Chapter 23: Hate
Chapter 23: Hate
Stairs.
After my not-so-triumphant return to Neighwhere, I could have died happy without seeing another set of stairs. Here, though, I found myself trudging up even more. I let out an exasperated sigh.
“Kick, you know we couldn’t have taken the elevator. Probably trapped, even if the doors weren’t locked.” Ash shot back at me, several steps ahead.
I nodded, and the motion hurt. Everything hurt. My legs and chest hurt. Healing potions could only do so much, and I’d taken such an extreme beating in the last week. It was all catching up to me as we climbed the stairs to the top, where another round of pain was waiting.
Similarly, I could tell that Ash wasn’t as well as he wanted us to think. He was keeping up with us and putting up a brave face, but I could tell that he was hurt. Whatever had happened to him out there, he was feeling it now. He was limping from his old injured shoulder, and his normally bright eyes were dark and hooded. His feathers were matted with blood, and I spotted multiple fresh injuries that he’d hastily and sloppily bandaged.
Fluster brought up the rear, exposed wings a shock every time I saw them. Each step was a visible effort for the mare, even with no apparent injuries. Potions had healed her, but she was still soaked in the gore from numerous ponies: dweller, family, and friend. Potions couldn’t heal her emotional injuries though, and I doubted she’d ever be the same. Every now and then she let out a sad little laugh.
I had to admit that I had expected to be making this trip alone. Since that day I woke up in a puddle, I’d thought I was the only pony truly dedicated to this. I’d never thought that I would really have anyone next to me when I finally found Hate, and brought to him the reckoning that he so deserved.
Plans changed. Motivations changed, and I’d met other creatures that had as much of a reason to see Hate dead as I did. Through all of that, my end goal remained unchanged. This would all be worth the sacrifice, the pain, and all the devastation that had been caused by me, when I killed Hate and put his head on a fucking stick.
Lets see if we can keep him awake and alive for that. Oh, that’d be fucking great.
Yeah. Yeah, it would.
From somewhere beneath us came a loud cracking sound. A thump of pressure blasted up the stairwell, and I knew that the Rangers had gotten through the door we’d locked behind us. I’d been hoping that the Endless would have gotten back up by now, so either they had put it down again or it was still incapacitated. The door had never been meant to hold them for long, but the locked and jammed mechanism had bought us a little extra time.
Either way, it meant that they were coming after us. We had all stopped to look back, but as one we started moving again. We were faster than the heavily armored Rangers, even with our assorted mental and physical injuries. So long as we kept moving, they wouldn’t catch us.
“So Kick... do we have a plan?” Ash asked over his shoulder, probably to kill time more than anything. He should have known the answer.
“Do we ever?” I sighed to myself. Why did we even bother with actual plans? Vaguely outlined goals just seemed to work better. “Get to the top. Find Hate. Kill Hate.”
“Yeah, that’s about what I figured.”
I’m the luckiest fucking pony in the wasteland that you haven’t gotten us killed yet.
Yeah. I kind of am.
A short time after that, with the end of the stairs only a small distance ahead, the griffin stopped suddenly. He turned to me, a wide grin on his face, a hint of sadistic glee creeping around in his eyes. “Wait, I do have a plan.” He pulled open his bag and started digging through it.
“Well, explain as we walk. They’re right behind us.” I kept climbing the stairs, walking right past the occupied griffin. He didn’t follow, and Fluster actually stopped as well as she came up to him, not wanting to brush past him to keep going.
“I didn’t spend all that time running, you know.” He paused, mouthing off numbers as he counted something inside his bag. Reaching in, he pulled out several bulky disks. I knew what those were. One of the few weapons I’d encountered that I’d been lucky enough not be hurt by: landmines.
“I got these off a Ranger I took out. Thought they might be useful.” As he bundled the explosives, he peered over the edge of the stairs, down through the middle. The gap ran all the way back to the bottom, filled with vines that weren’t, and I stopped to take a look as well. It was dark, but movement could be seen. The rangers were definitely coming up, but they were still a ways behind.
“Do you know how to place a mine?” Fluster had gotten past him, and was sort of cowering at the next landing. I had to admit that the question made me a little nervous as well. Messing with explosives if you didn’t know what you were doing seemed like a terrible idea.
“Yeah... learned how when I was a cub. Problem is, there’s no dirt to bury them in... Ranger’s would see them, and neutralize ‘em before they could trigger them.” He had an assorted number in his arms. Red lights, green lights, blue lights, I counted at least four varieties. There was one big one I wasn’t sure about, a black disk that was twice the size of the others.
“So, we improvise. Brace yourselves.” As he said it, he dumped them all over the edge. I let out a surprised little yell as the pressure sensitive explosives tumbled away, and hurried to catch up with Fluster. The landings were the thickest parts of the stairs, and would keep us from being exploded just a little better than the relatively thin stairs themselves.
It was only a few seconds before one of the mines hit a ledge. They had been falling in a group, and following a smaller blast came an incredibly loud boom as the rest went with it in one rippling detonation. The sounds overlapped into one single roar that filled our entire world for a fraction of a second.
I could see the blast wave as it punched through us, picking us all up and dropping us unceremoniously. All of my injuries hurt again, my ribs especially as the over-abused bones got a jarring reminder of how damaged they were. Luckily, it was more disturbing than damaging, and I was wobbling on my hooves in seconds. If we’d been much closer, that could have pulped our insides.
Through the ringing that was left in my ears, I could hear the sound of stairs collapsing. As I glanced back over the edge, I regretted my timing as a wave of dust and debris rode the shockwave into my face. I coughed and stumbled back, rubbing at my unbandaged eye with a fetlock. Through my watering eye I saw that Fluster had both wings over her face in a defensive position, and understood why she strapped them down when she was hiding being a pegasus. She had instinctively used them as a shield, and now I saw that Ash had as well. I resented the winged creatures for a few seconds as I worked on getting dust out of my eye and nose.
Lowering his wing, he gave a slight cough almost as if mocking me. His grin, despite everything, was genuine. He chuckled at me and started back up the steps. “That worked out better than I had hoped.”
