make this a lot more interesting. And I do wonder about Catskill's vital and mental status. When you're constantly surprising yourself with your actions while in the company of a necromancer, that's rarely a good sign.

[NorrisThePony]

Fantastic chapter. Giving us Amanita and Catskills' perspectives on the sequence first was a damn good call.

[redmar]

I can see that the author has edited this chapter since it was first published. It was a good call of the author to chnge Bitterroots thoughts about being shot at.

[FOXTrot2]

Amanita wasn't expecting lethal intent? I'm surprised that she's surprised.

Also, that blizzard came in fast.

[FridayPie]

9482350
Cale'anon Vatay would agree