North Woods NightMares

by Starfighter

Chapter 4: Worthy Assistant

“GO, now!” the NightMare yelled to PW. The escaping mare could canter pretty well on two legs but would not be able to gallop.

“What is it? Need to reload? Gun’s jammed?” an alarmed PW asked.

“Damn fingers acting up! I need to short it out with water. It’s been happening more lately.”

“2! I dealt with that in testing! There’s two wires in the j-box on your hoof that you need to cross. I can get it with my wings right now!” PW called, lunging towards the mare soldier. He took to the air in a hover and grabbed Night Mare-2’s hoof, with her junction box.

“You really know what you’re doing, Polaris Wind?” the mare asked sincerely.

“Promise. If I’m wrong I’ll shield you with my body” the stallion said, opening up the box. He grabbed the two wires with his wings.

“What’s wrong nightmare?!? Gun’s jammed?” yelled somepony with intent from around the corner.

PW crossed the wires and reset them to their sockets, causing a buzz and the NightMare’s index finger to shoot out. Then whence the wires were reconnected she could use her fingers again. Night Mare-2 flung PW from her foreleg, across the road and into the bushes- out of the line of fire. Then she opened fire just in time.

"BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT!"

The panic stricken crowd split, with some creatures scattering, and some hard minded individuals standing their ground. The NightMare’s trained ability to strafe prevented her from getting shot, and she took six more lives to end the firefight.

Night Mare-2 hung up her dangling radio, closed the junction box and approached the bushes where PW landed. “Hey. Sorry about that. Are you okay?” she called.

“That was so awesome! You just hurled me like a trebuchet! So much power!”

“Hehehe! Oh PW” the mare laughed.

“Is the fight over?” the stallion asked, getting back on his hooves. The big mare raised her head and looked both ways.

“It would appear so.”

“I’m glad that worked. That was scary.”

“You probably could have flown off safely at that distance.”

“I mean for YOU! If we couldn’t get your fingers working it would have been curtains. How long has that been “acting up”?”

“Too long. And it wouldn’t have been curtains, just embarrassing. I’m a weapons platform. It takes more than a few bullets to take me down.” The NightMare paused and huffed. “PW?”

“Yeah?”

“If you really do want to support me, in the field like you are now… you did save my six. And my twelve. I guess I wouldn’t find having you around to be a liability.”

“I can stay?”

“You may stay at your own risk” the NightMare answered.

“You rock 2!”

“You’re not so bad yourself, PW. Just know I don’t know how HQ is going to react to this. It may not work out.”

After checking their surroundings, they went back onto the road. “Manehattan Control, I dispatched another six enemies. It appears that I will be able to recover the weapons. More of the enemy ran off armed- this isn’t over yet. Also, I’m reporting another finger lockup.”

“During the firefight?” came the response.

“Yeah. Over.”

“So you poured water over it?”

“No, switched the wires up.”

“How did you get it open? Did the other fingers work this time?”

“No, a pegasus helped me out.”

“…” “A pegasus on your side? A bystander?”

“Yeah.”

“Well you can tell that bystander he just rescued the most expensive piece of military hardware this side of the equator!”

“He can hear you sir. And he knows that.”

“What are your plans? Are you still returning to refit?”

“Yeah.”

“10-4.”

Night Mare-2 stopped at the body pile and looked around again. “Watch the road for me please? I’m going to reload.”

“You got it 2!” the pegasus replied. “So 2, if I saved your life twice already- how are you still alive after a whole year?”

“Well, maybe not my life, but definitely my appearance. The reason is because normally my firefights with armed individuals are one-offs. Armed with cannons. Today was fighting a small army. It’s almost worse than training. Most of the time it’s hand combat or a single armed warlord."

“Yeah the newspaper I read said there was an undisclosed cargo and then said the perpetrators were armed. Sure leaves a lot of room open for interpretation!”

After the mare finished reloading the D16 she unloaded all the guns except for one, bundled all of the ammunition up and took a strap out of her pack and wrapped the weapons together into two connected bundles. “Hey PW."

“Hey 2.”

“I got a job for you. Stand up!”

“You don’t want to carry them?” the stallion asked, as it was becoming clear what the job was.

“It would be hard for me to see over my shoulders if I carried these. As well as defend us” the mare said, placing the double bundle of 3 and 3 guns onto PW’s back with a single outstretched hoof.