As I successfully cleared my lungs of debris, I glared up at him. My voice was a little hoarse as I yelled up at him through the ringing in my ears. “A little more warning next time!?” I hoped there wouldn’t be a next time like that. I hated shockwaves.
-----
As we reached the top of the stairwell, I expected to meet a wall of defensive lead. All we found was a door. Ash reached for it, but I stopped him. “Ash... remember the probably trapped elevator? Might want to check this door too.”
He looked at me briefly, nodded, and put his shoulder and ear up against the door. He was making a show of listening to whatever was on the other side. He knocked once, and then before I could move he put his shoulder into the door, popping it open. A lack of explosions or any other lethal trap brought a breath of relief from myself and Fluster.
No sooner had a similar sigh left his beak than gunshots rang out. A bullet tore across the side of his chest, sending a puff of blood and feathers into the air as it cut a path across his flesh. He let out a screech of pain and ducked back behind the wall, getting the structure between him and any more bullets. A stray shot whistled past and hit one of Fluster’s pouches, exploding it in a cloud of medical supplies. She let out a short yelp and jumped sideways, getting out of sight. The shooters were beyond the door, and from the roar of gunfire it sounded like there were a lot of them. At least five, maybe more.
Probably more. There’s always fucking more.
The crash of gunfire tapered off, and I heard a mare talking over the renewed ringning in my abused ears. “Hey Ripple, that you?”
I didn’t know the voice, but that it wasn’t calling me Two Kick told me something. It meant that the mare talking knew me, and my curiosity took over. Peeking around the corner, I saw what I needed before pulling back to the safety of the wall.
“Come on out, let us shoot you and make this quick.”
Until now, I’d fought mostly raiders and slavers that had lived in the wasteland their whole lives. That sort of upbringing seemed to take the survival instinct out of a pony. Most of the raiders I’d slaughtered had always just rushed in screaming, even if it was a very bad idea to do so. Cover was something I was behind, not something ponies shot me from.
The ponies in the hallway were barricaded behind overturned tables, well maintained weapons aimed at us and waiting for us to make our move. Most distressingly was that from what I’d seen they all had PipBucks. These were Stable ponies. Ponies I’d grown up with, ponies that knew me and had the same benefits of good health, good schooling, and self preservation.
They know me. They know what I can do. Fucking use that against them.
With the Rangers and the heavily damaged stairwell below us, we didn’t have many options. We had to push through.
Then, thinking on the scene before me, I realized I’d seen that hallway before. It wasn’t some vague half-memory, like how Two Kick’s experiences came to me. This was mine. I’d seen it in a memory orb. We were so close to the end, and I wasn’t going to let a few ponies stand in my way.
“Did you use all of the mines?” I hissed across as Ash, where he was clutching at the bleeding slash across his chest. He looked across at me, nodding regretfully. I frowned, then turned to Fluster. “Do you have any explosives?”
She paused, thinking, then drooped her head a bit. “No... sorry.”
I slumped my shoulders, and nodded. We’d have to fight our way through. “Fine... we do this the hard way.” The griffin simply grunted as confirmation, coming to the same conclusion.
“Ripple, come on. Just come out and let us kill you. For old times sake.” I didn’t know the name of the speaking mare, and I really didn’t care to. She was just another part of the sickness that had spewed onto the wasteland from my Stable. She had to die. They all did if Equestria was going to get any better.
Daisy Day. Dumb as a stump, never let me between her legs. Hit her sweet tail hole more than once, though. Fun mare, if a little weird.
Shut up, Two Kick. I don’t need to know who she is.
I drew Broken, checking that it was fully loaded. Ash did the same, checking his revolver and placing it back in its holster before popping the magazine on Sight. Grimacing at how much ammo he must have left, he slapped it back in and nodded. “Okay, so here’s how we do this. You rush them, I pick off any that stick their heads up.”
I thought briefly about how many bullets were still lost in my body. I’d been shot more than I cared to think about, but if a few more bullet holes were the price I had to pay, I was willing to do it. Ash was a good enough shot, there was always the chance that I would make it through relatively unscathed.
Ash drew the revolver from where he’d just placed it, and whispered across at me. “When I start firing, move. I got six shots, then I’ll switch to the rifle. Got me?”
I nodded, psyching myself up for the suicide run I was about to make. My every muscle burned from overexertion, withdrawal, countless injuries, and exhaustion. Everything hurt, but I was as ready as I was going to be. “Okay, let’s do it.”
I fucking hate you. We’re both gonna die and I can’t even muster the energy to be angry at you.
The griffin looked me in my eye. “Kick some ass.”
Then, he wheeled out with the revolver and began snapping off shots. I was through the door, running hard. The Stableponies ducked behind their barricade made of overturned desks as the shots impacted near them, snapping off of walls and the metal barricade. That was what I’d hoped would happen. By the time the sixth shot had gone off, they were beginning to raise their weapons to return fire.
I was already in the air above the barricade. Their faces were filled with shock and rage as they saw me entering their space, and the timeslow of SATS let me see every detail as I soared over their barricade. Vines crawling on the walls and weapons slowly raising towards me, murderous intent filling the hall. One of them had a bullet going through his head from Ash’s rifle, the moment perfectly captured by SATS. I had shot a fair few ponies in the head before, but I’d never seen the skull imploding in such fine detail.
There was only one mare amongst them, Daisy Day, and she was the one that had been taunting me. I killed her first. Broken fired, the barrel only inches from her face as she screamed in rage. The buckshot tore through her lower jaw and neck, shredding her windpipe and spine in a spray of blood and meat. She was dead instantly.
Awwww.... Bye Daisy. We had fun.
I landed, immediately kicking backwards with both hooves. I hit one of them in the side, caving in rib and shredding organs as my ballistic hooves turned his insides to meat jelly. The other kick hit one in the rear, blowing that unfortunate stallion a new hole.
That left two. One of them moved faster than it seemed possible, and I realized how stupid I’d been. I grimaced as the PipBuck glinted on his foreleg. They had every advantage that I had, including SATS.
