The Coming Storm

by Jay911

First published 20th of June, 2015

Set in the Ponies after People universe. A vacationing race fan finds hooves in place of hands, and struggles to cope with the radical changes.

Side story to Starscribe's fine work The Last Pony on Earth. The main character was on vacation when the Event happened and hands were replaced with hooves. An attempt to find food & shelter is made after the apocalypse.

Now with 100% more cover art! My good friend Lionheartcartoon, also known as half of the creative team on the PMV "Children of the Night", happily put this together for all to enjoy.

Discovery

MAY 23

As soon as I opened my eyes, I knew something terrible had happened.

Shit, I cursed inwardly, and tried to unzip myself from the sleeping bag.

That failed miserably, as in I was hopelessly tangled in the sack, and no amount of wrestling managed to get me free.

Calm down, I urged myself. You must look like a jackass flailing around in here.

“In here” was the back (the cargo space and folded-down rear seats) of a rented SUV, in which I was camping at a racetrack. Every year, I take - or, I suppose at this point, took - a vacation to the track near my hometown, picking a particular racing series and staying there from Wednesday night to Sunday evening, enjoying the week’s events.

The reason I was so flustered is because it was light outside. During race weekends, the action was going from dawn to dusk (and, if you were camping there, much past dusk, with the “local wildlife” providing plenty of entertainment). Usually, the loudspeakers around the track began playing music at sunrise to rouse people “gently” prior to the big-horsepowered machines thundering around the course.

I forced myself to stop moving, and took a deep breath. I wrestled one arm out of the sleeping bag and tried to grab the zipper pull, but somehow, I wasn’t able to take hold of it. Frustrated and fed up, I kicked and shoved until I got myself free, cursing the stuck zipper.

I tried to pull on the handle for the back door of the SUV, to let myself out. I have to piss like a racehorse. Again my attempt to grab for something was stymied, and I fumbled around with my other hand for my glasses to try to figure out why.

I couldn’t find my glasses, and it felt like that hand was asleep or numb or otherwise deadened too. I turned to look around at my hand, and screamed in surprise.

Instead of a hand at the end of a poorly-tanned arm, I was staring at a grey fuzzy… thing.

Both my arms had been replaced by grey fuzzy things, maybe three inches in diameter and eighteen or so inches long. There was a joint in the middle like an elbow, except it could bend in all kinds of directions my elbow never could have, and of course they were joined to my body - which, as I looked down at myself, was also coated in grey fuzz or fur or something.

At the other end of the appendages, now that I was looking at them, was a hard material of some sort with a sheen to it. As I twisted my fore… arm? … around to inspect it, it finally dawned on me what I was looking at.

Holy shit, I exclaimed in my head. These are fucking hooves.

It finally dawned on me to look up and over the front seats into the rear-view mirror. Staring back at me was a pair of impossibly huge light-purple (lavender, I guess?) eyes surrounded by a dark grey equine face.

“What the fuuu…” I began to say, but my brain kind of crashed when I realized I could still talk despite being a miniature horse. I just sat there staring at myself in the mirror, mind vapor-locked.

I saw - not sure that at that point it was registering, though - that I was a small dark grey horselike creature, with huge eyes (with far more white than I’d ever seen on any horse) and a long, smooth … purple? … mane.

I still hadn’t picked up on the fact that something else was awry, but I quickly clued in on part of it, as I started looking around to see if anyone had noticed the strange creature inside my vehicle.

There didn’t seem to be anyone else around. Nobody was up and about, even though the sun was well on its way through its ascent. There was no noise from the track loudspeakers, no cars or bikes roaring around the track, and not a sound to be heard.

I finally found a way to lever the door handle open with my hoof and popped the driver’s rear door ajar. Two things became obvious at that instant:

One, there were sounds to be heard, namely birds twittering off in the nearby trees - but nothing else;

Two, as a dog-sized horse, the folded down back seats of an SUV were really freakin’ high off the ground.

I tumbled gracelessly out the door as it pushed aside from my weight against it, going, as my mother used to say, ass over teakettle once or twice before finally landing on my back.

“Ohhh,” I groaned, and the sound of my voice gave me pause. I blinked a couple of times, and then rocked back and forth until I could roll myself up onto my behind. I stretched my neck and dipped my head down to take a closer look at myself, showing a complete lack of decency.

And I’m a… I guess the term is a ‘mare’, to boot, I declared.

I struggled to my feet - hooves? - feeling unsure of myself standing on four limbs instead of two. When I felt I had my balance or at least a reasonable facsimile thereof, I staggered my way towards the next campsite over, cautiously approaching the tent.

“H-hello?” I called out softly in the alien voice. No response was returned.

The tent was zipped up to guard against the mosquitos the residents and tourists jokingly called the Ontario Air Force. I managed to wedge a hoof and foreleg (see, I’m learning the terms) under the weather fly and gingerly unzip it.

Inside were two sleeping bags, looking like they’d been occupied at one time, but not now, and not thrashed aside as mine had been.

Did I miss the rapture? I joked to myself. The more likely answer was that I had accidentally left the truck running overnight and gassed myself on carbon monoxide fumes, or was deliriously clinging to life crashed against a tree somewhere in the rural wilderness off a side road, but I decided to go with what I was experiencing, even if it was a fever dream.

Still stumbling around like a newborn foal, I checked out a few other campsites and found them just as deserted. One still had a fire going - or at least embers smoldering mildly - and a couple of half-full cans of beer either upended or resting near lawn chairs. The liquid reminded me of what I’d been thinking of when I first tried to get out of the SUV, and so I staggered over to the nearby copse of trees.

At a loss for how to go about my ‘business’, I lifted a leg like I’d seen dogs do, and - well, let’s just leave the rest of that there. I’m certain nobody cares to know every gory detail (and if you do, you need more help than I did at this point).

Resuming my search for anyone - or anything - else alive, I recrossed the road to the trackside campsites again, checking the last two before getting to the pedestrian bridge that went over the course between turns 1 and 2.

I actually think I whimpered, thinking of how hard it was to walk properly, looking at the stairs on the bridge. The tunnel that went under the track at turn 1 was a long way away compared to this (formerly) easy walkway.

In the end, I struggled up the stairs, wrapping my forelegs around the center handrail and all but pulling myself up one step at a time. The metal decking of the walkway didn’t feel as bad as I thought it would on my bare feet - I mean, hooves - but it was still all alien to me.

Then it came time to descend the other set of stairs on the inner part of the track. Because of the elevation changes on the course, I had twice as many steps to navigate as I’d had climbing up. Briefly, visions of me just pulling a Leeroy Jenkins and galloping down the stairs was replaced by a fuzzy little grey horse lying in the gravel at the bottom with its neck snapped, so I turned around and did the reverse of my climb up on the other side. The whole thing took over twenty minutes, whereas I’d done it the day before in as many seconds, but finally, I was on solid ground again.

The nearby concession stand was still buttoned up like it was closed, but they normally didn’t open until nine or ten in the morning. Idiot, I chastised myself. You didn’t check what time it was before you got out of the car. Then again, that hadn’t been my priority just then. From the position of the sun, my wild-ass guess was that it was mid-to-late morning.

The inner part of the track’s campgrounds were just as dormant. I went down the hill toward the main road - the service road that links all the campgrounds and facilities, that is - and, after crossing it, climbed the incline on the other side toward the paddock.

Smirking a little at the term ‘paddock’, I approached the fence to see that it was closed and locked, just like it would have been in the middle of the night. I hadn’t expected this - I was hoping that I could have gone right in, up to the main building, and then… what? Tried to find someone? Asked if they knew how come I was equinified and everyone else vanished? Get a refund for the last two days’ races that obviously wouldn’t be happening?

What the hell do I do now?

It was probably after noon by the time I got back to my campsite, and I was starting to get hungry. The cooler in the truck, though, was smelling awful.

Crap, what if I was out for more than just overnight? I wondered. What if it wasn’t really Saturday, but Sunday or later, and all the food had already gone bad?

I figured out how to get a stick in between the door handle and body of the truck, and use the stick as a lever to unlatch the door. Pawing the lid of the cooler off and holding my breath, nothing looked particularly off in there. A half-dozen frozen burger patties were still mildly pink, the cans of Coke were nestled in between what remained of the ice, and the wrapped cheese slices were still yellow. Then again, my father had often quipped that processed cheese slices were “just one double-bond away from plastic”, so maybe they really would be a staple of the apocalypse.

The problem was, even with hands, the individually-wrapped slices were hell to peel open. It was probably a toss-up which would be more difficult - getting the propane grill lit to make a burger, or unwrapping some cheese.

Under the knocked-aside lid of the cooler, I spotted the clear plastic bag of the loaf of bread I’d bought. I couldn’t reach it, and had nothing to grip with on the end of my appendages, so I gave up and reached in with my face, grabbing the bag in my teeth and pulling it out to the ground.

I frowned as I looked at the bag with its plastic tag closing it up. Would I be able to slide it off? If I did that, would I be able to reach inside for a slice of whole grain goodness?

Finally I decided on a course of action. Placing my left hoof “below” the tab but not on top of the bread, and placing my other hoof next to it, I pushed down hard and spread my hooves apart. The lightweight plastic easily tore and opened up a hole in the end of the bag. I couldn’t close it any more, but at least I could eat.

I repeated the process, sort of, with the bread in between my hooves, and managed to push a couple of slices out onto the ground as if the loaf was a tube of toothpaste. Sitting down on my butt (haunches? flank? whatever), I gingerly cradled one slice at a time between my front hooves, turning it this way and that to blow the dirt off it from its 4 seconds on the ground, and then popped it in my mouth.

It was even more bland than I figured it would seem. Dry bread with nothing on it. I might as well have been eating just oats or grain.

Keep it up, smartass - you might very well have ended up doing just that, if you hadn’t kept what’s left of your sanity.

Four or five slices of bread later, I was satiated enough that I didn’t feel the need to fight with the cheese or the BBQ grill. I nudged the door shut, making sure the stick stayed in place, and went to the tailgate of the truck to sit down, under the EZ-Up in the shade, and ruminate.

The only sound I could hear was the gentle wind through the trees and the occasional bird. No race cars, no fellow campers, no mechanics, no traffic going by, no planes or helicopters overhead, and no explanations booming down from on high.

Not that I expected that last one, but it would have been nice considering the absence of all the rest.

An ear twitched again and I heard something familiar all of a sudden. It was the chirp of my smartphone, somewhere inside the truck, warning of its battery getting low.

I scrambled to my feet - dammit, hooves - and hurried back to the driver’s rear door, which I’d left open when I fell out earlier. Rearing up, I planted my front hooves on the folded-down seats, and with one of my hooves and my nose (snout? muzzle?), shoved clothing and the sleeping bag aside until I found the device.

7% battery life left.

I found another stick and opened the driver’s door, then deposited the phone on the driver’s seat. Mashing the phone with one hoof to keep it still, and ignoring the chirps and beeps of complaint that I was entering my unlock pattern incorrectly, I searched for the charging cable. Once I found it, I grimaced at my predicament. There was no way I was going to hold a cable with a hoof.

Eventually, I wrestled the phone up onto the center console, with the end protruding over the edge of the arm rest. I ever-so-tentatively took up the cable in my teeth, hoping the connector was pointed the right way, and craned my neck, contorting it and my jaw in all kinds of unnatural directions as I fumbled blindly for the phone’s charging port.

Doo-ding!

“Yes!” I exulted, then froze, fearing I’d jarred it loose from speaking. I carefully pulled my head back and turned to look at it.

6% and charging. Saturday, May 23, 14:48. 37 notifications.

Hooves were not going to work to unlock the phone, so I clambered up into the driver’s seat partially and ducked my head towards the screen, touching it with my nose.

Seven tries (and 45 seconds, since I’d done it more than five times in a row incorrectly and the delay kicked in), I was able to get in.

The notifications were mainly automated things like sports scores, news stories, Facebook replies, and similar things, plus of course the low battery warning, which was now rectified. As I scrolled (having to mash my face into the phone to use it, then back away to read), a pattern became known: the last notification I received, automated or otherwise, was at 3:21 AM.

That prompted me to look at the signal strength. Five bars, just like normal.

Oh man, am I really going to do this? I asked myself. If someone picks up, what do I say?

I decided the disappearance of an entire racetrack worth of people - close to a couple thousand by my ballpark guess - was worth the insane response I was going to get when or if somebody responded and found me in my current state.

I lowered my nose once more and touched the phone icon, then released; then parked it on the 9 and let it sit there for five seconds.

EMERGENCY CALL, the screen indicated in bold white text on an orange background. I nosed the speaker icon - there was no way I was going to be able to hold it up, much less position it next to my ear - and listened to it ring.

After three rings, the click of the line being answered made my heart skip a beat.

“You have reached 911,” the woman’s voice said. “Operators are currently busy with other calls. Do not hang up. Your call will be answered.”

As the recording repeated, a chill went down my spine. Like hell they were busy with other callers - I volunteered with the amateur radio club once in a while, and knew enough about the 911 system that I knew that recording played both when all the lines were busy - and you wouldn’t hear a ringing tone at all in that case - and when all lines were logged off. And if nobody answered a phone within four rings, it was automatically logged off so that someone else in the center could pick up the call.

In other words, there was nobody in the 911 center.

I ended the call and tried a couple other numbers, just in case, but they were to relatives and friends on the other side of the continent, far away from me - even if they answered, what would they be able to do for me?

When the last of them went to voicemail after ringing ten times, I shivered once again as the reality of it hit me. I’d just called the other end of the country and got no response. That means this isn’t local.

I could very well be the last person.. or person-turned-little-horse.. on Earth.

I don’t remember the next couple of hours. To tell you the honest truth, I think I was lying on the floor of the truck, sobbing. If I’d gone insane, or perhaps lost all sentience and simply ambled off to nibble on some grass, it might have been for the best.

But I didn’t. And so here I am.

As the sun was on its way towards the horizon, the phone’s display blinked on briefly, showing that it was fully charged. That caught my attention, and I looked up at it, then blinked and focused on what lay behind it, affixed to the dash.

Worth a try, I mused.

I had to climb further into the truck and wriggle into a quasi-seated position, which felt uncomfortable in my new form, but it had to be done if I was going to use the ham radio.

I mentioned earlier I was a volunteer with the amateur radio club. Whenever I travelled, I brought along a vehicle-installable radio, which I’d set up in the SUV as soon as I got into it on the rental company’s lot. A couple of alligator-clamp cables and a magnet-mount antenna and I was “on the air”, as they say.

The power button was small, but I was tired of bumping things with my nose. I was bound and determined to make these hooves work, so I reached out and twisted my foreleg back and forth until I figured I was in the right position, and then pushed forward with the very edge of my hoof.

HELLO!! came the default power-up message on my radio.

“Fuck yes!” I exclaimed, only peripherally noticing that I moved my foreleg like I was doing a fist-pump.

It took a couple of minutes to gain the finesse required to turn the channel knob, but eventually, I dialed in a local repeater. I reached over with both hooves (leaning painfully over the center console against my ribcage) and scooped up the mic, then sat back up straight and squeezed it.

“CQ. CQ. CQ. This is…”

I paused. I wasn’t going to give my actual call sign, for a couple reasons. One, maybe a non-ham would be the only one listening, and I didn’t want to confuse them. And two.. if a genuine ham did hear me, and the Internet still worked, they could look up my call sign and cross-reference it to a name, and … well, explaining why this voice didn’t match that name was something I wasn’t ready for yet.

I took in a breath and squeezed again.

“...Hello. This is… a survivor. If… If you’ve had the kind of day I’ve had, you have more questions than answers. I don’t have answers. But I’m here. You’re not alone.”

Please confirm I’m not alone, I kept to myself.

“I’m at Mosport. There’s nobody else around. Something … unbelievable has happened. If you can hear this, please… no matter how bad you think you have it … please answer me. I know what you’re going through. If we stand any chance of making it… we need to stick together. … Over.”

The only sound was the hiss of the repeater closing, and then the fan on the radio cooling the device down.

I repeated a variation of the above a couple times, then tried to figure out how I could make it repeat. My radio wasn’t new enough to have a stored voice component. Then I remembered my phone. After a few dozen attempts, I got the voice recorder working, and stumbled through three or four ‘takes’ of my distress call. When I got it sounding the way I wanted, I propped the phone and mic up together, wedging the mic in between the seat and the console so the push-to-talk was depressed. Every few minutes the time-out function would kick in, cutting off my transmission, and I could just un-wedge and re-wedge the mic to start again.

With it all set up, I got out of the front of the truck and retired to the back again, lying down facing the radio, listening to my new voice plaintively beg for another to respond, as I chewed on bland bread and watched the sun go down on my first day as a miniature alien horse.

Author's Notes:

Hi everyone, figured I should get this one out there before too many others popped up. I'm trying to follow Starscribe's guidelines, but like everyone else, I'm waiting eagerly to know what comes next! And for those of you who have posted similar plotlines, please be assured I am not copying you. This is what came out of my head over the past few weeks - I had planned to release it all at once when it was complete, but quite frankly the number of side stories both (a) in Canada and (2) following a similar storyline to mine forced my hand. I hope we can all coexist together!

As I mentioned in the description, I will not be posting daily like Starscribe and some of the side-story authors. I've been out of the writing game for too long to keep up with that kind of pace. With luck, I'll manage to pump out a fair-sized chapter every week or two, but no promises. The only thing I will assure you of is I won't leave this abandoned. That's not my style.

Leaving the Nest

MAY 24

So I woke up the next day spitting out a feather.

What the hell?! Did I rip open the sleeping bag? I wondered. I couldn’t even remember if it was down-filled.

And why does my side hurt?

I rolled over and got myself oriented properly - that is, lying belly-down in the SUV’s “sleeping area” - and saw something that gave me yet another surprise.

It was a feather the same color as my new body’s coat.

Looking myself over (and only then realizing that I hadn’t worn glasses at all the day before - apparently transforming into a mini-horse returns your vision to 20/20), I blinked in surprise to see a feathered appendage tucked against my side.

What the hell, I repeated in my head. A quick glance on my other side proved I had a matched pair. Except, of course, for the one feather I’d managed to pluck overnight.

So I’m a short, stubby, fuzzy talking pegasus? I wondered. How had I gone all day not noticing the wings on my sides? Well, of course that was a question with a simple answer - I’d been overloaded with changes and revelations. I just couldn’t process them all.

The ham radio was still on, the mic stuck where I’d left it, the radio receiving nothing. The phone was still replaying my new voice over and over, even though I hadn’t been awake to open the mic and transmit.

Shit, the battery’s gonna be flat, I realized. I squeezed between the two front seats, standing partially on the console, and pushed the vehicle’s start button, thankful I’d sprung for the deluxe model with the keyless ignition. Turning a key would have been next to impossible, even though I’d managed some mild dexterity hoof-wise.

Luckily, the engine turned over, and the vehicle went into idle properly. I backed up into the sleeping area and lay down again, finishing off the last of the loaf of bread.

Food and water, I reminded myself as I had “breakfast”. I’d managed to get something to drink the day before by filling a sink in the common bathroom, and later biting the top off a plastic bottle of water from a neighboring campsite. If I was going to survive, I was going to need to find a steady source of nourishment.

Nagging (groan) at the back of my mind was another troubling thought. I was a fan of what I termed ‘apocalypse fiction’; I’d watched Life After People. I knew what was going to happen to the world if things were going the same way all over as they were at the racetrack.

Non-automated processes were surely already gone. Some automated stuff would be giving up the ghost soon. It was surprising that the cell sites and other such stuff were still running. The ham repeater needed power too, and I proved to myself that it was still on the air by keying up and giving my distress call ‘live’. The hiss of the repeater at the end of my transmission was the only response.

The area was served by a nuclear power plant, I recalled. Unlike what people think, an unmanned nuclear power plant isn’t going to explode or melt a hole through to the Earth’s core. Without the proper inputs, they’ll slowly go into a dormant state, shutting down and going into safe mode, for the exact insanely-unlikely situation I was living right at that moment.

So anyway, the point is, power would last until the reactors put themselves to sleep. After that, backup generators would kick in, and likely give another three days - 72 hours - of life. Once that was gone, things would get really quiet (and dark) really fast.

Don’t get me wrong - I had no delusions that everything would shut down nicely like that. I was particularly fearful of places like steel factories and other industrial sites that used particularly dangerous processes. To be honest, I’m surprised I didn’t see fires on the horizon.

Not just from burning buildings - everything from the above catastrophes to the simple situation of a stove left on; aircraft too. Planes had to go somewhere, especially if the crews just vanished. Maybe the fact whatever happened did so in the middle of the night (apparently) helped limit the number of crashes, since fewer planes would be in the skies at three in the morning.

The sound of the truck idling brought me back to the present. What could I do? I’d gone through my meager supplies, and wasn’t up to rummaging through others’ campsites for scraps. There was clearly nothing here at the track - for me or anyone else.

It took nearly a half an hour for me to get settled in the driver’s seat. It was still quite uncomfortable to sit the “normal” way, but I grinned and bore it, so to speak. Once again Lady Luck shined on me; the power seats, power adjustable pedals, and power adjustable steering wheel made it possible for me to adjust the controls to fit my new size.

I looked in the side mirror at the EZ-Up I hadn’t taken down. I had no idea if I could get it down without wrecking it, and even less faith in being able to re-erect it somewhere else. Besides, I was planning on going towards civilization, not away from it, and was hoping my next bed would be a real one, under a building’s roof.

I put the truck in gear, eased the pressure off the brake, and the first known horse-driven automobile went on its way.

I had put the ham radio on scan, searching for any signals, and only found the occasional data signal - automated telemetry - disheartening me further.

It hadn’t occurred to me until then to try the car stereo. I had to stop in order to gather enough dexterity to turn it on and change stations and bands.

There was nothing but static - and the occasional “dead carrier”, meaning an open channel with no audio - on the FM band. I thought I’d hit pay dirt on the satellite band, but it turned out to be pre-programmed broadcasts - the way a lot of stations were run these days, computer-driven playlists being pumped out without an operator at the board.

I saved the AM band for last. AM signals go a long way, and if I was lucky, I might come across someone who was in the right place for their signal to bounce, or skip, to me.

A frown crossed my furry face as the only signal I picked up was one, solitary, weak and distant pre-programmed station playing the same Beatles tune over and over.

I turned the radio off again and turned my attention back to the road. Surprisingly, it was empty; I’d expected driverless cars to be crashed into one another and scattered along the ditches and shoulders. Then again, I reminded myself, whatever happened did so at three-thirty in the morning.

I got onto the 35 and headed south towards the lake. As the road was clear, I could go whatever speed I liked, and the truck was just fine at 150 kilometers per hour. Fifty over the limit… in Ontario, if you get caught going that fast, your vehicle is seized and you have a mandatory court appearance.

I smirked. If I managed to catch the attention of a cop today, I’d gladly take the ticket in exchange for being in the presence of another person. Then again, would he dare to stop a vehicle driven by a grey-and-purple pegasus?

I howled with laughter for fifteen minutes at that thought.

A short while down the road, my joviality gave way to surprise and shock, sort of. I was seeing other living creatures, but I shouldn’t have been so dumbfounded.

In a pasture adjacent to the highway was a cluster of cows, milling about, chewing on grass, and doing what cows do.

I’d pulled over and shut off the engine to make things as quiet as possible. I rolled down the window (why do we still call it ‘rolling’ down the window when it’s just a button now?) and listened, trying to determine if any of them were talking.

“Hello,” I called out after a moment’s silence. They mainly stared back at me or continued on with their day.

“...Moo?” I said questioningly.

The one or two that had been watching me turned back to their grazing.

Feeling foolish, and disheartened, I sighed and powered the window back up, starting the truck and carrying on.

Ninety minutes later, I was in the city. There was nothing more of note than there had been at the racetrack. The roads were devoid of traffic, but to my surprise, most of the traffic signals were still working. Evidently the power was going to last longer than I thought… but I couldn’t count on it working forever. I needed supplies and fast.

A nearby shopping mall was my goal. I stopped in the fire lane - again, like when I’d been speeding, go ahead and arrest me, I’ll kiss you for it - and tumbled out of the truck, not having planned for a way to disembark gracefully.

“Fuck,” I mumbled, rubbing my probably-bruised rump with a hoof. And not cluing in that I shouldn’t really have been able to bend that way. In any case, I went to the mall doors and found them locked.

Of course… the mall would be closed at 3:30 in the morning, I chastised myself. I looked around for something to break in with. I thought momentarily of just bashing at the glass with a hoof, but knowing my luck, I’d get badly cut and end up bleeding to death right where I stood, or limp for the rest of my days… however long that turned out to be.

I found a trash can halfway down the fire lane with a lid on it, with the metal flappy bit that acted like a hinged door. I managed to kick it off the top of the can and boot it back to the doors, then pick it up in between my front hooves. Rearing back and up, I lifted the can lid over my head and flung it at the doors.

BWNNNGG!

It bounced harmlessly off the laminated glass, and I ducked and sidestepped to avoid getting hit. The evasive maneuver was unexpected and so I fell over on my side.

I growled and stood back up again, going over to the lid and kicking it again. It skittered across the pavement and rested against the door.

Thinking about it for a second, I grabbed at the lid with my hooves/forelegs again, trying and eventually managing to prop it up so it was resting against the glass, on top of the metal frame of the door.

I turned around and measured up the distance, parking my rear hooves over the propped-up trash can lid, and prepared to let loose with a kick.

Here goes nothing.

I shifted my weight forward, then lashed out with a mighty buck - or as mighty as I could muster.

“Oof!” I cried out as the door and trash can lid rattled. I looked over my shoulder(s?) and saw that, to my surprise, the glass had weakened and broken in a little bit.

I kicked again, and again, and lifted both my back hooves off the ground and bashed as hard as I could one more time, and the glass panel, even though held together by plastic laminate, had peeled away from the frame far enough to let me in.

I ducked under the crash bar on the door and squeezed my way inside, wishing I’d brought a flashlight. Power was on, but only the power that would have been on in the middle of the night, meaning most of the lights were turned low, and I’ve never really seen a mall where the light switches are readily at hand. Hoof. Whatever.

All the shops were shuttered too, with their glass or mesh/metal barriers drawn. This is going to be harder than I thought.

My hooves made loud clicking sounds on the cement floor, making me feel exceptionally conspicuous. It was a conflicting feeling - on one hand (and I’m deliberately using ‘hand’ here, lack of hands be damned), I desperately wanted to find another living creature; on the other hand, making enough noise to be heard all over the mall made me fear that something bad would come looking for me.

There was no way to deaden the sound of my hooffalls, though, so a-clopping I went through the corridors.

Even though it had only been a couple of days, there were smells in here that made me think something bad had happened already. Going against my good sense, I followed one scent to the supermarket anchoring one corner of the mall. I couldn’t get in past the barricades, but what I could see of the meat counter through them seemed to not be too bad off, and the power was still on. It still smelled like it was rotten beyond belief.

I decided to come back to the grocery store later, after I had checked out the rest of the place. Maybe I could find a master key somewhere to open everyone’s barricades, or maybe another shop would be open. Failing that, I’d have to figure out how to breach the shutters, and a couple of good kicks probably wouldn’t cut it this time.

Passing up the useless jewelry shops and clothing stores, I decided the next stop was the food court. Actually, back up a second. I said I bypassed the clothing stores, and I just want to touch on that a second. On the first day, after having my little crying jag, I tried to put on some of my clothes, but none of them fit at all, of course. They were too small in places and far too big in others. And I had a fur coat on, anyway, in the middle of a particularly warm spring. I won’t say I didn’t feel conspicuous every now and then remembering I was strolling around naked, but let me point out that I never once in my (human) life saw a horse that wore clothes, and I’m reasonably certain that (a) nothing in the stores would be my size, and (2) the turnaround time on alterations right now was probably pretty grim.

So anyway, my naked self strolled on down to the food court, which was in the lower level of the mall at the other end. Backing down the escalator, I wasn’t sure whether it was a good thing or a bad thing that it was switched off. I didn’t have to have a death grip on the rails like I had on the ped bridge at Mosport, though, so that was half-decent.

Naturally, none of the stores were open in the food court either, but a couple of them didn’t have shutters, and I hopped the counter at a burger joint, despite the stench coming from within. From my time as a youth working in a movie theater, I knew how to turn on the soda fountain machines, and I stood there pouring myself cup after cup of Coke and guzzling it down. (Probably not very wise considering I’d get more hydration from straight water, but when you crave something, you go for it.)

After three extra large drinks, I hiccuped and then let out a ghastly belch which echoed throughout the entire food court.

I blushed as I ducked my head and pushed on the door between the front counter and kitchen side. Not very lady-like, I commented to myself.

The odor was nearly staggering in the place, but I had to eat something, so I found a broom and unlatched the freezer, after turning on a grill and a deep fryer. Inspecting the freezer while I let the kitchen warm up, everything looked good, and the power was on in the freezer so everything was still well-kept. So I pulled out a brick of burger patties and a bag of fries, and set to making a meal.

Do you know how difficult it is to use a spatula with hooves? I ultimately had to trap it in between both my forehooves just to make it work. I only cooked two patties at first in case the meat was truly as bad as it smelled, but the entire bag of fries went into the two baskets in the deep fryer.

The smoke banked down in the place and triggered the fire alarm; it was then that I realized I’d forgotten the exhaust fans. Hooves over my ears to stop the bell from assaulting them, I pushed the ‘on’ button on the fan system with my elbow (?). Eventually the smoke and gases started clearing out, but the bells and strobes continued.

By the time I found the panel to silence the alarm, my fries were done. I flipped the burgers as I munched on salted golden fried potato goodness. They weren’t bad, but weren’t as rich a taste as I’d expected them to be, after not having eaten anything of substance for a day or two.

Finally, the burgers were done, and I realized I’d forgotten cheese. Oh well, next time. So I scooped the patties off the grill with the spatula, put them in between a bun, and set it down on a tray. Gulping down the butterflies in my throat, I dipped my head and bit a chunk out of the burger.

Gack!!

I spat out the horrible-tasting disaster of a burger. I couldn’t even salvage the bun, I was sure. The meat looked fine, but it was absolutely disgusting. Maybe this place failed its health inspection - but that didn’t explain away the bad smells everywhere else.

I went around to the front side again and shoved a hoof against the little tab on the ‘water’ spigot on the fountain dispenser, chugging down fluid straight from the pipe, to rinse the taste out of my mouth. As I was drinking my fill and then some, a sound from behind me made me freeze in place.

“Oh my God,” someone said.

I stared in abject shock at the figure before me.

Roughly the same size as me, a light pink micro-horse stared at me with wide eyes from under an orange and .. peach, shall we say? … multi-hued mane. It was wavy and surrounded her head in a style that looked rather human in nature, falling to a point just above her shoulder blades.

Eyes with surprising yellow irises blinked once, then twice. “Are.. are you real?” came her voice again.

I only nodded, too surprised to speak. Finally, after a few seconds, my wits came back to me. I’d finally found another survivor - or rather it was the other way around, it seemed. “Yes,” I said, nodding again. I didn’t know what else to say.

Feeling something different about my form, I looked behind me and noticed my wings were spread wide as if I were a peacock or something. Damn you, I couldn’t get you to do so much as twitch when I wanted you to move, and now this? With a large amount of concentration, I was able to force the appendages to fold up.

She approached the counter, and I myself blinked as I recognized that she was different from me. For one thing, she didn’t have wings. For another, she had a tapered conical protrusion sticking out from her forehead in the same color as her coat. A horn? She’s a unicorn? A miniature unicorn? A … minicorn?

“Where did you come from?” she asked, still breathless and in disbelief. “I know you haven’t been in here all this time, I checked the whole mall out.”

“I.. uh.. just got here,” I explained. “I was out at Mosport for the weekend… I found myself like this when I woke up Saturday.”

“Same here,” she said, nodding and gesturing to herself with a hoof. “But we’re different.”

“Yeah, I noticed,” I acknowledged.

“Have you seen anyone else?”

I shook my head. “You’re the first,” I replied.

“Uh-huh,” she nodded. Then she took stock of my location. “What were you doing, trying to get something to eat?”

“Yeah,” I responded. “But I think it’s gone off. Tastes vile, in any case.”

She smirked. “Did you try to eat meat?”

“Yeah,” I repeated, quizzical. “What?”

“Don’t you know ponies are herbivores?”

“Herb.. wait. Ponies?”

“Yeah. Ponies… you know, little horses? That’s obviously what we are. Or some strange alien version of them.”

“I thought ponies were a specific breed of horse,” I admitted. “With long manes and tails, and bred for… you know, I’m going to stop right now before I let my dumbness leak out.”

The unicorn giggled. “Maybe that’s for the best. Now come on out of there and I’ll take you back to my place for a nice salad.”

“Y-your place?” I asked as I clambered over the counter.

‘Her place’ turned out to be the Wal-Mart in the one wing of the mall I hadn’t visited yet. She’d heard the fire bell going off during my hopeless cooking attempt, and come running, worried that something attached to her hideaway was going to burn down.

In the middle of the furniture section of the superstore, she’d carved out a decent nest. On one side, it was walled off by tall shelves she’d evidently pushed into place from the shoe section. Tarps from the camping and outdoors areas were fixed from there to the ground a dozen or so feet away to give her a private bedding area with a couple of mattresses and blankets on the floor. The former aisle had been repurposed, blocked off with shelving and carts to form some storage and a passageway to the electronics section, where two of the largest televisions were each set up with a game console and a DVD player. All the other televisions were on, set to seemingly random channels. Across the other side of the electronics section, all the laptops that would run were opened up and surfing various Internet sites, except for one computer which displayed the lock screen.

Going the other way from the central nest area, a pair of low coffee tables had been set up, one as a prep table and the other obviously for dining. A shopping cart with greens and other non-meat products from the grocery aisles was at the end of the prep table.

“Welcome to Casa Jill,” the unicorn said, lifting a hoof and waving it before us.

“You did all this?” I said, impressed.

“Yup,” she nodded. “If I’m stranded here, I should live in style, right?”

I turned to look at her. “Stranded?”

“I live… lived… in Calgary,” she shrugged. “Was visiting friends. When I woke up like this, and with everybody gone… well… I didn’t feel like taking over their home. Y’know?”

I nodded, getting the picture.

“So, like I said, I’m Jill,” she went on. “What’s your name?”

I winced and tried to change the subject. “How far did you come to get here?”

“Not as far as you,” she said. “My friends’ place is over on Finch.”

“Did you set up any radios? Try to call for help?”

“Well, I did turn on as many news channels as I could,” she said, walking towards the bank of TVs and gesturing at them with a hoof. “The ones that are still on the air, they’re just showing empty studios. It’s like everybody vanished in the middle of whatever they were doing. Pretty freakin’ creepy if you ask me.”

“Yeah,” I agreed.

Thankfully, before she could ask her question again, my stomach chose that moment to grumble.

“Oh! I promised you some munchies,” she said, and hurried over to the prep table. With a dexterity that I found hard to believe, she took some of the fresh fruit and vegetables from the cart, peeling and chopping them, rinsing some of it through bowls of water, and placing it all in a large salad bowl. When she was done, she somehow managed to balance the bowl on her back, and walked back over to me, reaching up and taking the dish with a hoof before setting it down between me and the TVs.

“Lie down and have something to eat,” she urged. “I’ll be back with a drink in a sec.”

I did as instructed and nibbled at the garden of variety before me. To my surprise, it tasted quite good, and had an almost spicy tang to it, even though I hadn’t seen her dress it with anything.

Momentarily, she brought back a small pail of water, carrying it by its handle between her teeth. “Eere ya oh,” she said, setting it down carefully beside me, and then lying down herself in front of the bowl, snatching a tomato slice from it and chowing down.

“Thanks,” I said between bites. “I probably would have tried to choke down meat for a stupidly long time before I tried this.”

“No problem,” Jill laughed. “So anyway, what’s your name? Where are you from originally?”

My face reddened. Wait, can we blush in this form? “I don’t wanna talk about it,” I murmured.

“Hey, come on now,” she said, poking at me with a hoof. “We could very well be the last two people, or ponies, in the world. The least you can do is tell me who I’m sharing my supper with.”

Guilt racked me and won. “It’s…” I began, then grimaced. “I’m Tom.”

“‘Tom’?” she echoed. “I’ve never met a girl named Tom.”

I stared at her for a long minute, and just as I began to respond, her eyes widened. “You haven’t yet,” I said tinily.

Yep, we can blush, as is evidenced by her cheeks getting even pinker. She bent both forelegs at the elbows to cover her muzzle with her hooves.

“Oh I’m sorry!” she said, clearly hiding a grin. “You just look like-”

“I am, as far as I can tell,” I bit out, frowning and diverting my attention to the food.

“Really?”

“You wanna see for yourself?” I shot back.

Her expression changed as she realized how on edge the whole situation made me. “I’m sorry,” she repeated. “I’m so sorry.”

I chewed on it - and a leaf of lettuce - for a minute before I shrugged. “Nothing I can do about it,” I said. “And you had no way of knowing.”

She nodded. “Believe me, you are very much a mare.”

I raised an eyebrow as I turned to stare at her. “How are you such an expert?”

She smirked again. “Don’t take it the wrong way. Just, if you hadn’t said your name, I never would’ve known.”

“Yeah, well… if we find anyone else, let me keep them in the dark, okay? At least until I find the right time on my own.”

“I promise,” she said, putting a hoof over one of mine. “Your secret is safe with me.”

We ate in silence a bit more, until she said, “I wonder why this all happened anyway. I mean, the whole pony thing.”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” I said in between bites.

“I like your radio idea,” she said. “Maybe we can find someone else, or someone who knows what happened.”

“I have one out in my truck,” I said, gesturing vaguely toward the parking lot. “It might make sense to put it indoors and install a bigger antenna to get better range.”

“Sounds like a plan,” she said. “Although it sounds like you’re planning to move in with me.”

My brain stopped for a second at her accusing tone. “Buh,” I managed. I intended to argue that there was safety and strength in numbers, especially right now.

She blurted out a laugh. “I’m just messin’ with ya. Of course you can stay. My Wal-Mart is your Wal-Mart.”

“Thank you,” I finally said.

She rose to her hooves. “You stay put and finish eating. I’ll set up a place for you.”

I devoured the salad, watching the wall of TVs. As she’d said, the channels that were still broadcasting were showing either bars and tone or empty news studios where nothing at all stirred.

This is looking bleak, I told myself, but then had to remind myself that to me, Earth’s known population doubled from the time I’d woken up that morning to now.

Jill was a friendly, happy creature. I had no idea what she had been like as a human, but as a unicorn… a unicorn pony, I had to remind myself… she was certainly very accommodating and supportive.

Well, maybe not that supportive. She took me to show off the sleeping arrangements she’d made while I was busy eating - she’d partitioned off another section of the furniture area, with another pair of mattresses and some tarps. But inside my cozy little den, all the blankets and pillows were adorned with Disney princesses and the like.

“I got you some stuff to make you feel right at home,” she said teasingly. “Have a good night, Tom.”

“Night,” I grumbled, but as I entered the shelter this stranger had built for me out of the blue, I couldn’t help but allow myself a tiny smile.

Author's Notes:

For anybody from the area, the mall is the Pickering Town Centre. I've taken some liberties with what stores are in the mall and its layout - I haven't been in there for a couple of decades.

Progress

MAY 25

The next thing I knew, I was getting a nudge to my shoulder.

“C’mon,” came a voice. “Rise and shine, miss sleepyhead.”

I stirred, noting I was lying on my belly, chin between my front hooves. “Don’t call me that,” I mumbled.

“Don’t be such a spoilsport,” Jill responded, laughter in her voice. “Breakfast will be ready in a few minutes.”

I sat up and fought the urge to rub the sleep from my eyes (figuring that hooves to the eyeballs would hurt). “What time is it?”

“About nine-ish,” came the response from the kitchen area. “You slept pretty solidly.”

“Probably the best sleep I’ve had since this thing began,” I acknowledged.

Chopping sounds came from the kitchen at that point, so I presumed Jill had her mouth full of a knife handle. I sauntered over to the televisions and did a sweep with my eyes.

It looked like one or two that had been showing empty studios yesterday now had solid blue screens - the modern equivalent of static. The generators are starting to go out, I mused. The rest of them had nothing new of note. Weather for May 23 was still on the ‘bug’ (the term for the little icon in the corner of the screen), and headlines weren’t being updated.

I heard Jill come up beside me, and a plate of greens was deposited on top of the counter I was sitting by. “Want some milk?”

“Seriously? It’s still good?”

“It’s been in the cooler over in the grocery section. Expires the 29th. Regular or chocolate?”

“Wow. Chocolate, please.”

Jill smiled and pivoted, heading off.

I munched on the stuff I previously would have called ‘what food eats’. It actually tasted fairly good, despite the fact that it should have been bland (at least, to my opinion), especially since it was all a couple days old. Maybe Jill was some kind of kitchen savant?

“Foh, ell ee- aang on a ecken,” Jill said as she returned, and set down the plastic milk jug she’d been carrying by the handle in her teeth. “I guess I’m gonna have to get used to that. Sorry. Anyway, tell me about yourself.”

“About myself?” I said, holding onto the jug with one hoof and using another to force the lid to turn.

“Yeah. Who were y… I mean, who are you? What do you do? Where are you from?”

I smiled wanly as I got the lid off the milk jug. “I think we can safely use the past tense,” I told her, then chugged half the jug down. “Like I said, my name is Thomas James Wright. Yes, like the TV director. As far as I know, I had the name first, he can get in line behind me.”

Jill giggled as I took another drink. Was I more thirsty as a horse? Wait, wasn’t that a cliche?

“As for what I did, I programmed computer systems. Databases mainly. So you can see, my skills aren’t very transferable.”

“You never know,” she shrugged. “This could end up being reversible.”

“I’m gonna have to take the pessimist’s stance on that,” I argued, waving a hoof at the TVs. “Everything’s starting to wind down. Even if the millions of people who should be surrounding us right now appear all of a sudden, it’ll take forever to get people back into places and get them started up again. Take the nuke plant, for example. It’s a very secure facility. How do you get people into a very secure facility where the people who are supposed to be inside to push the only button to grant you access have vanished? Unless they reappear in exactly the same place they were when they left. If that happens, what happens to you and me?”

“You’ve got a point,” Jill said with a grimace. “But still, even if things don’t return to normal, statistical odds say we’re not alone, and when civilization restarts, we’ll have tasks we can do. Right?”

I shook my head at her smile. “You’re definitely taking the optimist angle, aren’t you?”

“No reason not to,” she said. “So, Tom… are you from around here?”

“Yeah,” I nodded. “I lived just north of Markham.”

Jill brightened. “Don’t you want to go home?”

“Hell no,” I shot back, probably with more force than I should have. “I… I mean, no… I…”

Her voice softened. “You’re afraid of what you might find. Or not find.”

I clenched my teeth, squeezed my eyes shut. “My sister and nephews live across the road from me.”

Jill collected me into a hug - or at least as much of a hug as two ponies can perform. “I understand,” she said. After a moment, she took a breath and released me. “Let’s move on. Have you tried those yet?”

Her hoof was angled at the wing on my side. “Y-you saw the sum total of my experience with getting them to move, yesterday,” I blushed. “I have honestly no idea why they splayed out like that.”

“You can’t unfurl them?”

“Nnngh,” I answered, grunting as I strained to spread them out. They quivered slightly, and I let out my air in a sigh. “I just don’t have any idea how to move them at all.”

“Hang on a second,” she said, and got up, retreating to her sleeping area briefly. Upon her return, she had a clipboard in her mouth, with paper and pencil trapped in the claw.

“I’m going to take note of our differences,” she said, putting the clipboard down before her and taking up the pencil in her mouth. It was mildly easier to understand her that way than it had with a plate in her mouth, but not by much. “Ohay. Oo have bings, I have a orn.”

I watched her make notations on the paper with the pencil, impressed at her skill, but keeping quiet.

“Anyhing elph?”

“Well, the obvious is I… well,” I said, gesturing to myself.

“Oh! Of courph. I arted ouh as a girl, you joined the barty late,” she said, smirking around the pencil as she scratched on the paper.

“Rub it in,” I sighed, rolling my eyes.

“Burn shidebays,” she said.

I blinked. “Huh?”

“Burn,” she repeated, making a motion with her hoof. I finally figured out she wanted me to turn 90 degrees, and I did.

She blinked. “Oh…”

“Oh what?” I asked.

“I bibn… *ptew!* I mean, I didn’t notice, you don’t have, a, um... “ Her voice dropped to a whisper as she blushed. “Abuhpickr.”

“A what?”

“A…” She squeezed her eyes shut, then squeaked it out: “A butt picture!”

I was speechless until she turned sideways before me, and even then, I was still at a loss for words. First, how had I missed that? Second, what did it mean and why didn’t I have one?

On Jill’s flank, above her rear shoulder (if that’s the right term), was what looked like a tattoo - if tattoos were able to be made from fur. On both sides of her behind was a full-color image of an old-fashioned quill and inkwell, with a piece of scroll-like paper beside it.

“Did you have a tattoo before..?” I asked.

“No,” she shook her head. “Wanna hear the strange part?”

I stared flatly at her. “Sure,” I said, sarcasm dripping from my voice. “Tell me the strange part compared to us turning into talking alien ponies overnight, not to mention the rest of the world disapp-”

“I’m a writer.”

“What?” I asked.

“Not my job, though,” she said, waving a hoof. “I was a lab tech for an oil company. And I do mean was - I got laid off six weeks ago during the downturn. But my hobby has always been writing.”

“Like novels and such?” I asked.

Jill nodded. “Yup. Fiction mostly, but I also have been a writer as far back as my school newspaper. I’ve done the office newsletter for a few places I’ve worked, and wrote stories off-and-on for a small newspaper in the town I lived in.”

I looked at her ‘butt picture’ again. “So you think we’re being categorized by our skills?”

“Could be. But I don’t remember the abduction or the alien branding ordeal,” she quipped. “But if that does explain me, it doesn’t for you.”

I shrugged. “It could have been part of the, um, misfiling,” I said, searching for a word for my ‘situation’. “Or maybe they couldn’t figure out what picture represents ‘snarky’ best.”

“Pfft,” Jill smirked, suppressing a giggle. “Anyway, I guess I owe you some answers, since I got some from you. I’m Jill Dannon. Jill’s short for Jillian, but only my mom gets to call me that when I’m in trouble. I’m single, no kids, only child. I already told you my job situation, and my parents have passed. I’m atheist, so I have no theories on why we were spared when everyone else got taken away.”

“We actually sound like we have some stuff in common,” I responded. “My mom died of cancer 6 years ago but my dad is-” I winced “-was still around. I told you about my sister and her kids. I’m not religious either. I’m single as well, and I’m 41.”

She blinked. “Oh.. you don’t seem that old. I mean! I didn’t mean it like that,” she blushed. “See, this is why I didn’t tell you how old I was, because I was worried we’d get in an awkward position.”

I smirked. “I thought it was because a girl never reveals her true age?” I countered.

She smiled back. “You just did.”

“Har har, that’s never going to get old,” I deadpanned.

“I intend to get some more mileage out of it yet,” Jill winked. “Anyway, cliches be damned, you’re 10 years my senior.”

I nodded, not knowing what else to do. “I don’t know if that really applies any more. We both look the same age to me.”

“And how old is that?” she replied.

I shook my head. “Your guess is as good as mine. Three days, technically?”

“Ohh. Touche,” she grinned, then stood up. “Anyway. What are we going to do today? Pull that radio out of your truck?”

“I had a different idea about that,” I responded. “It makes more sense to keep it in there if we end up using it for supply runs or exploring. Do you remember if there’s still a Radio Shack, or whatever they call it these days, in this mall?”

Fifteen minutes later and the exceptionally creative application of a paint can and a broomstick handle later, we were past the security barrier and inside the local electronics shop.

“I miss the days when these things had real radios in them,” I mused, walking the aisles.

“My uncle used to say the same thing,” Jill said.

I waved a hoof at the wall of inert techno-gadgets. “All these toys and junk… nothing worth using in our situation.”

“Yeah, you’d think the stockboy would be more considerate of the survivors of the apocalypse,” Jill quipped.

I smirked. “Exactly.” My eyes brightened and I quickened my pace. “Aha! Jackpot.”

“What is it?”

“A rare find these days, but we lucked out, it seems.” I tapped a hoof on the item on the demo shelf. “A base station ham radio. With this we can talk between here and the truck, at least, and probably make calls out to see if there’s anybody else out there.”

“Does it work?”

“I’d hope it’d not be on the shelf if it was broken,” I said, searching for the on switch. Finding it, I watched and laughed when the dials sprang to life.

Tuning in the local repeater and hoping it was still at least on battery backup, I tried to key it up, and got a return, though it was very staticky.

“That probably means…” I said, looking around the back of the radio and then tracing cables. “Aha. Yup,” I said, pointing to an antenna just propped against the wall in a nearby corner. “We need to get that higher and more in the open.”

Using a cart appropriated from a service corridor, we loaded the radio, antenna, some extra cable, and as much of the ‘junk’ that we thought would be useful, and headed back to the Wal-Mart.

“So what’s your plan?” Jill asked.

“I want to find the roof hatch in the store. The base of this thing is magnetic,” I said, kicking a hoof towards the antenna. “Put it on the top of the roof hatch. Run the extra cable from there back as far as it’ll reach towards the radio. Hopefully that will put it somewhere decently near our lair. Whatever distance we can’t cover we can make up for in speaker volume, I’m sure.”

“How are you going to get up to the roof hatch? There’s probably at least one ladder involved.”

I thought back to my perils on the first day, climbing and descending a simple set of stairs. “No problem,” I said with false bravado. “It’s gotta be done.”

It took about an hour to find the hatch, in the back room/warehouse side of the store. Luckily, it was at the top of a metal stairway, and I could maneuver along those without getting wounded these days. Antenna in my mouth, cable streaming out behind me, I reached up to shove the hatch open.

“Be careful,” Jill warned me from below.

As I pushed on the hatch, unlocking the latch (hey, that rhymes), something felt strange, and before I could react, the hatch whipped open with a loud CLANG, and wind and water blasted in at me.

“Whoa!” Jill reacted. “Is it ever storming out there!”

