Linkin Pony - Recharge: Revamped

by Kaciekk

Chapter 38

It was early afternoon when the party of traveling ponies made it to Los Pegasus. Once downtown, NightWave directed CharmingRhythm where to go to drop their team off. All three of SweetHooves’s teammates gave gracious “thank you’s” to the ponies who had brought them home. Afterwards, Rhythm set course for SweetHooves’s apartment.

The three ponies entered inside. Heartfelt emerged from another room, her eyes wide when she saw all of them.

“You’re back!” Heartfelt’s gaze drifted to SweetHooves. She noticed the bandage on her friend’s face. “What… what happened?”

SweetHooves didn’t reply. Instead, she walked past Heartfelt with her head hung low. As she made it into a bedroom, HyperBlitz followed after her. Heartfelt then looked at Rhythm, concern in her eyes.

“I know I said next time would be better,” Rhythm began with a sigh, “but I guess that was a lie. It didn’t go that well.”

“Is everyone okay? Did you get the rest of her team?” Heartfelt fret.

“Yes. We brought everyone back, but… some are injured. SweetHooves has a scared eye,” Rhythm revealed in a hushed tone.

“What? How did that-”

“Hybrids,” Rhythm stated. “Haythorn has been terrorized by rogues and by Hybrids. That’s why they couldn’t leave.” Rhythm thought for a moment. “They went there to help, but it wasn’t enough.”

“The Resistance has to do something about it, right?” Heartfelt said.

Nodding, Rhythm replied, “They have to. I’m going to be delivering a message to the president. I can’t stay too long.”

“Rhythm…” Heartfelt placed a hoof on his left foreleg.

“I promise I’ll come spend time with you another day. I can’t now,” Rhythm told her. He levitated something out of his saddlebag. “Here. This is the money I have left. I’ll pay back the rest later.”

“Oh- it’s alright. You don’t have to pay me back,” Heartfelt assured.

“We’ve got a stash of money back in camp. It’s not a problem,” Rhythm said.

“Really, you don’t have to,” Heartfelt replied.

“But I want to,” Rhythm insisted.

Heartfelt sighed and took the money. “Alright.”

Hyper exited the bedroom and trotted up to Heartfelt’s side. “Heartfelt, I want to thank you for looking after Jumpingjolt.”

“Of course,” Heartfelt said. “Do you think it would be okay for me to talk with SweetHooves? Is she okay with it?”

“I don’t know. You’ll have to ask her,” Hyper responded.

“Well, I’m going to be heading out,” Rhythm stated.

Hyper’s head shot up to alert the Unicorn. “Rhythm. I want to stay here for a few days with SweetHooves. If that’s okay? I’ll fly back to camp when I’m ready.”

Rhythm expected that much. “Of course. Take your time,” he replied.

Just as Rhythm began to move away, Heartfelt wrapped her forelegs around his neck and pulled him back to her. She hugged him tight and he placed a hoof on her back, patting a few times.

“I’ll be back soon, I promise,” Rhythm told her with a weak smile.

Leaving the apartment, Rhythm made his way for headquarters. Once inside he rode the elevator up to the president’s floor. There he handed over Hazel’s envelope to a guard. He didn’t even bother to wait for the guard to return once they went inside. Instead, Rhythm returned to the elevator and waited for it to come back up.

Behind him, there was the sound of the door opening. Someone called Rhythm’s name, and he turned around to see what it was about.

“The president would like to speak with you,” the guard announced.

The elevator had just reached the floor, but Rhythm abandoned his spot and headed back towards the doors. Inside he saw Clarity sitting at the opposite end of the table. Rhythm hoped that this was something about Haythorn, but the envelope laid on the table, unopened. Just that little detail irked Rhythm a bit.

“I wanted to know how work has been holding up in your camp,” Clarity stated. “Have you made progress?”

“Oh, um- yes, I- we have. We’ve continued to repair houses, as well as fend off any Hybrids in the area,” Rhythm reported, his brain still scattered.

“How much Hybrid activity has there been?”