The cone of shot hit me in the side. Most of it was stopped by the pegasus vest, but several pellets punched through the material or went through the wing hole. Pain flared through my side as I took the close range shotgun blast, and it knocked me off of my hooves in a spray of blood.
With his magic he reloaded the sawed off shotgun he had just all but killed me with, and leveled both barrels at my head. The other was leering down at me, a pistol gripped in his mouth. Our plan had just failed spectacularly.
“Hate’s gonna reward me for this one.” The unicorn took a second to taunt me, and it proved his undoing. The heavy bullet from Sight to the Blind went in one ear, and out the other. Half of his head just exploded outwards, a surprised look on what was left of his face as his cranial cavity was literally blown empty.
The pony with the pistol’s jaw dropped open, the weapon clattering out onto the ground. Using all of my focus, I shot him in the face.
Then I did what I did best. I lay on the floor bleeding, trying to keep breathing.
I’m fucking shocked. I didn’t think there was a chance in hell we’d survive that. But now we get to bleed out like a bitch. I fucking hate you.
Ash hopped the barricade, followed shortly by Fluster, and kneeled next to me. “Shit.. Kick...”
I coughed, tasting blood, and grinned up at him. “What... I’ve had worse... help me up, will you?”
Fluster gave me one look, and started tearing into the bags that the stable ponies had with them. I knew she was looking for any medicine she could, but I honestly wasn’t worried. I’d survived much worse than this.
I very shakily got to my hooves, Ash seemingly unwilling to help, and I staggered against the wall for support, sinking into the vines and sending a pulse of red through the illusionary foliage. Where I laid was an impressive pool of blood. Ash had started joined in the hunt for supplies as well, and I decided I might as well see what the fuss was about.
Turning my head, I saw that the vest was all but shredded off. I could see ribs in a few places, and my white coat was no longer anything resembling white along my entire side. Blood was sheeting out of the blasted crater of flesh. My blood. I needed that blood.
The open bottle of potion was rammed into my mouth so fast that if my jaw wasn’t already hanging open, I was sure that I would have lost some teeth. “Drink!” Fluster was holding the potion with her mouth, and it was almost like she was trying to give me a kiss.
You’re getting delirious, that cunt’s a marelicker. Snap the fuck out of it, and keep us alive you stupid shit.
I gulped down the potion, and immediately started feeling better. That was all relative, because I was pretty sure that I had buckshot in my lung. It was hard to breathe. I took as deep of a breath as I could when she pulled out the bottle, one of my lungs filling with fire. She jammed in another bottle and I drained it in a second.
“Shit... shit... I think that’s all there is... Fluster, he gonna be alright?” Ash was digging through a blood-soaked bag, tossing aside ammunition and food as he looked for anything to help me. I still had a few meds left myself, and pulled out some Med-X. It was a blood thinner, true, but I felt like I really needed it right then.
As I stuck myself, I saw that most of the bullet holes in my side had already closed up from the two rapid potions. My insides still felt wrong. Every breath was like I was inhaling metal shards. I was messed up bad.
I had to get to Hate fast. I dropped the needle and hauled myself off of the wall. I began taking a few steps, but Ash stopped me. “Kick, you need a few minutes.”
I shook my head at him. I didn’t have a few minutes. “We need to stop them... no time to heal.” I burst into a coughing fit, and took a few more steps. The potion was still working on me, and it was getting easier to breathe but it still hurt like a bitch.
I stumbled down the hall, the two of them following me like a tail made of complaints. They wanted me stop, to rest, to give it a few minutes. I kept shaking my head, muttering “No.” Not gonna happen. I knew I wasn’t feeling right, but I had to get Hate. The missing blood from my short stint as the Visible Pony model didn’t matter. The blood and buckshot bouncing around in my lungs didn’t matter. I paused to cough, and actually hacked up a pellet. The vines curled around the lump of lead in a pool of blood, and that didn’t matter either.
I rounded a corner, and found the hall that I had walked down as Hopeful Leap in that first memory orb. Copper’s voice echoed in my head, a memory I hadn’t thought about in a long time. “..There are enough built in safeguards to make sure that nothing bad can come of this.” Nothing bad, my ass.
At the end of the hall was a faded yellow door with pink butterflies. Past that door was Pandemonium.
I did my best to forget the injuries burning in my side and chest, and pushed on. “Kick... talk to us.” Ash stepped in front of me, barring my passage. He placed a claw on my chest, stopping me. “Kick, you need to stop.”
The pressure of him touching me caused me to burst into another coughing fit, spattering him with blood. I was hurt bad. I needed surgery, or the mask, or to just get this over with before I bled out from the internal injuries I knew I had.
I heard a click further down the hall, but didn’t have the mind to pay attention to it.
“Kick, you’re going to die before you even get there if you keep pushing yourself. I saw the hit you took, it wasn’t a good one. You need to let us help you here... you need to listen to me.” I knew he was right. We stood a much better chance if we stuck together.
I nodded at him, blood still leaking from my mouth. “Yeah... okay.” I dipped my head a little, slightly ashamed at how I’d just acted. These two were my close friends, and they were going to be with me every step of the way.
I’m gonna be right here too, you fuck. And I’m going to take my body back.
“We’ll just finish up here and get you back to Shade. Maybe Miss Knife or Doc Care can fix you up, and then we’ll be in the free and clear. Just watch; once we kill these ponies, life’s gonna get much better around here.” He was doing his best to cheer me up, and it was sort of working. Maybe this wouldn’t be as hard as I expected.
Ash gave me a winning smile through the blood and dirt, holding his talons apart in a reassuring gesture. Then, turning, he took a step into the kill zone of the two gun turrets that had stood constant vigil over that door for two hundred years. The click I’d heard earlier had been their hatches sliding open as they detected movement, and they’d just been waiting for one of us to step past a faded yellow line on the ground.
“Ash!” As I remembered the weapons and called out, they opened fire simultaneously. The bullets slammed into the griffin, one burst into his shoulder and the other tearing his leg off at the knee. He spiralled backwards in a spray of blood and feathers, hitting the ground with a shriek of pain and rage. The weapons kept firing, knowing their target, and he took several more hits as Fluster and I dragged him back into the safety of the corner.