Only then did it dawn on me that the white noise that had been in the background for most of the afternoon was a fierce rainstorm pounding down on the metal roof of the store. Now it was pounding down on me as well.

“Maybe we should put this off until it clears!” Jill called up to me.

“We’ll drown if I don’t at least get this closed,” I exaggerated, forcing my way up through the hatch. I stepped on to the roof and reached down to pick up the dropped antenna, and-

BOOM!

Oh yeah. Brilliant idea, being on the top of a metal building, trying to mount an antenna, in a thunderstorm. You’re just throwing away any smarts you had left, aren’t you?

Jill shouted something up to me, but I couldn’t hear her over the din. As I set down the antenna and tried to reorient it so it would stick to the flipped-over top of the roof hatch, the wind picked it up and sent it tumbling, extra cable and all, towards the edge of the roof.

“Dammit!” I snarled, and went after it.

Every time I thought I was within reach, it would snake out of my jaws’ grasp. In a full gallop, I chased the black cable, focused on nothing but it, until I finally chomped down on it-

-and realized, a fifth of a second too late, I was barrelling over the parapet.

The loading dock behind the store seemed miles distant, even though it was only two and a half stories below me. I squeezed my eyes shut and said, Well, I guess I’ll find out if I can make these things work. Flap, damn you!

I concentrated with all my might to unfurl the wings at my sides and make them keep me aloft. They were stubborn in their uselessness - I only barely was able to make them open up a little, but then confusion kicked in as I came to an abrupt stop.

Hanging upside-down from one back leg, I thought maybe I’d become entangled in the cable, but then I remembered that the very end of it was in my mouth, and the rest including the antenna dangled well below me. I craned my head up to see what I was caught on, and would have gasped aloud if it hadn’t meant I would have dropped the antenna.

Jill was at the edge of the roof, staring fiercely at me, her horn glowing a bright yellow, same color as her eyes. And a band of color around my right back leg was glowing the same hue, accompanying a feeling of a firm but unrelenting grip.

Author's Notes:

If you're reading this on the day it's published, this is as far as I've written to date. I of course have more material in my noggin, just haven't had time to put it down "on paper" yet. Plus, trying to make sure I don't stray too far from Starscribe's intentions with this world.

In the meantime, I did a piece for EQD's Writers' Training Grounds for episode 100, to exercise my creative center and such. I may try to let it loose on fimfic as well, if that doesn't violate any rules. Been way, way too long since I've submitted stories to any site (over 10 years if I recall correctly!). In any case it hopefully will show up on EQD after June 21.

Naturally, constructive criticism about any of my writings is greatly appreciated!

One Step Forward...

MAY 26

Like everyone else (or at least I assume like everyone else), I have recurring dreams.

You know the kind - standing in a crowded hallway in your high school ten years past graduation, knowing you had to be in class but also knowing you didn’t have any idea where it was or what course it covered.

That was one of mine, but not the one that matters.

The other one I had on a regular basis involved being in tight spaces. Things like really narrow hallways in houses, or having to go through a window opening - for some reason - that was only a few inches wider than I was. I have no idea what that’s about - if I knew, I might be able to make a decent living as a psychologist. All I know is I’m no claustrophobe, so it wasn’t out of some kind of fear.

Anyway, it seems like some things didn’t change when I became the pony me. I had that dream last night, sort of. Instead of a house or a subterranean bunker complex or the basement of an unfamiliar hotel, like usual, I found myself surrounded by puffy white stuff.

I was walking on it, and could push it aside to an extent, though there was a definite form to it if I probed deep enough - like a super-soft cushioned corridor, eventually I couldn’t shove it aside. But a corridor was still a corridor, and so I walked on. (Little did I notice that my dream self was walking on four hooves now, just like the real me.)

As per usual in my dreams, the corridor eventually opened up - no dead ends to trap me - and to my surprise, this time, I found myself in a cloud city. I don’t mean a tarmac-and-steel city in the clouds, I mean a cloud city. Every visible surface was white cotton-ball-like vapor.

And there were ponies. Hundreds of them. Walking and flying around, to-ing and fro-ing, going about their daily business, so it would seem. Every color of the rainbow was represented, but one thing stuck out as plain as the sun shining down on this visage.

Every single pony there was a pegasus.

I felt a bump against my side and turned to look at what had nudged me.

Bump.

Bump.

Bump.

A giggle.

Bump.

“Stop it,” I moaned.

Bump. Another giggle.

“Not until you see how I’m doing this,” Jill said with a mirthful tone.

I forced an eye open and turned my head to look over my shoulder. Just beyond my ribcage, a wooden spoon was hovering in midair, surrounded by a yellowish glow. It haltingly inched towards my side and the spoon part dug in, right in the soft part of my barrel below my ribs.

Bump.

“Hee hee,” Jill giggled again, squirming with delight from her side of the encampment. Her horn was also emanating that yellow glow.

“How…” I began, but I knew how. I’d seen it first-hoof - I mean, first-hand - last night. Like it was a completely normal thing to do, some kind of field erupted from her unicorn horn and a similar glow enveloped my hind leg as I’d gone over the edge of the roof. A few seconds passed, and my leg, everything else attached to my leg (thankfully!), and the antenna and coax cable held in my teeth were all hauled back up onto the roof.

Neither of us had any idea how it happened. Jill insisted she was just filled with a need to save me from falling, and the next thing she knew, she was depositing me back on the tar-and-gravel. I didn’t seem to sport any ill effects - other than being a little freaked out about it. We slapped the antenna up where I’d said we were going to put it, and came back inside, closing the hatch, and I went straight to lie down, apparently going to sleep soon after.

“Have you been up all night?” I asked her as she mercifully stopped harassing me with the utensil.

“Noooo,” she said as if denying an accusation. “...Not all night.”

“What time is it?”

“A little after seven-thirty. Why are you so obsessed over time? You ask every morning.”

“Force of habit,” I said. Things were still overloading me - the changes we’d been through, and now the dreams I was having, plus my co-survivor’s apparent ability to telekinetically grab anything she wanted and propel it through the air. Having something regular like the clock probably kept me sane, or at least clinging to the ragged edge.

“I need to explore this more,” she said giddily, rising to her hooves and ‘picking up’ the spoon again. “I bet I can make breakfast without lifting a hoof.”

“Wash that before you use it,” I called to her, sniffing at myself. “Eugh. I smell like wet dog.” We didn’t have those kind of cleaning facilities set up yet - bathrooms in malls don’t often have showers. I idly wondered if the sprayer in the produce aisle - do they still have those, even? - would still have pressure.

I mentally chewed on my dream while Jill built our meal. It seemed strange, but then again, all dreams did, to me. Maybe it was just my mind trying to catch up with my new body - replacing all the humans with pegasuses.

Pegasuses? Pegasi? I’d have to see if I could look that up and figure out which was right. The problem was, finding an encyclopedia or dictionary was going to be difficult, and the usual Web references weren’t going to be available much longer, if they were even still available now. Stupidly, I hadn't bothered to check.

I trotted over to the TVs and saw only two were still active - both were tuned to superstations, network broadcasters that probably had extra generator or power reserves to stay going even after the world had ended. It made sense that one or two would have extra emergency supplies courtesy of the government, to allow for public information channels to exist when everything else bit the dust.

Maybe. I had no idea, really - I was talking out my furry grey ass, so to speak.

“What’re you doing over here?”

Jill walked up beside me with our morning salad bowl balanced on her back, same as the day before.

“Thought I might sit down and watch Shrek - maybe even recite it word-for-word,” I responded, tossing a hoof at the DVD-equipped display.

Jill chuckled, getting the reference. “Aw, we’re not that bad off,” she said, depositing the bowl on the ground and lying down beside me.

“We haven’t seen or heard anyone else,” I countered. I dipped my head to the bowl and nibbled on a helping. “How come you didn’t levitate this out from the kitchen?”

“I’m not very smooth with it yet,” she admitted. “I didn’t want to spill any food. It’s going to be in short supply eventually.”

I wanted to talk more about her ability, but her statement about our supplies shunted my thoughts to that track. “That’s right,” I said, grimacing a little. “I guess we’re going to have to figure something out.”

“At the very least, we’ll have to get further out of the city so we can find some grass to graze.”

I looked up at her with a wide-eyed expression, trying to determine if she was for real.

She held up her front hooves in the 'I give' pose. “Kidding! Kidding. Relax.”

I smirked after her grin set me at ease. “Don’t joke about that.”

“Sorry. But you need a joke now and then. You’re always like a dark storm cloud.” She took a bite of the salad. “Anyway, I know you have your heart set on talking like a donkey and a Scottish ogre all morning, but weren’t you going to set up the radio?”

“Oh. Right,” I nodded, looking towards the back of the store. Of course, the project was abandoned midway through, when last night’s events transpired. “Yeah, I should get on that. Putting an end on that cable is going to be tough… I’m not sure I can work a crimper with hooves.”

“Tell you what. Do what you can by yourself, and I’m going to spend some time playing with my horn. When you get to the bits you need help with, call for me, and either my hooves or my horn are yours for the rest. Okay?”

“Deal,” I smiled.

And so, after breakfast, we went our separate ways. I went into the back part of the store and picked up the cable hanging from the roof hatch, using one of those rolling metal staircases to run the line along the ceiling, fixing it to the roof beams with duct tape. Why? I have no idea. It would have been just as easy to let it hang loose and run to the radio from there, but it would have been a trip hazard, and I guess I have a little OCD after all.

Once or twice - okay, several times - I heard a hellacious clatter from somewhere else in the store. At one point it sounded like someone threw a full set of pots and pans down a staircase. Immediately after came a distant cry of “I’m okay! I’m okay! Everything’s all right! Just keep doing what you’re doing!”

It was almost noon by the time I ran out of cable. Leaving enough length to dangle down from the ceiling to the cart we’d put the radio on, it ended up being about forty feet from our ‘bedrooms’. I guess this’ll have to do.

I ran a series of extension cords and power bars from the nearest receptacle to the radio cart, for power - the fire marshal would have had a heart attack from the daisy-chained cabling (mmm, daisies - wait, what am I thinking??!) - and confirmed it had power, but I still had to put a connector on the antenna cable so it could be hooked into the radio.

I went back into our ‘living room’ and called out, “Jill?”

“Tom?” came the reply.

“Where are you?”

“Dairy! Come see this.”

I trotted over there and blinked, stopping at the end of the aisle. I froze in place, not wanting to disturb what was going on lest I upset the whole spectacle.

Floating in midair were two plastic cups, each with varying quantities of milk in them. Also in the air was a partially-full milk jug with its lid off. The three objects whirled around one another, the glasses and jug pouring into each other with practiced, though not perfect, ease.

Jill had her eyes fixed on the objects in her magic field. I don’t think she would have noticed a freight train obliterating the aisle beside her. However, she must have heard me approach. “Lookit this! Three things at once!”

I just stared and shook my head.

We each had a celebratory glass of milk to mark Jill mastering - or, I probably should say, slowly learning to control - this new ability. She was still unsteady with it, kind of like a kid riding a bike without training wheels for the first time, but we agreed she should keep practicing with it, only on non-critical tasks (ironic considering how she discovered she had it).

So we ended up back at the radio. Jill held the cable and connector steady while I stripped the cable down to bare wires, then put it inside the connector and used the crimping tool with both hooves, pushing as hard as I could.

“Give it a gentle tug?” I suggested after I finished.

The connector didn’t come off the cable, so I declared it done and we hooked it up to the radio. Turning on the radio once more, I tried to tune various known channels, but nobody was transmitting, as far as I could tell. One or two repeaters made their ‘acknowledge’ response after I keyed the mic, but otherwise, the bands were silent.

“Let me try,” Jill suggested, and I took my hoof away from the tuning dial as it began to glow slightly, then move seemingly of its own accord. The frequencies on the display flicked from number to number as the radio was tuned without human - er, pony - touch.

“I’m going to try some different settings,” I said, reaching up to flick some of the myriad of switches on the radio face. Without getting too involved in the explanation, some signals could be perfectly readable in a specific mode or configuration, but completely lost with the default settings used. I wanted to make sure we didn’t miss somebody just because their radio happened to be set to some oddball modulation when they sent their distress call.

Nothing came through, and Jill looked dejected, but I said, “This doesn’t mean anything bad just yet. We’ve only had the radio on for a few minutes. Who knows how many people might have tried calling before we had it hooked up? Let’s put out a message and see if we get an answer.”

“Okay,” she nodded. The microphone glowed yellow briefly, floating over to me.

“Um, thanks,” I said, cradling it in my hooves. I had her tune to a specific frequency, then took a breath and keyed up the mic.

“If you can hear this, if you can hear my voice,” I began, “we are survivors. You are not alone. Please break in on this transmission and call in. If you can’t transmit, come to-” I paused, then looked to Jill and went on. “-the Liverpool Road strip mall in Pickering, Ontario. We will wait for you there an hour every day, from eleven-thirty to noon-thirty. We know you have questions. We may not have answers, but we can learn about our situation together. Please… let us know you’re out there.”

As I let go of the mic, Jill waited a few seconds until it was obvious nobody was answering. “Why did you give the address of the mall across the street?” she queried.

“Paranoia, I guess?” I shrugged. “It’s not smart to say ‘hey, we have food and water, it’s right here’. At least that’s what I learned from all the post-apocalypse stories I’ve read. Maybe that’s all horsesh… er… junk. But maybe it’s just good safe thinking.”

Both of us fell silent, waiting again to see if anyone would answer. When the radio remained dormant for another long minute, Jill said, “Maybe this was a bust.”

“Don’t give in just yet,” I said. I fiddled with the controls a little bit. “Let me figure out a way to repeat this … oh, that might work…”

“What might work?”

“Aaah, it’s complicated,” I said dismissively.

“Hey!” I got a swat on the back of my head for that. “Remember I was a lab tech before all this went down. I think I can understand a radio.”

“Ow,” I shot back, rubbing my neck under my mane. “All right then. This radio lets you send out station identification every so often. You can set it to Morse code with your callsign, or you can record a message - what’s meant to be recorded is your callsign and optionally some cheesy welcome greeting or something. But…” I tapped a couple more keys and buttons. “Now our little mayday call is our message, and-” four more taps and then a push of the Enter key “-now it is set to send out that ID every 15 minutes on this channel until we tell it to stop.”

“Not bad,” Jill said, seeming to be impressed. “How far will it reach?”

I sat back on my haunches and sighed. “That’s the sixty-four thousand dollar question. If the antenna works properly, a couple dozen miles. It’s not a professional grade high-gain model, so it’s not going to win any contests. I’d be pleased if it got into the GTA proper and across the lake.”

“Into New York State?” she asked. “Wow.”

“People don’t realize how close we are to the US,” I nodded. “I hear state patrol and other stuff like that all the time.”

“Did we tune it just now?” she asked, pointing to the dial with a hoof. Meaning, do we know if anyone still existed in that part of the US?

“We did,” I nodded grimly. “Well, part of it. We’ll need to get a different radio to try the other part. For now, let’s just let this thing work.”

“Does that mean I can go back to juggling?” she grinned.

“Actually,” I said. “I was wondering if you’d use what your ‘butt picture’ says you’re good at for me for a bit.”

Jill blushed - it was nice to get her on the defensive once in a while. “What do you mean?”

“I think it’s a good idea if we write down what’s been going on. Just in case…” I grimaced, not wanting to think of the idea. “In case we need our story told, of what happened here, and we’re not here to tell it.”

“God, who’s being morbid?” Jill retorted.

“Hear me out. At the very least, keeping track of what’s happened and what we’ve been doing will let us maintain a sense of what day it is, when those finally give up.” I had a hoof pointed at our phones, charging in our common area. “I’d really like to believe that we will eventually find someone else. Keeping notes on our experiences will maybe help them along when we come across them.”

“Okay,” she nodded. “Actually, I’d been thinking of keeping a journal myself, for some of the same reasons you mentioned.”

I nodded back. “Okay then.”

“Well, I’ll get started on that,” Jill said, standing back up and turning away. “I’ll go find paper and a pen in the office supplies area.”

“I’ll be over here,” I said, gesturing to our common area. Partially to keep the radio in earshot and partly to plan the next move I wanted - but was reluctant - to make.

We’d sat there for several more hours, Jill scratching out our story on a ruled notepad with a pen - manipulating it with her magic - and me fiddling with the radio, tuning the secondary receiver up and down (a lot of these radios have two receivers, so you can transmit and receive on one, like we’d set ours up to do, and monitor another frequency).

Finally, after as much messing about idly as I could stand, my mind said I had all the willpower I was going to be able to muster, and I stood up. “I’m going out in the truck,” I announced.

Jill startled, stopping her writing abruptly. “What? Where?”

“Where I should have gone days ago,” I said, feeling the guilt continue to well up in me, as it had been building steadily over the past 48 or so hours. “I owe that much to her.”

Jill figured it out right away; I was going to check on my sister and her kids. “I’ll come with you.”

“You don’t have to,” I said. “It’s not your problem.”

“I wasn’t offering, I was telling.”

I said nothing and just headed for the exit. Behind me, I heard another quartet of hoofsteps on the polished floor, and was grateful, though I couldn’t admit it openly.

The SUV was where I left it. Luckily I hadn’t left the door open, or the battery might have been dead by now. I tried to climb in and wrestle myself into the position required for driving, and after a short struggle, I found myself being nudged gently here and there, giving me a lift up, so to speak.

“Thanks,” I said, as Jill smiled, the glow on her horn fading. She bumped her rump against the door to shut it, then went around the other side and helped herself in and up.

Five minutes later, once we were on the road, Jill broke the silence. “Got any theories on where everypony went?”

“‘Everypony’?” I echoed, raising an eyebrow quizzically.

She shrugged. “You know what I meant. But look at the roads. No cars crashed, no planes down…”

“I had thought about that,” I agreed. “Even at the time of day this seems to have happened, you’d have thought there would be one or two cars to crash into things after their drivers were beamed up to the mothership, or whatever.”

“None of it makes sense,” Jill said, waving her forehooves in front of her. She held out a hoof like she was counting things off on fingers that were no longer there. “Why did it happen, why did some people get taken and not us, why haven’t other ponies contacted us, why are we ponies...”

I chuckled - or was it a giggle now? - and Jill looked over to me. “What’s funny?”

“Oh, not you. I’m with you 100% on every point you made.” I rotated the steering wheel as smoothly as I could, making a turn onto the 407 freeway. “I’m taking the toll road. And I have no intention of paying the bill when it comes.”

“Mmph,” Jill suppressed a giggle. “You rebel.”

“Anyway,” I carried on. “If I let my analytical side out for a bit, the odds are overwhelming that nobody is around to come find us. That’s why nobody has contacted us. There could be nobody in radio range. That’s, let’s be optimistic, a 30 to 50 mile radius at least in which we are the only two people left. I can’t even calculate how many people that means just vanished.” If I wasn’t driving, I’d’ve squeezed my eyes shut and shrunk down in the seat, to try to combat the thoughts this line of talk was forcing into my mind.

“The cars and planes and stuff, I have no idea,” I went on. “To me it’s just another part of the puzzle, along with the other questions you asked like ‘why are we ponies’ or aliens that look like ponies or whatever we are. Like you said, none of it makes sense. But what’s more important right now - what we need to focus on - is keeping ourselves fed, sheltered, and protected, and to maybe beat the odds and find some more survivors.”

Jill agreed with me and eventually moved on to playing with the radio - both the ham rig and the stereo - while we continued to drive. We chatted every now and then about various things, but I think Jill had realized that what lay at the end of our journey was weighing heavily on my mind and decided to avoid taking the conversation down that path any further.

She looked up when I put the shifter into Park, and found us in a gravel driveway, off Highway 48, just past a bridge over a little river. “Is this it?” she asked softly.

I just nodded, looking at the two-story house, all buttoned up like I’d last seen it, the Tuesday before I headed off to the races.

“Want me to go check it out?”

I glanced over at my traveling companion, a look of worry mixed with empathy on her pink muzzle.

“...Would you?” I finally said tinily.

Jill patted my hoof with one of her own. “I’ll be right back,” she said, then let herself out of the truck.

I watched from behind the steering wheel as she slowly walked up the path - or actually, on the grass beside the path - to the front door. It opened with a brief yellow glow, and in she went.

My mind raced with all the possibilities that were already options from what I’d seen from afar. The door was unlocked so she’s probably not there or else she’d have the place secured against survivors and scavengers, or maybe she saw us arrive and let Jill in, but why would she let Jill in she doesn’t even know her, of course she doesn’t know her a pink unicorn just walked in, and used magic to open the door no less, oh please don’t let there be bodies-

I pretty much overloaded at that point, just squeezed my eyes shut and curled in on myself, like I’d threatened to earlier. I said a while back that I’m not religious, but I was willing to pray to whatever deity was listening, even if it was some alien creature that had done all this to us, to have mercy on my family and me, and just either make them safe or ensure they didn’t suffer…

I have no idea how long I sat there curled up in the truck. There was a tap on the driver’s window, to which I nearly jumped out of my new skin. Turning, I saw Jill there, her horn touching the window. She backed up, face expressionless, and let me open the door.

“There’s nothing inside,” she said quietly.

I unbuckled the seat belt and tumbled out of the seat onto the ground - was this going to be my trademark, falling out of the truck every time I use it? - and got back to my hooves with Jill’s help.

We went up the front lawn, and detachedly I understood why she walked on the grass earlier. It was much nicer on my hooves than the pavement or stone floors we’d been trudging around on the past few days constantly.

Through the door I went; the same threshold I’d crossed thousands of times over the past two decades after my sister bought the place and moved across the road from our parents’ home; but this time for the first time as a fuzzy grey mini-pegasus.

Shoes - human shoes - were piled in a jumble by the door, as they always had been. Susan was the single mom of two teenage sons, and they did as teenagers do. The older one, Glenn, was into rugby and football, and signs of his having come from a recent practice or game in the latter were by the door, making my hairs stand on end from the stale sweat smell on the protective gear.

Sean, the younger, was a budding musician, taking after his mother; his trumpet, formerly hers, was in its case beside the couch.

The computer was on, as none of them bothered to ever turn it off when they were done with it. I nudged the mouse and Sue’s lock screen came up, with a picture of the two boys as the background.

Jill followed me around silently, though she’d supposedly already been through the place. I first went upstairs, looking in the boys’ rooms, seeing nothing out of place - and by that I mean they were as messy as they come. Just like any teenage boy’s room. It was impossible to tell if they’d vanished, been turned into ponies and walked away, or something else.

Back downstairs to the kitchen. The fridge was decently stocked, though I recoiled at the packaged meat sitting in there - it was probably past its use-by date, but I couldn’t bring myself to stomach its odor long enough to study it. The milk did seem off, though.

Through the bathroom into Sue’s bedroom. This was the ‘tell’, so to speak.

The bed was unkempt and messy, much like the sleeping bags I’d seen in other campsites at the racetrack. Sue had a fastidious love of keeping things organized. She wouldn’t even get dressed after getting out of bed before she made sure it was made up and ready for the next night’s use.

I noticed something on the bedside table and went over, poking at it. The iPhone came to life, still plugged into its charger.

17:21 06/26 LTE TELUS 100%

08:30 ((Alarm))

Sat, May 23

To-Do Today:

Glenn’s Practice 11:00

Get Sean to mow!

Collect Tom’s paper/mail &

water his plants

slide to acknowledge

I just hung my head and blew air between my teeth, completely speechless, brain totally numb, body soon to follow.

I felt a presence beside me; Jill read the phone display and frowned, then leaned her head against my neck in a comforting gesture.

She guided me back to the truck, and I walked, mainly on autopilot, as far as I can remember. The passenger door opened of its own volition and I was lifted into the seat and buckled in.

“Your place is this one? Across the road? It looks really nice,” I remember hearing, and the truck drove the short distance up the highway to my drive, turning down it and parking under the big tree. The one Sue and I had had a tire swing on in our youth. The one Glenn broke his arm falling out of when he was twelve.

I was helped out of the truck, gently, and led in the front door of my - formerly my parents' - bungalow. Somewhere in my mind I registered that everything was as I left it, with the exception of my newspapers and mail on the dining room table - at least the ones up to the 22nd.

The hall to my bedroom was narrow, not wide enough for two ponies, much less two people, to walk side-by-side in, so Jill nudged me forward, somehow guessing where the master bedroom was, and herding me up onto my bed. My pillows glowed briefly, fluffing themselves up, then set themselves down right where my head ended up after I was guided to a lying position.

“Rest,” came the voice softly.

I obeyed it, closing my eyes.

Cut the Cord

MAY 27

For the first time in several days, I woke without being poked or prodded.

And it hurt far more than the poking or prodding ever did.

Despite my new form, I went through my normal routine, being in my home again. From my bed straight to the bathroom, to tend to my needs. Well, I didn’t try to brush my teeth, but I guess I’ll have to figure that out sometime eventually. Or do I? Horses don’t brush. Right?

Next I went down the hall and peeked in the two guest rooms. Both were empty. So was the bathroom across the hall from them. Continuing past the basement stairs and the back door, opposite one another, I entered the dining room.

On the table, atop the papers and mail that was the last indication of my sister’s existence, was the small bag I’d put in the truck when we left the mall. A couple of bottles of water and some granola bars, plus my phone, which had its cable snaking out of the bag and into a wall socket. I ignored it for a minute, passing through the clearly empty open-plan kitchen beside the dining room, and went into the front room/living room.

Also empty.

Out in the driveway, my little sports car sat where I’d left it the week before, having rented the SUV to camp in at the track.

The SUV was gone.

I didn’t know what to think. Had Jill abandoned me? Was she off on a mission of her own she didn’t bother telling me about?

Had she been abducted?

I shivered as the duality of that last possibility hit me. I’d first been thinking of her being grabbed and hauled away by persons - or ponies - unknown, but the concept that she’d been ‘raptured’ while I was asleep made me want to wet myself in fright. I had no desire to be the only creature left in the world.

If there’s a God, take me, whereever you’ve taken all the rest of them, I begged.

I went back into the dining room and checked the phone - what I obviously should have done in the first place. I know. I’m smart, but I’m not smart.

I had a text message from an unfamiliar number.

I’m going back to the mall for a bit to make our ‘meeting time’ we promised on our radio message. Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be back this afternoon. If you need anything, call or text me. -J.

It was sent at 9:34. The phone, if it was keeping correct time, said it was just after 11 now.

I opened one of the water bottles and slurped it down, wishing I had something - anything - in my pantry. I’d planned it that way; I ran myself out of everything perishable on purpose before I went on vacation, so that nothing would spoil while I was out. I’d planned to do grocery shopping on the Sunday, on the way home from the races.

I couldn’t even make pancakes.

There was a single sleeve of saltine crackers way in the back of the pantry, and half a jar of peanut butter. I had no idea if it would work for my palate, but I tore open the wrapper, scooped them through the spread like it was dip, and choked them down anyway. I didn’t gag or send them back up, so I considered that a small victory.

Over in the corner of the living room by my easy chair, which I had no desire to sit in since it felt weird on my new frame, was a scanner. I couldn’t transmit, but I could at least listen in and see if either Jill found somebody, or somebody found us.

Of course, though, the radio persisted in its stubborn silence.

I turned on my TV, but only the two empty studios we’d seen on the TVs in Wal-Mart were broadcasting, their signals unchanged. I shut it off again and wandered the house.

Smelling the ‘wet dog’ smell I’d recognized the day before, and now having the resources to do something about it (at least, as long as the power kept the water pressure up), I went and had a shower.

Luckily, I had a fairly large walk-in shower, and not a regular old bathtub - I don’t know if I’d’ve been able to stand up in one of those. As it was, I had enough room to move around and do my thing. Washing wings - especially obstinate ones - was a new experience, of course.

I spent a long time in the shower. I’m not sure if tears mixed in with the wastewater pouring off me. I’m not even sure if alien ponies can cry. All I know is I said my goodbyes to Sue and the boys, and my dad on the other side of the country (or, rather, most likely not), while inside that shower stall.

My basement had a sun patio off one end of the house, with a sliding glass door letting people out to soak up the rays. Today it let a pony out instead, and I shivered like a dog to shake off the water, then curled up by the edge to watch the world (not) go by.

What do we do next? I wondered. Is there even a ‘we’ left? I was still not ruling out the possibility that Jill would weigh her options and decide to just move on. I really had no idea who she was except for the past few days we’d spent together. I could have completely the wrong idea about her.

I felt a tinge of guilt even thinking about that, considering how kind she’d been to me - letting me in to her ‘home’, sharing her accumulated scavenged spoils with me, and even accompanying me to see what happened to my family.

I sat there on the deck and sulked for a while, just watching the river across the back yard as it flowed uninterrupted, ignoring the departure of almost every creature that graced its banks.

I blinked and startled awake some time later - my coat was dry, and I had no idea how long I’d been out. Was I sleeping a lot longer than usual? Do alien pegasi need more than 8 hours a day?

The sun was still decently high in the sky, so it wasn’t too late in the afternoon. As I continued to wake, my ears twitched, and I realized what had woken me.

I snapped my head up to focus at the point my ears were telling me to. A deer was standing rock-still on the opposite bank of the river, in the woods, watching me.

I slowly got to my hooves, not taking my eyes off the doe. It held its ground.

Stepping as silently and slowly as I could down the short staircase to the back lawn, I breathed and kept my eyes focused in the same spot, trying not to let my mind think of a cartoon school principal sneaking up on the animal from behind.

I was halfway across the lawn when something occurred to me. “Hello?” I called out softly. “Can you understand me?”

Who were you before this happened?

The figure across the river didn’t respond. Didn’t do anything but stare at me, and flick its white tail once.

... or have you always been a deer, I went on to myself.

I made it to the bank on my side of the river. We were no more than twenty feet away from one another. The deer actually was a few inches taller than me, I realized, mildly miffed at that.

“You got any friends?” I asked, still speaking softly as if raising my voice would make it bolt. “Do you have any idea what happened?” Could you even tell me if you knew?

Suddenly, its head shifted, just as my ears twitched again. It was looking towards the road, and I was hearing something in the direction as well.

I hazarded a glance to the highway and felt my heart skip a beat as I saw a black SUV crossing the bridge northbound and decelerating.

Motion before me made me look back at the deer. Unlike any other deer I’d seen, which would have just turned and sprinted off, this one focused back on me again, took a cautious step back, stamping a hoof in the duff, and then backed away slowly, only turning and running after it was well within the cover of the foliage.

I didn’t spend much time dwelling on the encounter - instead, I turned and galloped across the back yard, up the hill that connected it to the front, and met the SUV just as Jill parked it under the tree, where she’d stopped the night before.

Did she have somebody with her in the passenger seat?

The driver’s door opened with a glow, and she hopped down. “Good to see you’re upOOF!”

I barrelled into her and threw my forelegs around her in a hug. She laughed and put a hoof around my shoulders. “Hi,” she started over.

“Thank you,” I said in a muffled voice directed into her mane. “For yesterday. And everything else.”

“No problem,” she answered, releasing me. She was about to say something else, but a sudden growl put my fur on end.

“Stop! No!” Jill commanded, and I was aware of her ‘passenger’ bounding out over the center console and onto the ground beside her. A black-and-white spotted creature circled around her a couple of times, then set to sniffing me.

A dog?

My thoughts went back to the same kind of thing I’d been thinking about the deer. Was this someone who’d heard our distress call and come running?

“What the-” I stammered.

“Easy,” Jill laughed. “Down, boy. She’s okay.” To me, she added, “He was wandering around near the mall when I got back there. I think maybe he broke out of a firehouse.”

I took another look. Indeed, the canine was a Dalmatian. “Uh..” I understated.

“I’m pretty sure he’s not like us,” she said. “I mean, he wasn’t human before. He seems too dog-like for that to be true. But he’s … how do I put this? … Spooky smart.”

“Dals are smart breeds,” I said, my head on a swivel as I tried to keep him in view, as he continued to sniff me out and went on to the surroundings shortly after. Irritatingly, I noticed my wings were in full freakout mode again, and grit my teeth to will them to close up once more.

“More than that. Like this. C’mere, buddy. Say hello.”

The dog immediately abandoned his pursuit of whatever scent was on the front lawn and hurried over to Jill’s side, pivoting towards me and holding out a paw to shake.

“Could be trained well,” I countered, letting it bump my upraised hoof.

“She’s like me,” Jill directed at the dog. “She’s my friend.”

The dog hunched down on the ground, crawled to me, and turned over to show its belly - a sure sign of submission.

I patronizingly rubbed its underside with a hoof, getting a wag and a … grin? … in response.

“The mall was deserted,” Jill went on. “Both of them. Except for him.”

“Oh,” I said. I didn’t know what else to add.

“Oh! And I thought maybe we’d try something different tonight.” She turned away and opened the back door of the SUV with her magic, using it also to bring out several grocery bags.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“Well, presuming we have a working stove here since we’re at a place where the kitchen appliances aren’t just props, I figured we could do a little better than salad.”

“Oh?” I said, watching as the bags floated past me, following her towards the front door.

“C’mon, buddy,” she said, and the dog leapt to its feet, chasing after her. I decided that ‘buddy’ had the right idea, and fell in line.

Jill was taking things out of the bags in the kitchen when I got inside. “I should have asked first thing,” she said apologetically. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” I said with a long and drawn-out sigh. “I’ve made my peace. Thanks. Again. For everything.”

She shook her head. “Don’t mention it.” After a pause, she added, “Did you have a bath?”

“Shower,” I nodded. “But I used up every drop of shampoo. Sorry.”

“Oh of course,” she shot back playfully. “What am I gonna use?”

“Didn’t you just come from a department store?” I walked closer and inspected what she was unpacking, and blinked. “Spaghetti?”

“You up for that?” she asked. “Crap, I didn’t even think to ask if you liked it or not.”

“No, no, that’s great,” I nodded. “I’m kind of surprised. Everything I’ve put in my face over the past four days has grown out of the ground.”

“I don’t think we’re true herbivores,” Jill shrugged. “Both of us have subsisted off something other than fruits and veggies so far.”

“Yeah,” I said, thinking back to the peanut butter. I surveyed all the ingredients, now that they were out of the plastic bags, and put on a look of dejection.

“What’s wrong?” Jill asked, picking up on my disappointment.

I couldn’t help but pout, ears folded back. “I wish I could have meatballs,” I said, waving a hoof across the pasta and cans of plain tomato sauce, with a handful of small jars of spices.

Jill patted me on the head. “Remember the last time you tried meat, sweetie.”

“Hush,” I frowned good-humoredly. “Anything I can do to help?”

“Point me in the direction of your pots, and get the stove going, two burners please, one high and one low.”

I did as requested, feeling a little better - okay, a lot better - now that I wasn’t the only living thing in earshot again. That thought reminded me of my encounter just before she returned, and I told her excitedly about the deer.

“That’s amazing,” Jill observed. “I’ve seen tame deer all over Calgary and the towns that surround it, back home. Some even eat right out of your hand if you’re patient enough.”

“I’m not sure that this one was just tame,” I said. “I got a really weird vibe from it.”

“Vibes, maaaan?” Jill joked.

“Like him,” I said, gesturing to the Dalmatian, who had just ascended the stairs from the basement after taking his own tour of the house, and apparently deeming it fit for habitation. He glanced up at me, then laid down beside the dining room table.

“I know, I know,” she responded, filling one of the two pots with water. “I don’t know what to think of it, but it’s definitely something we should keep studying. I’ll take some notes after supper - which is what I did last night, by the way. I filled a whole notebook so far and I’m working on the second one.”

“Cool,” I nodded. “You must write fast. What’s his name, by the way?”

“Well, he answers to ‘Buddy’,” smirked my cooking partner.

The dog looked up at us, then put his head back down. I could’ve sworn he either sighed or rolled his eyes.

“Oh, I thought that was just a placeholder,” I said.

“That brings up another point I want to make, but I’ll wait ‘til after supper to make it.”

“Oh?”

“After supper,” Jill nodded, seeming serious all of a sudden.

And so we continued making the meal. I discovered a couple of jugs of milk in the fridge that I’d somehow missed Jill putting away - I must have been distracted with Buddy - and I chugged one all the way down, much to Jill’s amusement.

I commented on how proficient she was getting with her TK magic, and she assured me she was practicing it every chance she got. She told me it was an interesting sensation, like she was just willing things to move around and they simply obeyed her. Then she commented that it wasn’t as easy as she made it sound, and I said I understood, gesturing to my wings. Still, I filed her advice away for the next time I had a chance to try to get my feathered appendages working.

I wonder if after three tries and failures I can turn this body back in under the lemon law, I said, smirking to myself.

We had some late lunch/early supper about half an hour later. Jill, of course, used a fork on her pasta, telekinetically manipulating it to spool spaghetti around the tines.

“Now you’re just rubbing it in,” I jokingly groused as I mashed my face into my plate, eating the ‘pony’ way.

“I could feed you if you want,” she teased.

“No thanks,” I said, leaning away. “Too ‘Lady and the Tramp’ for me.”

“Aww,” Jill giggled, then fell silent as we both took a few more mouthfuls.

“This is good,” I said when I came up for air at one point. “Thanks for thinking of it.”

“I figured you were tired of the salad bar,” she responded. Then, almost out of the blue: “What do you want to do? Go back to the Wal-Mart or stay here in your own bed?”

I stopped eating and lowered my head. “There are too many memories here,” I said, contradicting the earlier assertion that I was ‘over it’. “Plus it doesn’t feel like my own bed any more.”

“Uh-huh,” Jill nodded, then continued eating without another word.

At that moment, a chirp sounded from the radio over in the living room. At first, I thought we were getting our first indication of other life, but then with falling hopes I realized what it was.

“What was that?” Jill asked.

“Power’s gone out,” I said, looking over to the stove and microwave, both with their digital clocks dark. “Scanner switched over to internal batteries.”

“Ohhh,” Jill said with a frown.

I thought the empty world couldn’t have gotten any quieter, but now I heard it without a fridge and freezer running. “That took a lot longer than I thought it would,” I said. “I figured without human intervention it’d all break down way sooner.”

“Does that change anything?” Jill asked, taking up her second-last forkful of spaghetti.

“Probably not,” I shrugged. “I don’t want to stay here, and the work we’ve done already in the mall is better than nothing. Maybe we can find some solar kits and windmills to run the important stuff, like radios and fridges.”

“We’ll need to plant a garden,” she said.

“Yup,” I agreed.

“What’s our goal? Just sit there and survive and hope somepony comes across us?”

I didn’t even react to her unusual terminology this time. “Until we know how wide this reaches, I don’t know what else we can do. Maybe probe out on patrols, see if something else in the GTA survived. The mall is in between the two major highway corridors through this part of the world. It makes sense to stay there and let people come to us, I think.”

Jill set down her fork on an empty plate; I had finished some time before. “You are so messy,” she said, regarding me with a (somehow pitying) smirk.

I couldn’t see my face, but I could imagine it, drenched in tomato sauce. “I couldn’t help it, I had to have my snout in my food all night. Teach me how to magick things up and around.”

“You need one of these, I think,” she smiled, tapping her horn with a hoof. After a moment, she said, “Can I ask you something?”

“You just did,” I joked.

“Ha ha. I mean, can I ask you this. I’m handling this really well as far as I’m concerned. I don’t know why, but I am. I think maybe it has to do with me having my, um, ‘butt picture’, and my magic abilities. I think I’m adapting really well to being a unicorn pony all of a sudden, and maybe it’s because of the magic I seem to have now. But… well, you.”

“But me,” I nodded.

“You, um…”

“I don’t have a ‘butt picture’,” I said, using hooves to make approximations of finger quotes, “I can’t use these wings, and the big ticket item, I’m now batting from the other side of the plate.”

“Er. So to speak.”

“And you’re a little spooked about how I’m not so spooked.”

“When you put it that way,” she shrugged, trailing off.

“What point is there in freaking out about it?” I asked rhetorically. “I changed species. Why’s changing anything else supposed to matter? And more importantly, what can I do about it?”

Jill just blinked.

“I can’t do anything to change it,” I said. “I can only play the hand I was dealt. I learned that a very hard way when I was very young. There’s no point in worrying over what’s happened, because it’s in the past, and it’s already done.” I gestured with a hoof at myself. “This is already over and done with.”

Jill was quiet for a long moment or two. “So… you’re resigned to being like this for good?”

“Can’t do anything about it,” I shook my head. “Or if I can, I haven’t figured it out yet. Have you?”

She shook her head in response. “I get your point. We’re ponies now. Nothing we did caused us - as far as we know - to become like this. So logic dictates that nothing we do is going to change us back.”

“That’s about the size of it.”

“Including you being…”

I sighed and rolled my eyes. “Including me being a girl,” I said. “What, did you want me to blurt it out?”

A faint smile crossed her muzzle briefly.

“So,” she said. “You’re committed to ponydom and don’t want to stay here.”

I nodded.

“Well, I think you should leave Tom here. I know Jill’s staying behind.”

I blinked, even though I understood what she was saying. Sort of. I thought. “She is?”

“I’m sticking with you,” she clarified. “But there’s nopony who knows Jill Dannon, and I sure don’t look like her anymore. And the same can be said for you and Tom Wright.”

I couldn’t deny it, but I couldn’t get a word in edgewise; she was on a roll.

“Henceforth, I shall be known as... “ She paused for dramatic effect. “Swift Quill.”

“‘Swift Quill’?” I echoed, an eyebrow raised.

“I came up with it on the way back from the mall. It just popped into my head and seemed… right. Don’t you think?”

“It’s certainly unique,” I had to agree. “And I guess it fits you. There’s no denying you’re fast, especially with that magic, and what you’re good at - besides the magic - is literally…”

“A quill,” she beamed. “Say it. Say my name.”

I was tempted to blurt out ‘Heisenberg’, but instead, I said, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Swift Quill.”

The new Swift Quill giggled and squirmed on her chair. “That sounds so cool!” she gushed. “That’s me from now on. Now you have to make one up for yourself.”

“Buh,” I stammered. “Hey, this is a big decision. You just sprung it on me two minutes ago. Give me some time.”

“Better figure it out before we find somepony else,” she winked. “It won’t do to tell them you’re ex-Tom and still searching.”

“I’ll come up with something,” I muttered, my ears folding back.

Swift grinned, her eyes brightening. “There’s half of it already. You’re so dark all the time… you are going to be Stormy something.”

I sat up straight, unknowingly flaring my wings out. “What?! Wait a second, I didn’t agree to that!”

“Too late,” she sang. “I hereby dub you Stormy. Just think, if you weren’t so surly half the time, you could have avoided this.”

I frowned. “Are you really serious?”

She smirked again and pointed a hoof at me. “See? Exactly like that!”

I spent the next half-hour gathering up things I wanted to take from the house. This wasn’t going to be my home any more, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t find uses for some things that were here.

“Did she go bananas on me, Buddy?” I asked after spitting out the handle of a backpack full of items onto the living room floor. Jill - I mean, Swift - was using the shower while the water pressure was still good. We’d have to come up with something manual at the store if we wanted to enjoy that human luxury in the new world.

Buddy was lying on the couch, silently watching me cart stuff into the living room from various places throughout the house. Or was he passing judgement on my choices?

I found a spare duffel bag in the front closet and pulled the zipper open, loading some more items into it. In a moment of weakness, I collected all the photos from the walls and side tables in the house and packed them away along with my - Tom’s - wallet.

“Don’t tell her,” I said to Buddy as he looked on. “I just want to … it’s just in case.”

Just in case what? I asked myself. In case you turn back into a human? In case you come across someone you know and have to prove who you are?

I giggled humorlessly at that last bit - “No really, see I have his driver’s license, this proves I’m him” - and this time I’m 99% certain I saw the dog cast a sarcastic look my way.

All in all, I ended up with five bags of stuff. A lot of it was useful things like radios, kitchenware, and tools; some of it was mementos like I mentioned above, and some of it was just stuff I thought might come in handy somehow. I was a scout; being prepared was drilled into me from a young age. And when you needed something, odds are you’d need it again, so make sure you have it.

“Thanks for leaving a couple of towels,” Swift said, coming down the hallway from the bathroom. She had one in her magic grip, rubbing it against her hide to dry it, and one wrapped around her mane.

“That’s a decidedly human trait,” I said, nodding towards her head-towel.

“Says you,” she smirked back. “For all you know all sentient species do this.”

“Whatever,” I said. I turned back to the pile of stuff on the floor. “I could use some help with some of this.”

“Whoa. Traveling light, are we?” she joked.

“Out of everything in this house,” I said, waving a foreleg around, “this is what I consider my worldly possessions worth keeping. Cut me some slack.”

“I know, I’m just teasing. Hold still a second, I want to see if I can do something.”

“What now?” I said, half-fearing what was about to happen. To my relief, it was as mundane as magically lifting two bags and tying their straps together, then hanging them over my back like saddle bags.

“Oh, so I’m a pack mule now?” I retorted.

“It is your stuff,” Swift pointed out.

So, with two backpacks on my back and my ‘secret’ duffel’s handles held between my teeth, I led the three of us out of the bungalow my grandparents had built in 1948 and towards my new life.

Swift opened the tailgate of the truck and let Buddy get in first, then levitated the two bags she was carrying in, followed by aiding me with the three I had. She went around the passenger side of the truck after helping me up into the driver’s seat.

“Ready?” she asked me.

I stared at the dark and empty house.

“No,” I murmured. “But it’s time.”

Starting the engine, I backed the SUV out from under the tree and drove up the driveway.

MAY 28

I decided to get an early start on the day, since it - and the days to follow - was going to be filled with back-breaking work to get some power back to our new home.

The first and easiest thing to do, while we sourced more renewable projects, was to use the gas and diesel generators that were on sale in the various places all around us. Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Lowe’s, and Canadian Tire would have made a killing off me, if only there was still a concept of money. Especially since I ‘acquired’ a little flatbed trailer for behind the SUV to haul my, well, haul back to the homestead.

Another fire inspector’s nightmare of extension cables ensured the noise - and worse yet, exhaust fumes - were far enough away from us to be able to be ignored. I dragged the final cable up to the electronics section between my teeth, and let it fall to the ground. I had a specific thing I wanted to test out our power on, because it’s something I’d been craving ever since the Internet packed it in (and I hadn’t realized how much I missed it until I was cleaning out my house).

Over to my supplies I went and extracted an oversized green padded binder. Taking it back to the electronics section, I unzipped it, flipped through the pages with a hoof, and then very gingerly, with my nose, coerced an item out of a sleeve, praying to avoid causing any more scratches than the ages-old item already had on it.

While balancing the item on my nose, because I’d forgotten to plug in the power beforehand and I didn’t want to set it down while I did so, I forced the connectors together with my forehooves, lighting up a display and then lighting up my face with a grin.

Very carefully I set the CD down in a tray and let it be drawn into the disc player. When the disc was recognized by the player, I tapped the track seek button until the one I wanted was cued up, and then hit play.

A couple of drum beats later, electric guitar began blasting through the electronics section of Casa Wal-Mart. At 6:36 AM.

Ahhh, I sighed to myself, sitting down before the speakers, shutting my eyes, and smiling. I wish I’d thought of this sooner. Then again, ‘the cloud’ has evaporated, and all my music is gone.

Listening to the piece carry on, my thoughts drifted. Did you turn into a pony, Eddie? If you did, I bet you couldn’t do this any more. That’d be a true crime against humanity. Or pony-ity. Ponydom? Ponyness?

“What are you doing??” Swift half-groaned-half-mumbled as she staggered sleepily over towards the electronics section.

“Oh. Shit! Sorry!” I squeaked, and turned the volume knob down. “I forgot it was so early. I just wanted to make sure my power solution was- ...Wait.”

I stared at her as she stared back at me with low-lidded eyes, a nonplussed expression on her face. Buddy wandered over to see what the fuss was about as well.

“I woke you up?” I asked her.

“No, I was mini-golfing,” she snarked back at me.

I grinned. “I woke you up.” I jumped at her and pointed with my hoof, first at myself, then at her. “I woke you up! Hah! So there, sorceress!”

She rolled her eyes and turned around to walk away, muttering something about tying me to the rafters later.

“I woke you u-up,” I said in a quiet little singsong voice, hopping from pair of hooves to other pair of hooves, dancing around in a circle. “I woke you u-up, for a change it wasn’t me-e, getting roused from slee-eep, I woke you u-up!”

“Laugh it up, featherbrain,” came a fading voice from towards the kitchen area.

I giggled and turned around to get back to work on the power problem. Buddy had become disinterested in our little fracas and went over to inspect the ham radio on its cart.

“Oh crap! I probably should have plugged that in first, shouldn’t I’ve?” I said to him. He just looked at me and then went to follow the antenna cable, probably out of curiosity than anything else (far as I know, he hadn’t really explored the place yet).

I pulled the plug on the music and dragged the cord over to the ham radio stack. Unplugging it from the dead wall socket, I plugged it into the generator’s cord, and heard the radio across the aisle chirp as it powered up.

As I trotted back towards it, hoping I wouldn’t find a surprise retaliatory twig or rock in whatever Swift was preparing for breakfast, I heard sounds coming from the radio and quirked an eyebrow. Odd. I would have figured I’d have had to re-do the distress call after power was interrupted.

Then I realized they weren’t sounds that either Swift or I could make. Not at this point.

I galloped to the radio and cranked the volume, holding onto it from both sides afterward as if it was a balloon that’d float off if I let it go.

“-pect to be at your point in another 24 to 36 hours. I’m on ...foot, so it’s slow going. I hope your silence is just that the power gave out and that you haven’t left. ...Or worse. If you get this, please answer back. I heard your call, and I’m the only ...person I’ve seen for days.” The voice cracked. “Please give me a sign that you’re out there. ...All right then, I’m shutting down to save battery. I’ll turn on again at quarter-to again. I hope you hear me then.”

Author's Notes:

If'n you need hints to the references in this chapter:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7Et0a8fnuw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sI7XiJgt0vY

All Hooves On Deck

MAY 28 2:15PM

“Swift!” I called out.

“Yes, Stormy?”

I hmph’ed but refrained from arguing the point again. (I’d asked her to not call me that, and she responded by telling me to come up with something better.)

“Come and give me some help with this. Please?”

I could hear her trotting over on the cement floor. I was near the front of the store, at the doors that led outside. I was exhausted and my jaw hurt from what I’d been doing.