“Well, we destroyed a Hybrid camp as well as disable three- no- four nodes,” Rhythm said. He decided to keep out the part about there being another camp in the dried lake bed. “We saved some ponies from the camp, and from a distress beacon.”

“Your team has done excellent work, but I wasn’t expecting any less from you,” Clarity replied calmly. “These Hybrid encounters haven’t slowed down your progress on the camp, have they?”

“No, I don’t think so,” Rhythm answered. He thought about Hyper’s wing, but that was so long ago on the mission it didn’t seem notable to bring up.

Rhythm had grown annoyed by the stalling, and he decided to speak up. “President, I understand you are concerned about the progress of my camp, but there is something far more important you should look into. In that envelope is a letter from the mayor of Haythorn,” Rhythm pointed to the letter on the table. “They need help badly.”

“Haythorn? We have had contact with them in weeks,” Clarity said as she reached for the envelope.

So you knew there was something wrong, and still didn’t address it? Rhythm rediculed silently. “That’s because rogues destroyed their communications network. Please, they need backup help to fight off the rogues as well as Hybrids.”

“I see,” Clarity replied while reading through the lines of the letter. “How exactly did you get a letter from the mayor in the first place?”

“I went to Haythorn myself,” Rhythm stated bluntly, leaving it at that.

“Well, it is our job to provide aid to Resistance cities in our sector. I’ll see to this as soon as I can,” the lavender mare reported.

“Thank you,” Rhythm responded with a head dip. “And I promise I’ll keep you updated on the progress of my camp.”

Rhythm left the meeting room feeling relieved. There was something in the back of his mind that made him annoyed with how difficult Clarity had been. Despite that, he decided that wasn’t important at the moment and that he shouldn’t put any more effort into thinking about it. Rhythm was exhausted emotionally, mentally and physically. All he wanted was to return to his camp to rest.

Rhythm returned to his cab and traveled into the suburbs. On the edge of town, he noted sentries that were fighting off Hybrids. It had been a long time since he had seen this many Hybrids around the outskirts of Los Pegasus. He wondered if that was something to be worried about, or if the city’s defense will be able to handle it. A sentry stopped his cab before he could make it out of the city. Rhythm had to wait for approval from the sentry before leaving the suburbs.

Rhythm felt odd being alone again, but he soon grew accustomed to it. It was nice to have time alone, he thought, despite how tired he was. Luckily the radio worked now, and he didn’t have to spend the whole trip in silence. He was surprised to hear them play one of Xero’s songs, One Step Closer. That was a pleasant surprise, and cheered him up a bit.

Finally Rhythm made it back to the camp. A few ponies stared at him, obviously knowing that he had left to begin with. Rhythm met up with SpinningNote who was working on a generator behind an apartment. The purple Unicorn swirled around when he heard Rhythm’s distinctive hoofsteps.

“Rhythm! You’re back!” Spinning called out. “I can’t believe you just left without telling anyone first!”

“I’m sorry, it was Hyper who did that. I had to make sure he wouldn’t go alone,” Rhythm clarified.

“Where is Hyper?” Spinning wondered, gazing around.

“He’s staying in Los Pegasus for a few days…”

“Did you guys find SweetHooves?” Spinning asked curiously.

“Yes- but, listen. I’ll call a meeting and explain everything there. I don’t feel like running through this multiple times,” Rhythm stated, rubbing his forehead with a blue hoof.

“Alright. But first I think you should go see Feather. We’ve got a new pony here, and Feather’s not happy about it,” Spinning said with a grimace.

“Not happy?” Rhythm echoed, and went on his way to find out what it meant.

As he trotted down the path, Rhythm could see FeatherTune standing in front of the base. He was glaring at a pink stallion that stood in front of him.

“What’s going on?” Rhythm spoke up.

“Rhythm! This is the last pony I interviewed. And he’s coming just now!” Feather spat.

“Okay, and…?” Rhythm blinked.

“I’m sorry,” the pink stallion said meekly. “You never told me when I should come.” He spoke without malice.