“Fuck!” Ash yelled, clutching at his ruined leg with his good arm. He’d only taken a few hits to the shoulder, but they were bleeding heavily. I didn’t know how much medicine we had left, but I knew we’d be using it all now. I also knew that without a leg, he was in no shape to come with me, or to be left alone.
“Ash! You okay?” I asked a stupid question. He was bleeding everywhere, even as I forced our last potion to his beak and made him drink it. Like me, he still had the bullets inside, but he hadn’t been hit in the torso. I just needed his leg to stop gushing blood into the rapidly growing pool under us. “Ash, hold on!”
His eyes locked onto mine, and he narrowed them. “You’re gonna do something stupid...” He whispered as Fluster was busy using one of her belts as a tourniquet on his severed leg. I could only nod, knowing that he knew I intended to leave him and Fluster here.
What?
“Yeah... I can’t kill Hate and drag you around at the same time.” I smiled, trying to convince him I was going to be okay. No. I knew that I needed my friends to survive, but I needed even more than that to end what Hate was about to do. I had to go ahead, even if it meant I was probably going to die. “I’ll see you later.”
YOU FUCKING IDIOT!
I looked to Fluster, who had staunched the flow of blood, and then back to Ash. He’d passed out, from either shock or blood loss. I sort of hoped that he hadn’t heard the last thing I’d said, in the event that I couldn’t carry out that promise.
“You’re going ahead?” Fluster was looking at me, her eye bright as it stared into mine. She looked hurt, but I had the feeling she was still in shock over the loss of her friend. Seeing Ash and me hurt that badly must have been devastating for her. If we died, she’d be alone again. I had to make sure that at least Ash survived, so that Fluster wouldn’t lose everyone.
Fuck that cunt, I’m gonna lose ME! We’re done, you stupid fuck, let’s get out of here!
After a few seconds of staring, I nodded. The movement hurt, my insides still on fire. “Yeah, I am. I need you to take care of him... don’t let him die. Just... find someplace safe.” Her eye widened as I told her to go back. That she couldn’t come with after all this way. That I couldn’t risk any more of my friends lives fixing a problem that was my fault.
“When he wakes up... run. Get both of you out of here. Go back to Shade and Viola and the others. Be safe.” I looked away, at the unconscious griffin.
“I’ll catch up when I can.” I lied.
I trotted away briefly, back towards where the barricade was. Blood coated everything, but I reached down and picked up a mouth-grip pistol. The taste of blood was overpowering, but I didn’t really care. Using my magic, I checked that it still had ammo, then returned to the pegasus. I dropped it at her hooves. “Just in case.”
She stared up at me, then glanced down at the pistol. I knew she knew how to use it. Any pony that had lived in the wasteland their whole life had to. Her eye looked up at me, and she nodded.
Then, without another word, I turned and headed back towards the hall with the turrets and the door. I felt a tug, and glanced back. Fluster had grabbed the end of my frayed tail in her teeth to stop me. “Ripple... be careful, okay?”
I gave her a smile that despite how ruined my face was, I knew she would understand. “I’ll do my best.”
Best to get us dead, you shit-sucking idiot.
Nodding, she turned from me and started lifting Ash’s form onto her back. I would have helped, but I had someplace to be. If there had been other ponies up here, we would have encountered them by now, so I was certain that Fluster and Ash could find someplace safe while I finished what I was there to do. Two Kick made clipped noises of utter rage and terror in the back of my head.
I returned to the corner, glancing around it cautiously. The two turrets were still tracking back and forth, hunting for any more targets to enter their kill zone. I spent at least a minute looking for a way to turn them off before my eyes settled on Sight for the Blind, which lay in the middle of the hall where it had fallen when Ash had been hit. It was too far away to risk going out to get it, so I concentrated on using my telekinesis.
Again, as always, range was an issue. I had maybe a distance half my body length around my horn that my magic was good in, but past that it was spotty at best. The rifle lay at least three body lengths away. If I could even do this, it was gonna suck.
I holstered Broken, and concentrated. Wisps of blue tinted magic formed around end of the barrel, being the nearest part to me. Emboldened by my good start, I gave it a tug. The weapon slid across the ground a few inches, and I grinned. It took another minute to retrieve the rifle, and I let out a sigh of relief when it finally got within reach of my more powerful grip.
I was drenched in sweat and exhausted. It probably wasn’t just the effort of sliding the weapon. I still had a fair amount of buckshot inside me, and I could still only take half breaths without bursting into a coughing fit. But I had in my possession a weapon I could use to kill the turrets and get to the door.
Sight was not designed with a pony in mind. Sweeps had made it specifically for Ash, and it showed. Every part of the weapon was designed for use with hands. If I was an earth pony, I would have been completely screwed.
I peeked around the corner, holding the weapon tight to my side with magic. I just had to imitate a battle saddle, and this shouldn’t be too hard. Not that I’d ever used a battle saddle before, but the theory was simple enough.
Just line it up, brace, and...
Fire.
The rifle tore itself from my grip with the shot, to no real effect. The bullet dug into the wall vaguely near the left turret, endangering it as much as one of my coughs would have. Sight went skittering across the ground as it flew free, the recoil so much greater than I had expected.
I picked it back up, and tried again. I racked the bolt, loading in another round. This time, I took longer to aim. I positioned the gun differently. I tried breathing as regularly as I could.
My next shot tore into the center of the leftmost turret. It sputtered sparks and smoke into the hall, then its barrels dropped to the ground as it died and slumped into a mechanical death.
The third shot was just as true, now that I had the feel of the weapon. With both turrets out of the way, I stepped into the hall as I unloaded the empty casing from the weapon. When I slid the bolt back in, the weapon made a different sound than before. I’d heard it reload countless times, and this was the first time it had sounded hollow. Checking, I found that I’d only had three shots to start with. If I’d missed either of the second two, I’d have been completely fucked.
Then you could have just gotten us shot more. That’s about the only thing you’re really good at, isn’t it. You worthless piece of shit.
I slung Sight over my back, securing it. Even if it didn’t have any ammo, having Ash’s weapon with me was comforting somehow. A little part of my friend for company.