We’d picked up the radio transmission again at 7:45, as the caller promised, but it was too staticky to hear anything meaningful. I figure either the caller was in a valley or there was a ridge between us.

8:45 came around and we finally made contact. ‘Jeff’ was the name he used. He’d picked up our signal on the day before, just before the power went out. He’d been trying hourly since then.

We kept it short to save his battery in case of emergency. He didn’t know precisely where he was, which was why we didn’t go out to get him in the SUV. He knew enough to keep walking south toward the lake, and then follow signs to get to Pickering.

The only other thing we talked about was that he too was changed; he didn’t elaborate, and we just confirmed we were too. He hadn’t seen another soul, except for random animal encounters like we had experienced.

So, near the stroke of 9, we set down the radio mic and sat back on our haunches to contemplate the enormity of the news.

Since then, Swift had been “cleaning up the place” - making our living space look presentable, i.e. not having our bedding, random books and magazines, drink glasses, etc. thrown all about.

I’d been busying myself with other things, and as Swift came to find me, she blinked and stared at my handiwork (or rather hoofwork, I suppose). “What. Are you doing??”

“I need your help please, to get this-” I gestured with my chin at the sheet of bite-marked plywood I’d pulled all the way from the far side of the store “-up there.” I nodded at two A-frame ladders, sideways against the front windows of the store.

“What for??”

“It’s a spotting stand,” I said. “It-”

“I know what a spotting stand is, my uncle was a deer hunter,” she shot back. “You are not going to aim a gun at him!”

“Of course not!” I retorted. “See? Binoculars.” I pointed at the largest, best pair I could find, which I’d set on a cash register counter nearby.

“Why are you being so suspicious of Jeff?”

“Because we have no idea what he’s like,” I countered. “He could sound just fine but be a complete psycho-”

“Storm!”

“Look,” I said, ignoring the stupid name again, “do you disagree that it’s wise to be wary?”

“I...” she began, then the wind came out of her sails. “No… I guess not.”

“That’s all I’m doing, Swift. I just want to see him coming.”

She thought about it for a minute. “I guess you’re right,” she sighed. “I just had this image of you looking at him through a scope, trying to figure out how to work a trigger with your hooves.”

“Please. Trust me, you know me better than that, right?”

“Of course,” she finally smiled. “After all, you’re my oldest friend in the world.”

I giggled, and stepped back from the wood as it slowly lifted off the ground to be placed atop the ladders. “Thanks,” I said. “By the way, just out of curiosity… do you have, like, a limit you can move with that skill? I mean, does that-” gesturing to the wood “-feel heavy?”

“I can sense weight,” she nodded. “But it’s not a burden. I don’t imagine I could move, say, a semi. But a hunk of wood? Or a fridge? Or… a pony?”

“Yipe!” I squeaked as I rose into the air. I was deposited on the ad-hoc platform just as my spotting glasses were brought to me. “Uh… thanks.”

“Good hunting,” Swift smirked, turning to go back to her chores.

I looked around for a second, then realized something. “Um…” I looked down to the hard floor twelve feet below - nearly four times my height. “Swift? He doesn’t show up ‘til tomorrow. I don’t need to be up here right now…?”

8:40 PM

“Given any more thought to a name yet?”

“No,” I said. We were sitting down to a late dinner after having moved around stuff inside the store all day, making it more our home and less a Wal-Mart we were sheltering in. I’d set up three more generators (after climbing down from my perch, helped down from halfway by a pitying unicorn), and sourced a bunch of windmills and solar equipment which I’d yet to figure out how to put together. They were going to be less plug-and-play than a couple of diesel generators, I figured, so I’d set their setup aside until after ‘Jeff’ was dealt with.

“If you don’t, I’ll pick the rest for you eventually,” Swift said with a smile.

“You will do nothing of the sort,” I said. “I will figure it out on my own in good time. And I’m not accepting ‘Stormy’ for certain just yet.”

Swift continued to smile at me as she munched on dinner. “And how will you introduce yourself to Jeff tomorrow?”

“...I don’t know,” I frowned.

“You’re Stormy. That’s all there is to it.”

I had a sense of deja vu from that last statement, and it was clear from her grin that Swift did as well. I just shook my head and sighed.

“You gotta come up with something,” she prodded.

“I know! I know, I just need some time. Some of us didn’t get a silver spoon when we were ponified, with magic and butt pictures and names coming to us out of the blue and all.”

Swift laughed. “Well, if you need any help, I’m here, you know.”

“I know,” I nodded. I wasn’t really mad, I just didn’t want to be rushed into such an important decision.

Once supper was done, I rose to my hooves. “I’ll be up top for a while.”

“Up top?...”

“On the roof,” I clarified. “I wanna scout out locations for solar and wind installations.”

I suppose it would have been a less transparent fib if I’d actually took some solar or wind gear, or even some paper to take notes with, up there.

Instead, I stood on the edge of the roof, in the early evening overcast, trying to clear my thoughts and get ready for our meeting tomorrow with who would become either our first guest or our third team member (not counting Buddy, and the jury’s still out on him, to be honest - there’s something strange about him still).

I wasn’t thinking about my brush with disaster a few days back; surprisingly, that was far from my mind, despite all the revelations it’d brought. To imagine that a near-death experience would be low on the list of notable goings-on was incredible.

A breeze was coming off the lake, and I turned into it, letting it blow back my mane and tail and ripple through my coat. It felt oddly soothing. Shutting my eyes, I could almost imagine that I could picture the wind currents and their specific little eddies and vortices, like if it was a river and every little swirl against the rocks was visible.

After several minutes - maybe even half an hour - of standing there and relaxing in the calmness, the weird dream I had the other day came back to me. I opened my eyes to see that fog was coming in, and fairly swiftly, from the lakeshore. It would bank down to at least the roof of the building if not lower.

You’re insane, the rational part of my mind hollered at me. But the part that was controlling my limbs wasn’t listening.

As the fog bank arrived, I reached out and pawed at it with a hoof. It was bizarrely tangible, like I was pushing at something slightly less dense than cotton candy. It still parted around me while I stood on the roof, but I could make ‘dents’ and creases in the vapor at will.

I carved out a ledge in the fog and put my forehooves out, expecting to fall through it and land on the roof again. Instead, I found myself pushing against what felt like an ultra-soft bed.

Hesitatingly, I brought my hind legs up onto the ledge, and there I was, standing on water vapor, three feet above the roof of the building.

This is crazy.

With my mass on it (and I’m completely guessing, here - you have as much knowledge about this situation as I do - and probably more, considering you’re reading this after the fact), the little section of fog I’d carved out drifted slower than the rest of it. I slowly passed over the roof of the building, watching it go by as I stood there defying everything about physics that I knew.

Before I was carried over the edge of the roof and got too high off the ground for comfort, I hopped down to the safety of the tar and gravel, and turned back to watch the little shelf of cloud spring back up and merge back into the main… what do you call a big hunk of fog, other than a big hunk of fog, or a cloud?

For a few minutes I wondered what had been in supper that was causing me to trip out so badly. Shaking my head, I went back downstairs.

“Fog rolled in pretty good,” Swift said, peering out the doors beneath my spotter stand. “Didja see?”

“Uh, yeah,” I said, deciding to keep quiet until I knew more about what happened.

“Did you get your head cleared?”

“Huh?”

Swift came up and smiled at me. “You didn’t take any equipment up with you. So did you sort out what you needed to sort out?”

“Oh, um, yeah, pretty much,” I said. I added, “I guess I’m ready for whatever Jeff brings us.”

“What do you think he’ll turn out to be?” Swift asked as we headed towards the bedrooms.

“What do you mean?”

“Pegasus, unicorn…?”

“Oh. I have no idea. He didn’t say.” I cracked a smirk. “He didn’t sound smug, so we might be able to rule out unicorn.”

I got a playful hoof to the back of the head for that. “Hush, you.”

“Ow. Here’s a thought, though. What if he has neither? Or what if he’s not a pony at all?”

“What makes you think he might not be a pony?”

“These other animals we’ve seen that show signs of intellect. Maybe Buddy used to be someone too.”

Swift psh’ed in a dismissive tone. “I already told you I think Buddy’s always been a dog. But you might be right, maybe there are elephants and tigers and gators-”

“I think that’s lions and tigers and bears,” I cut in.

“Ha ha. But who knows… with the incredibly small number of us survivors, maybe it’s just a big coincidence that two ponies happened across one another.”

“I guess we’ll see in the morning. Speaking of which, do we have a plan of action? Or are we just going to both of us stand out in the open and trust he isn’t going to do something bad?”

Swift rolled her eyes. “You are such a worrywart. Maybe that’s your second name. Stormy Worrywart. Or three names. Stormy Worry W-”

“Don’t get started on that, I don’t want to go to bed angry.”

“Fine, fine. You asked my opinion, here it is. Let’s greet him with open hooves. I’d rather think that he’s a pony needing a friend than a pony looking to harm the only two other ponies he’s made contact with in a week.”

“Okay, but at the first sign of hostility, I want you to run.”

Swift smiled as we stopped in between our two ‘bedrooms’. “Are you worried for my safety?”

I blushed and looked away. “For both our safety,” I hurried to say. “Look, I’ll be over the moon too if he turns out to be an ally. But there’s no harm in being cautious.”

“Well, you feel free to be cautious, but don’t be hostile.” Each word from ‘don’t’ on was punctuated by a hoof jabbed into my chest.

“Deal,” I agreed, holding up a hoof in concession.

“Good night… Stormy.”

“Gah!” I winced, and Swift’s giggle followed her to her side of the bedrooms.

MAY 29 11:21AM

“We need a copy of the Theme from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly to play.”

“Hush.”

“I mean it,” I said. “He’s gonna be here right about high noon, even.”

“If it’ll shut you up, I can go find you a poncho and a cowpony hat.”

“Cowpony hat.”

“Yes. Cowpony hat,” Swift said pointedly, as we still both stared in the direction we expected him to approach from.

I sighed. “Fine.”

“Fine, you want me to get it, or…”

“Fine, you win, your little wordplay isn’t going to faze me any more.”

“It makes sense!”

“Whatever.”

Buddy circled us a few times, and I pulled a water bottle from my impromptu saddlebag, first taking a pull for myself, then offering it to him, as he guzzled the remainder.

“At least the fog burned off,” Swift observed. “Nice and clear to see anypony coming from a long ways out.”

I smiled, opting to not tease her about seeming to be wary about the meet all of a sudden.

Buddy finished draining the water bottle and deposited it back in my open saddlebag, then looked between the nearby mall - the one we weren’t occupying - and the two of us.

“I think somebody wants to explore,” I pointed out.

Swift looked at Buddy, then the mall, then nodded. “Go on, but don’t stray too far. If you find something useful, let us know.”

“And if you hear us calling for you, come a-runnin’,” I added.

He barked once and took off for the building.

“See this?” I said, turning to show her the empty bottle in my bag. “Brings back his empties.”

“Just wait ‘til he develops language skills,” Swift grinned.

“Now that will be something to hear.”

For another few minutes we were silent, and then the handheld (...what do you want me to call it? Okay fine. Hoofheld) ham radio in my other saddlebag crackled.

“Hello? Are you there? This is Jeff. I think I see you.”

I sat down so I could use my binoculars, which were hung on the strap around my neck. I lifted them up, and held them to my eyes. The radio levitated itself out of my bag. “Hold on,” Swift said into it.

I peered through the glasses and finally saw what looked like a white T-shirt waving back and forth on the end of a long pole. “Got him,” I nodded.

“Okay. That’s you by the Greek restaurant with the blue sign? On your right.”

“Y-yeah,” he said.

“Come on up,” Swift responded. “Be aware we have a dog that’s roaming around in one of the nearby malls. He’s friendly, but if he confronts you, just stop moving and let us know.”

“You got it,” he responded, and the radio fell silent again.

I watched the pole and flag start moving side to side, not as if it was being waved, but like it was tucked into a pack and the pack carrier was underway once more.

“How old do you think he sounds?”

“I dunno?” I shrugged. “Same as us? Maybe all of us who ‘survived’ and got transformed ended up the same ‘age’.”

“Hmm,” Swift said noncommittally.

I continued to watch in the glasses, and soon, my eyebrows surely rose up above the eyepieces. “Huh.”

“Huh what?”

“Looks like ponies are three for three so far.”

“Really? Let me see.”

Like a slapstick routine, I found my neck being jerked to the side as the glasses were telekinetically wrenched from in front of my face.

“Ow! Let me-” I half-choked out.

I became disentangled and rubbed my neck where the strap had dug in, while Swift took in the sight I’d seen in the binoculars. Coming at us was a male pony - a stallion, I guess? - with a light reddish-tan coat and blond mane and tail. The pole and its makeshift flag were indeed tucked into a saddlebag of some kind, stuffed to the gills with supplies. Behind him he towed one of those balloon-tired gardening wagons piled high with belongings.

Speaking of tired, or at least one of its homonyms, he indeed looked like he was spent.

“You got any more water?” Swift asked with mild urgency.

“Of course,” I told her. “Saved some for this reason.”

“Let’s go.”

Now that I’d seen Jeff and his situation, I had to agree - the poor guy needed our help. We broke into a gallop and met him near the disused intersection on the road.

“Sit down,” Swift said, magically rooting around in my bag for the extra water, and offering it to our newcomer. “Drink this.”

“Th-aank…” he began, but trailed off, not so much out of dehydration or ailment, but reacting to Swift’s telekinesis as she unscrewed the bottle cap and pushed the bottle towards his hooves. His green eyes focused on the plastic bottle hovering in front of his face.

“Drink,” I urged him. Like I said, he wasn’t too bad off, but he needed hydration, and he wasn’t getting any by staring at Swift’s magic.

He reached out and squeezed the bottle gingerly between his forehooves, blinking a couple of times as the magic faded. He started chugging the water before either of us could urge him to take it slow, and we just stood in silence watching him drink.

I took the moment to take a closer look at him. He had no horn, explaining why he was so surprised by Swift’s ability. He also had no wings - functional or otherwise - on his sides. So that meant, I guess, he was just a regular pony.

Well, a regular, sentient, talking pony currently taking down a one-and-a-quarter-liter bottle of water.

“Thanks,” he gasped, lowering the empty bottle. He looked at Swift. “How did you?”

“I’m a unicorn,” she smiled, taking the bottle from his grasp and recapping it, then tucking it back in my saddlebag. “I can do magic.”

“Wow,” he responded, duly impressed. “I’m not… well, I’m, I guess, just normal? If you can call this normal.”

Swift giggled, and I smiled and nodded knowingly. “We get what you mean,” she said to him. “By the way, I presume you’re Jeff. I’m Swift Quill, and this is Stormy.”

I winced.

“Swift Quill?” he echoed. “Were you a Native before this happened?”

She laughed politely. “No, I had a human name, but I think this fits me better.” She turned her side to him to show off her butt picture. “It kind of fits, when you look at it all.”

“Oh,” he said, eyes widening as he stood. “I was thinking I was the only one who got that weirdness.” He shrugged off the rope he was using as a harness for the wagon, and turned his rump to show us his own butt picture: a hammer, with three bricks surrounding it.

“Wow,” Swift said, while I silently fumed. Was I going to be the only one without my own rump icon? “Congratulations! Do you know what it means?”

“I’m - I guess I was - a third-year in building engineering at Carleton,” he explained. “I-”

“Holy shit!” interrupted Swift. Was that the first time she’d cursed in my presence? “You walked here from Ottawa?”

“Around abouts, yeah,” he shrugged. “Wasn’t too bad. I figured it was wise to head toward the biggest population center, once I found Ottawa was empty.”

“Wasn’t too bad?” Swift echoed. She turned to me. “I’ve found I have some increased stamina, but nothing like that, to walk, what, 350 kilometers? How about you, Stormy?”

I tried not to grimace at the accursed name again. “I can last longer than I could as a human, but I doubt I could make that kind of trip that fast.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” he said. “I don’t tire easily in this form.” He stood up. “Speaking of which, I’m good enough to move on to wherever we’re ending up. Thanks.”

We parted and let him fall in between us, as we headed back towards home. He noticed my wings and said, “Wow. A pegasus? How high can you fly?”

I scrunched up my face in a frown as I heard a snigger from the other side of Jeff. “I can’t, yet,” I said. “I’m still trying to figure out how to use them.”

“Oh,” he said, blushing a little. “Sorry.”

“She’ll figure it out eventually,” Swift said. “It took me a long time to learn magic.”

“Two days,” I scoffed.

“Well, you have to admit I was motivated,” she countered. “I could have just let you fall.”

“Fall??” Jeff said with alarm.

“I almost fell off the roof of our place putting up an antenna,” I mumbled.

“In a lightning storm!” Swift added happily.

“What?!” Jeff blurted out. “Don’t you know how dangerous that is?”

“Got an inkling of it, yeah,” I responded.

“You should really have had some fall protection.”

“My ladder belt doesn’t fit any more,” I quipped.

“I’m sorry,” he said after a moment, blushing again. “I shouldn’t be criticizing you. I’m sure you were doing what you could with what you had.”

“Exactly,” I said, brightening a little.

“So anyway,” Swift said, changing the subject, “you said you were in engineering school?”

“Yeah,” Jeff nodded. “I’m from Moncton, but I’ve been taking building engineering for a couple of years in Ottawa. That’s infrastructure and systems design, pretty much.”

“That’s actually pretty handy,” Swift said, and I agreed. “That’d help us immensely.”

“Happy to throw in, however I can,” he nodded. “I presume you’re on alternative power now?”

“Sort of,” I contributed. “I put together a few generators, but haven’t had time to work out solar or wind - though I did collect as many kits from the hardware stores as I could find.”

“Child’s play,” he said, waving a hoof before us as we walked along. “We’ll be up and running in no t-”

“What is that?” Swift demanded, magically seizing the poor guy’s hoof and drawing it towards her.

“Yipe! That’s attached, you know,” he protested, hopping to keep up with his limb’s arrested direction of travel. “Oh, you mean my boot?”

Enclosing Jeff’s hoof, and the other three now that I bothered to notice, was a leather-and-fabric bootie of some kind. It was far from a professionally sewn item, but it evidently did the trick, and was held on by extra-long hiking boot laces wrapped a couple of times around his foreleg, above the fetlock. (See, I can learn!)

“Haven’t you ladies noticed your hooves wearing down from the hard surfaces? Tch. I guess I know what I’m fabbing up first,” he smiled.

I shook my head. How could we have missed such an obvious solution? Then again, we were busy learning magic, and getting radios to work, and finding dogs…

“Oh, should I call Buddy back?” I asked Swift as we continued on.

“Nah, let him explore,” she said. “Maybe we’ll luck out and he’ll find something.”

“Buddy? Oh, the dog?” Jeff asked, and I nodded.

“Hey, have you encountered any animals on your travels?” Swift asked.

“Have I!” Jeff responded. “One night I spent in a tree because a pack of wolves were on the prowl.”

“Wolves,” I shivered. I carried on what Swift was surely going to ask. “Did they seem unusually smart to you?”

“Definitely,” Jeff nodded. “They seemed to be openly communicating, though they weren’t talking. Because, you know, that’s reserved for us pony folk.” The last bit was of course sarcasm.

“Of course,” Swift said, beating me to the line.

“And not just them. I was followed by a herd of cows for a bit of time.”

“Followed?”

“Indeed. As if they figured I must know where to go for sustenance. I.... Well, I’m not very proud about this, but I gave them the slip by ducking through some concrete culverts. Because I didn’t want to be responsible for them… I mean, until I heard your message, I didn’t know if there was a chance for survival, so I didn’t want to give them any false hope…”

“We get you,” I said. We were at the mall, at the door I’d kicked in an eternity ago. Or was that just last Sunday? “Here we go.”

“A shopping mall, that’s a good idea. Lots of, shall we say, raw material.”

“Exactly,” Swift said, telekinetically holding the fold of broken laminated glass open so Jeff could duck through. I followed him, and then Swift brought up the rear, after closing up the hole again.

“What’ve you been surviving on?” I asked, partly out of curiosity and partly to fill the time it’d take to walk to the Wal-Mart.

“Berries, fruits on and off the vine so to speak, and the occasional garden raid,” he answered. “I found out early on that red meat is off the menu for the foreseeable future. I tell you, that was almost the last straw, knowing I’ve had my last strip of bacon ever.”

“Buh,” I said, coming to the stunning realization at the same time. “Now I’m sad.”

“Oh my god,” Swift said, “What I wouldn’t give for a Baconator, if I wouldn’t bring it right back up again.”

“A girl after my own heart,” Jeff smiled.

“You’re both making me drool,” I complained.

“Relax, Stormy, we have plenty of celery and carrots yet,” Swift quipped.

“‘Stormy’,” Jeff said, as we rounded the corner to the Wal-Mart entrance. “How’d you come across that moniker?”

“It’s a placeholder,” I mumbled.

“She’s in denial,” Swift said brightly. “She gave up her human name too, but refuses to come up with a pony name. So I gave her one to match her disposition.”

“Aw, that’s not fair,” Jeff said sympathetically. “She doesn’t seem that surly to me.”

“Thank you!” I exclaimed.

“Stay with us a couple days,” Swift said, cracking a grin.

We gave Jeff the nickel tour of our home base. I don’t know if we could even call it a nickel tour any more, because, of course, money was just an obsolete word now.

“And these are our useless TVs,” I said as we walked through Electronics. “Had them going while the power was on, but nobody was broadcasting anything meaningful.”

“Too bad,” he nodded as we walked on. “You’d think getting to a satellite-equipped TV station would have been the ideal way to find survivors.”

“I know,” I nodded. “We didn’t get to a TV station, but we did get this.” I stopped at the ham radio cart, resting a hoof on it.

“Jerry-rigged pretty well,” he said, assessing the cart and its contents, and the cable snaking off towards the ceiling. “I’m very thankful for it.”

“You a ham?” I asked.

He shook his head. “No, but my roommate at the university had a couple of radios. So since he, erm, vanished, along with everyone else, I figured it would do me better in my pack than sitting on his desk.”

“I think that’s fair,” I agreed.

“Do you know what happened?” he finally asked.

“No,” I admitted. I gestured to Swift, who was shifting items around in her magic field to make a third ‘bedroom’. “Neither of us do. We both woke up to find we were alone and… ‘ponified’.”

“Ponified,” he chuckled. “I was up late working on a paper, when suddenly my touch-typing skills got… much less accurate.” He held up his forehooves. “I fell out of my chair and can only assume that I passed out from the shock. When I awoke, it was early morning, and campus was deserted. I tell you, that was frightening, but the scary part was hearing the carillon on the Peace Tower at Parliament Hill slowly fall out of sync and stop playing the hourly chime on time. Or, eventually, at all.”

“Wow,” I responded, nodding. “Yeah, that would be kinda creepy.”

“So, may I ask what you did? Before?”

“Oh, I was a computer g… uru,” I said, almost tripping myself up. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Swift pop up from behind a divider she was moving, smirk, and tuck back out of sight.

“Oh?”

“I programmed databases,” I said. “Near as I can figure, that’s why I don’t have an assigram like you two do. I don’t have any useful skill in the new world.”

“Nonsense,” he scoffed. “You rescued me. I’d say that was a pretty important skill.”

“Well, it didn’t give me an icon,” I groused. “You know what? I don’t even know why it bothers me that much. It’s not like I’m jealous or anything. I could get along just fine having a plain, unadorned butt.”

“Who can tell what the reason behind all this is,” Jeff shrugged. “Maybe we’re all in some omnipotent alien’s science fair project.”

“Well, we’d better get an ‘A’,” I quipped. “For all the effort we’ve put into things.”

We’d continued walking around and were at the front of the store now. “What’s this? A blind?” Jeff asked, sizing up the ladders and plywood.

“Of sorts,” I said. “Just to make sure we can see who’s coming.”

He nodded. “Good sound defensive tactic,” he said, then turned to carry on.

I instead turned toward the middle of the store. “HAH! Ya hear that?!”

“Stormy Stormy Stormy Stormy Stormy!” came the response.

Jeff didn’t know what to think. After a moment, he gestured at me with a hoof. “Do you know you’re doing that?” he asked.

I looked at what he was indicating and found my wings poofed out again. “Dangit,” I cursed, “that’s all they ever do.” I grunted and forced them back in.

“It almost seems like an instinctive response,” Jeff observed. “You’re trying to make yourself look bigger against a predator or foe.”

“I… wha?” I said, never having thought of it that way. “...You know, that almost makes half-assed sense.”

“I know it’s an odd combination, but I was minoring in veterinary biology,” he said, adding sheepishly, “Just so I’d have some transferable skills to help my sister tend her horses back home. Ironic, huh?”

“Uh, yeah,” I said. Wanting to get off the subject, I led him towards the automotive bays. “Here’s where I’m keeping the gennies…”

We surveyed my haphazard attempt at keeping us powered. The three or four machines I’d gotten to run were chugging away, less one that had apparently run out of fuel while we were out. Jeff and I together managed to refuel them from jerry cans relatively safely, without smelling too much like we’d bathed in a refinery, and got them all running again.

Then I showed him the stash of renewable resource parts I’d, ehem, ‘acquired’.

“Yes, indeed,” he said, stroking his chin with a hoof. “We can make this work. Tomorrow is going to be a good day, I think.”

We all had supper not much later, and continued to catch each other up during and after the meal, each learning what the other(s) had encountered. What Jeff had seen and experienced on his way to us would fill several journals alone, I’m sure, and we certainly had a lot to add to our own story’s pages once Swift found some time to get down to her so-called prophetic task.

Buddy finally returned from the other mall with a canvas shopping bag containing three Coke bottles, two tins of wet dog food, a can opener, and the labels off a couple other cans. See, scary smart. I think the extra labels were to hint that there was more where this came from.

As I gulped down the beautiful yet warm carbonated beverage, Swift showed Jeff to his new quarters. I set aside the empty bottle, failed at concealing a burp, and stomped around in my bedding a few times, turning around until I found a comfortable spot to hunker down in.

Yes, today had been a pretty good day. And tomorrow seemed like it’d be decent as well.

The New Normal

JUNE 13

Life in our little corner of the world got pretty decent, all things considered, once Jeff got to work. His skillset was quite useful around the place - between establishing our power sources (with which I helped), fortifying our outer walls, and making a proper entry and exit instead of the busted-out door I'd created, things changed a lot in the first couple of weeks he was there.

Saturday marked the third week since what 'we' were calling P-Day - Ponification Day. Naturally that name was Swift's idea. Besides what was mentioned above, a lot had gone into improving our home. The sidewalk that surrounded the mall had trees embedded in the sidewalks, in dirt covered with iron grates so people couldn't spread it around. We - okay, Jeff, who must be the Clydesdale of ponies for how strong he seems to be - pulled those grates up and the trees out, stirred up the ground (do you know how hard it is to operate a roto-tiller with hooves?), mixed in some soil from the garden center, and started 39 little gardens around the perimeter of the mall.

In case those didn't pan out, we also tried some hydroponic gardens inside the garden center. That took some of our power to run the lights and such, but we figured it'd be worth it.

Jeff was an interesting fellow. He was obviously still using his human name - which was Jeffrey Peter Reynolds, for what it's worth - but showed some (marginal, limited) interest in coming up with a 'pony name'. I think it was more to play along than anything else. Strangely enough, he wasn't getting needled about it daily like I was. I eventually did acquiesce to using Stormy, but only because 'hey you' would have been even more annoying. I didn't intend to put up with it forever, but I needed to come up with something that fit. Like Swift's name. That fit her to a T. Why couldn't I have that kind of luck?

For that matter, why couldn't I get my stupid wings to work? After three weeks of trying, I finally could get them to close on command, and could open them stutteringly at will, and seemingly instantly when I didn't want or expect them to - the 'poofing' that seemed to happen when I was surprised or angry. Made me feel like one of those dinosaurs in Jurassic Park that had webbing that spread wide around their head to intimidate prey.

Sadly, I was no predator and thus had no prey. Unless you counted bananas (which are stupidly hard to peel with hooves, might I add).

The ham radio was one of the lucky items to get permanent power once our solar and wind farm was in operation. Jeff helped me run the cable to (and from) a better location, and we found a real desk mic we wired in so we could just step on its push-to-talk key in order to transmit - that made it a lot easier to use the thing.

It was put close to the windows of the store, on a platform we built in the corner, kind of a second story or mezzanine. It was the more professional version of my ladder-and-plywood spotter's stand, with a carpeted floor, a mini-fridge, and a couple of blankets to cover up with. And a staircase! No more clambering up a ladder I couldn't grip.

Our bedrooms were no longer ad-hoc tents either; instead we'd made oversized cubicles of sorts. It would have looked right at home in an Ikea store, to tell you the truth. Three walls and no ceiling - our bedding and personal effects piled in each little cubby.

There were still only the four of us (Buddy got his own room, of course), but we made four more rooms over and above that, optimistically. We didn't pick up any other signals of note, though, at least nothing we could make out. Every now and then, atmospheric conditions or strange bounces would give us snippets of conversation - in the old world, this wasn't uncommon, even across the entire continent. I just wished we could answer them back and tell them they were heard, and weren't alone. I know I'd wanted to hear that reply from somebody - anybody - when we first started broadcasting.

We never heard any signals from towards Moncton, New Brunswick. The cellular networks were long since memories, too, and this depressed Jeff for a few days at one point. I think he had the same kind of BSOD that I did when getting to Sue's house, just at a lesser level. I'm happy to say he got through it, with our help.

"Ponytown, this is Swift, come in, over."

I reached over to the radio and stepped on the mic key. "What the hell is Ponytown?" I asked, dreading the answer.

"You're sitting in it," Swift answered as if it was the dumbest question in the world.

I sighed - off-air, though. "Go ahead with your message."

"Can you ask Jeff if we'd have a use for any more generators? I just found the mother lode."

I sat up, alert. Swift was out in the SUV, obviously; we'd agreed to do semi-regular 'patrols' to see if we could find supplies, survivors, and threats, in that order.

When I succeeded in summoning Jeff, he borrowed the radio to ask what Swift meant.

"I'm at one of those industrial rental places. They have those big trailer-mounted generators that can power a whole block. Five of them. And two big semi ones if we could find a tractor."

"That's amazing," he replied. "You can never have too many backups. Bring what you can back with you; don't worry about the bigger ones. If we need them, we know where to find them."

"Gotcha."

"I should have thought of those first, instead of the little consumer-grade junk," I apologized to him when the radio call was over.

"Not a problem," he said dismissively. "What you did worked out fine. But if you want to redeem yourself, I have a bit of a project I think is right up your alley."

"Oh really?"

Fifteen minutes later, I was fully engaged, so to speak, in the task.

"Yeah, we can do this," I said eagerly. "It'll be molasses-in-January slow compared to the Internet, and no error correction, but we can do it."

"What do you need?"

"Well, obviously a computer, or several. Connections from them to some spare radios, and then we kinda just pick a frequency and use it."

Jeff had read up on some of the things one could do with ham radio gear. One of the bazillion things he'd dragged halfway across the province in his wagon was a full download of several useful websites, something a couple of guys at university had done in his sophomore year, which he figured was a good idea. And the idea he had me working on was to link several computers together in a network, replacing the defunct Internet with communications across radio frequencies. (Yeah, I know all wireless computer communication is across radio frequencies, cut me some slack.) We'd employ packet radio concepts - where each piece of data sent or received would be sent in a burst of electronic 'noise', at least to the human (or pony) ear, but be decipherable by the equipment we were linking together. It was kind of like the dial-up modems of old, but even simpler than that, as we would be pushing data across a single frequency - one way at a time, or 'half duplex' as the terminology goes.

"I don't know how you don't have a butt mark in computer science and radios," Jeff smiled as I put things together.

"Mayveh... ham on a fecon... *ptui*," I said, spitting out the cable I had between my teeth. "Maybe it's not my 'destiny' like the pictures you two got."

"For that to be true, wouldn't there have to be something you were better at than this?"

I blushed a little at the snuck-in-sideways compliment. "Thanks," I smiled. "If there is, I don't know what it is."

"Maybe you haven't found it yet," Jeff shrugged.

"I guess," I said, more to go along with the conversation than anything else. "Okay, now to find an open frequency. Shouldn't be too hard." I dialed the spare radio to the telemetry part of the ham band, more by reflex than anything else, and froze when my ears twitched.

"What's that?" Jeff said, turning towards the speaker himself.

"I... don't know," I admitted. I'd almost skipped past it, and turned the knob backwards a little to fine-tune the signal in. Whatever we were hearing was a definite man-made (...sigh, I guess I'll admit it could have been pony-made) signal, and not noise or interference. It was not analog voice - a signal you can pick up just with a basic radio - and didn't sound like digital voice (needing a special decoder) to me, either.

"Could it be a message?"

"Probably a safe bet," I said, heading over to the 'radio perch' to use the base station. On the way I snagged a set of over-the-ear headphones from the remnants of the electronics section and ripped the package open with my teeth. Fitting the headphones on my ears (and trying to find a place the headband wouldn't be in the way), I jacked into the radio and tuned the frequency. There was the signal, clear as day.

I shook my head after listening to it for a moment. "I have no idea what it is," I said. "I don't recognize the format. We could try to plug in the computer and decode the few types it can figure out on its own, but this signal doesn't... I don't even know if it's voice or just data, or how to decode it. On top of that, it might be encrypted, and if it is, we don't have the computer power needed to break most encryption."

"But who do you suppose it is?"

"Could be anyone," I said, sitting back and shedding the headphones. "Other survivors sending a message with a broken radio. Somebody crossing a telemetry radio with a ham rig because they don't know what they're doing. Or a gas line or oil well somehow came back online and is sending its data to a master station that isn't answering."

"Or it could be... Them."

"'Them'?" I said, quirking an eyebrow and looking over my shoulder at Jeff.

"You know. Black helicopters. Secret three-letter agencies looking in on their ant farm."

I rolled my eyes. "You've been hanging around Swift too long. I'm not playing Scully to your Mulder."

"In all seriousness," Jeff said, smiling, "don't you think some form of the government must have survived?"

"If they did, they're doing the right thing by hiding," I replied, lifting a foreleg like I had a clenched fist at the end of it. "To leave all the survivors to fend for themselves and hide away on their own would be unforgivable."

"Good point. Besides, if the math follows what we discussed the other night, I'm probably the only sentient being that made it out of the NCR."

"NCR?" I echoed.

"National Capital Region," Jeff clarified. "Ottawa."

"Oh, right," I nodded. "I was thinking of a different NCR." When he didn't react, I said, "Did you ever play video games?"

"A few, but apparently not the ones you're thinking about, because I've never heard of the term NCR in a game."

"Looks like I might have to get you into a few more," I smiled.

Just then, the radio crackled once more. "Ponytown, Swift requesting permission to approach."

I sighed and stomped on the switch again, rolling my eyes. "Are you going to make me start using that stupid name?"

"Yes! To both of them!" Swift shot back, laughter in her voice. "I'm comin' in."

"You did well for never having driven a trailer before," I commented when we got to the auto bays, where we were storing our generators, mechanical gear, and the SUV, the latter of which was neatly parked outside the bay, with an attached, trailer-mounted 100-kilowatt generator tucked inside the building.

"Or did you magick it into the bay?" Jeff said with a smile.

Swift lifted her chin high and might have blushed a little. "I have no idea what you are on about."

"We could just check for tire tracks on the floor," I mused. "Anyway, find anything else neat?"

Swift looked relieved that I was changing the topic. "As a matter of fact, yes," she responded brightly, opening the rear side door and picking up some items (in her magic, of course). Buddy bounded out of the passenger side at the same time.

"Is that ... fresh fruit?" Jeff said in bewilderment, eyebrows threatening to raise high enough to detach.

"How did you get that?" I asked.

Swift set down the three bushel baskets between us. "I can't take all the credit. And I'm not sure how fresh you might consider some of this. Buddy picked up on the sound before I did, and once we got there, started zeroing in on the scent, I think."

"What sound?" I wondered aloud.

"We found a cold storage warehouse, still sealed up and operating," Swift beamed, then gestured to the trailered generator. "In fact, that's how I got this. Two of those big semi-mounted ones with two tankers full of diesel are parked at that place. There was a heavy-duty, high security fence around the place, and no signs identifying it. A couple of defensive points with guns, too, but nopony was there. I don't know if somepony else is using it as a survival bunker and we just missed them while they were out - but I didn't see any signs of life. Anyway, there's plenty of food stored there. And on the semi-trailer generator, I found a plate that said 'for customer service' and gave an address. So I drove there."

"Good thinking," Jeff said. "And I'm already thinking of a way we could make use of some of those generators. Let's go back there later on. I hope you saved the address?"

"You bet," Swift nodded. "So, what have you two been doing while we were out scavenging?"

The four of us began walking back into the building proper. "Stormy and I started planning out a communication network," Jeff said. "Using the computers and the ham radios, we can send at the very least text messages."

"Cool!" Swift said. "I've been missing my phone. Going into withdrawal."

"We also heard a messag-"

"You what??" Swift cut me off, turning to face me. I stepped a little back and felt my wings spread out in surprise.

"Let me finish," I said, folding up again. "It wasn't a voice message or a recognizable signal, but it was definitely something more than just random noise. I'm gonna try to DF it later-"

"DF?" came another interruption, this time from Jeff.

"Direction finding," I said. "If I mess around with antenna positioning and shielding, I should at the very least be able to get an azimuth - which direction the signal is coming from. Anyone else got questions to interrupt with?"

Buddy just stared back at me.

"Okay then. If we know what direction it's coming from, it might help figure out what it is or who's sending it."

"Could it be from Toronto?" Jeff asked.

I sighed; this had been a sore point between the three of us (yes, three; as much as Buddy was in our group, he didn't get an equal vote on the tasks we chose to do). "Maybe," I acquiesced. "It's entirely possible that we're just now getting signals all of a sudden from there, despite total silence for the past three weeks."

"Nopony's disagreeing with you," Swift said, clearly just as tired of the subject as we all were. "You don't want to risk going into the city unless or until we have more people to back us up. It's a sound argument."

"Fair enough," I said. "I just didn't want to get into this all again."

"Let's just drop it," Jeff suggested. "Swift, do you want some help making that into a meal?"

"Give me some time to figure out what I'm going to make, and I'll call for you," she smiled, taking the bushels of food into the kitchen.

After supper, I was sketching out plans to make the computer network that Jeff had suggested into something better - closer to full-duplex, or two-way, simultaneous communications, and supporting more things that we were used to having like perchance Skype, or something along those lines - even just voice and still picture transfer would be better than nothing.

Jeff had also hinted at his other idea he'd gotten when Swift had returned home; it involved going to a few select cellular tower sites and putting a generator at each. We'd have to be diligent about refueling them, but if we chose the sites right, we'd get a semblance of a communications network again. That semi-scuttled my side project, though the tricky part was the telephone exchange part of the equation. None of us knew how to get the phones back to being phones again - presumably there was some kind of ground station where the wireless side of things went into computers and networks and linked up with terrestrial or 'landline' networks. That would be hard to figure out just from guesswork. The cell sites we could just pick almost at random - contrary to popular belief, the fact that there are multiple cell towers on every block of a city street isn't because the signal doesn't reach that far, it's that we had so damn many things trying to use the system. Think of your average pre-Event (I refuse to use 'ponification') person. Telephone, tablet, laptop, oh and your car has OnStar or something like it too. That's four connections to the network from just one person. Keep in mind the average businessperson might have two or three phones (one for work, one for home), and multiply by a couple million people, and you start to understand why we need towers upon towers. So anyway, with only three of us (again, Buddy might be a valuable member of the group, but so far he hasn't asked for an iPhone) needing connections, we figured we could get away with just a half-dozen towers around the area. We probably could have just picked two really close to the mall, but we wanted flexibility for when one or more of us were out on scavenger runs. Then... we doubled the estimate, because what if some survivor was wandering like Jeff was when he found us, and suddenly noticed full bars on their phone after days and weeks of no signal?

Anyway, sorry for the technospew. As mentioned, I was drawing and doodling ideas for how to use what was at hoof - dammit, now she's got me doing it - and what we could make of it. The best thing I could say of it all? I was getting pretty skilled at writing and drawing with a pencil in my mouth.

At once, startling me, I heard sudden movement in the 'hallway' between my bedroom and the others'. I got to my hooves, folded in my stupid wings again, and caught just a glimpse of Buddy sprinting for the doors leading outside.

"Buddy? Buddy!" Swift called out, running to the edge of her room and looking in the direction he'd run.

I was at the room's edge/hallway in a flash as well, but Jeff rushed past both of us. "Stay put," he insisted.

I frowned a little and rolled my eyes, and Swift knew what I was on about - neither of us were interested in being the damsels needing protection. Still, Jeff was stronger than both of us put together (if you tied Swift's horn behind her back - well, you know what I mean), so it only made sense that he go see what Buddy was now growling about at the doorway.

I went over to the mezzanine and scrambled up its stairs, snagging the binoculars' strap in my teeth as I went, flipping them through the air and catching them with my hooves as I squatted by the glass, peering outside at what had Buddy's fur on edge. The early evening dim light made it hard to see, but I was sure I could spot something moving out there.

Swift scooted to a stop beside me. "What is it?" she asked.

"Can't tell," I answered. "Lots of them, though." I stole a glance over to the radio to be sure it was turned on and turned up; I'd've kicked myself forever if we'd missed someone calling for help who got ambushed just outside our door.

Buddy leapt up at that moment, slapping his forelegs down on the crash bar on the inside of the door. It shoved open and let him outside, despite Jeff's best efforts to restrain him. The stallion's hooves only swiped at empty air.

From the few seconds our reinforced doors were open, I heard two things. One was Swift yelling, "Buddy, no!"; the other was a loud cacophony of barking and growling.

"Turn off the-" I began, but stopped when I realized it was futile. We'd put all the lights in the store on the generator, and just left them on all the time. We had no real means of turning them off except to go to the switch panel and mess around. And if I remembered correctly, there were multiple switch panels in different places. Furthermore, we hadn't bothered with exterior lights because we were always inside by night time. So we were left with very bright lighting on our side of the glass and very dark conditions on the outside. A significant tactical error.

I tossed down the binoculars and mashed my face against the glass, shielding my eyes from the light with a hoof, trying to see what was going on outside. "Did Jeff go out?" I asked Swift, and got no reply. I wasn't going to take my eyes off what I could see, though, which was a number of dark shapes writhing and lunging near the front doors.

The shapes stopped darting back and forth and began facing off against one another. Or, more precisely, one against all others. I imagined that the one was Buddy, but still couldn't tell exactly what was attacking him.

Then, all of a sudden, the lights along the front half of the store went out, and I realized why Swift hadn't answered me - she'd dashed off to the back room to throw breakers. As my eyes began to adjust, I could finally tell what was going on outside. It wasn't supernatural beasts or monsters, but a pack of about ten dogs. I could see a pair of Dobermans, a couple of retrievers or pointers, and a mishmash of others. They all looked about as emaciated as I thought they'd be after three weeks of not being fed by humans.

Buddy was indeed squared off against all the rest. He was growling and snarling, and the Dobermans were snout-to-snout with him, just as angry. The rest of the mob were yipping and barking randomly, but one bark from one of the Dobermans with its head turned back to face them silenced them all.

Buddy barked a few more times and appeared to ... nod? Or point, with his head? ... towards the other side of the street. Some questioning sounding yelps and yips came from the crowd, and he barked once more, then held his ground fast.

Slowly, the other canines backed away from the building, all but the Dobermans. One stared at Buddy with a look that I swear looked like utter contempt for a few moments, then they too turned and disappeared into the night.

"What was that?" Swift asked as she returned from resetting the lights.

"As far as we can tell, Buddy was facing off against a pack of dogs," I said, still peering outside to try to see which way the animals departed, but between the lights coming back on and the total darkness outside, they disappeared in moments.

"Is he okay??"

"So far, he seems to be," Jeff said, having let him back in and begun checking him over. "Other than a few light scratches and maybe one bite, he's fine."

"Thanks, pal!" Swift said, hurrying to the dog's side and rubbing his head with a hoof, much like a human might have skritched behind Buddy's ears. He clearly enjoyed it, leaning into the affection. "We'll have to try to find you a steak or something later. At the very least a big ol' bone."

"Did it look to anyone else like he was communicating with them?" Jeff asked.

"Kind of," I nodded. "In fact, remember the place he found with all the dog food? Across the street? I think he sent them over there."

Realization crossed Swift's face. "They were hungry! That makes sense. And rather than let them break in here and take everything from us, you told them where to find their own stash. I'm real proud of you, Bud."

"Indeed a good job," Jeff agreed (and I nodded). "Let's hope they spread the word."

JUNE 21

"Guys, I need a second computer."

Swift's declaration at breakfast threw us both off.

"What? Why?" I asked. We'd put three of them on a poor-man's (...don't make me say it) network, as I think I said before, primarily for communication between the three of us, and secondarily to review data that Jeff had thought to download from the Internet and bring with us. "Don't tell me you broke the first one."

"No!" she shot back, sticking her tongue out at me briefly. "I want a dedicated one for my writing."

Jeff just quirked an eyebrow. He began to make a crack about fanfic authors, but Swift interrupted him.

"Hear me out," she insisted. "It's a simple reason. I started writing about us, but I think I need to get serious and write about us." She spread her forehooves wide at this last word.

I stared at her for a moment, and Jeff came to the rescue of my uncomprehending mind. "Oh! Humanity as a whole," he said.

"Exactly!" she nodded, pointing at him with a hoof. "It's getting pretty plain to see that there's very little of it left, if anything. We need to store archival copies of all that you saved from the 'net-" she nodded at Jeff "-and everything we can find or save starting right now. And then I'll write about... well, everything. Assuming that we're not the only ones left, there will be people in the future who would benefit from knowing what life was like before Ponification."

"For once, I agree," I commented. "I can probably cobble together another working laptop if we can spare the power for it."

"Shouldn't be a problem," Jeff nodded.

"Thank you," Swift beamed. "And everypony in the future who will read about us thanks you."

Our little ... commune? Home? Survivors' encampment? (please don't make me call it 'Ponytown') ... continued to evolve and improve. By that I don't mean that we brought in any other survivors, unfortunately - as depressing as it was, we seemed to be the only sentience in radio range. Either that, or others were hearing us, and chose to ignore us for some reason.

Speaking of radios, on my 'survival patrols', I chose to hit as many professional radio shops as I could, until we had a veritable showroom of top-of-the-line equipment in our 'radio room/crow's nest'. Unless the signal we'd encountered was encrypted (in which case we'd need to know the key), what we had acquired should have been able to crack it.

Frustratingly, the signal - which seemed to be decently far away after all, fading in and out at random as it did - defied all attempts to capture or decode it. I even recorded it to computer and broke it up into individual beeps and boops, as much as I could, and read up on cryptography to try to see if it was some obscure code, but I was stymied so many times that I wanted to throw the computer out of the window.

Maybe it's a red herring, anyway, I told myself more than once. Like I said to Jeff when we first discovered it, it could be something as inane as an automatic process that we started picking up due to weird atmospheric conditions or something related to the fact there weren't seven billion people generating signals to drown this lonely little chirping out as background noise.

One thing we did put together, which was no small feat I might point out, was weather radar. We found a radar station and gave it power - they're pretty well automated, so it wasn't like we had to be meteorologists or computer science graduates (oh wait, I'm 1 for 2 in that regard) to make it work. From there, one of our bashed-together link radios/computers brought the signal back to our place, and from then on (save for a couple of times when we neglected to run spare diesel out to the radar site), we knew what to expect of the early summer weather - which was unpredictable and dangerous enough with a news station weather team spoon-feeding it to us in advance. Looking at blotches of color on a map screen was nowhere near as good, but it'd have to do.

I have to admit that I took advantage of the radar for my own gains, too. Trying not to be seen studying it one night, I saw favorable conditions forming, and at the right time, said, "I'll be outside for a bit."

"Okay," Swift nodded distractedly as she drummed away at her 'saving history' computer with magical touch-typing. "Stay close and call out if you need us."

"I will," I promised, and headed for the roof hatch.

Being the last week of June, the early evening was still illuminated by the sun, as bright as any late afternoon. It didn't take any effort at all to spot the low cloud bank rolling in from the lake.

"Come to mama," I muttered, watching it impatiently.

It approached, and I swallowed a lump of hesitance that grew in my throat, then jumped up at a precise moment.

I stood on the top of the cloud, my mass slowing the whole thing until it was creeping along at centimeters per minute. I had plenty of time to mess around with this one!

I took a few tentative steps, and found that like my last experiment, this was just like walking on an ultra-soft bed. I got up the courage to trot, then eventually gallop, and was running all over the top of the cloud bank.

When I skidded to a stop, it bunched up under my hooves like a loose carpet. I stepped aside and smoothed it out and the cloud returned to 'normal'.

I reached out with a hoof and scooped some cloud aside, making a little hole in the top of the vapor body.

Cloud storage, I smirked, then giggled.

"Ha! I told you there was something weird going on!" I heard Swift say. I turned to face the roof, folding my poofed-out wings in, and saw her and Jeff standing ten feet below me, staring up in wonder.

"How are you doing that?" Jeff wanted to know.

"I, um, dunno how it works," I admitted. "I just know I can do it."

Swift pawed at the edge of the cloud closest to her a few times, and only succeeded in spreading the vapor out like dissipating smoke.

"I don't get it," I reiterated, reaching down and gathering it all back up into a little ball. As I compressed it beyond its original density, it grew darker and eventually burst into a miniature rain cloud, irrigating a four-inch-wide section of the building roof. "This is only my second time trying it."

Jeff also tested touching the cloud and found it stubbornly behaved as clouds normally should for him as well.

"Leave it to you to break physics," Swift quipped. "This is why we can't have nice things."

"Hey," I shot back, playfully yet still feeling my wings poof out in anger. "I'm not the one who seemingly invented magic-"

They both looked up at me as I stopped talking. "What?" Swift finally said.

I was staring wide-eyed at the world around me, then looked back to my wings as if the answer to what I was experiencing would be shown there. Then I turned and faced into the breeze, urging the feathered appendages to extend further, and my eyes got even wider.