“Agh!” he squawked with the burden. His legs quivered and buckled, unfamiliar with needing to carry so much weight in the heat of the moment.

“Hehe! How cute.”

“Shut up! I got this!” the stallion huffed, walking off.

“So you do! Good job buddy” the mare replied before pausing in thought. "We need to make one stop on the way back. The townsfolk… they don’t like this stuff on my face” said the blood coated mare soldier, pointing a finger to the red spots.

“Aha! They don’t?” laughed PW.

“You have a pretty good tolerance for gore, PW. It almost creeps me out.”

“I’ve been conditioning myself. I’ve wanted to be here for so long at your side it’s like a dream come true.”

“The little stallion with such huge dedication!”

“Oh come on!”

Night Mare-2 inhaled and exhaled deeply. “Smell that cool air pocket? The pond is nearby.”

“Pond? Oh- I thought you were going to stop at some spring or something” replied PW, glad that he was getting a rest. He was nearly certain that the titanic mare knew he was struggling, and that she just kept quiet out of respect.

“Nope. Not out here.”

“I’m actually glad to know a mare who will go swimming with ice in the water.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah most mares complain about the water temperature being under seventy. I’m not that way. I’m like you.”

“You’re northern raised then too?”

“Yeah. Maybe not as far north as you. I’m from the skies north of Cloudsdale. Latitude sixty degrees. But also a few thousand feet up. You’re from the Crystal Mountains, latitude seventy degrees.”

“You’re just a walking encyclopedia aren’t you?”

“Yeah. Do you think it’s going to be safe though for us to go swimming here?”

“Well, we are close to town. But I do not think so. I need to wash off. You will stay out of the water and sit with the weapons.”

PW was bummed that he wasn’t going to go swimming with the mare, but also felt a huge obligation to be with the guns. “The guns don’t like the water I guess?”

“Nope. They plug up.”

“I see. I’m also honored that you trust me with the weapons.”

“Not the D16. You can’t fire that thing. Well maybe you could but you’d also get shot back. And as if you of all ponies, could stop me” the mare teased, leaning in sideways to bump him a bit.

“Hehe! So it’s the one small gun you left loaded?”

“That’s no small gun, PW, that is an AJ-47! You’d better act like it’ll knock you down because it will if you’re not ready!”

“Oh.”

“Have you ever fired a gun before, PW?”

“Uh… no.”

“Let’s fix that then. You’d better know how to do it before your life depends on it” said the mare, as they arrived at the rocky shore of a very reflective small lake.

PW couldn’t even wait for the burden to be lifted and collapsed. “You did good, PW. That’s a lot of weight, even for an earth-pony” said the mare, lifting the gun strap with a single hoof.

“Thanks. I know that’s nothing compared to you, you’re a machine.”

“Thank you!” said the mare, unstrapping the loaded gun. She inspected it for integrity before facing PW. “First cardinal rule of gun safety. Never point a gun at somecreature you don’t intend to kill. I do realize this means I was an ass earlier for aiming at you. I’m sorry.”

“No worries 2! I’d never aim at you- you should know that well.”

“Second rule of gun safety. Keep your barrel pointed below the horizon. See how I’m holding the AJ-47? Against my chest, firm stance, and gun aimed at the ground. For you, a good stance would be sitting. You need to get good before you can fire a gun standing. On the left side here is the safety. Third rule of gun safety. Safety is on unless you have made the decision to use the weapon. To shoot, take the safety off, look down the sight as I am now, look to line up the two needles here and here, and once the shot is lined up, pull the trigger once.

“BKK!” fired the gun as the NightMare continued. “Immediately turn safety back on! Do not hold the trigger. Ammo is precious. You can’t spray guns like the enemy did back there. Probably 3 shots went out. That would be fatal if you aimed right.”

“That’s intense!”

“As I said it’s not a little gun. I’m actually going to make sure you can even take the blowback first. I’m going to lightly sock you now.”

The stallion’s ears went down and his pupils shrank, and his wings began trembling. “Wait… wait” he said stepping back. “You’re huge 2! You could really hurt me.”

“I could. But I know what I’m doing and the strength will be exactly the same as the gun. Ready?” the mare asked, rolling up her sleeve.

Author's Note:

Writing in my spare travel time to HarmonyCon 2024 I've been able to get a lot of words written and the (unedited) story is now up to 32k words (the first four chapters only comprise 7k words) so lots more is coming!