You’re just ignoring me. Fuck you, I’m here too.
I walked down the hall, limping as I went. I was so close. I just had to push on a bit farther, and then this would all be worth it.
I came to the door, which was closed firmly. It had just slid open in the memory, and I realized I had no idea how to get it to do that. As I stood there, unsure of my next move, my PipBuck made a whirring sound, and then a beep.
An automated voice played into the hallway. “Identity verified. Welcome, Sweeps.”
The door slid open with the subtle grind of unmaintained machinery. The vines parted, and gave way to the chamber within.
As I limped through the threshold, I pulled Broken from my side and made ready. The room had changed in two hundred years. It had been crowded with equipment before, but now it was much more so. Rust and thick wires filled the room, but it was obvious some of the machinery had been brought in more recently. The ceiling had fallen in in some places, spilling cords and wires from service ducts above into the room.
The room was still dominated by Pandemonium’s holding tank, but I couldn’t help but notice that the glass was shattered at the top where part of the ceiling had crushed it. Time hadn’t been kind to the once-sealed unit, and the once rich orange liquid inside was now a sickly black. The form within couldn’t be seen, and I briefly wondered if he’d rotted away entirely in the long years. Movement around the base of the tube snatched my attention away though, and I caught a flash of white between two large consoles.
Epiphany.
I picked up the pace. I didn’t know where Hate was, but I knew he was in this room, or close. If I could stop whatever Epiphany was doing, and kill Hate, this would be over. I could make my deal, and fix everything.
You stupid fuck. You’re still thinking about making a deal with that monster? Just kill them all and burn this place to the fucking ground. Be done with it.
I rounded a corner, aiming Broken. Epiphany looked up at me with a little smile, and I went to pull the trigger. Something hit my weapon, something moving too fast for me to see.
“What!?” I yelled reflexively, my eye following where the weapon had went. It was dangling from a metal rod that was imbedded deeply into a concrete wall. I’d seen weapons like that before, and I knew how fucked I was.
My gaze shot to the side, and I saw the red pony a split second before he fired another rod. It hit my right leg in the shoulder, punching in deep. The metal tore through muscle and shattered bone. I suddenly knew what it felt like to have a limb removed, and my leg flailed wildly on scraps of tendon as I collapsed in a spray of blood.
“Fuck! Hate!” I yelled through the intense pain tearing through the previously numb parts of my chest. I reached for Broken, but my magic fizzled and sparked weakly.
A hoof dominated my vision, and I looked up through a haze of pain and tears. Hate was standing over me, looking down at me with a triumphant grin.
“Ripple, my brother, I should have known that was you shooting at my door. The Rangers would have been much less subtle, and then you just walked in. Curious, how you managed that, but not important.” He gripped my jaw in his magic and drew my gaze up to his, lifting me off of my ruined leg which dangled painfully. I was feeling faint, and knew that I’d lost entirely too much blood. I was going to bleed out, and that would be it.
“You must be devastated. You got so far, with so much against you, and you’re dying at my hooves for a second time. Tragic. Truly.” He looked away, towards where Epiphany was. That direction, the whiteness was threatening to consume everything. The vines were flowing freely. And I was losing the fight to stay awake.
To stay alive.
He hit me upside the head with a hoof, snapping me back to the present. “Now, my friend, don’t go falling asleep on me. I want you to see this, the moment that I’ve worked so hard for. All the sacrifice, all the evil, it will all be worth it in a few minutes.”
“Epiphany, how goes the project?” Epiphany was busy working at a table, and I could feel what was on the table. The stasis must not have been as effective as those that had held the Cubes I’d found earlier, because I could definitely feel their effect, but Pandemonium wasn’t forcing his way into my head as he seemed fond of doing.
Good. That fucking monster doesn’t belong in here.
Epiphany turned, clearing my view. All four Cubes were on the table, wired together into a thick feed running up towards the black, broken tube. The containment field was a haphazard conglomerate of metal and blinking lights, crude and rough compared to Epiphany’s usual designs. He must have been hurried.
“Yes yes, it is nearing completion.” His eyes met mine, as if he was just now aware that I was there. “Oh, so you survived. Odd, few escape my little friend’s embrace. Bravo.”
“You knew he was here? You didn’t tell me.” Hate sounded less annoyed than he could have been. I had been hoping for a fight between the two. “No matter, the issue is past us. Please begin the merging process.”
“Oh, with pleasure.” Epiphany grinned an uncharacteristically wide smile, as though this was a crowning achievement in his life. He turned, and flipped a toggle set into a generator next to him.
An electric hum filled the room, and half of the machinery clustered around us kicked to life. A few sputtered and died, kicking out sparks and smoke. This didn’t concern Hate, who now had a triumphant look on his face.
“I’ve done it.” He spoke softly to himself, stepping away from me towards the cubes.
A flash, and the whiteness consumed everything.
-----
I was standing in a great plain of nothing. There was nothing as far as I could see, just that ever present white.
“Ah, and it finally comes together.” The voice hissed in my ear, and Pandemonium did his snaking wrap around me. I realized I was looking at him out of my left eye, and he was coiling around all four of my good working legs.
“Just like you, my messy pony. This isn’t your reality, so you don’t have to be on the edge of death. At least, not while you’re here. With me. And our mutual friend, of course.” With a flourishing gesture, he indicated towards where I found Hate. He was standing there, closely watching us.
“Pandemonium, enough with the theatrics. I did what you wanted, now grant me my wish.” Hate put his hoof down, eager to get on with it. He was giving me a weird look, like he honestly hadn’t expected me to be here.
Pandemonium popped into existence next to Hate, running a claw through the red pony’s mane. “Patience. You’ve both been through so much to get here, how about we just take a breather.”
He floated away from Hate, scratching at his chin. “As it stands, I have a quandary here. Separate parts of me cut deals with both of you to bring me back together, and you both did your parts. Equally, in fact. So now, I just have to choose...”