"Crap," Swift said. "I think she needs to be rebooted. How do we get her down from there?"

"I'm okay," I said in a hushed tone. "I'm just... wow."

"Wow what?" Jeff asked.

"I can ... feel it," I said. "Three kilometers an hour from this direction." I stabbed at the air directly in front of me with a hoof. "Around ... well, lower pressure than normal. Really humid. Twenty-six degrees."

"What?" Swift said, giving me a weird look.

"There's a heavier air mass coming in from across by Rochester," I said, gesturing in that direction while looking back and down to her. "Probably going to be a strong shower. In the next couple hours."

"You can tell all that from standing on a cloud?"

I shook my head bewilderedly. "This is something else," I said. "Another thing I found out last time I was up here was I could feel the air currents and almost sense what was happening with them. But I've never tried it with my wings out."

"So you're a pony weather vane?"

"Shut up," I mumbled at her. "Are you saying your super-duper magic doesn't let you sense all this?"

"The thing you and Jeff put together lets me sense all this," Swift countered. "You know, on the computer screen downstairs."

"I can't tell," Jeff contributed. He peered southeastward. "But it does look kind of dark over on the horizon."

"I'm coming down," I said, folding in my wings and hopping from layer to layer until I could leap back onto the store roof.

Swift looked at me with an expression crossed between thinking I was crazy and thinking I was the most exciting pony she'd laid eyes on. "We're all going to go back inside, I'm going to make some hot chocolate, and you are going to tell us everything, and I mean everything."

"I don't know how much more I can explain," I said, "but okay."

Swift went in first, and Jeff was ushering me through the hatch, intending to follow me inside. As I stepped through, I looked over my shoulder to take one more look at 'my' cloud. Free of my presence, it was light enough to once again lift off and rejoin the others in their march across the local sky.

Life in Ponytown

JULY 1

Happy birthday, Canada, I said silently to myself and the country that for all intents and purposes no longer existed.

For all I knew, the entire population of the country now consisted of one unicorn, one regular pony, and one defective (but improving) pegasus.

I let the anthem and fireworks play in my head, while the flags hanging off the front of the building cracked in the medium-strength breeze coming from the south-southeast, carrying with it water vapor from the lake which would inevitably condense and fall to the aforementioned defunct country as rain later on.

My reverie was disrupted with a clank from behind me and a shouted voice. "Never mind! I found her. Up here again." Hoofsteps crossed the roof and shortly thereafter, Swift's voice was much closer and softer. "No clouds to snag a ride on today?"

I kept my eyes shut to try to focus on one last fleeting sensation of the climate around me. "Not humid enough yet," I sighed. Opening an eye and folding in my wings, I looked sideways at her. "What's the matter?"

"Nothing's the matter. Just wondered where you'd gotten to. You normally tell us all where you're going."

"Nobody was up yet," I responded. "Didn't think you'd take kindly to me rousing you to tell you not to worry about me because I was heading out."

"To tell you the truth, I wanted to come with you next time you did this," Swift said, sitting down beside me.

"What for?" I asked.

"I can do more than just lift and move things with this, you know," she said, tapping her horn with a hoof. "I can sense ... Idunno, I guess it's magic. It feels like there's magic all around us."

"Have you detected any other unicorns?" I said.

"No, not as far as I can tell," she said with a scrunched-up face, miffed at me unwittingly derailing the conversation. "I just want to sit and watch you."

"You think I have magic," I finally deduced.

"I just want to see what I can see," she said, waving a hoof towards me and the roof's edge. "Go do your Batman pose again and play weather vane."

"It's hardly a Batman pose," I murmured, but got up and went to the edge from which the winds were coming anyway. Focusing again, I let my wings unfurl, and shut my eyes, letting the breeze - which had died down somewhat, but was still enough to make my mane flutter a little - talk to me.

I took in the differing atmospheric pressures, the airflow and its subtle changes in direction and velocity, and the little bits of water vapor that were technically too small to detect with the naked eye, but I could sense (or smell? Feel? I have no idea) gathering against my hide, bunching up briefly before sliding past me and scattering again.

I looked over my shoulder, lowering a wing briefly to let me see Swift. She was staring at me with her horn glowing yellow. "What?" she said.

I smiled. "I just wondered if when you were doing something other than your Uri Geller impression if something else glowed like maybe your eyes or whatever."

"Oh, hush."

I giggled and turned back to sampling the environment around me.

"I could tell you I have x-ray vision, and you'd not know if it was a fib or real," Swift said out of the blue.

"If you do, have that I mean, tell me what kind of weird-ass joint we have in our limbs that lets us bend them like horses one second and humans the next. It's like we have ball joints instead of knees."

"I was joking, but that might be an interesting thing to look at some day if we find a working x-ray machine."

"Pick any hospital. Just bring along a semi-tanker of fuel to power it back up," I said. "By the way... speaking of semi-tankers of fuel. That cold storage warehouse where you said they have huge generators and fuel stores and high-security fences. Did you turn anything on or off when you went in there?"

"Maybe," Swift said. "I don't know. I went to find lights at one point. Why?"

"Just thinkin' about that weird transmission that faded in and out for a few days. I wondered if that was a bunker phoning home that you broke in."

"I did not 'break in'," Swift said with indignance. "I walked right through the door."

"After magically picking the lock, I bet. Right?"

"...I plead the fifth."

"Wrong country," I quipped, and thought back briefly to my ruminance on countries earlier. I was getting bored; the currents weren't saying anything new. "You got any data yet?"

"I guess," she said, and I folded up and turned to face her. "I don't know what it means, though."

"What did you get?" I asked, walking over to her as she stood.

She made a shrug with her forelegs. "I... think you have some kind of magic. Not a lot. Or at least you weren't expending a lot in doing what you were doing."

"Swift, I was standing there feeling the breeze hit me. I probably could have fallen asleep."

She made another noncommittal noise and began to follow me back to the hatchway. "I really thought I'd get more. Are you planning to do any cloud surfing later?"

"If conditions get right," I admitted. It still felt weird to be talking about this stuff with the others, but I was warming to it. "I suppose you want me to let you sit in on that too?"

"Yes please," she smiled. "Maybe I can figure out how to let me and Jeff walk on clouds like you can."

"Sure, take away my unique abilities," I joked with her as I ducked in through the hatch door. "You don't see me begging to be able to bend spoons without a horn, but suddenly the pegasus can stand on clouds and you act like I'm cheating."

"When the pegasus can get on clouds without using a one-and-a-half story building as a step stool, then it won't be cheating."

"Ouch!" I laughed.

Jeff was putting away dishes - bowls, to be more precise; we frequently had less and less use for flat plates, considering three out of four of us had limited dexterity with cutlery - but stopped when we came back downstairs.

"Are you going out soon?" he asked me, picking up a notepad from the table.

"Yeah, in a bit," I nodded. It was my turn to do the "patrol" run. "You want to come?"

"No, not unless you want the company. But I do have a shopping list."

I looked over the notepad. We were about equal in our mouth-writing skills, which was to say neither could really read the other's scratchings without plenty of time and effort. But we both tried. Little miss magical quill didn't bug us about it, either, which was a plus.

"First aid kits," I said with realization upon reading that line. "...and veterinary supplies. Yeah, okay, that makes sense."

"We've just about cleaned out the health clinic here in the store, and we need to be honest with ourselves," he said. "None of us really meet the criteria for what's left in there at this point."

"Yeah," I said. I tried to crack a smile. "I've seen what they do when a horse breaks a leg, though. Either one of you comes at me with a shotgun..."

"Just keep being as careful as we have been so far," Jeff said in all seriousness. "All of us. We've been lucky til now."

"Now ya jinxed it," I drawled, looking further down the list. "Phones? Don't we have enough in the display cas-" I then noticed the type of phone he was specifying and smacked a hoof to my head.

"If you can power them up as soon as you find them, all the better," he said. "Who knows - maybe the network is still alive."

He was referring to satellite phones. They were like bulky, oversized cell phones, for the most part, except they talked not to cell towers, but to satellites orbiting the planet. We knew quite well that the cellular network was gone, except for the little bit we'd recovered on our own, but it was entirely possible that whatever had caused us all to become brightly colored equines didn't affect the ring of satellites around the earth. GPS was still largely operational, as far as we could tell from the truck's dash, so at least the theory was sound.

"Anyway," I said, moving on. "Tes... ooooh, I remember hearing about these." TESLA home battery systems.

"I don't think you could disassemble an installation on your own," Jeff said. "Probably not even the two of us together. I suspect it might take the finesse of a certain someone with her fancy magic." He smiled. "I suspect these are few and far between, and odds are astronomical there's even any in Canada at this point, let alone within our reach. It'd be a huge boon though if we could score even just one, to bank our generated power in."

"Agreed," I nodded. "Anything else besides the usual?" - meaning, of course, edible food and fresh water. And things to read we all hadn't read 13 times apiece already.

"What, is that too easy?" he smirked, nodding at the list.

I smiled and tucked it under a wing - a trick I'd been pulling lately since they weren't good for much else. "See you in a while," I said. "Buddy! C'mon."

An hour later, I was on the road - or, more precisely, off the road at a roadside gas station, hacking up a lung.

"Puah," I exclaimed, spitting out hydrocarbons as I jammed the length of garden hose into the SUV's filler pipe. Gasoline started running from the underground tank into the SUV.

Buddy looked at me from his guard point with a disdainful look.

"You try it some time," I told him. "Tastes like ass."

He looked away and continued to scan for threats - of which there probably were none, but better to be safe than sorry.

"This stuff's not going to last forever," I murmured, listening to the fuel gurgle through the hose into the truck. "Might not have to worry about it much longer."

I suppose I could find a nice full station somewhere or a tanker and dump a couple gallons of stabilizer in it, I thought to myself. That was probably the best solution, since it would involve less siphoning too, especially if I chose a tanker. Or maybe it was time to eschew gasoline entirely? Diesel was supposed to last longer, wasn't it?

"Or! Or," I blurted out aloud, startling Buddy. He huffed at me and shook his head.

"Sorry, bud," I said. "The answer's obvious. I should have thought of this when Jeff mentioned the batteries this morning. We go electric."

The odds were half-decent that I'd find a Model S somewhere in the suburbs of the GTA. The only problem was that it didn't have a big cargo space like the SUV (even with the "two trunks", or a trailer hitch for the flatbed trailer. Maybe it was best to toss the idea around with the others before abandoning our SUV - which also had my old ham radio in it, which an electric car wouldn't have.

After a lot longer than if I'd been using a proper pump, the SUV's tank was finally full, and I stashed away the siphon kit, reeking of gasoline. "I'm sure this smells worse for you, pal," I apologized to Buddy, keeping it as far from his riding position (passenger seat, naturally) as possible.

A quick raid through the convenience store - with its plentiful spoiled frozen goods and melted ice cream and so on - gained us some warm drinks and a few random canned goods, plus some candy bars and chips. I gave Buddy some lukewarm bottled water and offered him some regular potato chips, but he balked at them and just drank his fill as we moved on.

I was still having a hard time getting the taste of gas out of my mouth when I saw something in a field beside the road, and pulled over to a stop, looking at it over the steering wheel.

I sat there for a long few moments - long enough that Buddy 'ruff'ed at me.

"What the hell," I said, putting the truck in park. "Stay here, I won't be long."

I got out and hopped the fence. As I crossed the field, I mused about how Sue and I used to call these things Shreddies in the winter, when there was snow atop them.

I stood before it, shook my head and shrugged, and reached out and took a chomp out of the big round hay bale.

Chewing on the straw, I realized it wasn't any better or worse than anything else I'd ever eaten. It definitely didn't light up my taste buds, but it was probably sustenance enough in a pinch.

I walked back to the fence and hopped it easily once again, then climbed back in the truck, where Buddy just turned to look at me silently.

"You tell anyone I did that and I'll paint all your spots pink," I said simply, putting the truck in gear and moving on again.

Buddy just made another huffing sound - was it a chuckle? - and looked back out the window once more.

The rest of the day went on in a cyclical routine - break up the monotony of driving around an empty world by listening to CDs of music by people who were no longer around to make more music, and feel depressed at that; find a place that might have an item on Jeff's list, stop and check it out; load up whatever spoils we obtained, then drive around some more.

We did manage to find most of the things we were looking for, which made it a good day overall. After parking the SUV back at the auto shop, I trotted back into the store proper, humming to myself.

"...Picture hangers paper cutters waffle irons window shutters paint removers window louvAAH!"

This last bit, while not in the song running through my head, was definitely justified, as Swift galloped around a corner and nearly collided with me.

"Great!" she said without any form of greeting, grabbing hold of a hoof while I was trying to settle my wings back down again. "Come on, I need your expertise to settle an argument."

My heart stopped trying to exit through my throat as I was tugged along, but it was still racing. "What? What's the matter??"

Swift didn't say another word, and just dragged me to a cleared-away part of the store, where Jeff was staring at something on the floor and shaking his head.

"This," Swift said. "I want to put it up. And don't you give me any grief about the name," she said, whirling on me again and jabbing a hoof in my direction. "Just tell me if it can be done or not."

Jeff sighed. "I didn't say it couldn't be done, Swift. I think it's a good idea to advertise ourselves to people. I said there were better ways of going about-"

"You had your turn," she said, holding a hoof up in Jeff's direction. "Let Stormy have her say."

What I had been deposited in front of was a mishmash of sign parts arranged in a row. There was a large stylized cursive P from the name of the mall, Pickering Town Centre; then the last three letters of the Sony Store logo. The first two letters from a Toys 'R' Us sign, a capital W from the Manchu Wok in the food court, and then the N from... I don't know where, really.

"Please explain to her that she has fluorescent, LED, and neon lighting together," Jeff said plaintively. "The wiring would be a nightm-"

"It's all just electric light," Swift said dismissively. "These were the easiest ones to get un-mounted."

I tried to figure out how to let them both win. To be honest, no matter how I felt about the name, it was a good idea to have something on the exterior of the place to let people know we were here, and just lighting up a random sign wouldn't have the same impact as something which basically screamed "we're like you, come find safe haven".

I looked to Jeff and picked what I thought was the hardest task of the endeavor. "Is it that difficult to get a neon transformer hooked up?"

"Its high voltage output is inherently dangerous and the whole thing would be difficult to protect from the elements, and might not even work well on the kind of power we have at hoof," he pointed out.

"Fair enough," I said. I looked to Swift. "Can we find a replacement W? Say, from..." I quirked an eyebrow. "I don't know, a Wal-Mart?"

Jeff chuckled and Swift whirled around to look at the relatively small lettering over the exit from the store into the mall - more or less the right size for her sign. "Oh. I guess that might work, yeah," she said with a nervous, embarrassed laugh.

"Jeff, I presume the CFLs and LEDs aren't a big deal?"

"They'll need to be wired separately instead of in series, but I suppose it'll be fine."

"Do you have a place for this all to go?" I said to Swift.

"Right above our entryway," she nodded. I was pleased by that; I feared the plan was to put it over the spotting deck, which troubled me for two reasons. One, light washing out night vision, and two, I wanted anyone who felt that the sign constituted a threat to concentrate their attention (and perhaps fire) on another, more distant part of the building (which was why our entrance was so far away from our living space in the first place).

"Okay," I said. "Glad we could work that out. In that case, I'm going to sort out my haul and try to put it away, and then do something up top that you gave me an idea for. Don't worry, it's not got to do with clouds or weather," I said, cutting off Swift's protests. "I promise, I'll come get you for that."

And so, a couple of hours later, I was struggling to carry several items up the roof stairs by myself. Jeff was busy wiring all the junk together and Swift was mounting it on the side of the building, with Buddy watching out for her for anyone approaching the site, so I was by myself on my mission.

We might as well have called today 'Catching Up On Shit We Shoulda Done Weeks Ago' Day, I said to myself as I hoisted the paint can up onto the roof. I had to go make a second trip for the roller and the tray - I tried tucking them under my wings, with the paint can's handle in my teeth, but lost my feathered grip on the roller tray and had it tumble all the way to the warehouse floor, necessitating I start completely over.

Between finding the satellite phones (which I did manage to do, though only one of the six I got were activated, so I'd have to figure out how to make the other five work later on tonight), re-thinking the idea of using a gas automobile, and doing what we all were doing now, it was all stuff we should have put in place as soon as we were settled. I wanted to smack myself in the head for forgetting some of this, especially the satcoms.

The paint smell almost drove me to my knees, but that was probably partially from opening the lid of the can with a screwdriver held in my mouth. The deep breaths from the effort to make that work caused me to inhale a lungful of paint fumes, but at least it wasn't the paint itself. I'd look pretty stupid with a bright yellow muzzle.

I managed to pour enough paint in the tray to make the roller work with it. Learning from my mistake opening the paint can, I went back downstairs and found a long handle for the roller. Holding it between my forehooves, I even managed to stand on my hind legs for a bit, propping myself up and laughing a little for the thrill it gave me to be at least pretending to be bipedal if only for a moment.

Finally, I got to work.

Three cans and 90 minutes later, I heard voices coming up the stairs. I called out, "Careful! Wet paint," from across the roof.

"What are...? Oh, you should have let me help. This must have been back-breaking," Swift said as the two of them came out of the hatch.

"I'm almost done. It was tough for a bit, but once I got into a rhythm, it turned out OK, I think," I replied. I propped myself up on the roller's handle again and stood tall just for shits & giggles. Smiling, I said, "What do you think?"

Both of them turned their heads a little sideways to try to read the large letters I'd painted on the building roof.

ALIVE

INSIDE

x3

"Times three?" Jeff inquired.

I looked at the two of them pointedly for a long moment. "Can I just add a little '+1' beside it?"

"I won't tell Buddy if you won't," Swift quipped to Jeff.

"The point isn't to give a census of how many dogs and cats are living with us," I shot back. "The important bit is what's before the times three."

"It's very good," Jeff acknowledged, and Swift nodded with a smile. "Now we only need a helicopter or an airplane to spot it."

"Or someone better with these than me," I added, spreading out my wings, and nearly falling from my perch on my hind legs from the change in balance. I grinned sheepishly once I got my rear hooves back underneath me steadily.

"That too," Swift acknowledged, rolling her eyes at my near-fall. She cast a look around at the horizon. "I thought you said there was going to be a cloud front today, feathervane?"

"Obviously I haven't perfected that either," I said, looking around along with her. The skies were clear from one end to the other as far as I could see.

"Maybe that's for the best," Jeff said. "We've all worked hard today and deserve a rest. You should come out front and see the fruits of our labors too."

"Let me finish up up here and I'll be right down," I said. I dipped the roller in the paint and set to finishing off the 3 - and preparing to add the plus one.

Fifteen minutes later, I'd wrapped up (and figured out how to hop over the still-drying lettering on the roof - wishing I could have just flown over it all, and for that matter, over the edge of the building to where my friends were) and was out in front of our entrance.

Swift was inspecting one of our mini-gardens when I arrived, while Jeff was fiddling with a junction box near the entrance door. "All right," he said, standing up. "I think we're ready for this."

"You haven't turned it on yet?" I asked.

"Waiting for you," he said. Then he stepped aside and gestured Swift in. "And since it was your idea, milady..."

Swift stepped forward and looked at the bundle of wires inside the junction box, at Jeff's urging. He instructed her, "Take the two white ones in your magic and hold them together, when you're ready. If you get a shock - can you get a shock while magically holding something?"

"We'll find out in a second," she said, grinning nervously. "Knock me clear if I start shaking like a leaf."

"Of course," Jeff nodded.

The wires were surrounded in a yellow magic glow, then a brief yellowish-white spark from within the glow as they connected.

"That looks awesome!!" Swift gushed, trying to stand back and look at her creation while holding the wires together at the same time.

I had to admit, it was an impressive feat, and looked about as good as a cobbled-together sign could. I smiled and nodded my approval.

"It's great," Jeff agreed, accepting Swift's sudden hug. I urf'ed and flared out my wings when she collected me up in the embrace as well.

"This is so going to work," she said, pulling us tightly close. "Now everypony can see us for miles!"

Supper that night was a veritable feast. I don't know how Swift still had the energy to make such a plentiful spread after working herself to the bone all day. Maybe magical ponies don't exert energy like those of us who have to get physical in order to do things.

We were sitting around digesting and going over my haul from the scavenging run for the day, and chatting about some of the ideas I'd had while out driving.

"I thought the truck was running rough the last time I used it," Jeff nodded when I brought up the fuel situation.

"The gas is probably starting to go in most every place we can reach it," Swift replied. "It's probably wise to look for a diesel powered vehicle any time now - they'll last for a while, so long as we're picky with our fuel sources and keep the engines clean and well-running."

Swift was speaking with such authority on the subject that I realized I'd nearly forgotten what she - Jill - had done for a living before the Event. This was her bread and butter.

"Electrics aren't really going to be ideal due to the small storage space, but we probably shouldn't rule them out either," she went on, mildly surprising me.

"Because diesel will eventually give up too?" Jeff hazarded a guess.

"Exactly," Swift nodded. "In about a year-" she shivered, probably at the thought of us still trying to fend for ourselves after that amount of time "-internal combustion is just not gonna work. Not without a lot of hassle tearing them down and cleaning them out. And using up probably all the stabilizer we can find just to make a couple of tanks of gas run without issues."

"I guess we'd better look pretty seriously for those battery banks," I suggested. "And some Mod-"

She pointed a hoof at me with a smirk. "We don't need to round up a fleet of your luxury sports car. Some of the hybrids on the roads today can be configured to use only their electric motors. There are hybrid pickups and mini-SUVs out there that fit that bill. Bring 'em in, disable the gas engine, and we should be able to run them as long as we have ways to charge 'em."

I felt my ears fold back. "Is there any reason I can't go find a Model S? I always wanted one."

Both of them laughed out loud.

We were about to turn in for the night when Jeff was studying the weather radar. "Hey, Stormy, there's something showing up approaching from the south side of the lake," he declared. "I know it's late, but are you going to give it a shot?"

I thought about it for a minute. I did feel like I'd been cheated out of my chance to play with some vapor earlier in the day, by misreading the climate somehow. I wandered over to the screen and watched the image for a couple of seconds. Just like he said, there was an indistinct blob crossing Lake Ontario and heading almost right for us.

"Same kind of front I saw this morning," I mused aloud. I thought it was moving a little fast, but with luck, I'd be able to 'catch' it and hold it down like I had with other clouds. "Yeah, what the hell, why not."

"All right!" Jeff said excitedly. "We'll be right up."

Moments later, they came up as promised, finding me standing with two hooves on the parapet of the building and the other two on the roof, in what Swift called my 'Batman pose' minus having my wings spread out.

"I brought a first aid kit," Swift teased, magically toting along a repurposed laptop bag we'd stuffed some medical and veterinary supplies into.

"Ha ha," I said flatly, turning back to the night sky. "I'm not sure about this. I'm not feeling it."

"Not feeling it? Turning chicken? Hey, chickens can't fly eith-"

"There's no breeze," I interrupted her. "And I'm not picking up any pressure differentials in that direction."

"So... no clouds coming?" Jeff asked for clarification.

"I'm not sure what's coming," I frowned.

"Sssh!" Swift cut in. After a moment, she set down the first-aid bag, so that even the strange shimmering-twinkling sound of her magic in use was gone.

"What do you hear-" Jeff began to ask, and then stopped, presumably because he picked up the same thing then that I did.

Whump whump whump whump whump whump whump whump.

Swift was up beside me in a fraction of a second, peering into the darkness. "Is that...?"

"I can't see them if they are," I told her. Weren't search helicopters supposed to run with giant spotlights turned on all the time?

"Uh... ladies?" Jeff said, an unnerving tremolo in his voice. "Maybe we should go inside..."

I missed whatever else he said, because an uneasy, primal fear started out just then in my gut and spread through me like lightning. Not only were my wings splayed out, but it felt like every strand of hair and fur on my body had stood on end. Involuntarily I found myself backing up to put my forehooves on the roof deck.

"I, uh..." I began, but as I turned to say whatever it was that I was going to say to Swift, I found that she was not there; she'd already pushed herself back even further, backing away from the edge and towards the roof hatch.

I followed her lead, not sure what was going on and not really caring at that particular moment. Even my analytical side had given up on me. Every fiber of my being was telling me that, despite the fact I'd longed to hear rotor blades approaching for over a month now, the approach of this particular group of them was a Very Bad Thing.

Finally I gave in to my urges and turned to head for the hatch at a dead run.

Jeff and I managed to keep our dinner down and stay just below the hatch, but Swift had dashed down the ladder and run back into the main part of the store. Buddy went after her, so I felt she was in good paws. Hoov- Whatever!

With the hatch pulled down as far as it would go and still allow our two pairs of eyes to peer outside, Jeff and I watched as a trio of machines - barely visible against the night sky - whumped their way over towards the nuclear plant, a few miles down the road, circle it, and dip below our horizon with landing lights suddenly lit up. It looked like two gunships of some kind I'd never seen before, and a larger cargo craft.

We stayed there silently shivering, even though the night was warm and (as mentioned earlier) windless, until the machines rose up again eleven minutes later, shut off their lights, and vanished into the black.

Deeper

JULY 2

I woke up to incoherent murmuring from beside me.

I'd stayed with Swift overnight. She'd burrowed deep into her covers in her bedroom like a frightened child, so that the only thing I could see when I got there was a quaking futon. It would have been funny if I hadn't been scared just as witless as she was - the simple answer was that Jeff didn't descend the stairs, and I was caught between him and the roof. I was not going out onto the roof with that monster out there, so I stayed there with him and watched.

Of course there was no monster. What there was was a trio of black, unmarked and unlit aircraft, some 1500 yards south of us. They never gave any indication of paying any attention to us, never turned our way or so much as pointed a gun in our direction. But all three of us were rocked to the core with some kind of basic, primal need to get the hell away from those machines at any cost. Had I still bothered to wear clothes, I'd need new britches for sure.

What was it that frightened us so? I had no idea, and couldn't explain or rationalize it at all. It wasn't some animal fear of machinery - the fact we spent so much time using the SUV and the generators proved that, at least in my mind. Was I subconsciously scared of being seen as a pony, and accepting the pony lifestyle (as much as I was)? That only made sense (thinly) for me - it didn't hold water for the other two.

Speaking of which, Swift was still under her blankets and whimpering softly. I faced her and asked her quietly if she'd gotten any sleep.

"...nothing there... just goddamn empty... a hole... dark ...cold..."

I sighed and patted the blanket on what I thought was her back, between her shoulders, and let her be.

"Morning," I said when I found Jeff in the kitchen.

"Hi," he mumbled.

"You got anything in the first aid kits like maybe ZzzQuil for horses? I'm not sure she slept at all. I'm worried."

"I don't know if it'd work. If it does, tell me, so I can relax too."

I quirked an eyebrow at him and finally noticed he had bags under his eyes too. "Oh... sorry. I hope you don't think I didn't take it seriously because I was able to sleep. Trust me, it shook me up pretty badly. I guess I was just so tired that it won out over the fear."

He shook his head a few times, almost too many times, as if he was still out of it now. "It's okay." He didn't have anything more to say after that.

"I guess I'll make some breakfast and keep sitting with her," I said, taking out two bowls. "I want to be there when she comes out of it."

"Good plan," Jeff nodded. "I'm going to... I don't know, really. Putter around and tinker maybe. I don't really feel like going out for a drive right now."

"Let's skip today. None of us are in the right frame of mind. Just don't forget to feed Buddy, ok?"

"You got it."

"Come get me if you need anything." With that, I finished making breakfast, balancing the bowls along my spine between my shoulders, wings, and tailbone. It was kind of a proud moment, like if I was carrying plates of food like a restaurant server would without any training or skill.

I went back into Swift's room, setting one bowl down near her lump on the futon and taking another to my resting spot nearby. Munching away, I silently went over what had happened the day before.

After a while, she began mumbling again, and I got up and walked over to her. "C'mon, Swift. You either need rest or food. Do you want me out of here so you can sleep?"

Hooves darted out of the pile of blankets and grabbed mine, and a face with bloodshot eyes looked up at me. "No! But yes... Stay with me, please... until I sleep... when I sleep, she'll help me..."

I did my best not to jump out of my skin. Folding in my wings, I crouched down before her. "Who'll help you?" I asked.

Swift's eyes were darting back and forth. "Yes," she said, as if my question deserved a yes-or-no answer. "She will."

I looked at her for a long moment and lifted some bread, cheese, and lettuce out of her bowl. "If I make a sandwich, will you eat it? Then you can get your head down and let her... help you."

Swift focused on the food and studied it for a fleeting moment. "Okay," she nodded, still shaking and quivering.

"All right," I said softly, pulling my other hoof away to assemble the sandwich. While I was doing it, I kept an eye on her.

She frowned and looked like she was about to burst into tears. "Thank you," she said almost imperceptibly.

"It's okay," I smiled. "We're all okay. No big deal."

She kept herself low to the floor and chewed on the sandwich after I hoofed it over to her. I stayed on the ground with her, as promised.

"Who's going to help you?" I asked as she finished the meal, hoping it wouldn't cause another freakout.

Swift was still largely out of it, but she smiled and looked at me. "The princess," she said. "She comes to my dreams. Tells me everypony will be all right."

"The wha?" I balked.

"Thank you..." she said again, putting her head back down between her hooves. "Night night."

In a few moments, there was light snoring coming from the blankets. I hadn't pressed her for more info because I favored her rest and recovery more than deciphering this latest bombshell.

I tried to busy my mind with things that didn't involve what Swift had said, or what we had experienced the night before.

I miss baseball, I declared to myself. I wondered how I might swing a bat in this new form. My teeth ached just from the thought of holding a bat in my jaw and hitting a fastball.

Maybe I could get to SkyDome and run the bases - a longtime dream of mine; if we ever got our courage up to venture into the heart of the city. That didn't seem likely to happen any time soon, based on our experiences the night before.

Sighing, as my mind took me back to situations I wasn't eager to dwell on, I reluctantly reflected on it and what it meant for us.

We'd finally seen evidence of other survivors, and they didn't even seem to notice us. I suppose it could have been possible that our attempts to draw attention were too little too late. The other possibilities made my mind race.

One: They saw us and didn't deem us a priority. I suppose it was possible that whatever they were doing down at the nuke plant took precedence; if it was a choice between rescuing me and making the whole area safe by centering on the nuclear plant for a bit, hey, I've survived on my own - er, I mean, with my friends - for over a month; I can handle a few more days.

Two: There was no one there to see us.

What if the machines were some kind of automated, Terminator-esque setup, running on automatic after it determined that its operators had disappeared?

I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head, as if the crazy ideas would be sent scurrying back to whatever dark recess they came from. Now is not the time to be daydreaming about outrageous science-fiction theories.

...says the talking pegasus pony.

Still, all things considered, it was almost impossible that someone with that kind of advanced technology could not have noticed us. Besides all the lights we had running in a world plunged into darkness, we were emanating radio frequency energy - a fancy way of saying we were transmitting on a bunch of different frequencies, and constantly.

That thought gave me an idea, so I stood up, studying Swift for a second to ensure she was sleeping restfully if not peacefully, and left her room. The shoes Jeff had made us in his first few days with us - boots, really - ensured my departure didn't rouse my friend.

I went up into the radio room/spotting stand and climbed up the stairs, settling down in front of the radio. For several minutes, I just stared out the windows at the dead world before me, while I formulated what I was going to say. Finally, I put a hoof down on the mic button.

"Hello. Whoever you are, I am assuming you are government or military, and you'll have the ability to record this and play it back to your heart's content. You were at the..." I paused, wondering if I should mention the nuke plant, in case others were listening. Could these guys have enemies who would thwart whatever they'd done at the plant? Were these guys the enemies?

"...You made an excursion to a site very close to us last night," I went on. "We watched you from our base." I didn't know what else to call our new home, but that was for another time to decide. I also didn't make a comment on them scaring the pee out of us, however they made that happen. "There are three of us here. We've ... changed. We all used to be people from or visiting the local area, but on May 23 we found ourselves alone, with everyone else gone. As far as we know, we aren't ill, and we haven't found anyone else. At all. Not even bodies."

"If you're coming for survivors, you'll be able to spot us just north of where you flew to last night. If, for some reason, you're... not coming for us, if you can give us anything - advice, supplies, or even just an acknowledgment that you hear us and know we're here... we'll take anything we can get."

"We're monitoring this frequency 24 hours a day. ...Over."

When I let off the mic switch, a voice came from behind me relatively quietly. "Good job."

I turned to look at Jeff standing at the bottom of the stairs.

"I figured we had to acknowledge what happened last night somehow," I said, keeping one ear focused on the radio in case they answered right back.

"Couldn't help but notice you didn't mention, well, the unpleasantness."

"A, that's quite a way to put it, and two, how long were you listening?" I asked, standing up and coming down the stairs, after making sure the radio's volume was cranked so I could hear it anywhere in the store.

"When you started talking about the 'excursion'," he said. "I was over there-" he gestured to a pile of stuff we'd pushed out of the way ages ago "-seeing if we could make use out of any of that junk."

"Ah," I nodded. "You get any rest?"

He shrugged. "I've never really needed a lot of sleep. And when I need to relax, I tend to tinker."

"Gotcha. Just ... you did say earlier you wanted some down time."

"Noted. That I did. Let's just say that taking the day off from scavenging will fill that bill."

"Okay," I said. We were walking aimlessly through the store, through the random piles, racks, and stacks of merchandise still lying about. I decided to breach another subject that was nibbling at my brain. "When you do sleep, do you dream?"

"Uh... yeah? Don't we all?"

"Come on," I prodded. "Even the way you answered that tells me you know what I'm talking about."

Jeff sighed. "I wasn't sure if it was a by-product of the ponification. I'm still not sure it isn't. But yes, I do dream of a world of ponies."

"That's all three of us, then," I nodded. "If what Swift said about her dreams counts. Maybe 'the princess' is a creation of her mind she uses when she's stressed."

"That I can't comment on," Jeff said. "All I've seen is an idyllic countryside with all sorts of ponies coming and going. Villages full of them, living like we do, I mean in houses and having jobs and such. If it isn't just my subconscious trying to apply 'normal' dreams to my new form, then I wonder if it's not some kind of premonition."

"What do you mean?" I asked, genuinely curious.

"Like I said, everybody... or everypony as Swift would say, worked. There were mailponies, as in, delivering letters and such. One like you, in fact," he smiled, elbowing my wing. "And bakery ponies, and salesponies working in shops and markets, and farmer ponies, working in fields and orchards. The weird part was a lot of what they used seemed to have human origins. For example, at a coffee shop, mugs with handles." He waved a hoof before us as if to indicate the foolishness of that design.

"So, what... you think you saw the future?" I asked. "How Earth ends up? I guess it's good that you saw lots of ponies, but I presume that means that we all have to relocate and colonize somewhere."

"I don't know," he shrugged. "Like I said, maybe it means something, maybe it's all BS my mind makes up to keep me sane." He looked over to me. "How about you? Your turn."

"Oh," I said, realizing I did indeed owe him an explanation of why I was talking about dreams. "I dreamt about ponies too. But mine were all in the clouds."

"Is that why you're so interested in them?" he asked, pointing towards the ceiling.

I nodded. "Kind of. You say you saw pegasi in your dreams... in my dreams, up in the skies, that's all I see. Pegasi only."

"Pony segregation," Jeff mused.

"I don't think it was like that," I responded. "More like, pegasi are the only ones who can live up there. I mean, we have wings-"

"You just said 'we'," Jeff smirked. "Are you going to say 'everypony' next?"

"Shut up," I mumbled, blushing and frowning. "Anyway, there was this whole city in the clouds. Kind of like your dream's village, I think, but I don't remember seeing anyone doing any specific jobs. It kind of had a Greco-Roman vibe to it, without the togas of course. Ponies were going around visiting and living their lives, but if they were working, they were doing jobs that aren't apparent, or at least not like I'm used to."

"Maybe their jobs are on other clouds," Jeff posited.

I turned on him, wings out. "Are you just humoring me?"

"Not at all," he said, holding up a hoof defensively. "Sorry, it was the first thought that came to me. My mouth was still engaged. Safety was off. Sorry."

I giggled a little. "It's okay, it's a plausible idea." I looked back towards the part of the store where our bedrooms were. "If you dream of ponies on Earth, and I dream of ponies in the sky, I wonder what our resident unicorn dreams of? Besides princesses."

"Maybe you can ask her, when she wakes up."

I nodded. "If she's not still upset. I want her to 'come down' on her own. I'm still not sure why she reacted worse than we did."

"Maybe it has to do with magic?" Jeff hazarded a guess. "Maybe she saw something that scared her."

"So the survivors in the black helicopters have magic? I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing."

"I was thinking that whatever sent us packing was some kind of ultra-high-tech fear inducer. I mean, you know how SWAT teams and riot squads have ... or had... weapons or devices that could make sounds so loud they'd hurt? Sending protestors and rioters away without having to beat them back or use rubber bullets or water cannons? Maybe 'They' have something that makes you want to code brown in your pants, and they used it on us last night so we'd stay away while they did their thing at the power plant."

"If they have that, it's stupid powerful," I said. "We're over a kilometer and a half away."

"Just tossing out ideas," he said. "Anyway, if you find out anything from Swift, let me know. I'm gonna go tinker some more."

"Okay," I said, smiling. "Thanks for the chat. See you at lunch, I guess." I turned at the next aisle and headed back towards the bedrooms.

I awoke with a start - not enough to poof my wings out, but I jerked my head up and looked around.

I'd huddled up beside Swift's futon again so I'd be there when she woke up. From the way she'd behaved before finally drifting off, I figured I owed her that much. And then, apparently I'd misjudged how tired I truly was, and dozed off myself.

Beside me were cast-aside blankets and an empty bed.

I got up and poked my head out the 'door', looking up and down the aisle. While I sought out my friend, I tried to recall if I'd dreamed while I was snoozing. Disappointingly, if I did, I couldn't recall anything about it.

I found Swift in the kitchen, rinsing our breakfast bowls in the sink, by hoof. She looked much better, but had a withdrawn look on her face, like she was deep in thought. Still, the twitch of her ears towards me told me I'd been detected.

"Hi," I said softly. "Feeling better?"

"Hi," she nodded in return, quietly. "Rested. Thanks."

"Of course," I said, coming to her side. I reached into the washtub and pulled out the other bowl, swishing the water around within it and then upending it back into the sink. I wanted to say something - anything, but I didn't know how fast to go, so I held off for the moment.

"Sorry about last n... this morning," Swift murmured.

"Nothing to be sorry about," I said, setting the bowl on the drying rack. "We were all freaked out."

Swift's shoulders jerked in a kind of a shrug as she laughed humorlessly, just one solitary 'hah'. "Freaked out's putting it mildly. I... have no idea what came over me."

I chose my next words carefully, after a moment's pause. "You said this morning that you felt there was nothing there, like an empty hole. What did you mean?"

She shivered, but kept it together. "Everything around us has magic in it." She looked at me. "Even you. Me. Jeff. Buddy. Everything living or not. You say you can 'see' air currents? I can 'see' magical energies... I guess that's the best way to put it."

I nodded. "I follow," I said, glad we had an analogy; it would make things easier to understand, seemingly.

"When I looked at those helicopters... all I 'saw' was a huge bubble of ...nothing. A magical void."

I chewed on that for a second. "What does that mean?" I finally asked.

She sighed. "I don't know. It could mean they're alien things that don't belong here. In our world, I mean. Were you a science fiction fan?"

I held up a hoof. "Live l... oh, shit, how can I do the Vulcan thing with hooves without fingers?"

Swift snerked and nudged my side with a smile. "Dummy. Maybe these guys are from a different dimension where physics works differently, and they don't fit in quite exactly right here. Or maybe we're the aliens to this dimension, and that's how we were transformed - we were adapted to this universe when we were transported here, but those guys, also from our world, have protection against this place, and it manifests like that, and rubs us - and this whole place - the wrong way."

"All valid theories," I agreed. I decided to break the news to her as gently as I could. "We... um... I... called out to them on radio this morning while you were sleeping. Asked them to get in touch with us and explain themselves. Haven't heard anything back yet, but I thought you should know."

Swift nodded, with not a frown or grimace but a flat, determined expression. "You're right. As much as it makes my hide crawl, we need to make contact with them."

I took the other bowl from her when she offered it, and said, "Couldn't help but notice you didn't use your magic to do this." I nodded to the bowl as I shook the last of the water from it and set it out to dry.

"I... guess I was a little afraid," she admitted. She took up a dish towel in her yellow glow and used it to dry my hooves. "Better?"

"Only if you say so," I smiled. "Thanks."

"Thank you," she said, leaning into me. "For staying with me all night, and standing guard over me. How I wish you were still... you know."

It was all I could do to keep my wings from sproing-ing out at full attention at that instant. "Urgh... trust me, I do too... but that ship sailed, sadly."

"I'm just playing with ya," Swift smiled, standing back up straight and looking at me. But I wondered how much of that was really true.

"A-anyway," I stammered, changing the subject, "I had something else I wanted to ask you about. If it's not too personal."

"What's that?" Swift said as we both moved to leave the kitchen area.

"When you were heading off to slumbertown, you mentioned a princess, and said she'd help you. Is that... something new?" I said, trying to find the right words. "Or is it something you use as a coping mechanism?"

Swift's pink coat turned a little pinker. "Um... it's new," she said tinily. "You'll think I'm being stupid."

"Excuse me?" I said, stepping sideways a little so I could flare out my wings as we walked side-by-side. "I'm a carrier for about 7 different kinds of stupid." Folding back up, I added, "Hit me. That is, if it's not too pers-"

She shook her head. "I don't mind sharing. But don't laugh."

"I promise," I nodded.

"I've been having these weird dreams. I mean, almost constantly. Every time I sleep. Well, not every night, but maybe every night I've been stressed. The night before you showed up? I had one. The night after I rescued you from the roof's edge, and learned I had magic? Another."

"There's a common thread there," I grinned wryly. "I'm apparently a bad influence."

"Hush," Swift shot back, elbowing me. It made me soar - emotionally speaking, of course - to see my friend coming back out of her shell, even if going back to her steadfast refusal to laugh at my corny jokes and self-deprecating humor was what came back first. "And last night, er, well, this morning."

"Before you go on," I said, "maybe I should tell you, in the interests of full disclosure, that Jeff and I dream of ponies in a weird pony world too."

I added the 'too' before truly knowing if it applied, but her look at me proved me right. "So... have you met the princess too?"

"Erm... no," I said. "Not that we've noticed. I think maybe you should explain that one yourself."

"You'd know her to see her," Swift said. "She's like the amalgamation of all the best qualities of the three of us. Our three races, I mean. Earth pony, unicorn-" she pointed a hoof to herself, then to me "-and pegasus."

"She's a unicorn pegasus?" I interrupted.

"Alicorn," she nodded. "That's what her kind is called. All princesses are alicorns."

I tried to process that for a second. "There's more than one?"

"So I've been told," Swift responded. "They're much taller than us, like maybe six feet or more. More like full horse size than we are. Or at least she is."

"And you've been talking with her?"

"A bit," Swift nodded. "The first time, I could just sense she was there. That first dream I told you about, the one from just before you got here. I was roaming around a featureless plain... feeling kinda hopeless. And I could sense some kind of godlike being watching over me, and got a vibe that everything would be all right."

I said nothing, letting her continue.

"The next time was after my magic woke up, after you nearly fell off the roof. I saw her that time, and she actually approached me. She's this dark royal blue color, and her mane... how do I describe it? ...it's a starfield. Her mane and tail shimmer and wave and look like I'm staring into deep space. Her horn is way longer than mine, probably twice its size."

I laughed, grinning. "Horn envy? Who's the guy now?"

Swift facehoofed. Wait, what did I just say? Ah hell, you know what I mean. "Shut up. Her wings put yours to shame too."

"Ow. Low blow."

"You deserved it. Anyway, she has a butt picture of the moon on a black background. Space, I guess. Fits her name... Luna."

"Princess Luna?" I echoed.

Swift nodded. "Princess of the Night. And I guess she's a dreamwalker or something."

I had a small BSOD at that. When I recovered, I said: "She exists?"

"Yes!" Swift responded. "What, you thought I was making her up?"

I tried to verbally backpedal. "Hang on, now, I said earlier I didn't know if it - she - was a coping mechanism or what. Listen, I'm buying what you're selling. Go on."

She took a moment to compose herself. "All right. As I was saying... the princess can enter anypony's dreams. And interact with them. Or so I gather, from my experiences with her. She doesn't actually speak of her world that much."

"So she's in a different world? Not this one? I mean, we're not supposed to be on a mission to find Luna here, right?"

"I don't think so. If that is the plan, she hasn't said so. Let me finish."

"I'll shut up until you're done," I said. "Sorry."

"The second time I encountered her was after I learned magic. I was dreaming of all the things I could do with the ability to just wish things up with a spell. Levitation, telekinesis, teleportation, the whole lot. She came to me and congratulated me on learning so quickly, and wanted to know how I got there. So I told her - about catching you, I mean. She said it was theorized that skills might awaken from dormancy due to a high-stress situation. She said I'd need it - the skill - where our world was going, and urged me to practice every chance I got." Swift gestured to me, then her. "Same thing we agreed on the next day. Then she said she had to go, that lots of ponies... no, wait... lots of 'her little ponies', were her exact words, needed her counsel. And then she vanished, and I woke up."

"And today? Did you get to see her today?"

"Not at first. I guess I can't just summon her like I was thinking I might. Maybe I needed to be lucid dreaming and invent something like the Bat-Signal. Maybe a Luna-Signal. Anyway. I found myself living a nightmare, being chased by people - not ponies, people - with guns that could fire anti-magic. The field that made us all crazy last night."

I nodded and leaned into her for (her) comfort.

"Thanks. I guess Princess Luna must have seen that I was in trouble, because suddenly I dreamt that she arrived and took me to an ethereal plane far away from the bad guys. Again she said she couldn't stay, but let me speak this time. I told her what had happened and that I'd been dreaming of her world all the time. She said that part was understandable, but didn't explain why. She seemed troubled by the mention of the helicopters, but other than telling me to keep a wide berth, she said they were probably nothing to worry about. She said that she and 'her agents' were working to make things right, and we should keep doing what we're doing. Said we would prevail if we stuck together and depended on one another. That that's 'the pony way'. And then she was gone again."

I was left speechless. I honestly didn't know what to say. Finally I uttered, "So is that why you talk like you do now?"

"It kinda makes sense, doesn't it?" Swift smiled.

"This is huge," I exclaimed. "But I'm not sure how to break it to Jeff that we've solved the mystery of what happened based on your dream."

"We haven't come close to solving anything," Swift countered. "All we've got is a pony princess telling us to buck up and be strong and everything will be all right. The why, we haven't even scratched the surface on that one yet."

"Alien pony race reshaping us into their own image?" I said. "Colonization is my guess."

"I'm not so sure," Swift shook her head. "The princess talked about her world and 'our world' more than once. She took care to talk as if the two were separate. I don't think a conqueror would behave like that."

"Maybe we need an audience with the king or queen instead," I said. "See if you can set that up next time."

Swift made a face with a half-smirk and batted at me with a hoof. "Stop making fun of my dreams!" she playfully scolded.

"Ow. Maybe you should call me Punching Bag. NowaitforgetIsaidthat!" I hurried to correct myself, while she laughed.

"Ohhh, what a couple of days," she sighed, and looked like she shed a load of stress all at once.

"Thanks for sharing all that with me," I told her. "I hope it helped."

"I think so," she nodded. "Thanks for being there, Stormy."

It was my turn to sigh and shake my head with a smile. I guess I was saddled with that moniker now. "So. Any thoughts on what we should do about last night's visitors?"

"Far as I'm concerned, they can stay wherever they went to," Swift shivered. "I could do without that feeling ever coming back."

"I understand," I agreed. "But I did put out a radio call to them. What if they answer?"

Swift mulled it over for a moment. "I think that depends on their answer, don't you?"

"Good point," I nodded. "I presume what Luna told you ... and for that matter what any of us saw in our dreams... is privileged information? Not to be shared?"

"Absolutely," Swift agreed with fervor. "Let's keep that under our hats for now. We still have no idea who's good and who's bad on this playing field."

"True." I looked around for a clock; we'd left bunches of them all over the store, set to the correct time, since nobody was carrying watches or phones any more. It was late in the midafternoon, and I said as much to Swift. "We, Jeff and I, decided to write off today's scavenger hunt, so there's nothing on the schedule today."

Swift smiled. "When I was at home, before Ponification, and didn't feel like working, I sat on the couch and ate peanut butter and saltine crackers all day, flipping through random TV channels."

I let out a little laugh. "I can't give you TV, but I bet we still have some crackers that've kept. But you have better dexterity than me-" I gestured to her horn "-so you get to tear the little packets open and spread the peanut butter."

She laughed back and hoof-bumped me. "Deal, Stormy."

Author's Notes:

I've been able to churn out a lot during my two weeks summer vacation from work. I'm not abandoning this, but my update process might begin to slow a little when I return to my job on Monday. Never fear, there will be more!

First Steps

JULY 5

US Independence Day came and went uneventfully. Sorry, any Americans reading this. I'm sure there were ponies somewhere across your country having the same feelings I did on the first.

The one thing that I did do during the Fourth was mull over the population that was left, of both Canada and the US. And, I guess, the world in general. Simple math led me to believe that the three of us in ... dare I say it... Ponytown... were quite literally one in a million, each of us, if not rarer - possibly even one in two million. Unless there were some people in the area doing the same thing as us - surviving - except for the reaching out and trying to make contact part.

That would mean between 17 and 35 people... ponies... existed in my country. The concept gave me chills, to say the least. There was no delusion in me that maybe there was a limit to the extent of the phenomenon. If my father on Vancouver Island on the other end of the country was gone (he never answered his phone, emails, or other means of contact, so I put 2 and 2 together and got 4), and there was a complete lack of a 'disaster response', or any kind of response, from other regions - the USA or even overseas - mean that the most plausible answer was that what we were experiencing was representative of what was going on worldwide.

"So you're suggesting there's only 350 ponies at most in the United States?" Swift said at breakfast when I mentioned this.

"And at most 7500 in the entire world," Jeff finished the arithmetic. "That's not a promising statistic."

