Another One Bites the Dust
I woke up, and the first thing I realised was that I was very, very high up. That's not surprising, really, since there are so many mountains, mountain ranges and mountain accessories scattered throughout the Wasteland. In fact, it was quite a nice view from where I was - I could see Tenpony Tower and the Manehattan Ruins that surrounded it and Fillydelphia's radioactive smog and with a few buildings poking through. The rush of wind up here was rather relaxing, too.
Next thing I noticed was the weights at my sides. Well wherever I was and however I got here, at least I had my saddlebags. I hoped I had enough food, and I was about to check until the third thing, what was probably the biggest and most immediate problem.
I was in mid-air.
Suddenly that rush of wind made me tense, the weights at my side were no longer a comfort, and the view was getting lower and lower by the second. My heart was pounding, vision narrowing in on what I expected to be my crash point. They say your life is meant to flash before your eyes at times like this - I've traded with a few ponies with first-hoof experience in the matter - but all I saw was the sort of brownish-grey that I'd lived with all my life. At the last second, however, a flash of metal caught my eye. A Sunrise Sarsaparilla star bottle cap.
I guess even when I'm at the luckiest moment in my life, I still have absolutely shit luck.
*****
Waking from unconsciousness was very quickly getting old, but I suppose something could be said for the fact that I wasn't dead. That didn't, however, stop me from feeling the pain that racked my body. I could swear I felt pain in my wings, but I quickly dismissed that thought. I was a unicorn after all, I don't have and never want wings, especially after this ordeal. All four of my legs were bent at horrifying angles, and while I couldn't move them myself they were slowly and agonisingly shifting to a straightened position. The dirty dark green of my coat was speckled with red with no small thanks to the growing pool staining the dusty ground beneath me.
There was a loud 'POP!' and I screeched with pain, the sharp feeling drawing my attentions to a foreleg that almost looked as good as new. I didn't have time to think about it though as unfortunately it was followed by several more of these wrenching pains in rapid succession that nearly caused me to pass out for what must have been the third time in a matter of hours. I couldn't be certain on that timing though, unconsciousness tends to make you lose track of those things. I wasn't swarmed and picked at by raiders though, so it couldn't have been too long. I did have to move quickly if I wanted that to remain the case however, so I struggled to my hooves.
It was not a pleasant experience, trying to pick up my weight, and it took several slow attempts before I even managed a shaky, uneven stance. It felt like I was taller than before too, but I chalked that up to blood loss. I shouldn't even be moving after that fall, but if Celestia wanted to smile upon me from wherever she's hiding I'd gladly take what I could get. Taking a step forwards ended up with a face full of bloody dirt and another difficult attempt at standing, but I was proud to report that I could walk at the slowest of paces. As I regained my senses slightly and learned how to walk as if I were a foal again, I spotted the bottle cap that I all but landed on top of. I staggered over to it, cursed it a few times then picked it up in my teeth, turning my head back to put it in my saddlebags only...
Well, I wasn't wearing saddlebags. I did have wings. Somehow, somewhere, somepony magicked me some wings. Almost on cue with that realisation, whatever muscle memory that controlled them and kept them folded up packed up it's things and skipped town. The feathery masses unfurled and draped down my sides, as if giving up their will to live as the tips just barely dragged along the ground. I dropped the cap in surprise and a small part of my brain caught it with magic just before it landed. As my brain began to reboot I noticed several other, generally minor details that I probably would have noticed earlier if not for my spectacular dive. My mane and tail are a lot longer than before, I actually am taller than I was and it wasn't a figment of my imagination, my gecko cutie mark had grown wings and looked a bit more fierce, I'm a mare, my horn is a lot longer and heav... wait.
I'M A MARE!? My brain went into overdrive, running through scenarios of how ponies would react when - if - I made it back home. I briefly glanced around to make sure the desolate wastes around me actually were desolate, which thankfully they were, sat my flank down and checked between my legs. I had to be sure; hopefully my mind was just playing tricks on me and... nope. An extremely faint and brief touch confirmed for me that it was no illusion and I was in fact now a mare. Out of everything, the wings, the creepy limb healing, the cutie mark change... this was the. Worst. Possible. Thing! I liked being a stallion! My wife liked me being a stallion! My little colt exists because I was a stallion!
How long have I been like... this? I wasn't sure, but now I knew that I had to get back home, no matter what lies in store for me there. If only I could... if only I knew how to work these damned feathery sacks of useless! Gah! Walking like a good, proper unicorn it is! I turned around to find Tenpony Tower - if it's height was good for anything it was definitely the fact that it served as a reliable location marker.
It was around about the direction I started plummeting in, which meant that I, or whatever was controlling me, was running away from something in the opposite direction. I spared a quick look behind me and all I saw was a sickly green glow emanating from a crater. It energised me just looking at it, and I felt some innate urge to get closer to it, to feel the thrum of it's power as it coursed through my... no. I had to get to my family. They are what's important, not some dumb, glowing crater.
I at least physically felt a little better now. Good enough to walk, and I apparently had enough mental capacity maintain a simple levitation spell. I set the cap between my shoulderblades and set off towards Tenpony. I briefly wondered when the last time I ate was. I didn't feel hungry, nor did I feel dehydrated, but it didn't hurt to keep something in store just in case. I crested a surprisingly stealthy hill, looking this way and that for plants or animals worth snacking on, when I heard a gunshot ring out and a bullet whiz past my ear, dreadfully close to hitting me.