So this was where he betrayed me. All that work, and it was up to him if he even gave me my reward. I really should have seen it coming. Two Kick had told me not to trust him. Told me at every turn to run and leave Pandemonium behind. I should have listened, but I hadn’t wanted to listen to him. He was the one that got us into this mess in the first place. From what Fraya had said, he had tried stealing Pandemonium for himself. He’d gotten himself shot and left for dead, and I’d been made to clean up his mess.
If I’d just taken the cubes and left when I’d had the chance, I could be halfway to Canterlot by now. Away from all of this, and ready to start a new life.
I’d be abandoning all of the ponies in this city then. Blank was destroyed because of me, its populace killed or homeless. Underhoof couldn’t stay hidden forever. If I had left, I’d have condemned them all.
I had to make an attempt. I owed it to all the ponies that had suffered for the Stable opening.
“Your proposal... to kill my enemies, and leave me free to live my life... there are only two left.” I knew he wanted to get out of Equestria. He’d been here long enough, and I figured he’d want the fastest way out. “Hate wants you to do so much more. You’ll be here forever, stuck with us ponies.”
Pandemonium appeared to be pondering what I had said, but Hate cut him off mid chinstroke. “Think of the chaos. I know what you live for, Pandemonium. Death, suffering, chaos. If you help me in my goal, you shall have all of that as we burn the raider scum from this land. A cleansing flame, to make room for those they preyed on.”
Pandemonium curled around me like the snake he was, popping into existence with me in his grasp. “For too many years, I was trapped in four little rooms. I could see, I could hear, and nothing happened. Then, I got to see the outside.” He let out a laugh. “Oh, what you ponies did to your world. Death, carnage, all of my favorite things.”
He flourished a claw outwards, and the images of ponies appeared. I recognized them instantly. Every pony I’d killed since I had woken up in that field, as well as many that had died near me or because of me. Outfield and his little gang. Holepunch and Massacre. Sweeps. Willow. Bone Black. Ivory. Some of them were smiling, but I knew it was just an image to mess with my feelings. I wouldn’t fall for that.
He came face to face with me, a malicious grin that I hated. I would have killed him there if I could. I knew he was about to betray me, just from the look in his eyes.
“Seeing all of that; being carried around by you as you murdered and bled and hurt. It made me rethink my want to leave this all behind. Maybe a little vengeance for how your kind treated me... killing off a great deal of ponies sounds like a good use of my time.”
Without a sound, he was coiled around Hate, who had a triumphant grin on his face. The fucker had known this was going to happen. He’d let me walk in here, dragged me into this place, just so that he could watch me fail.
Again. Like he presumably had the first time Pandemonium had been involved between us. When I’d been shot and left for dead.
“No!” I stepped towards them, wishing I had a weapon. I couldn’t do anything in this white realm of Pandemonium’s, but I had to at least try and dissuade the creature.
“No? Always defiant. I do like that about you, my messy pony. So I shall grant you a boon. When you return to your body, you won’t bleed to death. That end isn’t fitting of somepony that helped me to such an extent as you.” He looked at Hate, grinning widely. “Does that seem fair? Partner?”
Hate nodded, glaring at me with a smile. He’d won and he knew it. “Sounds good. I’ll give him a quick death. I’ll make sure this time.”
“Oh, I’m sure you will. I staunched his wound the moment he came in here, anyways. You were always going to get your wish, anyways, I just didn’t want to seem ungrateful.”
His grin as the white faded to black was unnerving.
-----
My eyes flickered open, and I found that I had collapsed on the ground. Hate was still standing where he had been before the hallucination, and I knew it had only been a second since it had started. No matter how much time happened there, it never seemed to match what was passing in real life.
What just happened? Where the fuck did you go? I had my body for a few seconds, and then you butted the fuck right back in.
I tried standing, but my left leg was still only hanging on by a few shreds. Pandemonium had made good on what he’d said though, and the pink of newly healed flesh was covering the wound, a grotesquely healthy sight contrasted with the bloody meat dangling below it. I felt incredibly weak, which meant he hadn’t given me any of my blood back.
Our blood. It’s still all over the fucking ground, you worthless sack of shit.
I looked around, expecting to see the coiled form of Pandemonium somewhere in the room, but it was still just we three ponies. Epiphany was approaching Hate, asking a rapid stream of questions. “Did it work? Where’s the Draconequus? Why hasn’t he gotten out of the tank? What happened?”
Hate had his eyes closed, and a very pleased smile on his face. He twisted his head to the side, pulling a series of pops from his neck. Letting out a content sigh, he faced me and opened his eyes.
Where both had once been a cool silver in a white field, one was now reptilian and yellow. Pandemonium had eyes like that. He spoke, and his voice wasn’t his own. It was Hate and Pandemonium’s voices overlapping as one.
“Ah, it is so good to be back in a body, even if it is a frail pony body.”
“Hate?” Epiphany sounded confused. I was as well, but I had a sinking suspicion that I wasn’t the only pony that had just been betrayed.
Hate, or Pandemonium, narrowed his eyes. Two minds in one body I should have been used to by then, but it was still confusing to think about. My enemies glared at Epiphany from one body, and when they spoke next it was in a low hiss.
“You. Do you know what I hate more than anything? Being used!” His voice rose to a deafening yell, and several machines around us crumpled in a shower of sparks. I felt an immense pressure on my back, pushing me into the ground, but luckily I didn’t share the fate of the machines.
Epiphany took a few faltering steps backwards before being yanked off of his hooves, drifting into the air. Looking at Hate, I didn’t see a glow of magic. This wasn’t unicorn magic. This was something else.
“You like to experiment? To toy with ponies’ lives? I’m fond of that as well. Lets see how you feel about being split into pieces against your will.” The creature that was my enemies snarled through bared teeth. Pandemonium had never shown this level of hostility when I’d talked to him, and I suddenly realized I’d been played. He’d been acting. This thing was a monster the scale of which I’d never conceived.
Epiphany started screaming as his legs pulled in different directions. His muscles twitched and jerked under his coat as they pulled and tore. Blood began running from seams that split open in his skin, and his scream cracked and gurgled as he tore his voice box. Still, he kept screaming, a wet gurgling cry.
Run.