"I don't mean to be such a downer," I said. "It just came to me when I was thinking about the US yesterday."

"It's probably wise to keep it in mind," Jeff contributed. "To know what our odds are. In finding others, that is."

"If distribution didn't change, proportionally, we should still see more ponies here than anywhere else in the country," supplied Swift.

"Do we want to venture into Toronto any time soon?" I asked. Both of my companions shook their heads. Especially with our mystery visitors - who'd yet to respond to our calls - the topic was a non-starter. "Fair enough, I just thought I'd ask."

"What we will do is keep doing what we've been doing," Jeff said. "Agreed?"

"Yeah," Swift said, and I nodded in response. Casting out in an arc to try to locate food, supplies, and other survivors was still on the table.

"It's my turn today," he said, rising to his hooves, "but I think two of us should go and leave Buddy with whoever stays back. Reason being, the SUV is on its last legs. We need to find a diesel or electric car - maybe one of each - and today."

"I can come," I said, as Swift almost stereoed, "I'll go." We looked at one another.

"How do you do rock-paper-scissors with hooves?" I quipped.

"Rock-paper-scissors-lizard-Spock," she corrected me. "And sadly I have to admit you can't. Flip a coin?"

"Do you remember where any money is?" I asked. "I know I haven't touched any in 6 weeks."

"In the cash registers," she shot back, rolling her eyes.

"They empty them when they close for the night," I pointed out.

"Ladies," Jeff stressed. "Let's not get testy."

Buddy suddenly got up and went over to the spotting stand. There, he took one of the handheld radios in his jaws, pulling it free of the charging cradle, then walked over to Swift and deposited it at her hooves.

I jokingly sneered at him. "You just like her better 'cause she's who you met first."

He gave out his little 'huff' sound as he curled back up in the common area.

"I guess that's settled," Jeff said with a smirk. "I'll go warm up the car while you get our stuff, Miss Quill."

Swift rose to her hooves and picked up the radio in her magical grasp, turning it on. "Try not to wreck the place, Stormy," she grinned.

"Ha ha," I rolled my eyes. Walking back to my room, I muttered "Traitor" at the Dalmatian in my path, getting a 'huff' in response again.

While I was neatening out my bed, I heard Jeff come back in. "Uhm... are either of you playing with mobile technology? Like remotely operated devices?"

"What? No," I heard Swift say from her room. I poked my head out of my area to look at Jeff.

"In that case, I, um, I think we have a visitor," he said, gesturing toward the front of the store.

Moments later, the three of us were crowded around the window in the spotting stand, looking out across the parking lot in the early morning light.

"How far away?" Swift wanted to know.

"It was crossing the grass between the road and the parking lot when I spotted it," Jeff said, waving a hoof in the mentioned direction. "I don't see it now."

"Give me those," Swift said, pulling at the binoculars, even though the parking lot was barely 400 meters across.

"Don't you have a super-sight spell yet?" I asked.

"Hush," she said as she levitated the glasses to her face.

"There it is," Jeff said, his foreleg nearly knocking me over as he pointed across my field of vision, in a different direction. We swiveled that way and saw a... something making its way down the traffic lane.

"It's going for the entrance," Swift said, still looking through the glasses. There were murmurs of agreement that our plan to put our 'front door' far away from our living spaces was validated.

The three of us looked at one another for a moment. "Are you not feeling what I'm not feeling?" Jeff asked us.

"It's not giving off that weird vibe," Swift said, clearly with immense relief. "Does that mean it's not 'Them'?"

What 'it' was, from all appearances, was a cart a little smaller than a quad or side-by-side ATV. It was all black and had no place for a person - or pony, for that matter - to sit, though it looked like it had been repurposed from something else that once had that capability, or maybe it was the offspring of a bomb disposal robot and a Mars rover. There was a bulky section near the middle, and something on what appeared to be the cargo platform. There was also a camera pylon ringed with LED lights (which weren't lit up, being daytime).

"I don't know what it is," I said. "What do you want to do if it tries to get in?"

There was silence while we all thought about that situation. Finally, Jeff spoke up. "I'll draw its attention while you two get in the SUV with Buddy," he said. "Meet me at the city hall down the street after I shake it."

"Forget it," Swift said. "We're not splitting up. And if it doesn't have that anti-magic ray, we're not backing down. I don't see any weapons on it, either, and - wait. It's stopping."

"Where?" I said, pressing my face against the glass. The entrance was hard to see from this angle.

"Right by the sign," Swift said. "It's unloading the platform with a robot arm. Putting stuff on the ground."

"Let me know when it leaves," Jeff said, plucking the radio out of Swift's bag. "Or stops unloading and sits there, or whatever."

"What are you going to do?" Swift demanded. "You are not going out there."

"Not while that thing's still doing things," Jeff said, descending the staircase. "But if it leaves, or moves back and parks in a non-threatening manner, I'll risk it."

"Stormy, tell him he's crazy."

"We're all crazy, Swift," I said. "Just tell us what it's doing."

She fumed in silence for a couple of moments while Jeff trotted off toward our access to the entrance door. Since I couldn't see anything from my vantage point, I took a moment to ensure the main radio was set up to talk to the one Jeff was on.

"It's backing up," Swift said. "Looks like it's empty. The arm is folded up again. Still backing up. It left a whole bunch of stuff on the ground by the curb."

I told Jeff as much on the radio.

"Tell him not to go out there yet," Swift insisted.

"Is it staying there?" I asked.

"Still backing up," she said. Finally I could see it past the arc of the building's glass again. Indeed it was backing up, and looked like it was empty - a flat platform on six soccer-ball-sized wheels (spherical, too - I wondered if they could spin in all directions like some of those futuristic forklifts I'd seen on How It's Made once). It continued to back up and climb the curb, going up the grassy area between the parking lot and sidewalk, and then out into the street. Only then did it turn, and start moving down the traffic lanes at a greater clip.

"Move," Swift demanded as she pivoted. "I want to see where it heads."

I ducked aside and keyed the radio. "It's on the street now, Jeff," I said. "Heading west on Kingston, over near the lights now."

"Okay," he said, and as the squelch noise indicating he'd let go of the mic crashed across the radio, I realized another receiver was also making noise. I reached out and touched the volume knob on it with a hoof, and realized it was the undecipherable signal from before. It was stronger than I'd ever heard it.

It was indeed telemetry, between the little robot and whoever was controlling it.

"Dang! I lost it," Swift sighed. "It went past the Burger King and out of sight."

"Probably going back home, wherever home is," I said. "Or their temporary staging area. If it's the group we encountered the other day, they must be a long way away."

"Ladies," Jeff said over the radio. "You are going to want to come and see this."

The three of us stood and stared at the collection of items piled by the door. It looked like a Salvation Army food bank donation bin had been upended.

"Pancake mix?" Swift asked, turning a five-pound sack over and reading its label. "Powd... ohh, powdered milk," she added in a tone that crossed between longing and eagerness.

"This looks like one of those battery-powered coolers," Jeff said from the other end of the pile. I went around to his spot and indeed, it was a larger, sturdier version of the 'electric ice chest' I'd kicked out of the SUV before leaving Mosport. Mine plugged into a 12 volt car socket - this one seemed to have a battery backup and digital readout, plus a retractable cable.

"Swifty, we need some dexterity over here," I spoke up.

She came over to us. "There's a half-dozen boxes of cereal and a bunch of tins of coffee and tea... whoa!"

"I don't think either of us can deal with that latch with hooves," Jeff said, nodding to the car-door-like handle on the top of the portable cooler.

"Child's play," Swift smirked, magicking the case open. A small cloud of vapor floated away as the lid hinged up and revealed the cache inside.

"Cheese," she said. "Orange and apple juice. And what's this... medication?"

A vial, representative of nearly a dozen others, floated up between us. "It's antibiotics," I said. I reached in and picked out another, different-shaped bottle. "This one is a multi-vitamin."

"Quite the care package," Jeff declared.

"Was there a note or anything?" I asked, looking around. Swift had set the penicillin back down and was rooting through the rest of the box.

"Didn't see one," Jeff shook his head. "No bugs or traps either, though I'd only recognize them if they were blinking and beeping like in the movies, probably."

"There's chocolate in here," Swift exulted, half-in-half-out of the cooler, forelegs on its edge and head stuck inside it.

"We need to move this inside and catalog it," I decided. "I'll handle that while you guys go on the run."

It took the better part of an hour for three ponies and two pushcarts to do what the robot had accomplished in five minutes.

Eventually, we had all the items inside on the common area floor. Buddy examined it with his nose while the rest of us stared at the massive haul.

"This kind of makes our scavenger hunt easier," Swift said brightly.

"Indeed," Jeff agreed. "We should be good for food and such for at least a few weeks. We'll know more precisely once Stormy has it all jotted down."

"Aye aye, captain," I quipped, putting a hoof to my forehead in a mock salute.

Swift smirked and rolled her eyes. "We should go," she said. "Probably going to take a while to find two good vehicles."

"Oh!" I called out, having almost forgot. "To take out my ham radio from the SUV, just go under the hood with a ten-millimeter wrench and-"

"I've got it," Jeff smiled. "Looked over it a few days ago. Trust me, your baby's in safe hooves."

"Okay," I said. "Have a good drive. And if you see a Model S-"

"Give it up, Stormy," Swift groaned.

I didn't know if our benefactors didn't realize we were sitting in the middle of what used to be a grocery store (among other things), or presumed we'd ransacked it already. Had I been thinking clearly, I would have realized I asked them for food or other supplies (if in fact this was indeed from the creepy folks that visited the power plant the other day).

All told, besides what was already described, we had six cans of powdered drink mix (kind of like Kool-Aid, which made me smirk at the thought of 'drinking their Kool-Aid' - a little morbid, I know, but whatever); powdered/dried food of various kinds (eggs, fruits, oatmeal, and such), three cases of US MREs; six battery-powered LED lamps on towers, and a big battery box that could recharge them and the cooler - guess they hadn't seen our generator setup; various kinds of meds, some of which were duplicates of what we'd picked up from knocking over various clinics and vets, some which was new to us (like iodine tablets - for combating radiation sickness?); water purification gear, from tablets to charcoal filters and such; some survivalist books and pamphlets - a lot of which we could have written the book on by now, but thanks anyway guys; shampoo, shaving kits, and sewing kits - again, did they not notice the building we were in?; a couple of tool kits, a bunch of rolls of duct tape, and of all things a Coleman stove with several bottles of gas. Near the end, I was wondering if some bureaucrat hadn't just been dumping the contents of a 72-hour-kit into the robot's cargo bay.

Oh, and finally, a note, which had been tucked into the cooler where the cable reel was. I guess they figured we'd check there early on.

Survivors:

As you suspected, we are indeed aware of your presence. However, our situation prevents us from taking anyone in. Our own supplies are meager as it is.

Despite this, as a show of good faith, we have shared some of our stores with you. Please use it to your advantage.

I'm going to share something else with you, and I trust it will go no further than the person reading this. We are spread too thin to deal with you right now. Do not consider this a sign of weakness but of priority. We need to know how you are managing to survive at your location with the resources you have on hand. But there are other survivors we must contact first, and other situations we need to deal with.

You can continue to use the radio if you like, but we will not answer except in this fashion. Expect to be in touch soon, but how soon, we cannot say.

Stay alive, survivors. You may be the answer to our mutual continued existence.

--X.

Well then.

I frowned and put the handwritten letter on top of the cooler.

That's a fine how-do-you-do. 'Go away, you're not the big fish in our pond.'

I didn't know how to feel about that. If it indeed was the same group that had descended upon the nuke plant, they were to be feared - or maybe at least respected. But they had shared supplies with us, as we'd asked. So they weren't all that bad.

Unless this stuff is poisoned or drugged. I looked out over the cache and had a sudden vision of passing out, faceplanting in a plate of pancakes, and waking up who knows how much later milling around in a stockyard pen with a tag on my ear.

Shaking my head to rid myself of the mental image, I looked over to Buddy, lying in his usual spot.

"Wanna test any of this, pal?" I asked him.

I swear the dog actually rolled his eyes at me, then looked away.

"Fine, then," I said. I rooted around until I found the case of granola bars, pulled out the chocolate chip one, and tore the wrapper in half with my teeth.

"Pfeh," I declared, spitting out little bits of foil wrapper. I wish I could get better with my hooves.

Taking a chomp off the bar, I chewed on it a bit and swallowed. So far, so good, and it didn't taste too bad, either, if only a bit old. Not quite stale, but not fresh either.

"Do I look like I'm dyin'?" I asked Buddy. He looked over at me, sighed, and looked away again.

After washing it down with a drink of water, I decided the stuff was probably not going to kill us - or was slow-acting, anyway. I busied myself with putting the goods away in our "cupboards" and other storage places. It took a couple of hours, but finally everything was stowed.

And now I had a huge amount of cardboard boxes and the occasional hunk of foam packing to get rid of.

As I looked out over that particular mess, I could almost feel the light bulb come on over my head.

It was late afternoon before I got done setting things up, and just my luck, I heard a loud grumbling sound just as I was getting ready to put my work to the test.

It wasn't my belly reminding me I'd only had breakfast and a granola bar that day, nor was it Buddy declaring his assessment of how sound my planning was. It was a very distinct noise.

The sound of a Detroit Diesel engine at about half-throttle.

I turned and looked into the distance, and saw a battered old blue-and-silver pickup truck heading south on the side street, coming my way. It crossed the highway and aimed for the mall parking lot, as did another vehicle following, a white ... ggkk... Prius.

The two vehicles at opposite ends of the automotive spectrum roared and/or barely perceptibly hissed to a stop one story below me on the apron of the auto bays. My ham rig's antenna was on the roof of the truck, the cable snaked in through the partly-open sliding back window.

Jeff revved the truck's motor a couple of times, causing my ears to fold over and all the windows in the store to rattle. He grinned and shut the motor off, then climbed out of the vehicle, followed shortly thereafter by Swift exiting the Prius.

"Now that's a motor!" Jeff exclaimed.

"It sounds like a bus," Swift said with a sour expression.

"With good reason," I called down to them. "Those engines are used in heavy industry all the time. Whoever left that truck behind put some serious work into it."

"Why are you up there?" Swift said. "It's a cloudless day."

"Come around this side," I said, nodding to my left. They walked around the cars and the side of the building to see the loading dock filled with boxes, foam, and other soft-ish debris I was able to accumulate.

"You didn't answer my question," Swift said. "What... oh, no."

"Oh yes," I smiled, unfurling my wings. "Don't worry, this is how stunt people do this."

"Pastrana had a whole shed full of foam blocks," Jeff nodded with understanding.

"Exactly," I said, pointing a hoof to him.

"Stormy, none of us know how to set broken bones! Especially on wings!" Swift said rapidly.

"Then catch me before I hit!" I shot back, and before my mind could argue, I commanded my hooves to send me over the edge.

"Here you go," Swift said, bringing some freshly mixed Kool-Aid to me from the kitchen.

"Thanks," I said, cradling the glass in both hooves.

"Can I say 'I told you so' yet?"

"No," I said perfunctorily, from my lying-down position on my futon.

"Can I say 'I wish you'd waited until we got a camera ready'?" Jeff said, barely hiding a snicker.

"Shut up," I mumbled.

It was about thirty minutes after my attempt to fly. Yes, sadly... attempt.

Swift giggled a little. "You looked like a baby hummingbird," she said, fixing me with a sympathetic look. "I do have to admit your pile of boxes did cushion your fall."

I couldn't help but replay my mind's eye image of me suspended in mid-air above the loading dock and its half-acre of debris I'd tossed into it as a makeshift safety net. I was flapping my wings furiously but getting no lift at all from them. As my point of view began to rotate from my rapid descent, I heard a gasp and a wince and had enough time to think This is gonna hur- before I was... caught, actually, as I'd suggested to my friend, in a yellow cloud of magic. Which only slowed me down enough to make crashing into the boxes noisy rather than noisy and potentially painful.

"You do owe me now, you know," Swift said. "I saved you from picking foam chips and cardboard out of you-know-where for weeks."

"Thanks," I grumbled. "I was sure I could make it work. I mean, how hard can it be? Flap and fly, right?"

Jeff got up and walked away. Swift knelt down beside me. "There's probably a little more than that, Stormy."

"I guess," I sighed. "For another day, then. Anyway. I didn't tell you what all I found in the care pallet." I recounted the items and finally the note that had been tucked in with it. Her reaction was much like mine.

"I'm not sure how to respond to that," she said when she digested it.

"I guess... we don't," I shrugged. "At least not for now. Keep surviving, hope they don't bring their code-brown-ray back, and keep our distance?"

"For now," Swift nodded. "But we should probably prepare for them to contact us again. Sounds like they will eventually."

"Oh, I don't doubt that. But you're right. We need to be ready for it."

Swift smiled and stood up.

"But did you have to get a Prius?" I asked.

She froze and turned around. "What?" she said, as if understanding my question was a struggle.

I stuck out my tongue. "Those things are ugly. With a capital ug."

"My mom had a Prius," she said, turning her jaw upwards and sounding perturbed. "It was a fine car."

"We have the pick of the entire world. If you have your heart set on an electric, you can do better than a Pr-"

Jeff came back at that moment, interrupting me by dropping something from his mouth onto the futon in front of me. I looked down as Swift looked over as well.

National Geographic's Birds of North America and a battery-powered DVD player with screen.

"Somepony needs to study," Jeff said with a smirk.

Author's Notes:

A little shorter than the others. Like I said in the author's notes for the previous chapter, this has been a busy week for me, and next week is going to be just as full. I'll do my best to write a full, proper chapter next time.

CAVU

JULY 6

"Not exactly stealthy."

"I didn't know we were trying to hide," Jeff said back to Swift.

"Well..." she said, holding her words, as she didn't have a comeback to that one. We were outside, letting our breakfasts digest while we looked over the vehicles they'd come back with the night before. A Prius is a Prius, to be truthful, so we'd started with the pickup.

It was a lifted, blue and silver, 1978 GMC K2500 pickup. Someone had swapped a monster diesel into it that usually belonged in a city bus, highway tractor, or commercial generator. It had a "headache rack" bar protecting the cab from whatever was in the box, and it was a noisy, beastly thing.

"It's an awesome truck," I said, smiling as I looked over it. "All it needs is a 'Zombie Hunting Team' sticker on it somewhere."

That one got both of them to snicker. "Yeah, I can see that," Swift admitted.

"I made sure it had its own hitch," Jeff pointed out, walking around the back and indicating the lowered connector the truck needed due to it being so high off the ground. "I didn't want to get it all the way here and then find out our trailer would drag its bumper on the road."

"Good thinking," I acknowledged, circling around the rig with him. I was smirking to myself at how I could inspect the undercarriage easily from my vantage point. Maybe being this low to the ground had its advantages after all.

"Looks pretty mechanically sound," I commented. "It's a shame whoever took such great care of this thing isn't around to enjoy it."

"We can say a few words to thank him at dinner if you like."

I shot a look over to Swift, even though she was joking. "Let's not get all morbid."

Jeff went on to the driver's door, rearing up on his hind legs and unlatching it, then pulling it open. "One thing I like and don't like at the same time is how tall it is. Lots of ground clearance is good, but it's a chore to get up into. For those of us without magic," he added as an afterthought, smirking at Swift.

I put my hooves on the door sill, higher than my "normal" head height now. "Yeah. I thought I had a rough time getting into the SUV. I would've had trouble with this even when I was a full-sized guy."

I almost heard Swift wince for me. It took a beat for me to figure it out, and then my blood ran like liquid nitrogen.

"A full-sized what?" Jeff asked for clarification.

"Ummm..." Swift said hesitantly, after I'd remained frozen and silent for a long moment.

"Stormy?" Jeff asked, and I felt myself redden, and knew my wings were poofed out.

I squeezed my eyes shut, hopped back down to the ground, and scurried under the truck back to the safety of the inside of the store.

I heard, rather than saw, someone walk into the living spaces and stand at the threshold of my room. This was because I was curled up tightly in a ball, burrowed under all the blankets and pillows and other stuff littering my futon.

"Go away," I called out, which surely came out like a muffled mumble. I had no interest in talking to anyone. I'd just alienated and outed myself, and as far as I was concerned, life was over. Time to pack up in the middle of the night when neither of them were up, and steal away to go survive on my own.

I felt a hoof press down gently on the blankets, searching me out. The fact it wasn't a magical grasp lifting the covers off me was a mild surprise. "Hey," Jeff said softly. "Can we talk?"

I didn't know how to answer, so I didn't try. I felt him lie down beside me. To add another surprise, a thinner yet slightly larger creature flopped down on my other side and leaned up against me. Then he began slowly wagging his tail, thumping it against both the floor and my backside. Thump. Thump. Thump.

"I guess that was something you wanted to keep to yourself, huh?" I heard Jeff's voice filter through my protective fabric shield from the world.

There were so many things I could have said, and wanted to say, but the only thing that came out was: "Yeah."

"Can I ask why? Were you worried what we'd think?"

"Swift already knows," I murmured.

"What I'd think, then?"

"...Kinda," I admitted.

"Stormy, you're a pony. I'm a pony. Swift's a pony. We're already coping with being a completely different species, one... or three, depending on your point of view... that shouldn't really exist. To be completely honest with you... knowing who or what you were before doesn't make a difference to me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I don't care, and you shouldn't think that either. But we seem to be stuck like this, so there's no reason to dwell on the past."

I gave an emotionless little laugh. "Would you believe that's the same kind of thing I said to Swift when we were talking about this?"

"Well, there you go. Why are you so worked up over this? If you're already accepting it..."

I took a moment to compose my thoughts as he trailed off. "I guess I ... was afraid you'd think I was some kind of weirdo, for accepting what I've become far too readily. As if I was unhappy with what I was before, and-"

"Stormy."

I shut up and listened.

"...I'd say look at me, but there's a Frozen comforter in the way."

I wriggled a little forward and peeked out of my nest, finding myself face to face with the earth pony.

He put on a smile and said, "You're. A. Pegasus."

I blinked.

"What's the difference between accepting that you've been turned into a alien little talking pegasus, and accepting that you've been turned into a girl alien little talking pegasus?" He backed up put a hoof to his chest. "Should I be having an existential crisis because I'm an earth pony instead of a struggling collegiate? Should Swift be breaking down because she's a unicorn instead of a chemical engineer?"

He leaned in again. "Why should it matter to you - or anyone else, for that matter - what you were versus what you are?"

I gave a little smile, recognizing my own arguments being used against me. "I just didn't know what you'd think," I said tinily, ears folded back.

"What I think? I'm not the one who matters, but if you want to know what I think, I think it's one more bizarre piece to this whole puzzle. Nothing more, nothing less."

"You don't think..." I blushed. "I'm a guy pretending to be a-"

"You're a pegasus," he reiterated, cutting me off.

"...I'm a pegasus," I finally took the hint, smiling sheepishly.

"There's too much at stake to wring our ... well, hooves, at what's gone on in the past. We have to look forward, Stormy. Nothing in the past can help us. None of it will do us any good. And we can't change it."

"Right," I admitted.

"Now, I'll understand it if you want me to avoid calling you a 'lady'. I'm sorry if that was disturbing you before, but in my defense, I didn't know."

I shook my head. "It's what I am, right?" I said with a weak smile.

"So far you've shown no evidence to the contrary," he said with a wink.

I let out a timid laugh. "Thanks, I think."

He held out a hoof to me. "Can we go back outside now and finish looking over the cars?"

"Do we have to look at the Prius?"

Jeff hauled me to my hooves, helping me shed the blankets as I rose. "She spent a lot of time finding that car, you know. You should humor her a little."

I stuck my tongue out and frowned again. "It's a Prius."

"I wish I understood what you have against Priuses. Pri-i? Prius'?"

"Drive behind one for a while," I quipped, following him back to the auto bay doors.

Buddy got up as well and walked beside me on my other side, and I lifted a hoof to skritch behind his ears briefly. "Thanks, pal," I said softly to him. Despite all the snarking we did at one another, he was still a dog, and dogs were still man's best friend, even if man was a pony and a mare now.

When we got outside, Swift was pretending to busy herself with cleaning the last owner's stuff out of the Prius, little neat piles of junk lined up beside the rear hatch. She looked up and clearly didn't know what to say or do as we approached.

I decided it was a good time to bury hatchets. "Sorry I mocked your car," I mumbled.

Swift raised an eyebrow. "What exactly were you two talking about in there?" she asked Jeff.

And so, the rest of the morning was spent going over the vehicles, as we'd scheduled previously. It took all three of us to figure out how to force the Prius to run only on electricity. It limited the car's top speed, but as we were neither having to keep up with freeway traffic nor going on long highway trips, that was fairly irrelevant.

It had a power-adjustable driver's seat, too, which helped put things into the optimal pony-shaped driving position. Neither vehicle had adjustable pedals, though, which the SUV had, so we were sitting way too close to the steering wheel. Luckily there would be few things to crash into to set the airbag off and potentially fill our rib cages with shattered bones.

While the Prius was charging, we went back to the truck. It was left with its door open, same as how it had been after my faux pas.

Jeff crouched before me. "Allow me, madam." He winked and nodded to his back.

I smiled and rolled my eyes, though feeling grateful he was humoring me. I used him as a step stool to climb up into the truck, while Swift levitated herself into the passenger side.

No such luck as a power seat in this beast - instead there was a cloth-and-vinyl fixed bench seat. I tripped over the floor shifter as I slid over to make room for Jeff to haul himself up.

"What the... it's a manual," I commented.

"Yup," Jeff said, perching on the seat. "Oh, have you never driven one before?"

I shook my head. "I'm fine, my dad had a standard van when I was a kid. But isn't it hard to shift for us?"

Jeff shrugged. "I can reach," he said. "Match revs and you don't even have to use the clutch, except for taking off. Sight lines are a bit bad since you're sitting so low, but we'll see about doing something for that."

"I've never driven stick," Swift contributed. "So either I stick with the one car or one of you is going to have to teach me."

"We'll teach you," Jeff said before I could answer. "We should all be familiar with everything just in case we need to use it in a hurry."

"Like if one of us is hurt or incapacitated?" I finished for him, saying what he apparently deliberately left out.

"Or something," he nodded.

I tapped the power button for the ham radio and it woke up nicely, the electronic equipment a stark contrast to the 'ancient' mechanical dash. "Can you hear yourself think over the 453 at road speed?" I asked, referring to the engine.

"Are you supposed to?" Jeff grinned.

"Truck nerds," Swift said, rolling her eyes at us.

Later, I was finishing off the last of our carrots and reading a magazine I miraculously hadn't already seen for the 37th time when Swift came up to me.

"Done lunch yet?" she asked.

I looked up, making an exaggerated chewing motion. "Almosh," I smirked.

"Okay, 'cause I want to talk when... yuck! ...when you're done."

"Is this about earlier? 'Cause Jeff helped me get over that," I said. "We're cool."

"No, but that's good to hear," she said. "I wanna talk about our friends."

"Our friends?"

"The black helicopter guys?"

"Oh," I nodded. "Okay, be right there."

A few moments later, I found the two of them in the common area. "What's up?" I asked.

"Hey," Swift nodded, then set down the pen she was filling her latest notebook (I'd lost count at over 30) with. "Something's been eating at me about 'their' note." She held up the paper in her magic, then set it on the table in front of us.

"Ah yes, the mysterious 'X'," Jeff intoned.

"The mysterious 'X' thinks we have a mystery of our own," Swift said. She quoted the letter: "'We need to know how you are managing to survive at your location with the resources you have on hand.' Forgive me for downplaying what we've done here, but isn't it kind of obvious what we've done? I mean, we haven't done more than anypony else would have done. Right?"

"You'd think so," I agreed. "I mean, shelter, water, food, right? It's not like there's a dearth of resources for us to draw on."

"Unless they think..." Jeff trailed off, then shrugged. "No, I don't know what they're thinking."

"They were at the nuclear plant, so they know it's not radiating," I said. "Or, I guess, we assume it's not radiating. None of the alarms or sirens ever went off, but maybe something strange that doesn't register on the meters happened. For that matter, maybe there was a Dr Freeman in there who fucked with somebody's casserole." I gave Swift a quizzical frown. "You got any ideas?"

She shook her head, then looked thoughtful. "The only thing that comes to mind is the anti-magic field they employed on us."

"They hardly employed it on us," I retorted.

"You know what I mean," Swift hoofwaved. "Maybe it's a side-effect of their own survival gear or travel. Maybe they think it's lethal to everypony else."

It was Jeff's turn to look pensive. "You said everything everywhere has magic, right?"

Swift nodded.

"Except them? What about that rover that delivered the stuff?" he said, gesturing to the kitchen with a hoof.

"I didn't specifically check," Swift said. "But I didn't feel the anti-magic field from it. Or the stuff."

"Me neither," I contributed.

Swift swiveled her head around and looked toward the kitchen, her horn glowing briefly. "It's like everything else," she said. "No anomalies."

"Or maybe everything is anomalous," Jeff suggested. "Maybe magic isn't supposed to be here."

"Well, it is," Swift said, shaking her head. "Whatever their reasoning is, we need to come up with an answer for them when, or if, they call back."

"They said they had other things to do," I commented. "So I think we have a little time."

"Weren't you ever a scout?" Swift shot at me with a smile. "I thought you were supposed to be prepared."

"Ladies," Jeff interjected, and after a pregnant pause, we all shared a laugh considering the earlier events of the day.

"So anyway. We know these guys are out there. We know they're 'dealing with other survivors'-" Swift actually made 'hoof quotes' in the air "-whatever that means. And they want to know, on their own timetable, what we're doing and how we're doing it. So we need to get together an idea of what we're going to tell them when we talk to them again." She eyed me.

"Why are you looking at me?" I asked.

"You're our radio expert, Stormy," she smiled. "Plus you have a great radio voice."

Jeff sniggered, and I blushed, managing to keep my wings in this time. "Thanks... I guess," I said, looking away.

"Okay. Anything wrong with telling them the truth?" Jeff said, looking at us. "We lucked out in getting a skilled camper slash electronics expert, a chemist and professional organizer, and a building engineer slash budding amateur veterinarian together, and used all the supplies we found around us to build a survival shelter?"

"Better than nothing," I shrugged.

"What about a face-to-face meeting, or at least face-to-radio-to-face?" Swift asked. "Can your radio thing do video transmissions?"

I shook my head. "The best I can do is something called 'slow scan TV'. Think of a really slow slide show with no audio."

"Bummer," Swift said. "I get the feeling that seeing us would answer some of their questions. We could even take them on a tour of the place."

Jeff swung his foreleg. "The robot!" he said. When we looked at him, he said embarrassedly, "Aheh... just tried to snap my fingers. The robot, the cart thing, had a camera on it. Presumably for them to navigate with, but there's no reason we couldn't say hi the next time it's out for a stroll."

"Do we know when that is?" Swift asked. "Besides when it comes knocking."

"That weird telemetry sound on the radio was from it," I said. "I can set up one of the radios to listen for it - then we'll know it's close."

"Okay," Swift nodded. "So are we agreed that we tell them our life stories - after waking up on May 23, of course - as the answer to their question?"

We all agreed, and thus the meeting broke up. I went to fiddle with the radios for a bit, setting up things as we'd agreed, then returned to the common area to work on some other things.

Jeff found me there some 90 minutes or so later. Standing over me, some poster board and colored markers before me that I'd appropriated from the arts & crafts aisle, he quipped, "Stay between the lines."

I looked up at him and gave a sarcastic smile. "I should whap you with this for that," I said, unfolding a wing and then putting it away (unable to resist demonstrating my recently developed ability to control them separately, though they still didn't do their job yet).

"Sorry. What're you up to?"

"All the talk about us surviving and using our resources made me think about our scavenger runs," I began. "And yet another thing we probably should've been doing from the get-go. Leaving notices... messages... for other people ... or ponies... to find. Maybe none of them have radios or wore them out long before getting in range of our signal. So we should probably have done this a long time ago." I looked at the blank poster board. "And I'm not the best artist... especially now that I'm gonna have to draw with my mouth."

Jeff hmm'ed. "Sketch it out with a pencil first," he suggested. "That way you can just trace."

"I know, but 'a', it's the idea I'm having trouble with let alone the drawing of it, and '2', it's hard to trace when the lines you're trying to see are under your chin." I took a capped marker in my mouth and bent my head to the poster board. "Shee?"

"I get you," Jeff smiled, as I spat out the marker. "So what is it you want to say?"

I sat back and sighed, contemplating. "As sappy as this sounds, I want a picture of a pony on top. So people - ponies - will know this is from someone like them, who's gone through what they've gone through. Catch their attention."

"Sounds good so far," Jeff nodded. "Standing out against all the other flyers and posters out there. Where are you planning to put this, by the way?"

"I'm thinking we take a gennie to a Staples or something and crank out some copies, and laminate them, then leave them in places where it makes sense that people will gather, or scavenge. Malls, grocery stores, maybe even interchanges and highway junctions? Anyway, the text in the middle should say something like what we've got on the radio message - you know, we're out here, you're not alone, yadda yadda yadda. And then at the bottom, a simplified map of the area, pointing at our location."

"Ponytown. You know you're going to get flak if you don't include that," Jeff smiled.

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, yeah. 'You're not alone. We are survivors. We have food and shelter. Come to Ponytown! Kids 12 and under enter free on Tuesdays.'"

Jeff laughed. "Sounds like you have it all planned out, actually. Why don't you ask our resident scribe to use her magic abilities to draw this?"

"I don't want to seem like I'm taking advantage of her skill all the time," I said. "You know. Like when you own a truck, everyone suddenly needs your help moving? When you get magic, don't you think that she gets tired of levitating stuff for us?"

"She's eager to hone and fine-tune her new skills," he pointed out. "Once you figure out flying, would you consider it a burden to be asked to take something up to the roof, or fly this over there, or go up and see what you can see from overhead, or things like that?"

The thought of flying almost put my fur on edge. The fact Jeff said 'when', figuratively, and not 'if', buoyed my spirits. "Okay, I get your point. I'll ask her."

"All right," Jeff said, tapping a hoof to my shoulder. "Have fun. I'll be out playing with the truck, making sure the tune is right, and such."

I nodded, smiling, and got to my hooves, collecting the art supplies to seek out our unicorn.

"That's actually a pretty good idea," Swift nodded when I told her of my plan. "Sure, I'll help."

I set the art supplies down and flopped down on the floor. "I don't suppose you were any good at drawing too, in your past life?"

"I'm no illustrator, but everypony doodles," she said, taking up the pencil and looking at the paper for a moment. She waved a hoof across it as she spoke. "So. Pony here, 'about us' here, 'Ponytown' here, and a map down here?"

"That's about the size of it," I said, nodding. I gave her a few ideas about the text I wanted to use, and she jotted it down, erasing occasionally as she resized a word or arranged it differently.

"I figure the map should be small enough to not take up the whole thing, but big enough that people can figure out where they are in relation to us," I said.

"Right," she said, nibbling on the end of the pencil. "Wish we had a computer to just print off a satellite view from."

"Maybe Mr X could share some stuff in the next batch," I quipped.

"We need to be careful about adopting or taking in their tech," Swift murmured matter-of-factly as she scribbled out a drawing of the region. "I'm still not one hundred percent convinced they're on the up and up."

"Duly noted," I nodded. "I was just kidding."

"I know," Swift smiled, focusing on her work. After a few more moments, she glanced up and lifted a hoof my way. "Sit up."

"What?" I said, while complying. "What for?"

"Thanks," she said, stealing looks at me from time to time. As she continued to draw, she commanded, "Stop fidgeting!"

"I'm not..." I began, then the nickel dropped. "H-hey!" I blushed, poofing out. "Don't model it off of me! Draw a generic pony!"

"I am," she said, gesturing to the poster board with a levitated pencil. "See? No wings or horn."

"It's me de-winged," I complained, pointing a hoof at the mane style she'd sketched in. "I don't want to be on a poster!"

"Don't be such a baby," she smirked, continuing to draw. "You should be flattered."

As the cap was going on the last marker, Swift held up the poster. "There."

"Not bad," I said, with an impressed nod. It was actually quite professional-looking, with straight lines and clean text. "You're pretty damn decent for a 'doodler'."

"Thanks," Swift smiled. "I think the precision from the magic helps out a lot."

Jeff walked in, covered in grease and possibly a couple of singed patches where fur should have been. "Hey, are you two busy?"

"Ohmigod, what happened to you?" Swift gasped.

"Ah, it's nothin', just changed the oil on the truck," he said. "Fixed an exhaust leak and tightened up all the loose bits too. So. Busy?"

"We just finished the poster," I said, gesturing to it. "What's up?"

Jeff glanced at the board Swift was levitating and waving her hooves over like she was an equine Vanna White. "Oh! Very nice," he said, then blinked. "Is that a green earth pony you?" he asked me.

I just hung my head and sighed. Swift laughed and said, "She's embarrassed I drew her, even if I did a recolor."

"It looks great," Jeff said. "You should be proud!"

"What were you wanting?" I asked him, trying to change the subject.

"Oh! I want to take the truck out for a run, and we all never go out for a ride together. So let's all go for a rip."

I looked at Swift. "I'm in if you are," I said.

"Sounds good to me!" she grinned, setting down the poster and calling for Buddy.

The three of us were crowded into the cab - and crowded was perhaps an exaggeration; three ponies took up hardly as much room as three humans would. With one Dalmatian in the bed of the truck, we rolled out onto the road.

"See this?" Jeff shouted over the din of the motor. He gestured to a broomstick that was on the left side of the steering wheel, held in place with a bit of metal strapping on the lower part of the dash, and resting against the clutch pedal. "This lets you clutch-in with your foreleg." The other two pedals had large blocks of 2x4 lumber attached to them, much like a child would use on a tricycle. Or a pony in a non-adjustable car. "And you don't get as much pedal feel with these extenders in place, but you'll be able to reach them and still see over the dash."

"Not bad," Swift said from the passenger side of the cab, leaning partway over me to take in the modifications. "Though I would probably be able to do at least one thing with magic, so this is all for Stormy's benefit."

"Don't speak too soon," I shot back. "I haven't seen you handle two things at once in your magic yet."

"Oh! Challenge accepted," Swift laughed.

"Don't rack up my hard work, whatever you do," Jeff cautioned jokingly. He pointed to the steering wheel with a hoof, going on with his explanation. "I wanted to put a speed knob on the wheel to make it easier to turn one-hoofed, but there isn't one in Ponytown. I'll check some other auto shops next time I'm out on a run."

"Speed knob?" Swift asked.

I explained the device to her, then turned back to Jeff. "I don't know if there's a place redneck enough here to get that kind of thing. Just, if you find a place, don't get truck nuts," I laughed.

"Oh, I promise," he said, then pushed in the clutch, put the truck in neutral, and rolled to a stop.

"What're we doing?" Swift asked.

"Something I've always wanted to do," Jeff smiled. He gestured to the empty freeway before us - Highway 401, the main artery through Ontario, with nary a vehicle to be seen. He reached back behind me and unlatched, then slid, the rear window open. "Stormy, climb into the box."

"What? Why?"

"Just get out there," he said. "Get some fresh air."

With mild confusion, I wriggled through the window - almost a perfect fit, truth be told - and stood in the bed of the truck, alongside Buddy. "Okay?"

Jeff looked over his shoulder at me, smiling, and worked the clutch and the gearshift. "I kind of feel bad for this morning," he said. "I want to give you this as an apology."

"Give me wha-augh!" I began to ask, then yelped as I had to dance a little bit to keep my footing (hoofing?), as the truck lurched into motion.

Buddy was clearly smarter than me, or at least knew what was going on, and leaned up on the side rail of the bed, sticking his head out into the wind.

I finally figured it out, and put my forehooves on the headache rack, standing up so my head was in the wind above the cab. Looking down, I realized for the first time that the truck had a pop-up sunroof, which was open.

I must have looked bewildered, because Swift laughed and hollered up at me, "Do what comes natural, featherbrain!"

What comes natural? I wondered. Then it hit me at last. I was almost in 'the Batman pose', as Swift called it. And with Jeff keeping the accelerator pedal matted, with the truck hurtling down the freeway well north of the speed limit, I'd rarely experience wind as strong and as fast as this...

Out went the wings, and my senses were suddenly battered with a flood of information. The blast of air in my face and my feathers talked to me like it never had before, and it was saying "Oh wowwwwwww!".

With my head swimming in information and emotion, I somehow found presence of mind to try, just for a second, to flap my wings. Up and down, up and down, up and down. Surely at better than 100 miles an hour, even if I didn't know how to do it myself, aerodynamics should just take over, right?

I felt a little light in my hooves for a fraction of a second, and flapped furiously, but the sensation went away, like I was glued to the truck's roof.

I didn't even mind. I hooted and hollered and laughed, keeping my wings spread wide and lazily flapping in the wind, just feeling the sensation and enjoying the ride.

A Bolt from the Blue

JULY 25

I fought to get my bearings. I couldn't recall how I'd gotten here, or where 'here' was, or what I was doing, but I slowly figured things out. Sort of.

I'm in the clouds, I realized. Pretty high up, too. How had I gotten here? Did I sleepwalk? Did I voluntarily come up here and get short-term amnesia from lack of oxygen?

How am I supposed to know which way is north? Or up, for that matter?

Up, I figured, would be the direction opposite gravity. Wait, do ponies have inner ears? It is the inner ear that gives us our sense of balance, right?

Aha, there we go, I said to myself as my vision cleared. If the lake is that way, then this is north.

It took a split second for me to realize that my vision had cleared because the clouds surrounding me had dissipated.

Then what the hell am I walking on?! I panicked, failing to see the humor in being horrified that my hooves were not being supported by water vapor any more.

As I looked around, bobbing up and down, I didn't clue in for a minute; but eventually, it occurred to me to take a second look back over my shoulder blades.

Flap. Flap. Flap.

My wings were beating the air around me at a lazy pace, keeping me in one position, more or less, in the sky.

"...I'm flying?" I mouthed. Oddly enough, I couldn't hear myself, but what I was saying just seemed to 'be there' nonetheless.

"I'm flying."

I twitched a wing and turned ninety degrees in the sky, to face west.

"I'm flying!!" I laughed, and dipped my head, dropping into a high-speed dive.

A few hundred feet down, I arched my back and lifted my chin, and grunted under the strain of the sudden climb and the G-forces I was loading myself with. They went away as soon as I recognized them, and I rolled over, spinning like a corkscrew, laughing and yelling all the way.

Several aerobatic maneuvers later, I settled for hovering again, giggling madly to myself and wondering aloud how I was suddenly able to fly.

"I'm sorry to disappoint you," came a voice from nearby. "But the simplest answer is also the truth. You can't."

I looked up and over to see another pony hovering there not far from me. She was midnight blue in color, and much larger than any other pony I'd seen. Her wings were giants compared to mine, and she had longer legs as well. And... a unicorn horn? A huge one, at least twice as long as Swift's.

An alicorn, I realized. As my brain finally caught up, the pony's teal eyes twinkled with merriment. "But don't let the truth, nor I, stop you here."

"The Princess," my mouth said, finally hooking up with my brain.

She cocked an eyebrow. "You know me? I am certain I haven't visited you before."

I shook my head. "My friend," I managed to say. I wasn't even sure how I was able to say that - being in this creature's presence was so overwhelming, my head was swimming.

"Ah, yes, of course. I should have expected that ponies would talk amongst themselves."

"Princess... Luna," I said, remembering the name. "I have questions."

"Everypony does," she nodded. "Ask away, though I cannot guarantee you will get your answers."

Of all the things I wanted to know, for some reason, I blurted out, "Why can't I fly?"

She giggled a little and hid, poorly, a smile behind her hoof. "Why indeed? I apologize, your question reminded me of a particular filly in my own world."

"What am I doing wrong?" I prodded. "It's like... physics doesn't work for me!"

This time, she laughed aloud, and made no attempt to conceal it. "That is something you'll need to learn about your world's changes. Physics is no longer the only master there."

I opened my mouth to speak, but found myself ascending above her. I tried to dive, but it was like something was pinching me between my shoulders and lifting me. "What the-?"

Luna looked surprised for a moment. "Our time is apparently up for now," she finally said. "But fear not, my little pony, you will see me again. And keep practicing!"

I woke to the sound of hurried clopping and a strange sensation of floating along in midair.

When I opened my eyes, I realized I was suspended three feet above the floor of Ponytown, being dragged along by the scruff of my neck like a kitten, caught in the magic field of a pink unicorn pony.

"Gah!" I choked as I fully awoke. "What the-!"

Swift said nothing, dragging me along to wherever we were headed, despite my protests and wriggling about. I managed to get my head around to see in the direction we were going, and found myself being hauled towards the radio room/spotting stand, where Jeff was seated before the radio, looking about with mild panic and stammering.

"We-we hear you," he said, then remembered he hadn't stepped on the mic switch, and did so, then started over. "We hear you. Don't go anywhere, we're bringing... oh, good," he said, seeing me being deposited beside him. "Stand down."

"Stand by," I told him sleepily as Swift circled around to sit by his other side. I nudged the mic closer to me. "Stand down means stop and go back to what you were doing."

His expression fell. "Oh! Um, tell them I meant stand by. Sorry."

"Tell who...?" I mumbled, and then I finally realized they were talking to someone on the radio. "Yikes! Mister X?"

Swift shook her head. "Somepony else. Survivors."

"Sorry, say again?" came a scratchy, weak signal in response to Jeff's last instruction to them.

Wow, they're far away, I thought to myself. Or they have a really crummy transmitter. I keyed up. "Apologies, we're here. Who's calling?"

"Hello?" the voice came through again. Female - that was about all I could tell with the static. "Serge, I don't think this is working."

"It's working," I called out. "I hear you. Go ahead."

"It's working!" she echoed. "Uh, hello there. Are you... are you survivors too?"

"Yes, we are," I responded. "How many of you are there?"

"Three," she answered. "Three, uh... people."

I glanced around at my friends. Jeff was hanging off every word coming from me and the speakers. Swift had a small whiteboard and marker that we kept up at the desk so we could take down notes; she'd written down "Girl", and "Serge" on separate rows. Now she added a dash on a third line.

I decided to take a risk. "Are you ponies?"

There was a pause.

"H-how did you know that?" finally came from the radio.

"We all are," I said. "All three of us. It was a logical guess."

"We're not all the same. And we're not normal colors for horses. But I guess we're ponies. Yeah."

I looked at Swift and Jeff again. "Let me guess. Earth pony - I mean, regular pony... unicorn, and pegasus. Right?"

"This is really weird," she said, after another pregnant pause. "How is this po-" *static* "-ble?"

"We don't know. There's a lot we don't know yet. You sound really far off. Where are you?"

"We're-" she began, but there was a noise, and the mic cut off.

"What was that?" Swift said, leaning in towards the radio.

I held up a hoof in a 'wait' gesture. "Someone shouted. I think they-"

"-no, let me tell them!" we heard through static and commotion.

"Is she in trouble?" Jeff added.

"I think her friends are in disagreement with her," I said. I keyed the mic. "Hello? Are you there?"

The mic keyed with some open air - no one speaking - for a moment. Then she came back. "S-sorry. Um, my friends don't want me to say."

I smiled. "That's understandable," I said. "I'm just a voice on a radio. Let me see if I can help you out. I'm in Pickering, Ontario, Canada, at the shopping center. We've been living here since things changed, two months ago. Two of us came from around here, the third came from the Ottawa area. We've renamed the place 'Ponytown'-" I facetiously winced, and got an elbow from Swift for it "-and we have plenty of supplies here. Power too, thanks to one of us who is a building specialist and hooked up some generators. Our names... well, that may seem a little strange, but our names are Stormy, Swift, and Jeff. Two of us have taken names that fit our new lives better."

Maybe went a bit too far, I mused, waiting for the reply.

The radio crackled a bit and a background voice - a male - said "Fine! Do what you want." Then, after a moment, the female was back. "Sorry about that. We're in the Rogers Centre. You know, the stadium?"

"Hey!" Swift said to me. I looked at her and found that I'd poofed out and had a wing in her face.

"Eheh, sorry," I said, folding up. To the radio: "Yeah, I know the stadium well. You're probably doing as well off as we are."

"I'm not so sure about that," came the reply. "There's not a lot of preservable food here. We've gone out a few times to raid supermarkets, but everything close by is pretty much cleaned out now."

"Oh," I said. "Have you come across anyone else?"

"No", she said. "Just us. Is it like that where you are?"

"She sounds scared," Swift noticed. "Especially with that last bit."

I nodded. "We've been searching all over Pickering, Markham, Ajax, Whitby, Oshawa... we're the only ones."

"What happened to the world?"

"We don't know," I said. "But like I said, we have plenty of supplies here. If you're running out, you could come here."

"We don't have any way of moving," she answered. "There's a couple of ATVs here, but they don't work so well any more. Serge says the gas might be bad in them. Oh, I'm sorry. My name is Karin, and the other guy is Rich."

"Pleased to meet you, Karin," I smiled. "Okay. Well, if you can't find transportation..." I eyed my friends. "We can come to you."

"What?" Jeff and Swift stereoed.

"We have to!" I hissed at them.

"You'd do that?" Karin asked, incredulously.

"There's no way we can leave somebody out there who needs help," I told her. "We're going to come get you and bring you back here. We have vehicles which will work." My mind was hurrying to put a plan together. "If you can find a trailer, like a camper trailer or a box trailer, or something that a pickup truck with a regular hitch can pull, that'll help us bring you and your stuff back with us. If not, we'll try to find something on our way to do the job."

"Are you sure you want to do this?" she said after a pause. "You don't know us. We'll be doubling the consumption rate of your supplies."

I raised an eyebrow at that. Pretty smart one. "We'll be able to manage. We have so far, and we have sustainability efforts at least started, if not running. Besides, there's strength in numbers. Six of us will be able to survive better than two sets of three because some of the work we can pool together."

There was another long pause, and then a quiet, barely-audible, almost-sobbing reply. "Th-thank you," Karin said.

"It's not a problem. Keep this radio on, if you can; we'll contact you on this channel when we're getting close. We'll be on the way as soon as we can get some stuff together." Talking about the radio reminded me of the elephant in the room I'd been avoiding mentioning so far. "One quick question... you said you haven't seen any other survivors. Have you encountered any... other people or things? Stuff that maybe... scares you a bit?"