I stopped and flicked my ears towards the source of the noise, and subsequently the leaden present, and saw several ponies who were standing in front of a couple of brahmin, all of whom had weapons trained on me threateningly. One of them shouted something at me, but they were too far away for me to make out what they were saying so I started to move forwards. Another bullet shot between my ears followed by more shouting. Didn't they realise I couldn't hear them? I continued forwards and a third shot was fired, this one deathly accurate and would have been a killing blow if not for one thing.
Somehow I managed to put up a bright pink shield around myself before it hit. This didn't encourage the ponies very much as they all unloaded what ammo they had against my shelter. Finally I was close enough to speak with them, though the continuous sound of gunfire didn't help matters much.
"I don't want a fight!" I shouted over the din, my feminine voice surprising myself more than my words did them. It really hammered home the fact that I wasn't me anymore, just some shell that me filled. Thankfully they stopped shooting at me, for now at least, while one who I assumed to be some kind of leader responded to me.
"Then what do ya want, monster!? To take me goods? Kills me brahmin? You alicorns is never a good sign." Alicorns? Is that what I am? He turned to what I now realised are mercenaries hired to guard him and his wares. "Keeps an eye out for more. Thems alicorns never works alone." He was a gruff looking earth pony. Definitely a wandering trader that had seen many battles and won many more. Old, but at that age where it gave him the look of a wisened veteran and not decrepit. Scars covered his dusty brown coat and his hair had turned silvery, and I could have sworn he only had one eye. Not that it seemed to slow him down any.
"I..." What did I want? To get home, definitely. Clothes to protect my... modesty? They wouldn't hurt, if I had any caps... "Do you... collect Sunrise Sarsaparilla star caps at all?" He raised an incredulous eyebrow at me, the one that had no accompanying eye which really unnerved me, then started laughing. He started laughing so hard that I feared he was going to have a heart attack or something. He's old, I can't leave out the possibility that he could die at any moment! Eventually he calmed down though and looked at me with some shit-eating grin that had too few teeth.
"Listen girly,"
"I'm a stallion." I interjected. He merely pulled a long piece of wood - a pool cue, in fact - and slapped my flank with the thin end, causing me to jump up slightly and let out a rather feminine yelp.
"Looks and sounds like a girly to me, and I's only been wrong once before and I's learned me lesson then, so be shuttin' up. Tells me what ya be lookin' for and I's be tellin' ya if it be worth a cap. Stars or no a caps is a caps and it be worth a cap t' any trader worth their salt."
"Uh, clothes... and maybe a drink of water." I really was not a fan of speaking with a voice like this. It just didn't sound right to me, not what I've known all my life. And all it did was make the old stallion laugh at how uncertain I sounded.
"I's sure I's gots some pretty dresses buried in here somewhere..." He started rummaging through his packs when I realised he said he was looking for dresses.
"Have you got anything with pants? You know, stallion clothes?" All I got in return was muffled laughter from halfway inside a large bag that only got louder as he extracted himself with a... a bright pink dress with frilly laces...
"All I's gots that might be fittin' ya, girly. An' since ya be makin' me laugh everytime ya speak, ya can be havin' the bottle of water on the house!" He tossed both the dress and a bottle that was in a more conveniently placed spot at me, and I floated the cap towards him which he deftly snatched out of my magical field and dropped into a sack tied to a belt around a brahmin's neck. "An' just in case we's be meetin' again, what's y'er name, girly?"
The question snapped me out of my staring contest with the dress and made me freeze for a second. "Oh, uh, Bush Tucker." The stallion paused for a moment's thought.
"Used to be a stallion 'round these here parts that sold me animal meats called Bush Tucker. Had himself a shop in Tenpony he did, with a cute li'l colt and th' most darling wife I ever did see." That had my attention, and I quietly drank from my water as he rambled to himself more than anypony else. "Ain't seen him f'er years an' years now. I's think it's almost been a decade since that ol' bugger roamed these here hills." Whatever water I had in my mouth made the decision to take the quick exit and rushed up into my nose or back into the bottle. Almost a DECADE!? My... My family, they would have moved on by now but... I have to know for sure.
"Do you..." he stopped his ramble and looked at me. "Do you know what happened to his family? Are they still in Tenpony, or did they move?"
"Well... I's can't be sayin' f'er certains. The store be replaced with a cheese shop o' some type an' I ain't seen his wife in years neither. Folks be sayin' that she ain't had no way to be payin' up what she needed to be stayin' there and had to resort to stealin' goods from merchants outside until she be gettin' caught, y'see. And y'know Tenpony's rules on raidin' and all so that be the rumours of what be happenin' to her. The kid vanished too, ain't no sign of the tyke. Rumours on that be..." I couldn't listen to any more. I had no reason to. I knew how Tenpony worked, and I knew Tenpony's rumours always stemmed from some truth. It's not easy to keep things private there.
I set the dress on the floor, neatly folded like my wife always used to, and rested the bottle on top. Wordlessly I used my magic to pull the stallion's pistol out of it's holster and before anypony could react I threw up a shield and walked ten paces away. I turned back to face the group with the pistol's barrel resting against my skull, and they all stopped firing. The stallion had made the connection too, and just as he started moving forwards to stop me I squeezed the trigger.