With an explosion of blood, he was torn into four chunks. The four chunks floated there briefly, his head hanging limply with a shocked expression from one of them, before the pieces dropped unceremoniously into a wet pile of meat.
Run!
I was not looking forward to the death that had been promised me. I think I would have prefered bleeding out.
RUN!
Hate/Pandemonium turned to me, a pleased grin on his face. Then he paused, the look changing to a puzzled one. Blood began streaming from his eyes and nose, and he took a step back.
“What?” Using a fetlock, he wiped the blood from his face and looked at it. “Oh. Stupid, pathetic pony body... can’t take the strain. Useless, your entire species.”
He turned his blood filled eyes to the tube where his body was. “Time. I could never alter time... or I’d have my body back. Too decayed and damaged...” It was like he was talking to himself, like he’d forgotten I was even there.
RUN YOU STUPID FUCKER!
I only had three legs. Four if you counted the useless dead lump of meat and bone still tied to my shoulder. I couldn’t run if I wanted to. I could barely keep my eyes open.
I had to stop him.
I pulled myself to my hooves as best I could, and took a shambling step forward. Moving on three was difficult, but it could be done. Pushing myself, I started moving faster towards him as he walked away from me, still talking to himself.
“Phenomenal cosmic power... and I can’t use it. I have to find another body. Maybe Discord... wherever he is. A hydra?” He tilted his head back as he worked through his plan out loud. He stamped a hoof in triumph, letting out a shout. “An ursa major. That would do the trick!”
“A teleport shouldn’t do too much damage.” He closed his eyes, concentrating, and I almost shouted in joy at the luck. The chance he’d just given me.
With Broken still nailed to the wall, I was still allowed my most potent weapons. The weapons I had been named for. What I was known for.
My weapons. My name. My body! Do as I fucking tell you, and run! Get out of here!
I had made a loping trot, going as fast as I reasonably could. The distance was short, but I was moving slow. I had to make it to him before he teleported. I couldn’t let him get away. I’d never find him.
I had to shed some weight. I slipped the strap of Sight to the Blind from around my neck, and the weapon clattered noisily to the ground.
He opened his eyes just in time, as I summoned the last of my strength and threw myself into that old pivot. The killing blow, so worn into my muscles. The pivot was off with only one leg to turn on, but my rear hooves stabbed out like my rage made manifest. The two shotguns hit at the same time, as Pandemonium screamed at me. “NO!”
There was a roar, and a blinding white light, and then nothing.
***
Ash pulled himself into the destroyed room. The sun was coming up, bravely warming the rubble through the thin clouds. The walls and ceiling were gone, along with the a chunk of the peak, cleared by the blast that had shaken the entire mountain a few hours earlier.
The griffin was supported on Fluster’s back, using her as an impromptu crutch. The two of them gazed around the destroyed room, looking for any sign of their friend. Blood was pooled everywhere, scorched to a congealed stickiness by the heat of the explosion.
“Kick! Kick, where are you!?” Ash called, his voice hoarse and weak in the thin mountain air. If anypony could have survived, it was his friend. His best friend. He’d been through so much, a little explosion wouldn’t have been able to put him down.
“Ash... look.” Fluster’s voice was small and scared as she indicated towards the shattered remains of a wall. Ash was afraid of what he would see, but looked anyways.
There, against a blackened outline on the wall, hanging from a metal spike, was Broken. Ripple’s shotgun, the weapon he always had with him. Pristine. Untouched. The one thing in the entire room that hadn’t been destroyed in the explosion.
Ash stumbled forward, pulling away from the pegasus and hopping unsteadily to the weapon. He fell down right before it, and pulled himself up on the wall. He reached for the weapon gingerly, as though not wanting its existence to be true. Reaching out, he pulled it from its place on the wall and stared at it, disbelieving. He fell again, but slid down against the wall in a braced position.
“No. He said he’d come back...” Tears ran from Fluster’s eye as she stood there, watching the griffin cradle the shotgun like a wounded infant.
After a few moments, the griffin pulled himself back up, Broken held in one hand. “Damnit Kick... damnit.”
Following the blast to its source, the griffin spotted his rifle laying beneath a small chunk of wall. Pulling it free, he propped it under his arm, using the weapon as a crutch in place of the pegasus who was following him, muttering “No...” to herself.
Reaching the center of the blast, he only saw a space on the ground that was clear of any blackened marks, a rounded section of floor dug out in a smooth bowl. Spotting something under a broken console, he reached down and snatched it up.
In his claw he held a PipBuck, the scorched and severed leg of a pony within it. Seeing it, Fluster burst into tears, wailing and beating her hooves on the ground. Ash comforted her as best he could, staring at the chunk of pony in his grip. It wasn’t enough, as far as the griffin was concerned. He needed more.
“Where are you, Kick?”
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:D Atta boy Ash! Go look for him!
Ah man I can't believe that happened. So sad
. Good chapter anyways. Play this song while reading it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2x-N-OXWD-Y
So after all that we finally understand the Guise of Chaos. Wow.
A little closure would have been nice, but this was very well done!
Cheers on coming to a conclusion!
And quite a ride it's been. It's been a real pleasure getting to watch this story grow from when I first picked it up and major congrats are in order for actually seeing it through to the end. While I have my gripes about a bunch of things, you still did a good job of crafting a cohesive and complete narrative. Good job.
Well it says complete but will there will be an epilogue?
Also great chapter/story/everything mate I was afraid for Ash for a while.
~Reggie
What a breathtaking and fitting end...
It was a wild ride with many ups and just a little downs. Filled with memorable and deep characters, that were able to acquire my sympathy or even love. Some minor things could have been better, a few questions have been left without answers and the last two-three chapters seemed a little bit rushed compared to the rest of the story and... Eh forget my incoherent mumbling. They are the words of a reader disappointed about the sole fact that a story has come to an end
I liked Ripple and although his fate saddens me deeply I have to admit that I couldn't think one more fitting for him. A happy end with Shade and a couple of foals? Sure that would have been nice, maybe even believable but would it have been a good end for the story? Ripple's existence was plagued by pain and sacrifices and so were his last moments. Nevertheless he and his tale shall be remembered as one of the best in the Equestrian Wasteland
Who knows... Maybe the little R&R with Shade will bear fruits in the future? Epilogue maybe?