Karin laughed a little. "Ma'am, the whole fucking world scares me right now."

I smiled. "I get you. Okay. We'll be on the way as soon as possible. Hopefully we'll be able to contact you while we're underway, but there's a chance we'll be out of range for a while. Stay put, stay safe, and keep an ear out for us. All right, Karin?"

"Okay," she responded. "And thank you again."

"No problem," I repeated. "Ponytown out." I leaned back away from the radio, and only then realized how intense and wound up I'd been, hunched over and focused on the conversation. Evidently my friends were the same way, as they sat up straight as well, looking at one another and then at me.

"Well," Swift said, breaking the ice, "on one hoof, I know in my heart we're doing the right thing, but on the other hoof, I could smack you for not giving us a chance to discuss it before you committed us."

"You just said it yourself," I protested. "We're doing the right thing."

"Surely you see her point, though, Stormy," Jeff commented.

"Okay, I'm sorry," I acquiesced. "I didn't think it through. I didn't want to 'put her on hold' while we fought over it. She didn't sound like she would take well to hearing nothing from us all of a sudden."

Swift chewed on her lower lip, then nodded. "I think she's probably a kid," she said. "Dunno about the other two. 'Serge' sounds like a bit of a jerk if he was the one arguing with her."

"Let's not judge anybody just yet," Jeff interjected. "Keep it neutral."

I looked over to him. "Will the truck handle that kind of trip?"

He waved a hoof dismissively. "With ease. It's running fine."

"Will we handle it?" Swift asked.

"Well, here's our big chance to find out," I said. "What the big city is like."

"We're all going," she insisted.

I nodded in agreement. "That's why I suggested a trailer, so that there'd be room for them and their stuff. Otherwise, it would make sense to send just one of us, or maybe two for safety's sake - less going out means more room for stuff coming back."

"We do need to take some supplies, just in case," Jeff said. "We might get stuck somewhere and have to overnight away from home."

"We'll work on that," Swift said, standing up and nudging me. "You get the truck ready."

"Are you angry?" I asked her as we walked to the kitchen.

She sighed. "Not really," she admitted. "More excited than anything, I think. I mean, I would've made the same decision you did. But it was kind of sprung on us pretty quick."

"I'm sorry," I reiterated. "From now on, complete buy-in from all of us before I commit to anything."

"Deal," she said with a smile. Cupboard doors started opening with yellow glows as we approached our 'pantry'.

I tugged a couple of plastic tote bins over to put stuff in as Swift levitated it down. "By the way," I said, after spitting out the handle, "I think you might owe 'her' an apology."

"Who? Karin?"

"No," I said. "Her. The Princess."

Swift's expression was one of complete confusion. "What? Why?"

I gestured with a hoof to the back of my neck. "Well, when you came and got me for the radio call..."

Finally she figured it out. "Oh! Oh shit, really? Oh, I'm sorry! To you too. Was it your first time seeing her?"

"Yeah," I said, packing items into the totes. "It's okay though, she was in a good mood."

"She always is, or seems to be I think," Swift said. "What were... no, I won't ask."

"What were you going to ask?"

"What you were dreaming about. But that's personal. Between you and her."

The thought of my dreams being private except for a mystical omnipotent being that dwelled within it made my brain lock up for a second. "Fair enough," I said.

"Oh, hey, Buddy," Swift said as the Dalmatian came into the kitchen, curiously eyeing us. She set down in front of me the items she was levitating, then turned to face Buddy. "All us ponies are going on a road trip," she said. "Probably not back until tomorrow, but maybe longer. I hope not. Hold down the fort while we're gone, okay? Don't let anypony in, except if they're with us. Got it?"

"Arf," came the barked response, with a wag of his tail and possibly a nod of his head (I still couldn't tell if that was genuine or just random).

"Good boy." Swift reached up and petted Buddy's head, and Buddy went off with a sense of purpose, like he was already in 'guard mode'.

I put what Swift had set down into the baskets, and then asked, "You got this?"

"Sure," she nodded. "What are you going to do?"

I turned to face the radio 'room' again. "Send a message to our other fans," I said. "Let them know we're not abandoning this place."

"Good idea," she said. "Go ahead."

I dialed in the frequency I'd talked to 'X' on before. Their little robot hadn't made any more visits in the intervening time, and we hadn't bothered calling for them. But now it seemed important to bring them at least partially up to speed.

"Hello," I called out on the frequency. "Long time no talk," I said, laughing a little, knowing I wouldn't get a reply. "If you're monitoring other radio channels... hell, if you're still out there at all for that matter, you know why I'm calling. But assuming you missed it, we've found another group of survivors, and they need help. We're going to go give them that help, but then we'll be back. Hopefully with them. Three more, just like us."

I unkeyed the mic out of habit - it was bad form, back when the world still existed, to tie up a channel for too long on one transmission. Keying again, I added, "We may be gone for a couple of days. We're not abandoning Ponytown, though. We'll be back. Don't... I dunno, don't take it over, or tear it apart, or anything like that. We still need it. And we're leaving our fourth member here to keep watch. Don't scare him."

"And..." I thought for a minute before I added the last bit. "If you decide to follow or watch over us, please keep your distance. These other survivors, they're pretty skittish as it is. And if they feel what... what I and my friends felt when you went to the nuclear plant that night, they might... I don't know how they might react. Or us either. So please, stay at arm's length."

"Ponytown out."

By the time I got back to the kitchen, Swift had filled the crates and was setting up three more with some bedding and personal effects for each of us.

"The truck's good to go," Jeff said as he came in. "Stack these two and put 'em on my back and I'll go load 'em up."

Swift did as she was asked, and Jeff went off effortlessly carting away the gear on his shoulders. "Come back when you're done," Swift said. "We need to talk about something."

"You got it," the departing earth pony said.

"Can I help?" I asked her.

She kicked at one box which skittered over towards me. "That one's for you. Put what you want to take in it. Plan for a couple of potentially cool nights in the truck. Maybe possibly getting rained on too. Plan for anything."

"Garbage bag ponchos and my favorite Elsa blanket, got it," I smirked, and went to packing.

Jeff returned a few minutes later and Swift got my attention, then faced Jeff and sat down. I did the same.

"Okay, guys," Swift said. "We need to decide on something. Weapons. Do we bring them?"

I raised my eyebrows and looked to Jeff for his reaction. He too looked surprised.

"Wow, good question," he mused, rubbing his chin with a hoof. "What do we have that we could use?"

"Nothing like guns, and we couldn't fire them with hooves even if we had them," I said. "Maybe knives, broom handles, stuff like that."

Swift remained silent and let Jeff respond again. "I guess the bigger question is what do we expect to encounter out there?"

"So far the worst we've come across is a pack of hungry dogs," I said. "And we were safe from them so long as we kept a barrier between them and us."

"And Buddy sent them off to a known food source," Swift cut in.

"And Buddy sent them off to a known food source," I nodded. "My point is, if we're in the truck, we have two means of protection. One, we can just not get out. Two, we can drive away from whatever it is. But the other threat we could encounter - Mr X's black helicopters - nothing we could put together as a weapon would get anywhere near them. Nor would we be able to, the way their presence makes us feel."

"So nothing?" Swift said. "I'm okay either way. I just wanted to make sure we talked about it before we left."

"A few broom handles and such won't take up much space, and could prove to be useful for other things," Jeff shrugged. "Probably better safe than sorry."

"Sure," I nodded.

"Okay," Swift said. "Thanks, guys. I just want us to have everything we need before we get outta here. Let's not get down the road and have to come back."

"Speaking of which, what's the best route to get there?" Jeff asked. "This is the furthest west I've ever been, to be honest."

"Kingston Road," I said instantly. With a wry smile, I added, "Maybe not before Ponification, but I hear the traffic is better these days."

"Let's go trace this out on a map," Jeff suggested. "I want to have a good idea what we're going into. Swift, you okay if I steal her?"

"Go on," the unicorn said, waving a hoof. "I can finish this just fine."

Forty-five minutes or so later, we were standing around the truck. A map was taped to the dash indicating our route, the six totes - the supplies, our personal gear, and one more with some extra stuff in case the others needed anything - under a tarp in the front of the bed, and it was topped off with diesel and ready to go.

"Buttoned up," Swift said, magically lowering the garage door and throwing the interior latch. I watched with bemusement, realizing that locks probably meant nothing to unicorns.

"Okay. Who's driving?"

"We figured, or at least I figured, you would," I said to Jeff. "You've got the most experience with the truck."

"Agreed," Swift said. "I'll navigate, and Stormy'll keep eyes on the skies. And ground, and dark alleys, and everything else."

"Okay then," Jeff said. "Shall we?"

With all of us in agreement, we got into the cab, fired up the truck, and headed west on the highway.

"You know what we should have brought?" I said about fifteen minutes into the drive. "A camera, to record all this with."

"Why would you want to record all this?" Swift said. "It's so bleak, seeing it empty with nopony around."

"Look at it this way - you'll have lots of time to capture this exact scene, Stormy," Jeff contributed. "You can come back tomorrow, or next week, or in the winter, or..."

"I get you," I grumbled. "I just mean, for documentation purposes. Really now, don't deny that people are going to want to see how we survived in the early days."

"Now that's an optimistic view if I've ever heard one," Swift grinned.

"Isn't that what you said? Everything will turn out all right?"

She nodded. "True. Okay, well, I'll write about this and try to draw some of it when we get back. And you, your job is to come out and take pictures of stuff in the coming day. Okay?"

"Deal," I agreed.

The three of us fell silent as we continued down Kingston Road, through the older parts of the outskirts of Toronto. The road had shrunk from a six-lane divided highway to a two-lane street, but it was still very passable. As we'd encountered before, no vehicles were abandoned on the road - well, very few. The occasional delivery van that might have been dropping stuff off at stores at 3:30 in the morning was parked at the curb, but not one car was crashed up against another in an intersection or into the front windows of a restaurant at the end of the street, et cetera. It was a little bewildering - why did all the cars vanish with all the people? If they were abducted, were their cars too? If it was like the bubble that the original Terminator arrived in 1984 Los Angeles in, why weren't there divots out of all kinds of buildings where people had been spirited away?

Kingston turned to Woodbine, and Woodbine turned to Lake Shore Drive. The fear we'd all had of venturing into a city of unknowns was all but gone, but replaced by the depression of encountering a city of knowns - that is, known to be completely still.

Most of the trip we spent in silence, except for the occasional comment about the sights we were seeing. As we turned onto Lake Shore, I gestured with a hoof through the windshield at the CN Tower, now looming in the distance.

"There," I said to Jeff. "That's where we're going. The SkyDome's at its base."

"Too bad they didn't get their radio antenna up there," he said. "Probably would have been able to hear them just fine."

"Oh crap," Swift said, and levitated the radio mic. She'd remembered what I had at the same time - we were all so enthralled by the drive, we forgot to try to make contact with our destination.

"Thanks," I said, taking it in my hooves and making sure the radio was dialed to the correct frequency. Keying the mic, I said, "Hello? Can you hear me?"

I didn't expect an immediate response, but I figured I'd get something. After thirty seconds, I tried again. "Hello, it's the people from Ponytown. Sky- I mean, Rogers Centre, can you hear me?"

That time, I turned the squelch down as soon as I finished talking. The radio erupted in static, and after a second, there was a noise which could have been a weak response.

"If that's you, Rogers Centre, I hear you," I said. "Just barely. Your signal is too weak to hear what you're saying, but I know you're answering. We're on Lake Shore now. We're going to come to Gate... meh, I forget the number, but in the southwest corner, where the little plaza is outside. ETA... fifteen minutes."

After I turned the squelch back up and left us in silence once more, Jeff said, "What road am I looking for?"

"I don't remember the cross street, but it'll be obvious when we get there. Bremner's the road that goes around the stadium."

"Okay."

"Be careful," Swift said. "All of us. Don't get out unless it looks safe."

"Right," I agreed.

Nothing more was said until we came upon Rees Street. I gestured to the right, but even Buddy - blindfolded - would have been able to figure out how to get to the Dome from there. It was barely a couple hundred meters away.

"Leave it running?" Jeff asked.

"What?"

"The truck. Keep it running or shut it down?"

"Shut it off," Swift said. "Unless you intend to stay here with it. Bring the keys too, and lock it up."

I did a quick scan of the area I could see, and saw no one - and nopony - in view. "Looks clear," I said. "If they're outside, they're on the other side of the stadium or they're in hiding."

"Try them again," Swift suggested, nudging me with the mic.

I took it up again and keyed it. "We're here," I said without preamble. "Gate 10. Can you hear us?"

There was silence again - not even static this time, even when I unsquelched the radio.

"What do you think?" Jeff asked.

"Maybe they're on their way to us, and don't have a handheld radio," I suggested. "It looks clear, I say we get out and look."

The three of us climbed down from the truck and looked up at the stadium. It always felt immense for me to stand beside before the world changed, but now that I was so much smaller, it was a complete monster. Four-story-tall posters of ball players who most likely didn't exist any more flapped in a mild breeze.

"Spread out or stick together?" Jeff asked.

"Stick together," Swift insisted immediately, and I didn't argue.

"By the way," I said as I walked across the plaza. "Nobody feeling the weird scare-ray sensations, right? From Mr X's stuff?"

Swift shook her head. "We're safe from that, at least."

"Good."

The doors at Gate 10 and the adjacent Gate 11 were locked and barricaded with plywood, fencing, and other junk. The box office and entrances on the side street weren't accessible either.

"What do you want to do?" I asked Swift. "Wait here or circle around?"

Swift frowned. "Neither is optimal," she said.

"Let me take a run around the place," Jeff suggested. "If I see anything, I'll holler. If I'm threatened, I can move pretty fast."

"Okay," I said, then looked to Swift. "Okay?"

"I guess," she admitted.

Jeff nodded and took off up the stairs to the north. I said to Swift, "I was gonna say we wouldn't hear him if he yelled from the other side of the ballpark, but then I remembered my only experience with this place was with tens of thousands of people making noise around."

She giggled a little. "Good point."

I went back to the truck and unlocked it (Jeff had given us the keys) so I could try the radio again. As I was about to key it up, Swift called for me, so I got back down and went over to her.

"I heard something from the other side," she said. "Did you lock up?"

I nodded. "Let's go," I told her, and we were off.

Halfway around the structure, we found a door that had been bucked in. Naturally, it was dark inside.

"You don't have to tell me you don't like it," I told Swift. "I don't either."

"Jeff!" Swift hollered. "Where did you go?"

There was no response.

"That's one thing we didn't bring. Flashlights," I said.

"Let me see if I can do something about that," Swift said. She stepped close to the doors and let her horn glow. It brightened more than usual until a sphere of light about the size and luminescence of a 60-watt bulb floated before us.

"Neat," I commented. "So you're not just a one-trick p-"

"Finish that and you'll be put up in the rafters again when we get home," Swift growled.

"Sorry," I laughed. "Okay then. Shall we go?"

"All right."

I let Swift step through the broken door, and followed along behind.

Scattered Showers, Improving By Evening

JULY 25
1:07 PM

Swift and I were casting about in the concourse of the SkyDome, in near-total darkness. The power, of course, was out, and most of the doors were blocked with random bits of debris. Clearly on purpose, though, as we'd done at Ponytown to prevent all but the door we wanted used from being accessed.

Swift's latest trick, a ball of light hovering over her head like a cartoon lightbulb, was giving us a dim view of the world around us. The Quaker Steak & Lube restaurant, all locked up, off to our left, was still making my mouth water just thinking of the concept of perfectly cooked and salted french fries. When we got home, I'd have to check the potatoes and see if any were good to harvest yet, and then figure out a way to get some deep frying going on.

"Jeff!" Swift called out, her voice echoing up and down the empty concourse. We assumed he went in the obviously open door, though we knew not why. Had he seen someone? Heard someone?

If so, why didn't he come get us, or at least tell us where he was going?

"Whoa! Look out," Swift said, and put a leg across my chest to prevent me from stepping onto nothingness as the stairs to the lower bowl seats began before us.

"Those come up fast," I said after thanking my friend. I descended them carefully with her and we continued looking around.

"Does the fact that there's no encampment around here give you the heebie-jeebies at all?" Swift asked.

"Heebie. Jeebies?" I said, cocking an eyebrow.

"It's weird!"

"I know what you mean," I admitted. I shrugged, not even thinking that she couldn't see it. "It's a big place. Maybe they set up camp far away from the door, like we did."

"Right," Swift nodded. "Fair enough."

We made it down to row 1 - field level - without breaking any necks or legs. I blinked and motioned to the edge of the low fence that separated the field from the seats. On a human, it was a little over knee-high - to us, it was at about our chins. "Swift, light that up."

On the unpadded blue tubing that formed the seats-side of the wall was some fresh blood. Not a lot, but enough that you could tell what it was, and that it was deposited recently.

"Jeez..." Swift's ears folded back to complete her worried expression.

"I kinda wish we'd brought the sticks outta the truck," I murmured. "Jeff!" I hissed into the darkness.

"Hey, there's more on the top," Swift said, gesturing to a thin smear along the top of the wall's padding.

I looked at it, contemplated, and then said, "Okay. Boost me over."

Without argument, Swift magically helped me over the wall, and then assisted herself as well (and I didn't notice until later that she was able to keep up her light spell all the while). We were just beyond third base, on the warning track, but couldn't even see that far despite our magical illumination.

"Stop," Swift said in a whisper, freezing solid still. I did the same.

We could hear slow, uncoordinated footfalls on the artificial grass, crackling as the plastic blades crunched underhoof. God, I hope it's underhoof, and not under something else.

"Jeff," Swift called out in a low, conversational tone.

There was no response.

She looked to me. "Let's slowly follow the noise. If I stop, you stop, and vice versa. If you see something, let me know. Be ready for anything."

"You got it," I said, and fell a half a length behind her to her right side as she moved forward.

Three tense minutes later, or possibly an eternity (I'm not sure), we found ourselves approaching a reddish-tan and blond Earth pony staggering about in shallow center field.

"Jeff," Swift said with relief and hurried to his side, then staggered back a half-step. When I got to them, I saw why she'd recoiled - he had a bloody nose and black eye.

"Hey," he said weakly. "I'm... almost checked... hot on their trail."

"Jeff?" Swift said concernedly. "Are you okay?"

"Gotta find the others," he murmured, blood seeping from his nostrils. "They might be... 'fraid of the dark. Or those spiders."

I poofed out as the two of us whirled to look at what he was pointing at. There was nothing there but green plastic turf.

"Let's get him back to the truck," I said. "Or at least outdoors. I think he has a concussion."

"Yeah," Swift said, trying to guide him back the way we came (or at least we hoped we were pointed that way). "C'mon, buddy."

"Buddy's here?" Jeff said with alarm. "Shit, he was supposed to be guardin' Ponytown."

"He is," I said, moving to his other side to kind of keep him corralled. "Let's get you outside."

"But what about the girl? And the jerk guy and th'other guy we didn't hear from yet?"

"We'll find them soon enough," Swift said. "Jeff, you're hurt. We need to get you somewhere we can take a good look at you."

"'Kay," he agreed after a long pause to comprehend. "Yeah. Stupid railing."

"Why'd you come in here?" I decided to ask, not sure if I'd get an answer. "Did you hear something?"

"Yeah, a scream," he answered sluggishly, then made a half-hearted attempt at a girlish yelp. "Somebody needs help. No. Somepony needs help, right Swifty?" he chuckled.

"We'll help them as soon as we finish helping you," she assured him.

We got to the field wall and climbed over it again, accompanied by a curse and a feeble buck from Jeff - his attempt at punishing the structure that had injured him. Then it was time to tackle the stairs. "These don' look steep, but when you don't see 'em comin' - woosh!"

Jeff threw his forelegs out to the sides with the last bit, as punctuation to his statement, and Swift and I had to prevent him from falling on his face. "Yeah," I said pointedly. "They're tricky when you don't keep your hooves under you."

We climbed the stairs, then crossed the 30 meters of concourse, and were back at the door to the outside world. Jeff winced at the bright light, and I have to admit after adjusting to the dim illumination Swift was providing, I wasn't too pleased either.

"Stay with him," Swift said. "Make sure he doesn't get worse. Try to stop the bleeding."

"What, are you going to search alone??" I protested. "Wait until I can go with you."

"Stay with Jeff," she stressed. "If somepony in here was screaming, they might be in trouble."

"All the more reason for me to go wit-"

"I've got this," Swift said, fixing me with a gaze that said she was done discussing it.

"...fine," I frowned. "At least take one of our sticks with you."

"I'll improvise something first chance I get," she told me. "Get some water into him and sit him down."

"Be careful," I said. Then I realized something, and said, "Please, at least just wait 'til I get him to the truck and bring you back a radio."

Swift frowned. "Make it quick."

I hurried Jeff over to the curb by the truck as quickly as I felt was safe for him, then unlocked the truck, grabbed the handheld radio, made sure it had power, and tucked it under my wing; then, after admonishing Jeff to stay put, I galloped back over to the door.

"Keep in touch," I said, lifting my wing and letting the radio levitate away from me.

Swift smiled. "I'll be okay," she said. "Keep him awake and well." Then she turned and disappeared into the darkness.

Jeff had stayed put as requested. It almost made me want to sprint back and call out to Swift to wait for me, so I could catch up with her, but in my heart I knew he needed to be watched.

"I'm going to get you a water," I said, climbing up into the bed of the truck. One of these days we need to hit up a vet clinic and figure out things like pain meds for horses. Coming back down with a bottle between my teeth, I wrenched the cap off and handed it- sorry, hoofed it to him to drink.

As he was drinking, I studied his face. The black eye was a little swollen and he had cuts around the side of his face. His nose had stopped bleeding, but he was still drenched in red on the front of his face. I got another bottle of water to rinse him off, only meeting with mild protest.

I let him sit and take stock of himself for a few minutes, blowing his bloody nose and gathering his wits. "Can you even breathe through that right now?" I asked.

"M'talking, aren't I?"

"How do you feel now?"

"Like I headbutted a locomotive."

I looked at him. His eyes seemed equal - I remember hearing that head-injured people would often have different sized pupils. I hoped the same followed for horses.

I held up a hoof. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

Jeff looked at me like I was the brain-damaged one, then smirked. "Very funny."

I sat down in front of him and smiled. "Do you remember what happened?"

"Some," he mumbled. "Found an open door. Shouted 'hello' into it. Heard a far-off scream. Then you two found me."

"I think there's a little bit missing in there," I told him. "You fell down some stairs and hit your head on a railing."

"So much for being the hero," he smiled, then winced. "Where's Swift?"

"She went inside to look for the others."

"By herself?"

I resisted the urge to swat him with a wing. "You went in by yourself."

"Yeah, and lookit what it got me." He gingerly touched the side of his face near the black eye with a hoof, and then sucked in air through his teeth in pain. "Ow."

"I wish we had something to give you," I said. "I don't know if aspirin or ibuprofen will hurt us. Want more water, though?"

He lifted the bottle with his free hoof. "Still got some here. Thanks."

I was contemplating leaving him sitting by the truck and venturing as far as I dared inside the door, when the radio inside the truck finally crackled. "Stormy, you there?"

I pulled open the door, scrambled up into the tall cab, and managed to key the mic. "Go ahead," I told Swift.

"I've got 'em. They were way up in the luxury box level. Everypony's okay, and we're coming out."

"That's a relief," I said. "Need any help?"

"Nah, we're good. How's Jeff?"

"Getting better," I said. "About as sane as the rest of us now."

"Good to hear... I think," Swift half-laughed. "Talk to ya in a few minutes."

I climbed back down, leaving the door open, and sat beside Jeff again. "She's found them, and they-"

"I heard it," he interrupted me, nodding. "Good news."

"Did I lie about your prognosis?" I said with a hint of a smile.

"Big headache," he said. "I'll be okay."

"Can you stand?"

He gritted his teeth, grunted, and slowly got to his hooves. He swayed once, but ended up staying upright without support.

"Take it easy," I cautioned him. "Don't over-exert yourself."

"I'll be okay," he repeated.

"I just don't want you running across the plaza and eating pavement."

"I'm good," he insisted. "I'm just gonna take a few steps. Make sure everything's working. You go to the door and meet them."

"You sure?" I asked.

"Go, Storm. I'll be fine."

"Okay," I nodded, and turned and headed across the plaza, up the steps, and towards the open door. As I was heading there, I realized with dismay that I'd been on the field at SkyDome - probably for the only time - and hadn't stood at home plate, or run the bases, or anything on my bucket list.

I got to the door just as a tan earth pony was coming out. She took a step back in surprise upon seeing me.

"It's okay," I said. "I'm with the pony who found you."

"Oh," she said a little nervously. "Hello."

I stepped aside to let her fully out the door. She had a striking mane and tail of varying shades of green, and eyes of a reddish-orange tint, a little darker than Jeff's coat. On her rump was a red cross, much like a first-aid insignia. Behind her was a white male pegasus, a little on the stocky side, with red mane and tail and slate grey eyes; he had a butt picture of a crescent wrench crossed over a claw hammer. He squinted at the bright light and cast me a strange - possibly suspicious - look.

Behind him and just ahead of Swift was a thinner but slightly taller dark brown pony, with jet-black mane and tail and deep blue eyes. His tail and horn - okay, so he's a unicorn - had streaks of silver throughout - dock to tip along his tail, and in a spiral from the base of his horn to its point. He wore the mark of a paint brush and several splashes of color, as if dabs of paint on a traditional painter's palette.

Swift came out, smiling briefly as she saw me, but turning cross in a flash. "Where's Jeff?" she demanded. "Did you leave him?"

"He insisted," I said, wings out. "He's by the truck - he promised he wouldn't go anywhere."

Her light spell diffused, but I noticed her horn was still glowing. Momentarily, a cart squeezed through the doorway, carrying a stack of random and assorted items - clearly the other ponies' belongings.

"Whatever," she sighed. Gesturing with a hoof, she said, "Stormy, meet Karin-" pointing to the mare, then the pegasus and finally the unicorn "-Serge, and Rich."

"Howdy," I said, waving a wing, and reflexively offering a hoof to shake, or at least bump. Rich, closest to me, figured it out and tapped my hoof with a faint smile.

"Hi," the girl said sheepishly. "Thanks for coming for us."

"Not a problem," I smiled. "Can we all go down towards the plaza to meet our third?"

As we descended the stairs, Swift carried the cart with ease in her yellow glow, bypassing the cement steps with it completely. I couldn't help but notice that the trio were glancing back at her and exchanging cautious looks with one another.

"Jeff," I called out, waving a hoof. He cantered over to us and smiled, looking half-decent - much better than I'd envisioned when I first saw his injuries.

"Jeff, this is Rich, Serge, and Karin," Swift introduced them, setting their cart down near the truck.

"Pleased to meet you," Jeff smiled, dipping his head in a kind of a bow.

Karin blinked and stepped forward. "How'd you get hurt?" she asked, then gasped. "It wasn't from looking for us, was it?"

"It's nothin'," Jeff said dismissively. "Just a bruise."

"I'm a paramedic student. Let me look," Karin insisted, then added in a murmur with ears folded back, "...at least I was."

"Jeff, let her give you a once-over," I suggested. "Karin, I think he may have had a concussion. He rung his bell pretty hard falling down."

Jeff obligingly sat down and let himself be inspected. Serge was watching with an expressionless face, but Rich was studying Swift intensely as she sorted their gear into the back of the truck.

I sidled up to her and got her attention, nodding towards him. She figured it out and backed up a bit to be closer to him. "Haven't seen magic in use before, huh?" she smiled.

"It's amazing," he said. "How are you doing that?"

"Once you gain your focus, it's actually pretty simple," Swift explained. "Stick with me and I'll show you."

I decided since the other two were pairing off by race, I might as well too, and headed for the white pegasus. "So, hi," I said to him.

He shifted his gaze from Karin to me and then back.

"Serge, right? I'm Stormy." I offered my hoof.

He glanced at my hoof, then my face. "Of course you are," he rumbled.

I was rendered momentarily speechless by the cool reception. "Trust me, it fits me better than my old name," I smiled, then hurried to change the subject. "Can you fly with those?" I nodded to his wings.

He grunted again. "Haven't tried," he said. "Too busy survivin', kid."

I failed to suppress my laugh at being called a kid. "Fair enough," I said, letting it drop.

"Folks? Gather 'round," Swift said, levitating a crate down from the pickup box. "We've got some box lunches we brought with us, and some water. Let's take some time to have a bite and get to know one another."

Good idea, I thought to myself, admiring Swift's planning. We all got together and sat in a circle as Swift distributed the fruit & vegetable salads.

"So you're a medic?" I asked Karin.

She nodded a little. "Sort of," she said. "I was in training when this all went down. So not really."

"Hey, it's better than nothing," Jeff commented. "Thanks, by the way."

"No problem," Karin smiled, blushing a little.

"Besides, if you're a medic, she's our mage-" I pointed with a hoof at Swift "-so we're ready for a raid."

Swift rolled her eyes and Jeff chuckled. Karin clearly didn't get it and Serge was disinterested, but Rich brightened up, laughed a little, and held out a hoof, which I reached across the circle and bumped. "Good one," he said.

I caught a tinge of accent in his voice, and said, "Can I ask? Quebecois?"

"Oui," he nodded, smiling. "Trois-Rivieres."

"Jeff's from Ottawa," I said. "He might know a bit of French. I'm afraid I'm a little too rusty."

"Un petit peu," Jeff chimed in.

We all chattered on some more, and Serge spoke up once the conversation dwindled. "So. How much time did you all lose?"

"Lose?" I said, both eyebrows going up.

"What do you mean?" Swift asked.

Serge seemed irritated. "How much time did you lose?" he repeated. He tossed a hoof towards Karin. "Eight days." To Rich. "Three weeks." To himself. "Two days. What about the rest of you?"

The three of us looked at one another and then to Serge. Jeff said, "I don't think any of us lost any time at all. I know I didn't."

"Me either," Swift shook her head.

"I was asleep, but I woke up around eight or nine hours after I went to bed," I said.

"That's weird!" Karin cut in. "All three of us seemed to skip several days at least."

We listened as Serge explained. "I was on break on my laptop at work in the Maintenance of Way division over at Union Station," he said, angling a hoof towards the train terminal on the other side of the stadium. "I must have nodded off, but I didn't feel like I got any rest at all. I woke up Monday morning according to the clock on my computer screen, looking like this."

"I left night school at Centennial to drive home and suddenly night turned into day. And I turned into a horse... or a pony, I guess is what we're calling ourselves? And I crashed my car on the Gardiner from the shock of it all. Found my way here and found Serge making a nest out of the luxury boxes."

Rich spoke up. "I was in town for a gaming convention. I'm a computer game programmer. I woke up looking like this after the first night of the convention, and spent half a day trying to figure out how to get down from the eleventh floor of my hotel-" he gestured to a nearby tower "-without elevators or power for the card-swipe doors in the stairwells. I saw signs of life over here and came in to find I'd either slept twenty-one days or otherwise really missed out on the rest of the conference."

"That's really strange," Swift said, looking to Karin. "Especially yours where you say night turned into day. Are you saying you were driving along in the middle of the night on May 23 and suddenly it was daytime on May 31?"

Karin nodded and shrugged. "I didn't know it at the time. Serge's been really careful to keep track of what day it is. Since nothing's automatically recording it any more."

"Another one for the list?" I asided to Jeff, and he nodded.

"'The list'?" Serge inquired, an eyebrow raised.

Jeff chuckled. "The list of weird sh.. stuff that's accompanied this phenomenon," he smiled.

We continued talking over lunch. Had they found anyone else? No, just them, and random dogs, cats, and other pets roaming the downtown core. That bit of conversation prompted some discussion on how there was now just six of us left from a population area of around six or seven million people, and the same reactions that the original three of us had had came forth again.

What had happened inside, I wanted to know, derailing our subject briefly. Why had Jeff heard a scream?

Embarrassedly, Karin admitted that was her. They heard him shouting out and she was startled, dropping a box of stuff. In the dark, they didn't want to risk moving around and stumbling into someone that may or may not have been friendly (they weren't certain Jeff was from our group).

That brought up the question of why they were in the dark and didn't answer the radio. They didn't bother refueling their generator after talking to us on the radio, because they expected to be rescued and wouldn't need it any more. So when it ran out, it plunged them into darkness and took out their communications along with it - a simple lapse in judgment.

"So," Jeff said, polishing off his meal and standing up - still a little shakily, I noticed, but Karin had her eye on him as well, and didn't seem concerned. "Let's go get the rest of your stuff and get it loaded."

The three ponies looked at one another, then him. "This is it," Serge said, nodding to the cart Swift had unloaded. "Nothing else worth keepin'."

"Oh," Jeff said with a forced smile after a long pause. "Okay then." He looked at the neatly packed truck. "I guess we don't need a trailer then..."

"Do you mind riding in the box?" I asked. "I can do it if one of you wants to ride up front with Jeff."

"We can both ride in the back," Swift spoke up. "That means two of you can fit in the cab. Maybe all three if you don't mind getting cozy."

"I'll sit outside," Rich said. "I want to learn more about what I might be able to do with this." He nodded his head forward and kind of tried to look at his own horn.

"Deal," Swift smiled.

"Well, if nopony objects, maybe we should get on the road," Jeff said. "We'll get home and get you settled and then have time for supper and some more discussion."

Everyone agreed at that (and the three didn't even flinch at Swift and now Jeff's unique terminology), and we all saddled up - ergh, sorry, I can't believe I said that.

I was looking down from my perch above the headache rack, through the sunroof at the ponies in the cab of the truck. Serge was speaking casually with Jeff - a lot more animated and engaged than he'd been outside the stadium. Maybe the unique pickup truck brought him out of his shell, he being a mechanical professional and all. Karin had her face all but pressed to the glass, watching the outside world go by, clearly awestruck by the emptiness of it all.

I was in my normal pose, except for the wings - I didn't want to draw that much attention to myself at this point. It took all my inner strength not to flap them open and drink in the sensation of the wind rushing through my feathers, though; still, I was getting some... information? Sensation?... just from standing there and feeling the manufactured breeze go by.

Momentarily, Swift climbed up beside me, and I edged aside to give her room.

"Taking a break from your student, sensei?" I smiled, turning to regard her.

"He's a little overwhelmed," she nodded. "Gonna get down and get some rest now. I don't blame him. This whole trip was two-thirds clusterfuck from all angles."

"We all came out of it okay, with minimal bumps and bruises," I pointed out. "But if we do this again, you're right, we do need to put together a better plan. Maybe something written out with assigned roles and such. And proper supplies for doing a search-and-rescue."

"Hopefully we get a chance to get better at it," Swift smiled, and I nodded, understanding her meaning.

Hopefully, there were other ponies to rescue.

I was about to say something more - I think about the fact we'd neglected to ask them if they'd come across Mr X's crew, but I forget, because something in the background behind Swift, as we passed a side street, caught my eye.

"Oh... Oh shit!" I gasped, and my wings snapped open reflexively. Before I realized what I was doing, I leapt from the truck, fluttering to a safe landing on the sidewalk, and galloped back to the street we'd passed. Behind me, Swift was pounding the roof of the truck with a hoof, calling for Jeff to stop and back up.

I slowed to a trot, and then a slow walk, letting out a little squeal, wings still out in surprise. "Uhhh..." I said with a waver in my voice - that kind-of excited, shocky sound people sometimes make when something unexpectedly fantastic befalls them.

The truck grumbled in reverse back to the intersection and stopped, but I was approaching my quarry slowly, unable to believe what my eyes were seeing.

"Oh, for-" Swift said behind me, and jumped down, coming over.

By that time, I had my face pressed against the driver's side window glass of the titanium metallic-colored, glass-roofed Model S parked at the curb. An extension cable ran to a receptacle embedded in a stone wall framing the house's front lawn, but I wasn't paying attention to that, other than to appreciate the fact that the owners weren't there. The layer of dust on everything in the area made that obvious enough.

"You're getting drool on it," Swift said sarcastically.

"Oh, my sweet, I will nurse you back to health, after you've been neglected for so long," I said, leaning against the car. "Don't worry, you're in good hooves now."

Swift shook her head and turned back to call out to Jeff. "We're gonna need a minute or two here," she said. "Stormy's brain has encountered an error and must restart."

"Never mind her," I cooed to the car. "She doesn't have to ride in you if she doesn't like you."

"Hey, I never said that," Swift shot back.

She managed to pry me away from the car and search the adjacent house, while the others gathered around and watched, some in bemusement, some in complete confusion. We found the key fob after a quick search, and I went back outside, mashing the driver's side door handle with a hoof.

The door handles obediently popped out of the sides of the car, and I hooted in delight.

Opening up the door, I wriggled into the seat, then adjusted it for my stature. Finally, the moment of truth - I pushed the brake pedal. Everything on the dash lit up and indicated it was ready, with over 300 kilometers of range remaining.

"Ohhh," I squeaked again.

"Let me know if I should get some paper towels," Swift deadpanned from the door sill. "On second thought, I'm coming with you. Somepony's gotta keep you focused."

"Is she going to be okay?" Jeff quipped.

"Probably," Swift smirked, "but we'll let her have her moment. Give me the handheld back, and we'll see you at Ponytown."

Darkening Skies

JULY 27

"Anypony seen Stormy?"

"Take a guess," I heard Serge answer Swift.

"Thanks," she said, and her hoofsteps grew louder as she entered the auto shop. A glow surrounded the driver's door and pulled it open, and she stuck her head in the car. "You're going to run the battery down again."

"I don't care," I giggled. "I'm loading all my music."

"Naturally."

"And after that, I'm going to the radio place and getting a ham rig to put in here," I added, a grin plastered across my face.

"Of course. Can you squeeze in a minute to talk here and there?"

I turned to face Swift while the music player began its sync. "I'm listening," I said.

Swift lowered her voice. "Do you think maybe we should read the others in on Mister X?"

I mulled it over for a minute, giving it the contemplation it deserved. "Yeah, probably," I said eventually. "To be honest, I was waiting until they weren't flinching every time you used your magic. Once they hear that there's some kind of anti-magic device out there, things may not go so well."

"Good point," Swift conceded. "Any suggestions?"

"Idunno," I shrugged. "To tell you the truth, we haven't heard from them since the first time. Their little robot hasn't showed up either 'in person' or as noise on the radio. I'm beginning to wonder if they bugged out."

"What do we do then, if that happened?"

"The same thing we're doing now," I said. "Surviving."

Swift shook her head. "Whatever. Well, I still think it's a good idea to prepare everypony before the next time the black helicopters start flying overhead."

"I hear you," I nodded. "You're the best gauge of how they're handling magic. You should be the one to decide when the time is right to spring that particular trap on them."

"Trap?"

"Figure of speech." I noticed that the sync was done. "So now I'm heading over to Radioworld. Are you coming or staying here?"

She thought it over for a moment. "Fine, I'll come."

"Pull the cord out please," I grinned, and pulled the door shut.

Several minutes later, we were tearing down the highway with Def Leppard coming out of the sound system.

"This thing is crazy quiet compared to the truck," Swift said over the music.

"I know," I said, the grin not yet having left my face. "And it goes like stink, too!" To prove my point, I shoved my right hind leg down, and the car lurched forward at a faster rate than before.

"Be careful!" Swift scolded me. "The last thing we need to do is wear poor Karin out."

I eased the throttle off to settle in at 160 kilometers an hour. "She's doing fine," I countered.

"She's overwhelmed," Swift disagreed. "She keeps going over all the medical textbooks we picked up yesterday, and checking and re-checking our supplies, going on about how we don't have enough of such-and-such."

"Has anyone thought to tell her she doesn't need to carry the weight of the world on her back?" I asked. "I'll bet she feels like she's responsible for all our well-being. That's a pretty big burden to shoulder."

"You can try," Swift shrugged. "I did. Jeff did too, but she used his injury as 'proof' that her skills were essential."

"It'll all smooth out," I said, not knowing what else to really add. "Did I see Serge and Jeff drawing plans for something this morning?"

Swift nodded. "Serge thinks with six of us here instead of three, we need a proper kitchen instead of just the wash tubs and a couple of coolers. He and Jeff are redesigning the whole place with our rooms and the common area as the core."

"Cool," I said, and decelerated as we got to the electronics store. Pulling in, I noted it was exactly as we left it weeks before - which was good in one sense, but depressing as well.

We got out of the car and headed in the open door of the shop. I bee-lined for the radio I wanted, and directed Swift to find antennas and cabling of the right type.

"I didn't bring any tools, so we'll just take this back to Ponytown and install it there," I declared.

"Fair enough," Swift said.

We were in and out of there in ten minutes - don't ever let anyone say that girls take forever to shop. Yeah, I went there. We even picked up a second set of everything to put in the Prius.

As we climbed back in the car, the radios stowed in the trunk, Swift's ears flattened and she looked ill. "Um, Stormy..."

"Yeah?" When I turned and saw her, I blinked. "You okay? Gonna hurl or-"

"You'll feel it in a second," she said. "I think maybe that 'going like stink' plan from earlier is a good idea."

A sense of dread built up between my heart and my stomach and began to spread out from there. My hide began to crawl, and I felt like I was breaking out in a cold sweat. We both swiveled around in our seats and saw a bulky, black prop-driven aircraft at about fifteen hundred feet, a couple miles behind us.

I backed out of the parking lot quickly and got back on the highway, matting the accelerator pedal again. This time I let the car go as fast as I felt I could control it with hooves, which was somewhat north of 160, but not too far. The 'bad vibes' ebbed slightly, but then plateaued again.

Swift turned around again to look behind us. "Still there," she said with a trembling voice. "But not gaining on us. Keeping distance."

"Do we go home or draw them away?" I asked, focusing on driving.

"I... I don't know."

"We need to decide," I urged her.

"... Draw them away," she finally said.

I all but locked up the brakes, turning north on Brock Road, and hammered the 'gas' again, speeding up once more. The briefest of glances that I allowed myself showed the airship in a wide arc to follow us north.

"Still there," Swift said.

"Maybe they don't know they're doing this to us," I mused aloud. "But no, I told them as much in a radio call. If they were listening."

"I-I can try to brave it out," my friend offered.

"Let's file that in the 'plan B' slot for now," I said. The car bottomed out over the Finch Avenue intersection, taking a little air in the process.

"Did you put one of the sat phones in here yet?"

"No, because the friggin' things don't work," I said. We'd never been able to get them to connect to one another, despite knowing and dialing each others' phone numbers. They were turning out to be duds. "And I'm willing to bet you didn't have a handheld radio on you when you came to talk to me."

"Nope," she said.

"Okay. Hang on." The car whumped through the intersection at Concession 3, and when it settled down again, I spoke once more. "Still there?"

"Still there," she said. "It's keeping a pretty uniform distance."

The burning in my chest confirmed that. "I can tell," I responded. Settling in on the straightaway north of the 3rd, I used the time to try to think of a course of action.

"Stormy, we don't need to be running from them. They've been benevolent so far. Let's just-"

"This-" I said, reaching across to thump her in the chest "-can't be good for either of us. For all we know it's electromagnetic cancer. I'm not willing to put either of us through agony just to tell them to F off."

"We can't run forever!" she shot back.

"For another 217 kilometers, we can," I said, glancing at the dash. Under the underpass at Taunton we went, angling slightly to continue towards the Fifth Concession line. Thinking of that road, I settled on a plan. It wasn't foolproof, and far from ideal, but it would hopefully do the trick.

"Hang on for a hard left," I said as we climbed the hill towards the 5th. The flashing amber light hung over the intersection was there, but neither flashing nor lit, probably never to do so again.

"Don't crash," Swift advised me unnecessarily.

"Oh, ye of little faith," I smirked, and somehow managed to execute a rapid hoof-over-hoof spin of the wheel, tires squealing as the car left Brock and headed west on the paved Concession 5 road.

Swift turned around again, peering between the leafy canopy we'd gone under. "I think they're still there," she said. "My gut says so."

"Mine too," I agreed. "Just a little longer, I hope."

I got up to 150 - the most I dared on the narrow two-lane tarmac which hadn't seen any traffic nor upkeep in two months. Up and down hills we went, feeling like we were on a roller-coaster. If I was on the roof of the truck through this section, I'd finally get to fly, I told myself detachedly.

We thundered into the village of Whitevale, a few houses and side streets with a farm feed lot/mill and a bridge over a creek as the center of town. Just after the bridge was a narrow dirt road, which I slowed nearly to a crawl for and turned in, going under even thicker tree cover, coasting the car to a stop in the parking lot of the Seaton Hiking Trail.

"Can't tell at all now," Swift said, looking through the windows and roof at the tree branches above us.

"Yup," I said. "But maybe they can't either. Unless they're using infrared or something related to their funky anti-magic stuff."

The discomfort in our guts grew steadily for a few moments, then peaked. Lowering the window, I could hear the props of the aircraft orbiting the village. For about five minutes, it stayed there, circling and keeping our blood pressure up, and then at last, it must have turned and headed off; the sense of dread fell off abruptly and ebbed away to nothingness.

I looked over to Swift, who was panting and shaking; I realized that my own heart was pounding very nearly out of my chest too.

"Good idea," Swift sighed with relief. "Thanks."

"Yeah," I responded. "I'm gonna sit here for a bit and let them get plenty far away."

"Not a problem."

I smiled. "I hope these seats don't stain," I joked.

Swift laughed along with me.

"Where'd you guys go?" Jeff asked as he approached the car, as we parked it in the auto bays. He was moving some junk around, taking it outside through an open roll-up door.

"Oh, grabbing some radios," I said. "Getting into a car chase."

"What??"

"We encountered you-know-who," Swift said, speaking quietly. "They had one aircraft tailing us for a while."

"Okay, that forces our hoof then, I think," Jeff said. "It's time to tell the others."

"I guess you're right," I reluctantly agreed. "If for no other reason than to prepare them for when their guts want to turn themselves inside out."

The three of us went inside, and Swift and I blinked and marvelled at the changes that had happened so quickly. Serge and Jeff had pulled out the existing kitchen area, and were framing walls to become the new one. A stack of plumbing pipes were arranged off to one side, and some electrical conduit set down in another spot.

"Neither of us are carpenters, but we'll get it done," Jeff explained, as we watched Serge cutting a 2x4 down to size with a table saw. "We could use you for some of the precision work if you have time, Swift."

"You bet," she nodded.

"Guys? Can we gather together for a bit?" Jeff shouted over the sound of the saw. Serge looked up, nodded, and switched it off; Karin, who was reading a textbook in the common area, set a bookmark in it, stood up, and came over. Momentarily, Rich appeared from somewhere else in the store.

"What's up?" Serge asked.

"We have something we need to discuss," Swift said. "It's going to sound a little weird, and maybe even far-fetched, but believe me, it's real, and something we need to be concerned about. Especially you and me."

She'd cast a hoof towards Rich, who blinked and looked surprised. "What?" he asked.

"There's another group of survivors out there," I said. "We think they're survivors, at least. The truth is, we've never met them, but we've communicated with them and exchanged some goods once or twice."

"There's more of us?" Karin said, with excitement.

"What's the catch?" Serge said, his seemingly-everpresent wary expression on his face.

"They're a little strange," Jeff explained. "They travel around in black aircraft and send robotic vehicles out to interact with us. Like Stormy said, we've never seen an actual living person - or creature, for that matter."

"That's not all," Swift said, keeping up the tag-team conversation. "They seem to have some kind of anti-magic field. We'll be able to sense when they're getting close."

"What, like radar?" Rich asked.

"It's not like that at all," Swift said, shaking her head. She was clearly uneasy while describing the phenomenon to the three. "You'll feel a growing sense of despair build up inside you. Your 'fight or flight' instinct will kick in and swing heavily over to the 'flight' side. If they get too close..." She shivered and trailed off. Mainly, I realized, because her imagination was the only thing able to fill in the answer to that unfinished statement. They'd never gotten particularly close to us, and we'd been pretty badly freaked out each time they'd been barely within visual range. What if we found ourselves face to face with them?

"So we just keep you two away from them, right?" Serge said, nodding to Swift and Rich.

"It's not that simple," Jeff said.

"We do feel it more intensely because of our skills and preponderance to magic," Swift nodded. "But all of us have magic inside."

The three blinked. Serge scoffed. "I am not a magical fairyland creature," he grumbled.

"Wait 'til the next cloudy day and go watch your fellow pegasus," Jeff said, gesturing to me. I blushed a little at being called out, but nodded to Serge just the same.

"Even me?" Karin said, eyebrows high into her mane-bangs.

"Even us," Jeff nodded. "Don't you feel a firm connection to the Earth sometimes? Wonder how I can get these fruits and vegetables to grow so responsively in all the little gardens around here?"

She fell silent and mentally chewed on that for a while.

"You called us together to tell us this all of a sudden for a reason," Rich deduced. "Are they on their way here now?"

His two colleagues looked at him sharply, then us, as he asked that question.

"We're not sure," Swift answered. "They followed Stormy and me for a bit this morning. But that may have been nothing more than idle curiosity at seeing a car moving about." She didn't add that none of us had seen or felt their presence on the trip to and from the SkyDome. "We just wanted to prepare you all, in case that weird sensation falls upon us at some point."

Something occurred to me, and I spoke up. "Their unmanned vehicles - robots or drones or whatever you want to call them - don't seem to emit that field, but there is a way we can tell when those are nearing us too. It's a lot less fear-inducing - it's just a radio signal that they use to control the vehicles, and we can hear the frequency they use. I should go make sure that's tuned in and turned up."

"Good idea," Jeff said. To the rest of the group, he added, "The rest of us can get back to what we were doing. There's no need to be alarmed, really; like Swift said, we just wanted you to be forewarned in case they decide to pay us a visit."

The three were silent for a few moments. "Right," Serge said. He turned to go, and muttered, "Weirder every frickin' moment..."

Swift and Jeff went to follow him, and Karin, after a few more moments' reflection, returned to her book. Rich stood there looking at me for a moment, then said, "Care to chat a bit?"

"Sure," I shrugged. "Can we go over to the radios so I can work while we talk?"

He smiled and nodded, and we sauntered over that way.

"Mind if I ask something personal?"

I flinched - hopefully just internally. Here we go. "Sure, go ahead," I said as I fiddled with the radio gear.