“It’s been weeks!” Feather exclaimed.

“Hey, hey,” Rhythm eased as he put a forehoof on Feather’s shoulder. “That doesn’t matter now. He’s here now, isn’t he? He could still be helpful.”

Feather only snorted with a scrunched muzzle.

“What’s your name?” Rhythm turned to the purple maned stallion.

“Uh- Berry,” he replied.

“Well, Berry, you’re welcome here. So long as you do work. Do you think you can stay productive?” Rhythm questioned.

“I want to try. I’ll do my best,” Berry said, his voice still low.

“Then good. But if you slack off at all, we’ll have to have a talk, okay?” Rhythm addressed.

“Okay,” Berry responded.

“Alright. Why don’t you go over there,” Rhythm said while tilting his head to the gardening tent. “I’m sure someone there can help show you around.”

He watched Berry trot away as FeatherTune took his place next to Rhythm.

“The fact he came so late bothers me,” Feather stated simply. “I can’t trust he’ll have a good work ethic if he’s not punctual.”

“Hey, all we can do is wait and see how he does.” Rhythm shrugged.

“So… how’d it go in Haythorn?” Feather changed the subject.

Rhythm sighed. “Go find the others and tell them there’s a meeting. I’ll tell you all there.”

Feather only nodded in return and left the ground in search of his friend. Rhythm didn’t bother waiting and headed towards the base instead.

Once all five stallions were in the meeting room, Rhythm spilled out all that had happened the last two days. Starting from the beginning, he told his team how Hyper had left without telling anyone, leaving Rhythm no choice but to follow him. He explained the difficulty of getting to Haythorn, the situation in Haythorn,SweetHooves’ injury and that Hyper was staying in Los Pegasus. All of it left the other stallions somewhat dazed, trying to comprehend it.

“So what do we do now?” Blazing asked.

“I’d like to just get back to work, but not today, at least for me. I need to rest,” Rhythm admitted.

“That’s great, since you never let yourself rest,” Feather remarked teasingly.

Rhythm only gave Feather a slight glare. He shook his head and continued. “Nothing happened while we were gone?” Rhythm directed towards Echo.

“Nothing out of the ordinary. Why’d you put me in charge?” Echo wondered with a head tilt.

“Because… I don’t know! I want to make sure all of you know how to keep things under control.” Rhythm shrugged.

“I thought you were testing us,” Spinning said.

“Uh… I guess?”

“So you’re not?” Spinning countered.

Rhythm blinked as Spinning’s logic confused him. He shook his head rapidly as if trying to throw the fuzziness out of his brain. “I don’t know.”

“Is there anything you need us to do?” Blazing spoke up.

“Well… have you been training ThunderCharm?” Rhythm questioned and Blazing nodded. “Alright, good. I want you to keep training her, that will be your job.”

Feather sat up as Rhythm’s eyes locked onto him. “Feather. You don’t have to do it today, but maybe tomorrow, can you scout around the area and look for any Hybrid activity?”

“You got it,” Feather replied.

“Thanks, I appreciate it,” Rhythm said with a small smile. That made Feather smile too, feeling grateful for being needed.

“Anything on your mind, Spinning?” Rhythm wondered as he looked to Spinning, seeing a glitter in his eyes.

“Actually, sometime this week, I wanted to go explore around the area. Not like a scanning thing like you want Feather to do. I want to know more about this area, and if there’s any resources we can use,” The unicorn explained. “Whoever wants to come with me can.”

“Oh, that sounds fun!” Blazing said.

“That does sound like a good idea,” Rhythm considered. “Alright, I think that’s it for now. Thank you everyone,” he finished as he stood up.

“Oh,” EchoBeat let out. “When is Hyper coming back?”

Rhythm sighed. “I don’t know. I said he can stay with SweetHooves for as long as he needs to. I know he won’t want to stay away from us for too long, so hopefully only a few days.”

Echo and the others accepted that answer as the meeting ended. They all dispersed from the room and continued on with their tasks. Only Rhythm stayed in the base, ready to give himself a break for once.