I have read the story. I have been expecting bad end. I have been expecting good end. I have been expecting terrible end. But i have not been expecting indefinite end! You have no idea how much i hate you right now (dont take me literally, you have just ended good story and i kind of ... well ... guess you know the feeling). But that end! Oh gosh! Couldnt you have made it a bit more ... i do not know the word ... finished? Tie all the loose ends? I am just rambling ...
Anyway ...Thanks for great story, great characters (oh my I just need to know if he is dead or not ... or i guess i can just decide that he is still fighting the pandemonium somewhere) and a great deal of entertainment.
awesome story though an epilogue would be nice.
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Thanks, glad you all enjoyed it. As for the call for epilogue, I'm not abandoning the setting. More will come, just gotta give it a little time.
Bravo.
I'm sad that it's over ('specially that way), but that's what stories do, no? They end at some point. I enjoyed it while it lasted, really did.
Thank you for writing this and giving me and others something to enjoy. I hope you come up with a epilogue some time.
An epic end to an epic story.
Really, I stumbled on this story just after you posted the eighteenth chapter, and it's easily one of my favorite Fallout-related fanfictions (and the only one I found with a former raider as main protagonist).
Also, for some reason I was listening to "New Vegas Valley" during the last bit, and I gotta say it somehow fits.
Again, awesome story.
Kindly,
~Sinrar
Okay. Look, Snow...
Chapters can be ended on cliffhangers. This is done to make the reader long for the next part.
Stories, however, are not ended on cliffhangers. Not done. Especially not by ending on one of the story's main characters asking the same question we're all wondering.
So go write that bloody epilogue now. Unless this whole story's purpose was to get us invested in your characters and then troll us all half to death, this is nowhere near done
Onto the inevitable corrections:
)
> and I spotted multiplel fresh injuries
"multiple"
> Peaking around the corner
A 'peak' is the top of a mountain. You mean "peeking". (I knew I'd see someone make that error in writing some day!
> and that didn’t matter either
Missing period at the end.
> holding his hands apart in a reassuring gesture.
Aren't they claws? He's a griffin.
> I peaked around the corner
Again, "peeked".
> Welcome Sweeps.
Comma before "Sweeps".
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Then I am looking forward to the next story with Two Kick Ripple. Yeah ... I am still not abondoned him, I still belive he is still alive!
dude, if you end such a great ride here i will track you down and beat th' living crap out of you.
God damn.
Okay, so... Are more chapters going to this story, or will you be making a completely new book?
Oh come on man, you can't end Ripple's journey here, especially not like this...
It was good except for where you left off so congrats on that
you know... a lot of ponies (including myself) are going to hate you if you leave so many loose ends untied...
Okay... here we go.
Well, Snow, I have to say... you hit a lot of high notes on this chapter. At the same time, you made some pretty... interesting choices. First and foremost, the description of the combat is great as always, though I was wondering what the point behind the Stable raiders was. If they were integral to Ripple's old life, I was expecting something a little more of it, even if the scene was just meant to get Ripple closer to death. As for the final encounter with Hate and Pandemonium, I honestly expected something more conclusive. It was this big confrontation that you had us all gearing up for and... it's not over. Well, the story itself is, but it's not over. I guess that's acceptable given that you have so many loose ends that are just begging for a sequel at this point- what happened to Shade, the Whitecoats, Broken Arrow (who is totally still alive), Cinder, and more. If you've got the plan to make it all work out, then by all means do it. But as is... I can't say I'm satisfied. There was a ton of buildup, mounting and mounting and mounting... and you just leave us all hanging. It would've been nice to at least have some closure to thing, which can be done even if gearing up for a sequel. Sure, you can have some unanswered questions... but you can't have quite this many.
Now... again, these are my opinions, and that doesn't make me discount that this was a good story. There were some hiccups and places that didn't match the quality of some of your earlier pieces, but it was a good story. It just could've... ended a little better, I feel.
Signing off,
Adder1
Well all but the ending had me enthralled in this story hope you are just going to take a break and continue at a later date. It would truly be a shame to have something you worked on for so long end on a wasted note like this...
Well I can hope and wish you well in your future endeavors 
999/1000 times I REALLY Hate martyrdom endings, they tend to be cop-outs used by lazy, or plain stupid, writers who are unable to finish what they've started. The old "Oh, I'll stay behind, die, kill BBG, and that will fix all loose ends."
But this one?...I am sad to see what happened, Ripple is likely my favorite protagonist in the FoE setting, so I can't say I am happy about what happened. However, I also can't say that this feels like a cop-out. Back of my mind, I had a feeling that this would happen, and I think you handled it very well. I think too that the fact you didn't use it as a "OK world's over, everyone is dead, blah blah blah." I mean you managed to take a story which really was mainly about the character of Ripple, and make it about the world. Rather than being about him alone, you made it about him, his friends, and the world itself.
Now, where this goes from here is up to you, but I would love to see what happens next.
I think the world of Guise of Chaos is among the best in the FoE universe, and would be more than happy to read about what happens to Ash, Shade, and the rest of their merry band.
P.S. imo, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7g3RuoreRc (Dropkick Murphys - Going out in Style) fits this chapter perfectly.
This is something I've pondered time to time. Was there ever a romantic connection between Fluster and Ivory? I assumed it very possible. But if there was it was never blatantly announce which is quite appropriate for a first-person fic, because if Ripple is not aware that they are involved then it's not going to just come into light like that. It's better to work in subtlety in those cases. So what's the verdict? Just very close friends? One-sided romantic affection from one to the other? Or two way attraction that they either did or did not realize they had for each other? Or "draw your own conclusion~"?
It's over. As much as Ripple dying (presumably) was sad, it was also fitting. Maybe there could've been something done to take care of Two Kick, but eventually he was going to take full control back from Ripple. What better way for him to go, than to defy Two Kick as Ripple proved once and for all that he was nothing like his past self.
There's still an epilogue left to read, but damn... I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tearing up.
I had fun reading.