"You're the only one who doesn't have an icon, so it seems. Should that mean something?"

I sighed - mainly with relief, but he probably saw it as something else. "Near as we can tell it means you haven't - I should say I haven't - found my calling yet. I'm willing to bet you're quite an artist, and not necessarily as your paying job."

"I like to dabble," he conceded, nodding. "I program mostly, but have a hand in the graphics too from time to time."

I got the radios set up the way I wanted them - ready to alert us to X's bots' presence, and sending out our usual broadcast. "Swift's a very good writer, both fiction and documentation-wise. Jeff's in building sciences. And, well, your friends are demonstrating that they're good at what their butt pictures - I mean, icons - say."

Rich smirked a little at 'butt pictures'. "And yet you're here without a radio microphone on your 'butt'. Or maybe a... how would you depict being in command as an icon?"

My cheeks flushed. "I'm not in command," I hurried to deny. "I'm just doing what needs to be done. I don't tell my friends what to do. ...well, I guess I do, but not that way."

"And yet they do it," he smiled.

"And I do what they say, too," I protested. "Nopony has control over the others in our group."

"If you insist," he said. "Can I ask something else? Where does 'nopony' and 'anypony' and such come from?"

I winced again. "Dammit, Swift," I muttered under my breath, "now ya got me doing it." Aloud, I said, "It's a thing Swift started. I guess it's contagious."

Rich laughed quietly. "It's actually pretty sound logic," he shrugged. "Maybe it's good if it catches on."

"If you say so," I said. I finished with the radios and turned to face him properly. "Okay, your turn."

"My...? Oh," he said, understanding after a moment. "Okay. Hi, I'm Richard Leroy. I'm 22, work ... worked... for a video game company back home. Like I said the other day, I was in town for a convention."

"Hi," I smiled. "Yeah, you said you had to get down from the 11th floor with no power. How'd that work out?"

"Very tricky," he admitted. "Naturally there were no elevators. Getting into the stairwell wasn't a problem, but getting back out at the bottom was. Because you had to use your card to go on to any level, to unlock the door? But of course, they weren't working either."

"Wow," I said, with a grimace. "Sounds like kind of a fire code violation to not let you out at least at the bottom, but I guess there's no one left to fine for that, right?" Instantly I regretted that. "Shit. I'm sorry... I hope I didn't... I'm gonna stop talking now."

He smiled after a moment's reflection. "It's all right. I'm not offended. I'm sure we've all lost friends and loved ones too. I've made my peace."

"Sorry," I repeated.

"Don't worry about it," he insisted. Gesturing to my side, he said, "Anyway, I'm sure you wouldn't have had a hassle like I did. If I'd had wings, I would have just opened the balcony and flown out."

The image of a plummeting Rich, with my aggravation at not having working wings, filled my head, and I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head to exorcise it. "Don't wish for these," I grumbled. "They don't wor... I can't fly."

"You can't?" he said curiously.

"I don't know what the deal is," I said. "I've tried everything obvious, I've even read up on birds' behavior in flight. There's just something not clicking, up here I guess." I tapped a hoof to the side of my head. Then, for a moment, I remembered Princess Luna's comment about how physics could be overcome now, and wondered what she meant.

"I'm sure you'll get it," he said comfortingly. "After all, Swift has already taught me so much. I'm excited to be learning how to use this thing." He gestured to his horn.

"Can you do anything yet?" I asked.

He shook his head, still smiling though. "Not so far, but Swift assures me it will come. I have faith in her."

"Good," I nodded, and smiled back.

"So, about these other people..."

I nodded again, understanding where he wanted to go. The smile on my face evaporated. "It's hard to tell what their endgame is," I told him. "They seem benevolent so far. They've left us supplies once, but like we said before, we've never met them face-to-face. They're listening to our radio signals, and have answered with written messages. They seem most interested in understanding how we have survived."

Rich looked surprised and looked around the store, then spread his forehooves wide.

"I know," I agreed. "It seems pretty basic to us too. It's confusing. I'd really like to get into a proper conversation with them, but so far they haven't been willing to do so, and I'm not so sure I wouldn't wet myself in their presence. Um... because of the anti-magic field thing."

"I knew what you meant," he nodded. "Is it as bad as Swift said?"

"For her, and ...probably for you too, sorry to say, most likely. They went to the..." I realized he wasn't local and wouldn't know about the nuke plant, so I started over. "There's a nuclear power plant about one and a half kilometers south of us here. The first time we learned of them was when they went in there one night. They flew in from the south, across the lake, and circled around the plant a few times, then went inside. Never got even halfway close to us. And Swift... she got really badly freaked out. Jeff and I nearly shat ourselves, but Swift flipped out completely. Like monsters-under-the-bed scared, hiding under her covers all night, not sleeping a wink." Again I winced. "I'm sorry, I hope I'm not freaking you out by telling you this... making you worry about what'll happen if you encounter them."

"Don't worry," he said with a smile. "It's nothing I haven't heard from Swift already. In fact she said you brought her back from the brink. She's very complimentary of you in many things."

I blushed. "I just help my friends when they need it," I murmured.

"I'm sure," he nodded. "Anyway, I'm trying to steel myself against it, in the hopes that my teacher's experience and her friends' will prepare me. You know, fear for the worst, hope for the best?"

"Right," I said, nodding as well. "Good plan."

"Anyway," he said, standing up, "I'm sure you have work to do. Perhaps, quote, 'fawning over her stupid car some more'." He grinned. "Thanks for the talk."

I laughed and stood as well. "You do a good impression of her!" I said. "Anytime."

Supper that night consisted of various things we didn't need to cook or prepare, since the kitchen was still in pieces. It was taking shape quickly, but wasn't ready for that night's meal.

"When we can cook again, I was thinking, I might try some pizza," Swift said.

"Pizza!" Karin gushed. "Really?"

"Well, meat-free pizza, but yes. I'm still trying to think of what toppings to use."

"Even a cheese and tomato sauce pizza would be a godsend," I commented.

"Sounds like you'd better make more than one," Jeff joked.

"I guess so," Swift laughed. "Hey, Stormy, it's supposed to be overcast tomorrow."

"Yeah?" I said, brightening up. "Cool."

"What's that about?" Karin wanted to know.

Jeff was about to respond, but Swift shushed him. "You'll have to find out tomorrow," she smirked.

"Geez," I facetiously grumbled. "Put me on the spot, why don't you."

"You'll do fine," Swift said dismissively, then turned to Serge. "You might be interested in this too."

He harumph'ed. I'd never heard anybody actually pronounce it like that before. "I'm going to be busy finishing the kitchen. Helping us survive, not sticking my head in the clouds."

"Suit yourself," Swift responded.

"Don't mind him," Karin said with a hint of a smile. "He's always a sourpuss."

Apparently he was used to this teasing, for he didn't respond to it - just continued munching on celery.

As supper wrapped up, Swift got quickly to her hooves. "Don't go anywhere," she urged everyone, then galloped away.

"What's this about?" I asked Jeff.

He shrugged. "Got me," he said. "Since when have I ever been privy to what passes for coherent thought in her-"

"I heard that!" came a faint voice from near the back room of the store. "Don't finish that thought if you don't wanna sleep in the rafters tonight!"

Rich blinked and looked up to the ceiling high above his head. Jeff and Karin laughed.

"Trust me," I quipped. "It's cold up there and windy from the air ducts."

Rich's eyes widened. "She hasn't really..."

"Would this face lie to you?" I said, trying to put on as stoic a mask as possible.

Karin was all but collapsing in laughter when the lights went out.

I almost shot to my hooves, but then noticed that the other lights in the place were still bright. Only the common area had been darkened.

"What is she doing..." I wondered aloud.

I learned fairly quickly as she came back with a number of unlit candles of various shapes and sizes, and levitated them all so that one was in front of each of us. She laid back down in her place.

"I was thinking this was probably a better way to do it than to ask after stories from everypony, and bring up memories some of us might not want to share. But we should, now that we're all in this together, take a moment to light a candle for our loved ones that have... that aren't with us any more."

Everyone seemed to be warm to the idea - at least, no one protested - so Swift started. She ignited her candle's wick with a spark from her horn, and said quietly, "Thanks for everything, Mama." Then she set it on the low table between us.

Jeff was to her left, and nodded as she lit his for him. He paid some silent respects, then cradled the candle between his hooves to move it beside Swift's.

Rich did much the same, not trying to use his horn just yet.

Karin hugged the lit candle as close to her as was safe. "Mom... Dad... Kevin... I know you're in a better place now. I'll never forget you." Then she moved her candle up.

It was my turn, and the wick erupted in a flame before me thanks to Swift. I shut my eyes and thought of my sister and her family, and my father.

I won't forget you guys either, I silently promised. I hope you know I'm doing okay.

I put my candle up with the others, and watched Serge as he stared at his wick intensely, as it burst into flame. On one hoof, he seemed intrigued by the magically created fire; on the other, he was clearly deep in remembrance.

As he shut his eyes, I saw his lips begin to move. He was speaking far too quietly for any of us to hear, but eventually made a barely-audible whisper as he finished.

"...in your protecting embrace. Amen."

Six candles now burned on the top of the table, feeding off one another's warmth and illuminating us all with their light.

The mood remained somber throughout the evening. After we cleaned up from supper and let the candles burn down for a while, we went back to various things we had planned to do.

Swift and Rich went off to play Jedi and master again, while Karin went back to studying her medical text. Serge went to do more work on the kitchen renovations, while I went to the common area, to the computer terminal we'd put the weather station on, ages ago, so I could see if there really was a chance I'd get to do some cloudwalking tomorrow.

Jeff sauntered over after a while. "What's the prognosis?" he asked.

I made one of those strange, optimistic frowns. "Fifty-fifty, I think," I said. "Not helping Serge?"

"He seemed to want to be alone," Jeff said. "He's not a particularly social pony, I'd say."

I shook my head. "That was a really nice gesture by Swift, but I'm wondering if it bugged him."

"A lot of things seem to bug him," Jeff replied. "Just so you know, if you do go up tomorrow, I'm going to try to get him to at least come see you do your thing. I think he needs to embrace his inner pony. Come to grips with what he is."

"Okay," I said. "Hope I don't get performance anxiety."

"Just don't fall," Jeff smirked. "But if you do, we now have a very capable medical pony."

"Yeah, you're looking half-decent, instead of half-dead," I smiled. "She does good work." I resisted the urge to ask if she shared some extra TLC. It was just a suspicion I had, and it wasn't my business anyway.

"Indeed," he nodded, then quirked an ear, falling silent. "What's that noise?"

I listened in between hammer blows coming from the other side of the store. There was definitely something else making sound, and not Swift and Rich chattering back in the back room/warehouse. My eyes went wide as I realized what it was, and for the second time in a week, I lunged into a gallop for the radios.

Getting to them, I turned the volume up on the one configured to listen to X's bots' telemetry. I'd left it turned relatively low because the data sound was rather piercing, and would be easily noticeable at almost any volume level, but all but painful at louder ones. But this wasn't data; it was voice.

"Ponytown. Ponytown. Ponytown. This is Explorer Base. Do you copy?"

Jeff, having followed me to the radio room, was about to turn and run and call for the others, but I lashed out with a hind leg and stepped on his tail. He glared at me, but stayed put as he saw my stare back at him. This wasn't survivors. They were too... professional with their radio procedure. This was someone who made a living out of talking on the radio, and sounding authoritative while doing so.

"Ponytown here," I responded, trying to keep my nerves down in my hooves instead of rising up to my throat. "Go ahead, Explorer Base."

"Ponytown," came the response. "This is the ... survivors' encampment in Pickering, Ontario, Canada. Correct?"

"Af-affirmative," I said, cursing myself internally for stumbling over the word. There was little doubt in my head on who I was talking to.

"Ponytown, Explorer Base. We need to talk."

Author's Notes:

Well all right then! Suddenly a car chase happened. Now all I need is a beach episode. Amirite?

Distant Rumble

JULY 28

"'One: We will meet with only one of you. No more.'"

"'Two: That one of you will not bear wings nor a horn.'"

"'Three: No weapons.'"

"'Four: All others from your group shall remain in a location of our choosing, clearly marked, and plainly visible from the meeting site.'"

"'Five: Communications between your group and your nominee/designate will be permitted, but through only our devices, to be installed before the meeting. You have our assurances that we will not be recording, though we will be listening.'"

"'Six: Any violation of the above, no matter the severity or intent, will result in immediate cancellation of the meeting and our departure. Gross or continued violations beyond that instance will result in hostile action in order to protect ourselves.'"

Swift tossed the page at the table. After it left her magic's influence, it fluttered lazily and drifted down to land on the floor, where Jeff picked it up.

"'Have your answer ready by zero eight hundred,'" Swift quoted the last line from the paper, an acidic tone in her voice. "This is bullshit."

It was rare to hear her curse, but she had the right sentiment in my opinion. "We have fifteen minutes to decide," I said. As promised in the radio communication late the night before, the page had come overnight on the back of the robot rover, accompanying another pallet full of supplies - but this time, things useful to humans were left out and certain things clearly intended for hooved mammals were on the skid.

"If we say 'screw you, we're not playin' your game', then stuff like this comes to an end?" Serge asked, indicating the pile of supplies.

"Most likely," Jeff nodded. "And so far, other than point six in the message, their actions haven't been at all threatening towards us. I say they're a group we should keep good ties with."

"How can you trust that?" Swift said, pointing at the note. "They want to split us up, and decide which one of us they abduct-"

"Swift," I tried to interrupt.

"-and threaten the rest of us with deadly force if we so much as blink at them wrong?"

"There's so much we don't know," Rich contributed. "On both sides."

"They said they needed answers," I piped up. "They made recent contact with another group of survivors and understand more than before, but wanted our story to compare. They said things had changed."

"Yeah, they decided we're expendable if we don't go along with-"

"Swift, please, stop," Jeff cut in. "Everypony here understands your anger. We all agree. But it's a new world out there. We're not the citizens waiting for the town leaders to decide what we need in order to keep going." He looked around at the group. "We are the town leaders now. And we might have to make deals with potentially shady characters in order to keep our bellies full. Am I right?"

Serge slowly nodded, and Rich added an "mm-hmm". Karin, like she'd been since we gathered after waking up, lay there staring at the ground in front of her hooves.

Swift's ears folded back. "What if we're laying down with the wolves?" she began.

"Then we need to keep a close eye on each other's necks," Serge rumbled, and I nodded.

"Swift, we know how dangerous this is. But if there are really only 7000 people left in the world like the math suggests, we can't afford to make enemies with anyone," I pointed out.

"Speaking of 'people'," Swift said, magically wresting an item free from the skid of supplies. It was a bottle of blue powder. "This is for hoof disease prevention. This 'care package' dropped the work gloves, eye and ear protection, hard hats, work boots, and other stuff from the first one, all in favor of equine care products."

"That's a good thing," Jeff tried to interject, but Swift talked over him.

"Do you not realize what that means? They didn't know we were ponies before. They thought we were human. Which most likely means they are human."

That had occurred to me, but only briefly and in the back of my mind. Clearly to some, it wasn't on their radar at all; Rich reacted with surprise.

"Does that mean this isn't as widespread as we thought?" Jeff wondered aloud. "Maybe there are people still surviving elsewhere?"

"Guys, I hate to do this, but it's three minutes to eight," I said. "We need to get ready."

Swift made a heavy, almost dramatic sigh. "What are we going to tell them?"

Jeff raised a hoof. "I think the right thing to do is trust them. But cautiously."

Rich put his own hoof up slowly, nodding to Jeff.

"We can give it back to them just as tough as they gave it to us," Serge said. "Tell them in no uncertain terms that we won't stand for any bullshit." He lifted a hoof.

I nodded again and put my hoof up. "Full disclosure required," I agreed.

Swift looked miffed. She looked across the circle to the other mare. "Karin," she called out.

"Oh!" Karin said, looking up sharply, eyes darting around to see us all holding up a hoof each. "I... erm..."

Jeff was the first one to figure it out. "Karin, you don't need to worry. You're not the earth pony that we're going to send."

She wore a brief look of relief, but then worry for Jeff crossed her face. "Are-are you sure?"

"Between you and me? Absolutely. Now, if they would let a pegasus or unicorn go, I might make a different choice. But I'm not going to let you be subjected to them sight unseen. I've had experience with th- I mean, near them before. It's not a perfect solution, but it's what we've got to go with."

I stood up. "Swift?" I asked. "I know you're not OK with this, but will it do for now?"

She frowned and stood up. "They'd better give us every answer we ask for," she muttered.

"Ponytown. Ponytown. Ponytown. This is Explorer Base," came the flat, even, possibly-synthesized voice at precisely 08:00:02.

"Explorer Base," I answered, everyone else crowded around behind me. "Ponytown is here."

"Do you have a response?" was the terse query.

I took a breath, then keyed the mic. "Affirmative," I said. "The response is affirmative. With conditions."

"There are no conditions," Explorer Base responded immediately, as if they'd been expecting it. "The agreement shall be by the letter or not at all."

"'The letter' is pretty heavy-handed," I protested. "Forgive us, but we have misgivings as to your motives."

There was a pause. "Our motives are the same as yours, Ponytown. Survival."

"Says the group threatening to shoot us!" Swift shot back as I opened the mic. I turned and shushed her.

"Explorer Base, Ponytown," I said, starting over. "Surely you can understand our wariness."

Another pause ensued. "The conditions specified in the letter are for our mutual protection. Ours and yours. More will be explained in person." There was another slight pause. "I can assure you, no one wants to shoot anyone ... or anything. There's too much at stake to lose any more of us."

"You say that like you have an idea what's gone on," I answered, trying to pry some details out of the other end.

"More will be explained in person," the voice repeated. "We will send the RVR with coordinates and a timeline before noon."

"We're not happy," I told him. "But we agree that we need to work together to make the world go on. We'll be waiting."

"We'll talk again at the coordinates," came the response. "Good luck, Ponytown. Explorer Base out."

The wheeled robot came as promised in the mid-morning. (We were alerted to its presence by the data noise from the radio, which I'd neglected to turn back down after talking to 'the voice' earlier - so everybody's eardrums nearly ruptured from the screeching sound. I owe everyone cupcakes as an apology.) Unlike other times the device visited, we were present, and dared to meet it outside.

"I see it," Serge called out from the bed of the pickup, where he was perched with the binoculars. Like me, he had better long-distance eyesight than anyone else - and with the binoculars, could see things a significant distance away. "On the highway."

"Same as before," Swift pointed out, and Jeff and I nodded.

"There should be no anti-magic field from this thing," I commented, mainly for Serge, Rich, and Karin's benefit. "Nothing to worry about."

The six of us watched in silence as the buggy closed the distance, hopping the curb and the sidewalk again and driving down the embankment towards the store. Idly, I wondered if it was following a preprogrammed track, or if someone was actually piloting it.

Across the parking lot it came, a black square held in its clawed arm. As it neared, it became apparent that the object was a plastic-wrapped binder.

Jeff elected to be the one to receive the documents, since he would be our emissary. As the buggy stopped a dozen feet from us, we slowly gathered around its front. The pole-mounted camera was sweeping left and right, taking us in. I actually had to pull Swift back, who went lens-to-snout with the device, either to intentionally give the operator (and whoever else was watching) a very close-up view, or for her own purposes of inspecting the camera at close range.

Jeff hefted the binder in a hoof after retrieving it from the claw. "All this work for a few pages that could've been shared over the radio," he mused.

"They probably didn't want anyone who was eavesdropping on us - if there is anybody doing that - to know our rendezvous point," I said.

"Whatever." He lifted it up again and waved it in front of the camera, then looked into it. "Okay, we've got the book," he said, shouting, as if that would make his voice heard on the other end. "We'll be there."

The operator - there had to be one, I figured, for this little trick to have been possible - made the camera tilt up and down in a sort of a nod, and then the rover backed off.

"Interesting choice," Swift mused, looking at the open booklet on our new kitchen table.

"They obviously want to see us coming from a long way off," Serge said.

"Or vice versa," I nodded. The coordinates were accompanied by a map, pointing to the nearby municipal airport. Far from an international hub, but large enough for there to be plenty of open space.

"Is there a time specified?" Rich wanted to know.

"Two o'clock this afternoon," Swift said. "Nice of them to leave us room for lunch."

"In that case," Karin spoke up, "anybody mind if I go for a run? I promise I'll be back before it's time to go."

"Go ahead," Jeff smiled. "Have a good time, but be careful."

Karin smiled brightly and headed to the common area. "C'mon, Buddy!" she called, and momentarily was accompanied by the Dalmatian who was happy to follow her outside.

"They're hitting it off well," I observed.

"I'm amazed she can keep up with him," Serge said. "I don't know who has more fun."

"Anyway," Swift said, calling for attention back to the documents. "Here's how I see it. Tell me if anypony has problems with this." She was pointing to the map with a magicked-up spoon. "They want us here, and Jeff here. Coming in from this direction only. That means we can all come together up to this point, where we have to separate. Should we take one car or more?"

"Take them all," Serge suggested. "There's no harm in having options available. Plus they might want him to go with them."

Swift shivered at the idea. "I hope not, but okay. Now they say they're going to have the area 'prepared' for us by the time we get there. There's going to be a green-painted square we can all stand in. We all have to stand in. If we venture outside it, they will call it all off. Something here-" she gestured to a wider radius circle, but not by much "-they're calling a 'point of no return line'. Ominous much? And then this little red frickin' dot, over here, for Jeff."

"Looks to be about twenty feet across, if this is to scale," he said. "I can live with that."

"What's the legend beside it say?" Rich asked, leaning over and peering.

"'Communications and shielding'," Serge and I stereoed. I picked up the conversation: "The one has to be their comms line they promised. Shielding, I don't know. Sounds obvious, but why do you need shielding? Maybe from their scare-ray?"

Jeff shrugged. "I guess I'll find out at two."

Swift sighed. "I still don't like it, but I guess we're doing this." She looked around at the rest of us. "Anything else?"

"This will be the closest we've ever been to them, presuming they don't use robots," I said, mainly speaking to Swift and Rich. "We have to agree now that we're going to steel ourselves against the feelings we feel when they're near, and stay put as promised, regardless of what happens. If for no other reason than to keep Jeff safe." I looked at my companions.

"Agreed," Swift said, and the others nodded. She put on an air of confidence and conviction that defied her nervousness, though.

"Okay. We should make sure the cars are ready, and get some lunch into us. I guess the best arrangement is Jeff in the truck, and Swift and Rich in the Prius, and you and Karin split up between me in the S and Swift in the Prius?" I said, turning to Serge.

"I'll come with you," he said. "Karin can decide when she gets back."

"Okay," I replied, and everyone nodded. "See you at lunch."

Jeff came to me a few minutes later, as I was programming the GPS in the Model S for the trip to the airport.

"Hey," he said softly.

"Hi," I said, looking up briefly from my efforts, then focusing back on the screen. Working a touch-screen with hooves was surprisingly successful, but required a significant amount of concentration to hit the right human-finger-sized buttons. "Hang on a sec."

"It's okay, take your time," he said. "Just wanted to ask a few questions."

"'Kay," I murmured, finishing the programming. Shortly thereafter, I turned to him. "What's up?"

"Just wondering if there's anything in particular you think I should talk to them about," he said. "You being our leader and all."

I blushed. "I am not our leader," I huffed. "Don't put that in peoples' heads."

"Well, you're a take-charge kind of pony," he countered. "You and Swift both."

I tried to make a dismissive noise and change the subject. "Be honest with them. We've got nothing to hide. No reason to not tell them anything they want to know."

"What if they want to take me away, like Serge said?"

I frowned. "We'd need a really compelling reason to let you go, and assurances you wouldn't be harmed. The only thing that filled my head when he said that was some kind of alien-dissection thing in reverse. ...Sorry."

"No problem. You weren't the only one."

"You nervous?"

"Does the Pope shit in the woods?" he smirked.

I laughed. "I don't know. I'll have to find a Catholic bear and ask him."

"I'm sure we'll get through this," Jeff said, reassuring himself as well as me. "If they wanted to do us in, they have so many other ways to accomplish it. This'll just be a very interesting meeting, and that's all."

"I hope you're right," I said. "I'd say we'll have your back, but ...you know what their documents say about us straying from our 'viewpoint'."

"It's all right. Just knowing my friends will be nearby is good enough."

I felt a little warmth from that statement. "Gotcha," I smiled.

A couple of hours later, Serge and Karin were in the car with me, with Jeff ahead of us in the pickup truck, and Swift and Rich behind us in the Prius. We set off heading east for the half-hour drive to Oshawa Municipal Airport. Well, half-hour with traffic; probably 15-20 minutes for us, because none of us cared for speed limits any more.

"This is a nice car," Karin said from the back seat.

"Thanks," I smiled. "It was always my dream car, so finding one was a big plus."

"I thought that was the benefit of living in Switzerland," Serge said.

We both "huh?"ed at him.

He cracked a smile, one of the first I'd seen from him. "Their flag. It's a big plus."

The car was filled with laughter as we headed up Brock Road. "Oh, that was good," I said, smirking.

"Figured we needed to lighten our mood," he responded.

"You should do that more of the time," Karin suggested. "I'm sure these ponies wouldn't believe me if I said you're not always gruff and grumpy."

I remained silent while the two friends went back and forth. Serge said, "First of all, don't you start with the 'ponies' thing too. Second-"

"Well, that's what we are, isn't it?" Karin said innocently. "What we've become. I thought you were over the whole losing yourself thing. George Coutts is still with us."

I raised an eyebrow at the name. Serge must have noticed it, for he asided to me, "That's my real name. Serge is just a nickname. I'll explain later." To Karin, he added, "Whatever. Second, I've got a lot to be grumpy about, kid. I would've thought a teenager would be at least as upset about all her friends vanishing."

"Hey, hey, hey," I said, waving a hoof in the air. "This sounds like dark territory to be wandering into. Let's keep it civil."

"It's okay," Karin said, a little flatly. "I kinda deserved that. Sorry, Serge. I keep forgetting."

"It's all right," he said. "Just... stop try'n'a get me to toss it all aside and embrace 'pony life'."

"Understood," she said.

I turned off Brock onto Taunton Road, and decided to let silence reign for a little bit. The ham radio shattered it a few minutes later, with a call from Swift.

"So, I guess we'll all park in the parking lot, then walk to the green zone, right? Then Jeff goes on from there?"

"Sounds fair to me," I responded. "So long as Jeff is okay with it."

"I'm fine," he answered. "And don't worry about me once we split up. Don't forget I walked a couple hundred miles on my own. I can take care of myself."

"Don't underestimate these guys," Swift warned. "We still don't know what their goal is, besides 'to survive, just like us'."

"I'll be careful, Swift. Trust me."

"As much as I hate to jinx us by talking about it," I cut in, "we should have an action plan. In case something goes down."

"Okay, what?" Swift asked.

"If they turn hostile, we take appropriate cover and try to get back to the cars. If Jeff needs rescuing, it'll be Karin and Swift to do it. Karin because she moves so fast and can carry him unaided, Swift in case they need magical assistance. The rest of us will each grab one vehicle and make ready for an escape. Who can drive stick?"

"I can," Serge said to me.

"Serge said he'll do it," I told the others, "so if it comes to that, he'll take the truck. But hopefully, nothing happens and we just have a really interesting conversation. Right?"

"And whatever you do, resist the urge to run," Jeff added. "I know it'll be overwhelming, but be strong." As if on cue, the dull ache in my belly started to make itself known, and judging by the uncomfortable fidgeting of my passengers, it'd hit them too.

"Agreed," I said. "And help each other out. We need to rely on one another to get through this."

"Coming up on the turn now," Jeff said.

"Okay, let's stay off the radio now. Talk to you all in person." In pony, my mind corrected me.

We turned in off Taunton onto Airport Road, past a golf course, and into the parking lot of the municipal airport. There were a number of black vehicles, both aerial and ground based, on the tarmac behind the terminal.

"That thing's the size of a C-17," Serge said, pressing his face against the window, looking at the largest aircraft. "How'd they even get it on the ground here?"

Resisting the urge to vomit, I pulled up beside the truck, then parked and shut off the car, stepping out. Swift parked beside me, and all six of us were reunited once more.

"I figured we'd hear jet engines running or generators or something," Swift said. The three who hadn't personally witnessed these guys before were busy staring wide-eyed at the crafts and clearly being uneasy at how their own skin was crawling.

"Just a low-level hum," I observed.

"Well, I guess this is it," Jeff said. "Wish me luck."

"Don't you get dead," I warned him.

"Trust me, that is very high on my list of things to not do."

"Are we all good?" Swift asked the others, getting hesitant nods, but nods nonetheless.

Jeff turned and started walking across the parking lot, past the terminal building, toward the tarmac. We had a crudely painted green line that we were to follow, leading to a set of scaffolding erected on the side of the two-story terminal building itself.

"Everypony doing okay?" Swift said with a wavering voice as she set her first hoof on the scaffold's steps.

"Oh, just peachy," Serge called up from the back of the single-file line. "I feel like I'm gonna puke."

"I presume we all feel like that," Rich said.

"Yup," I confirmed. "Karin, you okay?"

"As okay as I'm going to be," she said with a worried tone.

"We'll get through this," Swift said. "Let's just get up top to our 'safe zone'."

The five of us climbed the stairs to the top of the scaffold, where we found the entire roof of the terminal building was painted green. One corner of the side facing the tarmac had a post with a speaker and microphone hung from it, but it was what was on the tarmac that was drawing our attention.

More than half-a-dozen machines - it felt wrong to call them vehicles, because none of them had any windows, and few any visible doors - sat on the intersection between the two runways, about fifteen hundred feet removed from the terminal. Large cables or conduits connected the units together, and every last bit of it was painted flat black, except for the sides of the aircraft. The large one and two smaller machines that looked to be like the one that had pursued Swift and me earlier were adorned with crisp, white logos involving a series of circles, and the plain letters HPI. No other markings, lights, or hatches were visible.

"Spectators in position," we heard from the speaker box nearby. I walked over and examined it. It was a simple stage microphone and a personal monitor - nothing fancy. Cables ran from it down the side of the building and across to the tarmac, ultimately to the red dot Jeff was approaching, about a thousand feet from us, where something similar seemed to rest upon a table, with a large bulkhead abutting it. From there, the cables continued to one of the wheeled machines.

The others had gathered around me by then. Swift was leaning against my side, and I gave her the same in return. "Be safe, Jeff," she muttered, ears folded back.

As we watched Jeff carefully step towards his assigned position, I heard a buzzing fade in and out above us, occasionally audible above the hum of the equipment on the tarmac. Looking up, I saw a third ... shall we call a spade a spade, or at least a gunship a gunship? ... orbiting at about two thousand feet over the airport.

"Delegate in position," the processed-sounding voice came from the speaker as Jeff entered the red circle. He obviously heard it too, from the speaker situated near him, as he startled, then walked over to it and the table it was on. He looked at something on the table, then said aloud, "Can you guys hear me?"

"We got you," I answered.

"Spectators and delegate," another voice cut in - this one sounding human, though muffled as if inside a mask. "Communications are working well. To the spectators - you currently have the ability to be heard by your friend. Please stay where you are, observe the rules we agreed upon, and do not interject, or your link will be switched to listen-only."

"Fine," I answered. "We're staying put."

"Delegate," the voice went on. "Please maintain the shield panel between you and us at all times. Deviation will result in this meeting ending abruptly."

"Understood," Jeff answered. "And 'the delegate's' name is Jeff."

"...Interesting," the voice said after a moment. "In that case, Jeff, it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance. My name is Dr. Greg Baker. I will make myself known shortly."

I wanted to ask what that meant, but we found out in short order. The side of one of the larger wheeled machines opened, and a figure emerged, in what could have been a black or dark grey armored space suit.

That wasn't what made us all gasp, nor my (and Serge's, I failed to notice) wings splay out.

What gave us all surprise was that the figure was human.

The figure was attached to the machine by a thick umbilical cord, which snaked along behind him as he walked. It was too smooth, too real to be a robotic construct - this was an actual, real, live human being we were watching.

He walked slowly, bulkily, towards a chair and table that was sitting in the middle of the tarmac. Sitting down, it looked comical - they clearly wanted to behave as if he and Jeff were at opposite sides of the same table, if you ignored the 1500 feet of empty space between them.

"Mr. X, I presume," I murmured.

Evidently the mike was a lot more sensitive than I thought. "Forgive me for that," Dr. Baker said with a polite laugh. "My bosses did not want names used in prior communications." He switched gears back to professional mode: "Would you like a chair, Jeff?"

"I'm fine," Jeff said. "But seeing you, I have some questions of my own now."

"I'm sure you do," Dr. Baker said. If he nodded, we couldn't tell; the suit of armor he wore masked all but the most gross, dramatic motions. It was like a high-tech version of the Iron Man Mk1. "As a show of good faith, since you all came and are sticking to the terms, I'll let you begin."

"Are you really human inside that?" Jeff asked.

"Very much so," Dr. Baker answered. "Now, my turn. Let me put it how you just did. Were you really human? Before the Collapse?"

"I was," Jeff nodded. "We all were. Very much so," he added as a quip. "What happened? Was this localized? How did you stay human?"

"Too much at once," Baker said, his hands raised in a placating gesture. "This was, unfortunately, global. Beyond, really. Universal. How we stayed human, I suppose has to do with the shielding and our bunkers. To be honest, we only confirmed that you animals were all former humans just the other day, in conversation with another group of survivors. We had no idea that you were sentient beings. Most of our encounters prior to recently have ended poorly."

"Okay, explain the shielding. I'm standing here, breathing the air fine. I haven't turned into a glowing puddle of goo in the past two months and change. So why is it necessary?"

"It's twofold. Kudos to you for realizing it was for radiation, but not the kinds of radiation you'd be familiar with. To put it simply, some time in the early morning of May 23, Earth was bombarded with thaumic radiation." Serge stiffened beside me but I didn't detect it. "This coincided with the disappearance of nearly all the world's population, and the transmutation of the rest into what you find yourself as now."

"Except you," Jeff pointed out.

"Except us," Baker acknowledged. "Our shielding and our bunkers kept us alive. What happened to you - and the other survivors we've made contact with - was an unforeseen turn of events, at least to us. Had we known..." He trailed off, then began again. "Second reason for the shielding is to protect us from you."

"From me?" Jeff said. "I'm hardly going to-"

"Not any overt actions on your part," Baker interrupted. "You, your friends, other 'pony' survivors, all emit great amounts of thaumic radiation, far greater than the 'background' levels the Earth now resides in."

"I'm radioactive?" Jeff said, unable to resist looking down at his forelegs. "But I feel-"

"Whatever it is that made you this way appears to have protected you as well, despite the laws of physics saying it shouldn't happen. It could be said that you evolved to be one of the few organisms that can survive on this new Earth."

We all mulled that over for a couple of moments. Despite the laws of physics, I mused, thinking on the last person... creature?... to use that term with me.

"Okay," Jeff said. "So we can survive out here and you can't. How many of 'you' are there? Why do you keep following us? Do you not know that that hurts us?" He thumped his chest with a hoof.

"We've seen what our presence in close proximity to ...your kind... does," Baker responded with hesitance. "Which is why we're going to keep this meeting short. It's in our mutual interest to stay in touch and work together, instead of against one another. Our... incompatibilities may make that difficult, but with the RVR, we hope to overcome as much of that as we can. I'm going to be brief, and I most likely can't answer any more of your questions, but we'll prepare a brief that we'll send with you, letting you know what we know. Suffice it to say that you and your friends, and the other survivors like you, are probably the best hope humankind has at survival."

We conversed about the whole encounter on our way home; they essentially shooed us out of the area not long after that bombshell, saying that they needed to shut down their gear and get moving, and our presence was preventing that. To be honest, I don't think any of us had any strong desires to hang around, anyway.

"What was that that they gave you?" Swift asked on the radio.

"It's a tablet computer," Jeff answered. He was looking over the thing while Serge was driving the truck; he said he was okay, but we'd convinced him to let someone else drive, what with him having been so much closer to their shielding and all. "Not a brand I've ever seen before, though. And it's... wow, it's got a signal."

"Like a cellular connection?" I asked.

"They're probably tracking us with it," Swift grumbled.

"They said it would be easier to communicate with us through it, rather than over 'insecure radio' - I guess they mean this," Jeff responded, referring to the ham radio he was talking on.

"We need to go over this 'brief' they said they put on there," Swift said. "When we get home."

"I was going to say after supper," Jeff joked, "but I don't feel much like eating right now."

"We'll have to eat eventually," Karin said. "But I'm with them, I'm not hungry."

"Same here," I said over the radio. "I guess it's Story Time with Uncle Jeff when we get back."

After we'd read what the HPI had to share with us, we didn't feel very hungry then, either.

"This is crazy," Rich said, looking over what Jeff had just read aloud to us.

"You're telling me," Swift frowned. "I can't believe they knew and didn't do anything!"

"They did," Jeff pointed out. "Logistically speaking they did what they could. I'm not any happier about it than the rest of you, but they say that what they did was the limit of their ability. Think about it - protecting humanity from a new kind of radiation? I'm amazed they got it done in three years for as few as they managed to save."

"It still doesn't make it any better," Karin said. "Think of all the ones they didn't save."

"I don't know if 'they' didn't save them," I suggested. "They didn't save us, either, and we turned out okay. For a demonstrably different definition of okay."

"This is way too much to take in in one sitting," Jeff declared. "Let's set it aside and have some supper, then pack it in. We can start fresh tomorrow."

Everyone agreed. Serge was still sitting there looking introspective after the rest of us had gotten up and started to walk away, so I went over to him.

"You okay, big guy?" I asked. "We're going to partake in your beautiful new kitchen. Come show it off."

"Hm? Oh. Yeah," he said, getting to his hooves. "Sorry. Let's go."

The six of us headed off for our meal, each evidently musing about their own reactions to what was seen, heard, and said over the course of the day. One of the last things Baker said to us before he wrapped up lingered in my mind.

"This is a game-changer. Things will be very different come tomorrow, for the better, because of us."

Scattered Showers

AUGUST 1

"Morning," Rich said as he went past me.

I grunted a hello and frowned at the weather radar computer, as I had for the previous two days. Where were southern Ontario's famed afternoon thunderstorms? If the HPI people had figured out a way to control the weather, and were depriving me of the one thing I could enjoy in this form, so help me, I'd-

"You sulking again?" Swift said, following Rich to the warehouse side.

"It's not sulking," I complained. "It's disappointment laced with frustration."

"Sure, sure, Stormy. When you're done disappointment-laced-with-frustrationing, you're welcome to come watch Rich learn. He's getting along nicely."

"Hmph," I grumbled. Rub it in, why don't you!

Serge was apparently part of the train of ponies going past me. "You still think you'll be able to do that, huh?" he said to me.

"It's not a question of 'think'," I shot back. "I've done it before. At least the cloudwalking part. The problem is, Mother Nature isn't playing nice."

"Should I be praying for rain?" he smiled. "Or at least cloud cover?"

"It'd be appreciated," I said, turning away from the computer. "I guess you're going to watch the magic show?"

"I'm intrigued," he admitted. "Trying to open my mind to this. It's... a kind of a struggle for me."

That took most of the wind out of my angry sails. I fell into step with him as we walked towards the warehouse. "I don't think I've ever asked you about it before," I said softly. "So I don't know how to bring it up now. I take it you're... a religious person?"

"To put it one way, yes," Serge smiled. "My faith in our Lord is being tested these days, but it's still there."

"I see why all this might be a challenge," I admitted. "Especially when whatsisname called magic 'thaumic radiation'."

He held the warehouse door open with a foreleg. "I'm trying to keep an open mind, like I said. So for now I'm just observing."

"Gotcha," I nodded. "And thanks." I went inside the back room of the store, looking at the tall metal racking that once held acres of product for sale. What we hadn't used up already we'd consolidated in an easier-to-reach area, and chucked most of the rest out the loading dock into the dumpster (and around it - well past overflowing). Finding an empty spot to perch, I leapt in that direction, scrambling up once I reached the shelf. It seemed like there was lots of 'hang time' on my jumps these days - I wondered if gravity was changing along with the Earth.

Serge chose to sit on the floor below the racks. Before us, Swift was bouncing a basketball up and down in her magic. Thirty or forty feet down the aisle, Rich stood, staring at it.

"Remember, don't focus too hard," Swift said, casually dribbling the ball while she talked. "There's a fine line between being 'in the zone' and going past it."

"Right," Rich nodded. "I'm ready."

Swift lobbed the ball at him, and the yellow glow vanished; then, faintly, a blue hue washed over it. It stopped in mid-air feet from Rich's face, which lit up.

"Yes!" Swift exulted. "Good job. Can you dribble it?"

Rich looked at the ball, then the floor, then the ball again.

"Don't overthink it," Swift said. "What do you do when you bounce a ball by hand? You just let it fall, then catch it when it bounces back up to you. Do the same thing."

Rich blinked in realization, then his magic field diffused. The ball dropped to the floor, bouncing up not nearly half as high as it had fallen, so he wasn't able to catch it.

"Well, you have to push it down with some force," Swift laughed. "You've played basketball, right?"

"A little," Rich said, pursing his lips. "In grade school." He commanded the ball to rise again, then gave it a telekinetic shove. Releasing it, it bounced, and then he caught it again on the upswing.

"There ya go!" Swift grinned. "Now just do it over and over."

Slowly, Rich got the hang of turning his magic field on and off repeatedly. In short order, he was dribbling - hardly Harlem Globetrotters worthy, or even Toronto Raptors worthy, but he could bounce the ball repeatedly. Every now and then he tried to bounce it off the wall for a change.

"Over here," Swift said, hopping up to her hind legs briefly to wave her forelegs like she was 'open'.

Sticking his tongue out as if it gave him extra concentration, Rich commanded the ball to fly away from him; he flung his head back and forth like the ball was tethered to his horn and needed its motion to make the trip. Swift caught it easily and dribbled some more, between her legs, under her barrel, and so on.

"Back atcha!" she shouted, and flung it at Rich.

He was so mesmerized by her moves that he clearly wasn't expecting it. I gasped as his magic field failed to materialize, and a sharp PSSHT! sound was heard.

When I looked back up, I almost made that same sound myself, covering my smirk with a hoof.

"Awww," Swift said. "That's not how you're supposed to catch it. You okay?"

I heard Serge snerk beneath me, and almost let loose with one of my own. Rich was standing there with a punctured basketball draped over most of his face. One eye peeked out from beneath the deflated ball, looking nonplussed. He said, "I bet there aren't any unicorn soccer players for this exact reason."

"We've got more where that came from," Swift laughed, walking over and retrieving the ball from his horn. "You were doing good for a while there."

"I'm just glad we weren't using bricks," he quipped.

I hopped down and over to where they had ended up. "You looked good for the first part there," I commented.

"Thanks," he smiled. "Still getting the hang of this whole thing."

"You'll make it," Swift said. "At least you have a teacher. I had to figure this all out by myself."

"How did you manage that?" Rich wondered aloud.

"Trial and error, and lots of practice," she said. "Stormy helped."

This time, I couldn't hold it in. "Pfft, if you can call it that," I said.

"What do you mean?"

"I fell off the roof and she caught me. On the first try, too!"

"You think it was the first try," Swift laughed.

Rich and Serge looked at one another and laughed nervously.

"What're you guys all laughing about?" Jeff said with a smile as we came back in from the warehouse.

"Just stuff," Swift said. "Making any headway?"

"This is like seven War and Peaces back to back," he said, leaning back from the tablet computer. "It's like reading the phone book, but with much more interesting information."

"Like browsing Wikipedia?" Swift said.

"Yeah."

"TV Tropes?" I queried with a grin.

"Hey, let's not get too crazy," Jeff smirked back.

"How did magic lessons go today?" Karin wanted to know.

Rich put on his 'miffed' look. "I have a lot more learning to do."

"Aw, you'll get it. I couldn't barely get mold to grow back home, but with what Jeff's shown me, we'll have a bumper crop of vegetables every few weeks. If I'm that good with the land as an earth pony, then a unicorn is going to have no trouble with magic. I really envy you, actually."

"You do?"

"Yeah! Zipping things around all over the place without having to carry them, having your own built-in flashlight... heck, I'll bet you guys could do all kinds of things like energy bolts and teleportation with enough practice!"

"Keep dreaming," Rich smiled.

The lot of us separated at that point. I went over to the radio room to sit and spin the dial through the bands, something I did once or twice a week. With luck, I might stumble across something new, hopefully not from us or the HPI.

The HPI. Human Preservation Initiative. To hear them tell it, they knew about the whole 'Collapse', as they were calling it, years in advance. The explanation for whatever happened was buried in the documentation Jeff was currently reading, but the gist of it was that something in the makeup of the universe changed, and caused Earth to be bathed in something they were calling thaumic radiation - otherwise known as magic.

Any technology sufficiently beyond comprehension... I thought to myself, horribly mangling the quote. The idea was still there; magic was a force in the universe, just like gravity, light, and so on. The situation we were in was not unlike the apocalypse stories I'd read - well, before the apocalypse - where Earth was caught in a solar flare or an electromagnetic pulse. But instead of electronics fizzling out and sending us to a new Stone Age, it was humanity that very nearly fizzled out, and while it was definitely a new Age, the jury was still out on how it would work out.

There was no doubt that 'thaumic radiation' was magic, at least as far as the layman - laypony? - was concerned. Swift had long said that every one of us had magic within. Even those of us who couldn't levitate things had ability beyond normal; Karin had hinted at it moments before, talking about her and Jeff's uncanny ability to make things grow despite all the odds. And then there was Serge and me.

Don't think about that, I told myself, shaking my head. It'll come eventually.

Lying on the floor and rolling the radio dial under my hoof, I listened to the static coming through the headphones. I closed my eyes and, despite what I'd just admonished myself, wandered mentally to a place where I was lying on a cloud, the hiss becoming the sound of a constant breeze blowing past.

Oh wow, napping on a cloud would be incredible, I told myself. Like lying on the fluffiest feather bed in the world. And the breeze and the sunshine would make it feel like heaven...

"Storm."

I jerked awake, looking around. The headphones slipped off, the band falling over my eyes.

"Pfhwha?" I managed.

Serge was on the stairs to the radio room. He looked bemused at my splayed-out position on the green carpet. "You in for lunch?" he said with a smile.

"Oh. Yeah. Thanks," I said, removing the headphones fully. "Be there in a sec."

"No rush, we're just getting started. Gonna try that pizza idea."

"Now I'm for sure in," I smiled.

Serge smiled and nodded, then turned and went down the stairs again. I turned my head back to the radio, then blinked and moved my head a little further to look out the windows.

Wow. It's raining.

Maybe Mother Nature had been listening in. Or maybe her agents in black vehicles and armored suits. Either way, a strong downpour was pounding the pavement outside.

The clouds weren't very low, though, so I would have to wait for another time. Still, the rain was good to see; our crops in their tiny little individual gardens needed it, and it would wash away a lot of the dust that had been accumulating all over everything.

"So what are we trying on here for toppings?" Jeff asked as I arrived at the kitchen table.

"Whatever you want," Swift said. She was rolling out the dough with her magic and a rolling pin, while Karin was carefully opening tins of tomato sauce by hoof. "It's going to be an experiment."

"Cheese is a must," I supplied, sitting down.

"Naturally," Karin said, indicating a package of shredded mozzarella - apparently part of our most recent care package.

"Tomatoes," Rich suggested.

"Mushrooms?" came from Jeff.

Several other non-meat ideas came up from the crowd, and Karin was hurrying to collect all the items. She paused to watch Swift try to spin the dough in the air like a traditional pizza cook.

"Hey, you should be doing this, Serge," Karin said, and Rich laughed.

"I'm not dextrous enough, not now anyways," he shot back. Swift apparently wasn't perfect either, but managed to keep the dough corralled enough to salvage it and put it back on the prep counter.

"What's that about?" Jeff wanted to know, meaning the banter between the three newcomers.

"Serge is just my nickname," came the explanation after a few moments. "For my love of pasta and my looks ... well, before this happened." He gestured to himself. "My coworkers gave it to me. Said I looked like the typical Italian laborer. And since my lunch was always leftovers of my wife's beautiful lasagna, or tagliatelle, or ravioli..."

He fell silent as the memories washed over him.

"Sounds like you should have some suggestions for us, too," Karin prompted, to try to pick him back up.

"Bah, I doubt we have the ingredients," he said.

"You'd be surprised," Jeff spoke up. "Between what we've been growing and the care packages, we've got some pretty interesting stuff. And if it's something we don't grow now that we can, just say the word and I'll give it a shot."

Serge smiled and gave it some thought.

I have to admit, the pizza experiment was a success. As someone who always ordered a meat pizza with extra meat, I had always pigeon-holed pizza into the same category as hamburgers or steak in my mind, and I guess it went off the menu mentally when we learned that pony digestive systems didn't like meat. It was definitely emotionally buoying to learn that we could salvage some of our past favorites this way.

As we were finishing up our lunch, Swift glanced outside at the rain still coming down. "Been watchin' the skies, Stormy?" she said.

"Cloud cover's too high right now," I replied. "Maybe something low will float by when this washes through. Besides, I don't wanna smell like wet dog."

"I'm telling Buddy you said that," Karin joked.

"You do that," I shot back with a smirk.

"I really hope we get some low cloud soon," Serge contributed. "'Cause I really have to see this to believe it."

"Yeah," Rich agreed.

"I'm gonna bet you can come up with me," I said, nodding to Serge. "We'll have to try it."

"Oh, 'we', will, will 'we'?" he said, an eyebrow raised.

"Yes indeedy," I grinned back.

"So," Karin said, flopping down beside me on the radio room carpet after lunch. "Show me what all this is."

"Hi," I said to her. "You interested or just wasting time on a boring rainy day?"

"Yes," she smiled. "Now talk."

"Okay," I shrugged, smiling back. "This is my little listening post. It started with this ham radio over here, which Swift and I set up to try to find out if there were other survivors, in the early days." Early days! Listen to me. "When it became obvious we would want to both send out our 'come join us, we have cookies' message and listen on other channels for distress calls and other transmissions, we put all these other radios in. Probably got over a hundred thousand bucks of gear in this little space. ...Not that bucks mean anything any more, I guess."

"I'm glad you said it before I did," she smirked.

"Yeah," I nodded. We'd have to come up with a barter and trade system or some kind of commerce system - if we encountered anyone else, that is. "This one with the red tape on the knobs is tuned to the HPI's channel. Red for don't touch - we don't want to bump it off-frequency and lose touch with them."

"Duly noted."

"The rest of these are scanning various frequencies or waiting for us to find something worthwhile to listen to, then I'll program them." I tossed a hoof towards the usually-dormant laptop computer in the corner. "About all that thing is good for these days, without an Internet."

"Tell me about it! I'm going into Facebook withdrawal," Karin laughed.

"I'm maybe not that bad," I smiled. "But I do miss the interaction. I guess there's nobody left to talk to anyway."

Karin nodded, her grin fading as she looked to her hooves, lowering her chin to them.

"Sorry," I muttered, feeling as though I'd put my hoof in my mouth.

"Nah, it's okay," she said. "I walk myself into that trap a dozen times a day, thinking of my mom, my dad, and my brother."

"Can I ask a personal question? How old were you at Ponification?"

"Seventeen," she said. "Just finishing up my last year of high school. Ready to go into the paramedic program."

I nodded. "I figured. Don't get me wrong - you just seem like a..." I trailed off before I wedged another hoof in there.

"A kid?" she queried, a faint smile coming back. She looked up at me from the carpet. "I don't mind you saying it. It's what I am."

"'A kid' would hardly care for Jeff like you did when he was injured," I protested. "Or pull her weight so strongly around here like you do. Our produce, um, production has almost doubled with you helping him out."

"I worked in a farmers' market for the past two summers," she explained, "and a greenhouse each winter. But there's something strange about the soil here. It just thrives."

"It thrives when you and Jeff work it," I pointed out. "You work your Earth pony magic on it."

She scoffed. "I do not have magic," she said.

"Of course you do. All of us do now. Haven't you been listening to Swift? Didn't you feel a black hole inside you at the airport?"

"...Yes," she admitted, shutting her eyes at the memory.

"Just because you and I can't throw fireballs or lift things with our minds doesn't mean we don't have magic," I told her. "In a way, I actually pity the unicorns for their plain, pedestrian, mundane methods of using magic."

She blinked and looked at me as I paused, falling silent, ears twitching.

"What was that?" she asked.

"Just waiting to see if I heard someone screech 'I heard that!' from across the store and start dragging me towards the rafters," I smirked.

Karin giggled. "Does she really do that?"

"She threatened me with it once. But don't tell anyone else. I like the looks on your faces when I act like she's done it lots of times."

The earth pony beside me laughed out loud that time. "You're weird... I hope you don't mind me saying that."

"I'm a purple-haired talking pegasus," I pointed out. "I'm the epitome of weird."

"True," she giggled again. "So. Let's talk about your magic. I've heard you say you can't fly yet. But you keep threatening to take Serge up on a cloud?"

I nodded. "If the stupid blinking weather will ever co-operate, I'll show you all. I figured it out by accident one time, and don't ask me how I knew to try it out - I just did. It's like walking on a waterbed, kind-of. But don't you try it yourself - Swift put her hoof right through a cloud trying to follow me."

"So we each have our own specialties," Karin supposed. "Unicorns can do magic magic, I mean, 'traditional' magic, wizard and sorcery stuff. Earth ponies can make crops grow like crazy, are strong, run really hard and fast, and not get tired doing it. And pegasi can walk on clouds and maybe fly?"

"Now you're catching on," I nodded, hoping the latter part of that wouldn't become a fib.

An hour or so later, Swift and Rich were practicing in the common area. Instead of games of catch - with balls or bricks - Swift was having Rich do some simple levitation practice, moving around boxes of stuff, and picking small items from piles of larger ones, including items hidden or buried beneath others.

As I walked into the room/area, Karin and Serge were watching, and Swift was giving a mini-lesson. "The trick is to see 'through' the other things," she said, extracting a Minion plushie from beneath a pile of other toys. "Don't say to yourself that Stuart is 'under that pile somewhere'. Visualize Stuart through the Mr Potato Head and the Optimus Prime and the Strawberry Shortcake doll. Make them transparent in your mind."

"Right," Rich nodded.

Stuart went tumbling goggles-over-feet over Swift's shoulder as she discarded the poor Twinkie-colored plushie. "There's a Darth Vader helmet somewhere in the pile. Find it without disturbing anything else."

I sat down as Rich put on his concentrating face. Jeff came in at that moment and began watching with intrigue, and after a couple of false starts, Rich was able to extract the black mask from the pile.

"Nice!" Karin hooted, clopping her forehooves together.

"You have only begun to discover your power," Swift said in a low tone. "Join me, and I will complete your-"

"You set this up to do that quote," Serge laughed.

"I plead the fifth," Swift shot back, smirking.

"Well, I just had a weird moment," I said, unable to contain myself any longer.

"What was?" Jeff wanted to know.

"Well, first of all, I just talked to somebody on the radio. And not the HPI."

"What?!" "Seriously?" "You did??" came a disjointed mishmash of voices not in any way resembling a chorus.

"Yeah, on low band," I nodded. "Probably one of the longest DX - er, I mean distance contacts - I've ever made. Western Manitoba."

"Wow," Serge echoed.

"Yeah," I answered him. "It was scratchy and fading in and out, but I managed to pick out that it was a single pony, a mare. And she's going to try to make a steam engine work, and is getting it on the rails and underway."

"Unreal," Swift commented.

"Sounded like she was planning to head towards the GTA... so we may have a guest eventually."

"I hope you wished her luck," Karin suggested.

"Even just getting the switches right will be a chore," Serge said, his past as a trackman coming to the fore. "Hopefully there aren't any stalled trains in her way."

I shrugged. "We never found any cars that were occupied, or crashed after being, shall we say, suddenly unoccupied. So is it safe to assume that trains that had people in them at the time of Ponification vanished too?"

"Sounds like sound logic," Rich nodded.

"I... guess my car did, didn't it?" Karin said, looking around. "If what you guys've said is true and I jumped through time. And it came back with me."

"Does that mean..." Jeff said, thinking on it for a moment. "That people will eventually start reappearing as ponies, with their cars and trucks and airplanes and such, where they were when Ponification started?"

We all looked around ourselves uncomfortably, then realized the store would have been closed and empty in the middle of the night, so there was little chance we'd encounter a new crowd of shoppers-turned-ponies materializing in our living room, so to speak.

"If anypony knows, they're not telling," Swift said.

"Yes!" I exulted, pumping a hoof as I looked out the windows.

"What? Oh!" Swift said, interrupting her lessons with Rich, noticing that the rain had finally stopped. "Yay! You guys are in for a show."

I galloped for the roof hatch stairway, with Jeff and Swift ushering the other three to follow. Shouldering the hatch open, I popped out onto the roof, wings wide in excitement as the fog drifted lazily here and there.

Jeff was the first up the stairs behind me. "Hey, we have to repaint that," he said, pointing to the "x3 (+1)" in yellow on the tar-and-gravel surface.

"Is she crazy?" Serge said, emerging just after Karin, who was right behind Jeff. I was busy at a full run towards the layer of vapor that was adjacent to the loading dock side of the building's roof.

"She'll be fine," Jeff smiled. Rich and Swift came out last and the three newest members of our group gasped as I leapt into the air and lunged for the low-flying cloud.

With a start I realized I was about to overshoot the stupid thing - something in the currents aloft must have given me extra lift. I tucked in my wings and angled for the greyish-white fluff, catching it and sticking fast - stopping almost hard enough to somersault me. I bounced from pair of hooves to pair of hooves, front to back and side to side, playing with the cloud like it was a trampoline. I turned, grinning, to see several mouths agape.

"See??" I laughed. "Easy as pie!" I continued doing acrobatics, bouncing and flipping in the air, doing loops and spins even a master trapeze artist would have had trouble with.

"Unreal," someone said.

"You!" I thrust a hoof at Serge, calling him out. "Get up here!"

"It's not possible," he said, shaking his head.

"No," I shot back, grinning some more. "It's necessary."

Swift and Karin urged him to trust me, and he tentatively took a step or two forward, like he'd been told to take a leap off a bridge with no bungee cord to arrest his fall.

"Are you-" bounce "-going to let me-" bounce "-have all the fun?" bounce

"You're a lunatic," he muttered, peering over the parapet of the roof.

"That may be, but I'm still standing on a cloud," I smirked at him. "You want to lie awake in bed tonight wondering if you could have done it too?"

I stopped bouncing so that I could take his hoof. He was standing with all three remaining hooves on the thin cement parapet, one foreleg outstretched towards me.

"Have faith, Serge," I said softly to him with a wink. "I won't let you fall."

He looked at me again and made contact with my extended hoof. With his other foreleg, he reached out to put it on the cloud, and as soon as he did, it failed to go through, and met with the unfamiliar semi-firmness I knew myself all too well.

He blinked and gave a shove with his foreleg at the puff of vapor, as if to test its ability to hold him; unfortunately, it behaved like pushing against an air mattress lying in a pool - the entire cloud began to drift away from the building. With two hooves on and two off, Serge froze in panic.

Oh no you don't! I remember thinking, and tried to pull him up onto the cloud with all my might. He was, though, as described earlier, a mite bulkier than the average pony. That is not to say Serge was fat; more so he was 'stout'. A big guy, so to speak. And mousy little Stormy wasn't going to just haul him up by one hoof. I squeezed my eyes shut, bore down and called on all my strength to sort this out.

Gasps erupted from before me. I felt Serge's hoof start to slip from my own, and began to panic. Pouring on the willpower, I tried to keep my grip, but gravity was having none of it. The white pony slid out of my grasp and began to shriek.

I kept my eyes shut, not wanting to see the gory outcome of my failing to keep my promise to him. The shriek, however, was cut short, accompanied by a bump, and continued gasps, but now instead of in front of me, they were from below.

Opening first one eye, and then the other, I found myself twenty-five feet above the roof of Ponytown, Serge safely sprawled on his back on the proper side of the parapet, and the other four ponies staring up at me, hovering above them.

Sunny Breaks

AUGUST 2

"I HAD A DREAM SO BIG AND LOUD, I JUMPED SO HIGH I TOUCHED THE CLOUDS," I sang at the top of my lungs, bouncing happily through the common area.

"Uh oh. Somepony's awake," Karin spoke up, but the warning was far too late.

Swift looked over at me, hooves going up to cover her ears. "You might be able to fly now, but you can't carry a tune worth a buck!" she sneered.

I skipped over to her as I continued singing, eventually getting snout-to-snout with a huge grin on my face. "I STRETCHED MY HOOVES OUT TO THE SKY AND DANCED WITH PONIES THROUGH THE NIGHT!"

"Somebody feed that thing!" Jeff hollered from somewhere else in the building.

"Maybe food would keep her quiet," Karin joked.

"She should be stuffed, considering all the snacks we had last night celebrating," Rich commented.

A pink unicorn's hoof was placed against my muzzle. "We get it, you're happy. And I bet this is gonna be the best day of your life, right?" Swift deadpanned.

I grinned around her hoof.

"Don't start back up, or so help me, I'll-"

"Your threats have no power here! Not anymore," I cackled. "I can fly down from the rafters now!"

"Let's test that!" she snapped, her horn beginning to glow.

"Ladies!" Rich said, standing up. "Please. Don't fight!"

"We're not," Swift said, diffusing her magic. "Somepony just needs to tone it down."

"All right, all right," I said, backing off, still smiling. "I'm sorry. I'm just... so..."

"We get it," Serge interrupted, grumbling, as he came through the common area, beelining for the kitchen.

I could almost feel myself deflate as he went past. Everyone else fell silent as well.

I started to slowly go after him, but Karin called my name. She shook her head, got to her hooves, and dashed off past me, following him.

"I didn't mean to bug him," I frowned.

"Don't beat yourself up," Swift cut in. "We know you're happy. We're happy for you, too. I was just joking with you. But he's not in the mood to share in your joy."

"All the more reason I should go apologize."

"Stormy," Rich spoke up. "I know him better than you, and Karin knows him better than I. Give him some time. Trust me."

"Okay," I said, ears drooping, as I pivoted around. "If he comes back in here, tell him I'm sorry."

"Where are you going?"

"Outside," I said. "Up top."

My plan hadn't changed, but my enjoyment of the morning was diminished by the issue with Serge.

I stood on the roof, forehooves up on the parapet, wings wide, eyes shut, feeling the wind.

South-southeast at 9 kilometers an hour, I told myself. The speed was an estimate, of course - all I was really getting was its strength. The temperature I could tell, but relative to my own body temp. Humidity was also something I could sense.

Back to the wind - it wasn't just the breeze flowing past; I could detect the currents both ahead of and behind me, like it was a river of air and I had details on every cubic centimeter of it within a certain distance. The temperature variances in each stream of air were as plain to me as the differences in color of the older and newer blacktop on the roads. The sun's rays gave me warmth, but didn't interfere with my assessment of the contents of the sky. I could even tell what the likelihood of clouds forming was, based on the humidity, temperature, and airflow.

All of that was filed under useful information, but what I wanted to know right now was: Is it good weather for flying?

What I told myself, being a rookie who didn't know any better, was: It's always a good day for flying.

With that, I leapt up, beat my wings against the air, and took flight.

The view from on high was incredible. I could see the entirety of Ponytown, the surrounding sidewalk (and our 30-some-odd little gardens), and the parking lots and unused streets beyond.

I tried to keep pushing out of my head how so much of what I was doing wasn't possible. I ignored the fact that my wings shouldn't have been large enough to support me; I pushed aside thoughts of how it wasn't getting colder and harder to breathe the higher I went, as I figured it should have; I told myself to forget about what would happen if whatever magic was at work suddenly decided to pack it in and send me plummeting.

Instead, I just flew.

What Luna had told me in my dreams was definitely worthwhile. I had to keep the right balance between my knowledge of physics and my insistence that I was going to fly regardless. Dipping a wing still made me turn in that direction; leaning made me roll. But it was the interaction with the atmosphere that let me do all that in the first place, I somehow knew.

Lifting my head to start rising, and using a nearby thermal to assist in the climb, I took a rest on top of a 20-some-story apartment building across the road from Ponytown. The roof was quiet except for the wind; there were no hums from rooftop air conditioning units, cell tower sites, or other such equipment. I would be well and truly alone with my thoughts.

This is such a big deal, I told myself. Had I had the power of flight from the start, things would have been very different.

The thought of coming across an HPI gunship suddenly crossed my mind, and I whirled around, scanning the sky with mild but unnecessary panic. It was pointless to worry about something I could sense (but wasn't sensing) coming from a mile away.

What I did realize from my look around was that my vision was greatly improved. I hadn't realized it before, but I'd probably been seeing better for quite some time, perhaps from Ponification on - after all, I'd needed glasses before, as Tom.

What I was seeing, from across the street and twenty-plus stories up, was a white pony with red mane exiting the roof access of Ponytown and step outside, looking around, first around the roof and then up in the sky.

I took a running start and put myself in flight, circling down towards the Ponytown roof.

As I approached the roof, it occurred to me that I had far too much speed. Flying up to the apartment tower had been easy, as I just flew up to the roofline from below and did a little jump to close the distance. But coming downward, I'd forgotten one basic element of physics that I couldn't ignore: Gravity.

"Oh shit, look out!" I hollered at Serge as I swept across the edge of the roof, moving far too fast for my comfort. My hooves struck gravel and sent it flying, erasing the yellow-painted message we'd said we needed to revise anyway. At the other end, my fellow pegasus turned and saw me hurtling towards him, skidding, flapping my wings frantically to try to 'go into reverse'.

Rather than duck or get out of the way, he spread his hooves wide and steeled himself. I had a look of surprise on me as I collided with him, sending him scuffling backwards a few feet and falling over on his behind.

"You okay?" he said after we extracted ourselves from the tangled heap.

"Fine," I said, embarrassed at my deplorable landing. "Thanks. Sorry about that."

"I'm sure you didn't mean it," he assured me, offering a smile.

"How about you?" I queried.

"Me? I'm fine," he said matter-of-factly.

"I meant about earlier," I clarified.

"My answer stands," he said, getting to his hooves and facing me. "Don't beat yourself up over it. I'm happy for you. You've succeeded at something you've been working at for a long time. Congratulations." He gave me a smile and a nod.

"Thanks," I said, forcing myself to smile in return. "I still feel bad for dropping you when I promised you I wouldn't. And especially after you were so worried of falling."

"It wasn't falling I was worried about," he told me.

"What?" I asked.

"You need to understand things from my perspective. You asked me before if I'm religious. Stepping onto that cloud... it stood to make a huge impact on me, and everything I believe. Should I consider my Lord invalidated by all this?" He waved a hoof at himself and then me. "Or is this a test of my faith, a challenge for me to overcome? To prove that I have the strength needed to survive in this new world?"

"I guess I'm an atheist, or agnostic, or maybe both," I said slowly. "But I think I understand what you're saying. And I'm sorry for my part in introducing doubts into your mind."

He shook his head. "Don't blame yourself. It's not your problem. I'm the one who needs to find answers. Perhaps I should be thanking you, for putting me on the road to coming up with those answers."

"If you want to think of it that way, then okay," I smiled.

"I do," he nodded. "And I want to give you something for being so understanding."

I blinked and must have looked confused. "Come again?"

Serge lifted a wing and let something fall into his hoof, which he then presented to me. "I don't pretend to know anything about flying, but if my guess is right, you might find these handy."

In my hooves was a boxed pair of pink, purple, and black Oakley womens' ski goggles.

"What the...? Where did you find these?"

"There was a box marked 'seasonal' in the corner of the warehouse," he said. "All kinds of winter junk in there. I figure they'll fit you."

I fumbled with the clear plastic case, trying to open it and release the goods inside. After a few moments, I had them out, and tried them on. The strap needed adjustment, but they covered my eyes completely and gave the world a yellowish tint.

"What do you think?" I said, smiling and facing him.

"I think they look good," he smiled back and nodded.

I stepped forward and gave him a one-legged hug. "Thanks, Serge. I appreciate it a lot."

"Thank you," he said, returning the embrace, "for understanding me."

"Not a problem," I said. "I'd go test them out, but I just came back down and wanna rest a little. I'll try them out after lunch, okay?"

"Sure thing," he answered, turning to open the roof hatch.

We went downstairs and towards the kitchen, but we heard a commotion in the common room, so we altered our course.

I stopped short, feeling my wing collide with one of Serge's as we both poofed out in surprise. I lifted up the goggles to make sure I was seeing what I thought I was seeing.

"Stop it!" Rich was protesting, rearing up. On top of his head, stacked on his horn, were four homemade donuts. A fifth was in between Karin's teeth, she having just jumped up to snatch it away from Rich. "Stop eating my practice rewards!"

"Tell Jeff to stop making them taste so good!" Karin laughed, her mouth half-full.

Swift was sitting before them, smirking and laughing. She saw us and said, "We were levitating donuts and practicing precision placement..."

"They're mine!" Rich said, starting to gallop away from Karin, who gave chase, cackling gleefully.

"I can't leave you fools alone for a minute," Serge sighed, putting a hoof to his face.

I went and found Jeff, to get away from the insanity.

"Your donuts are kind of popular," I said when I found him, out front tending some of the mini-gardens, with Buddy lying nearby enjoying the sun.

"Oh?"

"Yeah," I laughed, and told him what was going on. He just smiled and shook his head.

"What're those for?" he asked.

"Huh? Oh," I said, realizing the goggles were still propped up on my head. "Serge gave 'em to me. Figured I could use them when I was flying. To tell you the truth, I didn't notice it when I was up there, but my eyes did kinda dry out on me."

"Good," Jeff smiled. "I mean, that you two are OK. Not that your eyes dried out."

"How does your garden grow?" I smirked.

He sighed. "We might be at our limit. And that's not a good thing."

"Not enough return?"

"Not if we want to stay here indefinitely," he said. "I worry we might have to move to some place where we can have a full and proper garden patch."

"You mean, like out of town?" I said, nodding northwards.

"Yeah. It's not like we can grow here," he said, gesturing to the parking lot with a hoof. "I mean, I'm good, but I'm not that good."

I tried to do some math in my head. "How much more space than what we've got now would make you comfortable?"

"Twice as much minimum. To future-proof it, say four times as much. Why? Do you have an idea?"

"I might," I said. "Give me a bit to work on it."

"What are you thinking of? I already thought of rooftop gardens and they won't do either - we'd have to exchange the soil constantly-"

"Leave it with me a bit," I insisted, heading back inside. "Trust me!"

I went inside and worked on a laptop for a little bit, then went to the common area. The donuts were gone, but all four of them were lying there reading, studying, or otherwise occupied.

"Everything sorted out in here?" I asked.

"Hi," Swift said with a smile. "Bellies are sated and lessons are over for today."

"Bellies are partially sated," Rich faked sulking. "Three-fifths sated."

"Think of it this way," Karin giggled. "I helped you avoid putting on two-fifths of the calories."

"Has anyone seen the tablet computer?" I asked.

"Yeah," Swift said, levitating it out from under what she was reading. "I'm done with it. You want to take a turn, do you?"

"Figured I might as well," I nodded, tucking it under a wing. "Thanks."

The radio room was partially bathed in sunlight, which made for a perfect reading area - warm and mostly bright, but not bright enough that the display on the tablet was washed out.

I had grabbed a tablet stylus from the junk pile that used to be the store's Electronics section, because hoof-tapping on the tablet would be difficult at best. So I lay there in the sun, stylus in my mouth, tapping on various things on the screen.

Reading the information stored on the tablet was a shock, to say the least. The HPI, or its predecessor, knew this was going to happen? And they did noth- no, wait. That was wrong. They did something; they created the HPI, and "saved" a handful of them. Condemned to a life of living inside thick radiation suits and in bunkers below the ground, protected by technology I couldn't begin to fathom. For decades - almost a century - humans had tried to find the holy grail of energy production, something that would eliminate internal combustion engines and make our reliance on consumable fuels obsolete. And in three short years, the consortium that established the HPI figured it out - but only to use it to protect a select few people - a tiny handful of humanity compared to the population of the world. And how long would their protection last? Nuclear reactors would only work for the length of time they had fuel - that explained the trip to the Pickering nuclear plant near us, so many days ago. To hear the HPI tell it, humans outside their protective envelope died almost instantly, with no visible trauma or injury, as if the entire world had become lethally toxic.

The tablet confirmed what we'd suspected: What they were calling 'thaumic radiation' was indeed magic. Somehow, magic had inundated our world - perhaps our universe, if one was to believe what was written on the tablet. It was something we'd lived without for billions of years, but now we found that we couldn't live with it. There was supposedly no stopping its arrival, so the HPI plan was put into action, protecting a scant few humans from the newly-hostile environment. I supposed that designs for manned moon and Mars exploration were cannibalized for the HPI plan - but it was far more difficult than constructing some insulated inflatable buildings like the stories I'd heard of about the Mars colony solutions. Such a wall would be an adequate barrier between the atmosphere of Mars and what humans could survive in, but 'thaumic radiation' needed to be blocked by far sturdier stuff.

I shuddered at the thought of humanity living in underground or heavily shielded bunkers for the rest of its existence, always worrying about when the nuclear fuel would finally give out, or fretting that the shielding might pack it in. Was there anything in human history with 100% uptime? I doubted a person with my anxieties would be able to cope with living like that.

I don't have to worry about that, I thought to myself, looking down at my hooves cradling the tablet. I can still live in this world.

Lots of information contained within the tablet meant it was easy to despise them. However, instead, I found myself pitying them.

That also brought up the question: How did I and my friends survive? And where did the rest of the world's population go? It still seemed like there was a lot of conflict and unanswered questions despite the wealth of information provided. The people the HPI saw exposed to this new Earth without any shielding didn't vanish, or turn into ponies. They just died, or at least became brain-dead, according to the HPI's tablet (thankfully, they didn't provide video documentation).

Why did the people who survived, survive, as ponies?

What made ponies resistant to the lethal properties of magic, compared to the human form?

And of course, where did everypony else go?

As that thought drifted through my head, I shook it. I can't believe I just thought that. Now I'm using that term in my own private headspace.

Then again, as was said earlier, it's what we are now. And to believe the HPI documentation, there's no turning back, and even if we did, the result would either be immediate brain death or starving to death inside an HPI bunker whose resources were already stretched beyond the limits - that is, assuming they'd let us in at all.

Enough of this morbid train of thought, I told myself. I went back to what I'd spoken with Jeff about earlier.

Okay. Five feet square times 39 plots is... I looked for a calculator app on the tablet.

AUGUST 3

Breakfast was pretty decent that morning; Jeff and Karin's recent mastery of dough made it possible to make bread, so we had fresh bread to go along with our fruit slices. I found a jar of peanut butter - expired, but what really can go bad in peanut butter? - and made a sandwich - mind you, the apple wedges were on the side.

"You are filthy," Karin scolded Jeff, taking a hoof in her own for inspection. "We need to get you showered today."

"Comes with the territory," he shrugged with a smile. "Having to dig constantly in the garden pits'll do that to ya."

"You going 'up' again today?" Swift asked me.

"Nope," I said. "And unfortunately I have to ask that you all cancel at least this morning's plans as well. We need to get out of here for about 5 hours."

"What?" Swift said, an eyebrow raising.

"Wait a minute, what?" Jeff asked, interrupting the conversation he was continuing with Karin. Rich and Serge simply looked up from their food.

"I got a delivery coming," I said. "The kind we probably don't want to be around fo-"

"You called the HPI here??" Swift cut me off.

"Yes, but for a good reason," I replied.

There was a brief pause. "Well, what is it?" she finally said.

"I want to make it a surprise," I told them. "Trust me, will ya? Let's just go out and have some fun."

"What are you up to?" Serge rumbled with a suspicious eye turned my way.

"Nothing bad!" I insisted. "Would you all rather hang around in here while their scare fields are doing their thing out in the parking lot?" When there was no response, I added, "I thought so. So let's pack some lunches and go have a day off."

A short while later, we were headed north on Brock Road, in the pickup and the Prius this time.

"Hot today," Rich observed from the back seat, nodding toward the temperature indicator on the dash of the car.

"Yup," I agreed. "But we have a cooler of drinks, so we'll be good."

"A cooler of drinks and sandwiches, and a duffel bag full of sports gear," Swift added, from the driver's seat. She and Rich had been the ones to load the stuff into the truck, so she would know, of course. "Do you really think we can play games?"

"We can sure as hell give it a try," I nodded.

"I'll bet it'll work," Serge supplied, waving a hoof in between the front seats at us. "This is probably the size of a person's wrist. You can jam a glove on that."

"That's the spirit," I grinned, hoof-bumping him.

"You're all maniacs," Swift said, with a faint smile on her muzzle.

"Go ahead," I said, turning sideways in the seat to face her. "Tell me you never played sports."

"I'm from Calgary," she reminded me. "Sports involved skates or people jumping on the backs of things that we look like now."

"Anybody who gets on my back is gonna get off in a lot less than eight seconds," Serge declared, and the rest of us laughed.

"Turn here," I interrupted. We made a right at the ghost town of Brougham, passing a church, hardware store, convenience store, and fire station. Several turn-of-the-(past-)century homes sat withering away on the sides of the road.

"And left up there," I pointed. Swift obeyed and pulled into a gravel lot beside a playground.

"A community park?" Rich asked.

I nodded, as the pickup pulled in after us. "My parents played beer-league here for a few years. My grandmother ran the snack shop," I said, gesturing to a shack over to the side of the playing field.

Buddy darted out of the back of the truck and raced across the field at full tilt. Karin, laughing, bailed from the cab and took off after him.

"Better catch 'em both, you don't know what they can get into!" I called out as I exited the car. Jeff climbed down from the truck, sighing and shaking his head - but with a smile - and hurried to give chase.

"Do you wanna play on the jungle gym?" Swift teased, looking toward the playground.

"Nope," I said, hopping up into the truck and opening the duffel bag. I took a baseball glove and a ball out of the bag, putting one in the other and the combination on a forehoof. Then I flapped a couple of times and hovered over the truck, nodding behind me to the baseball field. "My playground is over this way."

Three-a-side baseball is difficult enough on its own, with one pitcher, one infielder, and one outfielder. Doing it as ponies? Even more zany.

I wished I'd brought beer at one point, but none of us had been willing to yet explore the methods by which a pony could get drunk - and what an intoxicated magical being was capable of.

Having said that, it was loads of fun. We finally answered the question of what was the best way to swing a bat, and it was indeed with it clamped in your jaw. It didn't sting or ache as much as I thought it would, but maybe ponies' teeth were sturdier, able to handle the beating they took from being used to pick up and grip things all the time. Wait, that's not to say that I had anything to compare it to. I mean, I didn't try to swing a bat in my teeth when I was Tom.

The logical distribution of players to teams meant that Serge pitched, Karin handled the infield, and Rich roamed the outfield; in the other half of the inning, I took outfield, Jeff infield, and Swift pitched. It was mostly fair, especially considering that nobody had tried to play as ponies before. But our fastest runners were handling the relatively narrow infield, and our fliers and/or magic-users took the outfield. The 'newbies' team used their biggest guy - who, we learned, played in a company softball team for a couple years - as their pitcher, and our team used our magic-user for that position.

We played three innings of three outs or three times through the order (so 9 batters) each, and had a riot of a time. I almost got hit in the head with a ball when, during my first at-bat, I was standing there staring down Serge, who was about to unleash a pitch at me, and I heard from off to the side, where Swift was standing: "You swing like a girl!!"

I just about bust a gut laughing, dropping the bat, and as mentioned nearly getting plunked. Jeff was howling right beside Swift, and the other three didn't know what to think.

After our semi-quasi-ball game, we sat on the grass in the outfield, near the parking lot, and had lunch.

"Okay, I have to admit, this was pretty fun," Jeff said.

"Yeah," Rich said. "I didn't get hit in the head with any balls this time."

Swift and Serge and I snerked at that.

"You gotta tell us what's going on back home, though," Swift insisted.

"Nope," I said. "I want it to be a surprise."

"Oh come on!"

"It'll be worth it," I told her.

"Let her have her fun," Jeff said. "Though I don't know how you can consider anything with those people fun."

"We're gonna have to work together," I said matter-of-factly. "It's a fact of life in this new world. Do you deny that?"

"Why does working together mean we get evicted from our home for half the day?" Serge wanted to know.

"C'mon, you all know why," I said, looking around at them. "Nopony wants to feel like their gut is tying itself in knots. We've subjected ourselves to it for, what, a few minutes, an hour at most when we met them at the airport? Can you imagine what being in that presence for five hours would feel like?"

Rich spoke up. "I know I would've turned tail and run, probably all the way up here."

"Yeah," Karin said from beside Jeff. "Okay, you get the benefit of the doubt for now. But we want to know what this was all about when it's done."

"Oh, trust me," I smiled. "It will be very obvious when we get back."

I couldn't keep them from wanting to return as soon as lunch was done. Hopefully the HPI has bugged out by now, I thought to myself.

"I'm not feeling anything," Swift said as we turned back onto Highway 2, just over one kilometer from Ponytown.

"We'd feel it long before now," I agreed. "It's safe to go in." I told as much to Jeff and Karin on the radio.

We pulled up to the intersection before the mall and it was plain to see what had been done - and it outshone my expectations. A huge section of the northeast corner of the parking lot - away from our entrance door and the auto bays where we parked our vehicles - had been cleared, first of cars, then of pavement and grass, and then gravel. It was levelled, tilled, and ready for planting. To my surprise, a pallet with some kind of Scandinavian language written on its boxes was sitting at one end of the plot.

At my request, Swift pulled to a stop next to the turned soil, and Jeff pulled up behind us. We all got out, and I immediately went over to our earth ponies.

"It's enormous," Jeff said, staring at the tilled earth.

"10,000 square feet," I said. "Over ten times what we have in the little tree hole gardens. Half for us, half for them."

Jeff was still boggling at the size. "For them?" he said.

"They're gonna be here all the time now?" Swift wanted to know.

I shook my head. "Nope," I told them, and waved a hoof at the plot. "This is their part of the work. We're to tend and grow the crops. Package up half of each harvest and make it ready for delivery. We can work out a pickup site later. Maybe build a helipad over there or something," I suggested, gesturing towards a parking lot across the street, far off from our home. "I think that skid over there is seeds. Looks like they handled our starter pack too. We just have to make sure to keep this working in perpetuity."

"And they did all this on the promise we'd work with them?" Serge said with a tone of incredulity.

I turned to him. "I guess they trust us," I said.

Karin was laughing and poking Jeff. "Look at this! Think of how much stuff we can grow."

He grinned back at her. "Ready to get dirty?"

She just snerked and giggled, nodding and elbowing him in the side.

That evening, I found myself in the radio room again, tuning the bands and idly searching for any other sounds, as I did every so often. I intermittently picked up bits and pieces of what I could only presume was the Manitoba crew, supposedly hurtling this way on a steam locomotive.

It gave me a good feeling to think that there were other ponies besides us. Almost as good a feeling as finding out that the guys in the black helicopters could be counted upon to be our friends, when all was said and done.

That thought directed my attention to the tablet, still sitting where I'd left it after using it the day before. I dragged it over to me, found the stylus, and mouth-tapped out a message.

Thanks for doing that, I 'wrote'. You won't regret it. When you see how fast we can grow things, you'll be overwhelmed.

It took a couple of minutes, but a reply came:

As we said before in person, miss Storm, your group may be humanity's saviors. We're willing to invest in that which stands to help us.

Stay in touch.

-X.

I smiled and nodded, then nudged the tablet aside to keep scanning through the radio bands.

Author's Notes:

What does Scandinavian lettering have to do with food in the apocalypse? This.

Cloudburst

AUGUST 8

I found Karin, Rich, and Swift all in the common area. The unicorns were practicing, and Karin was reading the tablet.

"Hey," I said. "Any of you guys free to spare a hoof for a minute?"

"We can break for a bit," Swift said, gesturing for Rich to do precisely that. "What's up?"

I lifted up a contraption grasped in my hoof. "Need a little advice and maybe a bit of manual labor to help me jerry-rig this."

"What is it?" Rich asked.

"A radio headset," I said, lifting up the headband and placing it on my head - though it was obvious that it was ill-fitting. "I want to set it up so that I can do stuff and talk on our local channels at the same time, without having to carry a radio designed for human hands. This has voice-activated control, but as you can see the headband's too big and the mic hangs way out past my muzzle. I can't cut bits out of it, because then I'd have to re-wire it, and it's not designed to do that. So I need some thoughts on how to shorten it up."

"I wonder if we could fold it over telekinetically without it losing its strength," Swift mused, indicating the metal headband part. "Kind of in a flattened S, so that the extra length is overlapping itself."

Rich nodded. "Is the mic boom rigid? If it's not, if you can bend it, I wonder if we could curl it a little bit to take some distance out of it too?"

I smiled. "I knew I was coming to the right place. The other issue I'll have is, this headset still has to hook on to a radio, and I need a way to hold onto it without having to actually hold onto it. Kind of like those bicep straps that people used to hold MP3 players with."

Karin looked up. "Actually, that exact thing may do the trick. I think I saw some in the junkpile. Let me go look." Before I could interject, she got up and dashed off.

"Let's try that magic idea," Swift suggested, telekinetically taking the headset from me and handing it to Rich. "You give it a shot."

"I have a few spares," I said, "so don't worry about wrecking it."

Swift bapped my chest with a hoof. "Don't judge him before he shows you what he can do!" She watched as Rich picked up the device.

Tongue stuck out in his usual expression of concentration, Rich bent the thin, curved piece of metal over upon itself, somehow avoiding snapping it. Then, he did the same again a few centimeters away from the first fold, bending it back the way it originally was, and shortening the whole thing by the same few centimeters' distance.

"That might work," I said. "May I?"

The device floated in a blue haze over to my extended hoof, and then fell onto it.

I raised the headset up and put it over my head, positioning the earphone cushion in my right ear, and putting the other end - with no earpiece on it - ahead of my left. The boom mic was still in the wrong position, but the headband was a good, snug fit.

"That's pretty damn good," I said. "Thanks!"

"Still got to figure out the microphone," Rich said, taking it back. "Leave it with us for a bit, please?"

"Sure," I said gratefully.

Just then, Karin galloped back. "Is this too small?" she asked, offering a neoprene sleeve on a cardboard backing.

"Let's check it out," I said, taking it from her. I ripped the cardboard off and tossed it aside, then wriggled the sleeve up my right foreleg.

"Looks decent," Karin said with an approving expression. "Too snug?"

"No, I think it'll work, actually," I nodded, more and more happy by the moment. "Thanks!"

"How many more of those do we have?" Swift asked, clearly thinking of the ways she could exploit the little accessory.

Karin grinned. "A dozen or so," she said. "It's mighty disorganized over there. Maybe we should clean up the junk pile so we can find stuff that turns out to be not junk."

"You're hired," I said at the same time as Swift, who winked at me.

Later that morning, I went out for a flight and to clear my head. Over the past few days, some interesting things had happened, and I needed to digest it all.

First off, though it'd been my idea, or at least I'd been the one to put it in motion, the working arrangement with the HPI was a strange, uneasy situation. I had the feeling that my friends worried that the quasi-military outfit weren't being entirely truthful with us. Personally, I thought it was partly legitimate and partly related to the predator-prey effect, especially with their magic-canceling fields in operation.

Second, we'd communicated with other colonies, at last! I was over the moon - well, not literally, of course; but I was overjoyed when we finally started picking up more radio transmissions. Besides the group from Manitoba that came through on the train, we'd learned of at least a couple more groups out there. One was relatively close - Kingston, just a couple hours up the highway. The one guy who talked on the radio said he was a thestral - I guess that's a batpony of all things - and had a regular pegasus pony kid with him as well as another earth pony stallion. They planned to try to stick it out on their own, which I considered a good idea, provided they had the resources. The more of us that were spread out, the better chance other survivors had of finding somepony near them to be their safe refuge, so to speak.

I was flying further than I'd gone before - by air, at least. I had driven virtually the same route a week or two before, with Swift beside me, as we fled what we thought was a gunship attacking us. I even followed the same route, musing that I was passing through the same space that the anti-magic energy had just a few days earlier; I felt lucky that there was no residual effect lingering in the sky.

The overall feeling of flying was still thrilling me to the core. Everything about it was nonsense, and didn't belong in a sensible, science-respecting world. However, science now had to share the stage with magic, and magic was helping me do what I now found I loved. The wind rushing through my wings, feathers ruffling and mane fluttering, was the thrill of a lifetime. The forces as I turned and banked, rose and dropped, made themselves known in muscles I never knew I had before my wings finally took me aloft.

Flying under the tree canopy was absolutely insane - less than fifty feet off the ground, going faster under my own power than I had ever dreamed possible. I'd have been scared if the concept of traffic was still a reality, because i was flying down the centerline of the old, disused concession road I'd hurtled down in the car, but I knew precisely where all the still-operating vehicles in this part of the world were, and Not Here was where.

"Don't fuck it up, don't fuck it up," I muttered to myself, preparing to bank and then land. Landings had not been my forté so far. The meeting with the train ponies had been embarrassing at first, since I'd tumbled onto the scene, having been up for a flight when they pulled in to Pickering. I had to learn that I wasn't an airplane, and miming a gallop as I neared the ground wasn't the way to transition from flight to hooves-on-the-ground. I really had to look for the NatGeo book that Jeff had gifted me a few whiles back, on North American birds. That still likely wouldn't teach me how to land, but it wouldn't hurt.

But this is going to, I winced as I came in for a landing still going about forty kilometers an hour. Despite what I'd just told myself, I found my legs scrambling, like a dog about to be tossed into a pool. Through some sort of miracle - maybe Luna was smiling down on me - I scrambled across the gravel parking lot still upright, but banging my hooves against lots of small rocks, and coming to a stop just before I would have hit the wooden post and wire fence that separated the parking lot from the hiking trail.

"Like a glove!" I cheered to no one in particular, trotting around in a celebratory circle a couple times as I shoved my goggles up onto my forehead. Once my heart had dropped down to somewhere near a low multiple of my resting rate, I sauntered over to the beginning of the hiking trail, looking down the overgrown path I'd hiked and biked several times in my youth.

Settling into a trot, I started walking down the path, happy to be 'out of the house', so to speak, and enjoying the fresh air. Were it not for my changed form, I might have been able to believe I was in the world of my past, before the Event. The world around me, with no distractions, deadlines, or other interruptions, just me and the wilderness.

And, apparently, a squirrel, who began to dart across the path about ten meters in front of me, then stopped and stared.

"Hi guy," I said cheerily, in a good mood for a change.

He chirped and carried on, us both going our separate ways.

Shortly thereafter, while heading down past the creek, I saw my second fellow trail-user. A grey rabbit loped onto the dirt path, stopping to sniff the air and sit there staring in that peculiar 'I'm right here but I'm not looking at you' pose that some animals seem to adopt.

"I don't have any carrots," I said with false apology in my tone. "We ate 'em all last week."

The grey bunny was joined momentarily by a snow-white one, and then both of them hopped slowly down the trail ahead of me.

"If you guys think I'm going to break into a musical number," I laughed, "you're out of luck. Disney packed it in a few months ago."

The rabbits disappeared around the bend, and I smiled and sighed, enjoying myself. My mind was drifting back to some of the times I'd traveled this trail in my youth.

There used to be cabins down here somewhere, I recalled. Sue and I would hang out with our friends and pretend we had our own little town.

And now, my mind chased those thoughts with others, you're the leader of your own town for real.

"I'm not a leader," I said to myself, shaking my head, squeezing my eyes tightly shut. But if I were to be truthful to myself, I knew that everyone looked to me for answers and suggestions for all our daily doings.

But I rely on them just as much, I protested internally. They're as much my support as I am theirs.

I huffed out another sigh, angry at myself for allowing the real world's problems to intrude on my walk. I forced my mind to clear itself and enjoy my surroundings.

The path was indeed growing over, but not too badly - it was still easy to follow the trail. The rabbits had gone out of sight - likely on some route that didn't include the track that humans had chosen to wear down over the past 50 or so years - and again I was by myself.

At one point where the foliage beside the trail thinned out, I ventured off-path and checked out the creek. Interestingly enough, it was thriving - much more vibrant and full of life than I remembered it. It was a miniature stream now, with fish actually swimming back and forth, and the sounds of frogs, water-based insects, and such up and down the bank.

Mother Nature takes back what was hers, I mused, watching a brook trout swim by.

Carrying on, I crossed another small creek over a boardwalk, again finding my brain calling up memories of a lifetime gone past and times enjoyed in this place. I wondered if I would be the last sentient creature to wander here, or if 'ponykind' would repopulate the Earth enough to make outings like this commonplace again. (I steadfastly refused to let thoughts of 'repopulation' and what my assumed chore in that would be; I had even less interest in thinking of that than I did being 'mayor' of Ponytown.)

With a start, I recognized the widening path turning into the parking lot on the Taunton Road section of the hiking trail. I'd been so wrapped up in my thoughts, I hadn't noticed I'd walked the whole thing. Or at least one leg of it.

I don't have to go back for my car, I smirked, realizing I could continue further. I hopped up and fluttered into the sky, crossing the road and trying to remember where the next leg's trailhead was.

A couple of hours later, I finally emerged at the southernmost terminus of the hiking trail, in much better spirits than I had been in weeks. Galloping along the third concession road to get some speed to take off, I noticed clumps of mud and dirt popping free of my hooves to tumble onto the tarmac.

Better wipe your feet before you go inside back home, I thought with a smirk as I took to the skies. Or Swift will tear you a new one.

Noting the patchy cloudy sky, I had an idea, and angled upwards to find a suitable cloud. When I had my sights set on one, I alighted on it with ease.

Why can't you land that smoothly on, well, land? I wondered to myself. Did it have to do with descending? It was always easy for me to flap a few times and reach up to perch on something slightly higher than me - a cloud, a roof, a ledge, the bed of the pickup truck, and so on. It was going down that gave me grief.

I let that thought slip away as I ground a hoof into the cloud, hoping that I could scrape the mud and gunk out of my hooves with them. Why not? Nothing else about how I was able to stand and walk on puffs of water vapor made sense.

Instead of cleaning myself, though, I found that I was pushing the cloud's vaporous body together - condensing it. The whole thing shrank the more I kicked at it.

Intrigued, I made wider and wider sweeps with my leg, 'gathering' bigger swaths of cloud with each pass, like I was clumping snow together for a snowman. However, instead of a large ball of white, it was getting greyer and greyer - and not from the brown dirt in and on my hooves. The cloud was actually getting denser by the second.

Eventually it reached a tipping point, and the fluffy, puffy vapor went from feeling like walking on a borderless feather pillow to making squishy, squelchy sounds beneath me. Eyes wide and taking it all in, I gave the side of the cloud one more kick, and it promptly let loose, deluging the area below it with a mild rain.

"You've got to be kidding me," I whispered. The cloud slowly faded from the navy-blue color it had taken upon compression, to a dark grey, then a dull grey, then an off-white, and if I'd left it long enough, I'm sure it would have been as white as new-fallen snow.

I had hopped over to another nearby cloud, though, a larger one, and flying beside it, shoved with all my might. At first, the cloud simply drifted across the sky in the direction I was pushing, but after a couple of false starts, I was able to figure out how to keep it stationary and make it condense.

Soon enough, I had it down to a third of its original size, and almost completely black. Once again, the lightest touch caused water to burst forth from the shape, pelting the ground below.

That. Just. Happened.

I grinned and went to look for a third cloud, to continue exploring my new skill.

"Where've ya been?" Serge asked when I came into the kitchen a couple of hours later.

"Out for a walk, and a fly," I said.

"Why are you soaking wet?" he queried, after getting a look at me. My coat was still damp, and my mane and tail as well, but I wasn't dripping on the floor wet.

I smirked and shed my goggles. "Got caught in a shower," I told him.

"It's been sunny all day here."

"Localized," I clarified, hanging the goggles over the sink to drip dry.

"Uh-huh," he said after a moment. "What do you want on your pizza for supper?"

"Surprise me," I said, grinning as I cantered away.

"Hey," I called out as I entered the back room. "Is it safe to come back here?"

"Sure," Swift answered. "We're over this way."

I turned left and headed towards the roof stairs, finding her and Rich near them, working on levitation, but of a sort I'd not seen yet.

Swift was enveloped in a blue glow, and Rich a yellow one, both floating in midair about ten feet off the ground, facing one another.

"Holy..." I said, blinking.

"Don't break my concentration," Rich said, concentrating hard. Both ponies bobbed in the air like corks on a sea.

"Turn me around," Swift requested, and slowly rotated along her vertical axis to face me. She blinked. "Did you just come out of the shower?"

"Sort of," I smiled. "Rolling my own. Figured out something new about clouds."

Swift tilted her head a little. "You're messing with weather now?"

"I think it's my prerogative, if my magic lets me do it," I countered. "Unless you happen to have a manual on how to be a pegasus pony you've been keeping from me."

"I think she has a point," Rich said as he tried to swim through the air, to turn and face us.

"Hush up or I'll make you walk on the ceiling," Swift grumbled.

"You're just jealous that I'm finally getting somewhere with my magic," I smirked.

"Um, hello?" Swift said, waving a hoof at her and Rich. "You got a long ways to go, rookie."

"I'm a fast learner, just like your star pupil," I shot back.

"Do I need to turn a hose on you two?" came a voice from behind us. I spun to see Jeff standing in the doorway quirking an eyebrow, and Karin beside him, face full of mirth.

"We were just joking around, Dad," Swift laughed.

"Don't send me to bed without any supper," I pleaded, playing along.

Jeff rolled his eyes and turned away.

About an hour later, we were enjoying our dinner meal together in the common area.

"This is good," Rich said between bites. "Thanks, Serge."

"No problem," he responded. "It's too bad I had to use prepackaged cheese, though. Real cheese is much better."

Jeff brightened, remembering something. "Hey, when that other group was here, we talked about that kind of thing."

"So we did," Serge nodded, looking to me. "You said you had some ideas, if I recall."

I nodded back. "Like I said then, we can probably make a chicken coop here, but I have my doubts that cows will have the space - and the grass - they need anywhere near Ponytown. It might be necessary to have a field up somewhere out of town."

"Up where we played baseball?" Karin asked.

"Exactly," I said, pointing to her. "There's lots of farmers' fields there and plenty of ways we can get cows out there. And I'm sure you two can figure out a way to make them proper pastureland."

"Who knows, Stormy," Swift said, cracking a grin. "Maybe you'll get your cutie mark in animal husbandry."

My ears flattened and my expression darkened. "Don't remind me of that." One of our recent guests had revealed that she had shared some dreams with Luna as well, and learned of the proper terms for various nuances in our lives. One such official description was for that of what Swift and I originally called a 'butt picture'. Don't make me say it. Really.

Everyone was laughing while I was glowering, and then Jeff spoke up. "Too late to work at it today," he said. "How about first thing in the morning?"

There was a smattering of agreeable noises, and then Rich said, "Do you have any idea where to find any animals that have survived this long on their own?"

That was a good question. We looked at one another, trying to think of it. "I guess we'll find out tomorrow," I shrugged.

"Hey, maybe Jeff can find the herd he gave the slip to when he was hiking here," Swift joked. Everyone else looked confused, but Jeff adopted a wide-eyed look of terror.

"No," he whispered. "They'll be out for my neck for abandoning them. I'll have to go into the pony protection program. Grow out a mustache, move to another city and change my name - to one of those silly ones you two use."

Again the group erupted in laughter.

AUGUST 9

"Everypony ready?" Swift called back through the open rear window of the pickup.

"We're good," Serge said for himself, me, and Rich. Swift was interfering - I mean, riding with - Jeff and Karin in the cab. Behind us, we had the flatbed trailer hooked up.

Jeff took the truck out onto the road, heading north, as we had most other times we'd gone out for a drive. We bypassed Brougham, the town with the field we had our eyes on, for the time being, and went another few kilometers up the road towards the village of Claremont. There, we found a Co-Op store - but this was not the typical grocery store type you might have seen in other places. This store was a farmers' co-operative, selling things that farmers, ranchers, and gardeners might find useful.

Jeff and Karin went bananas as soon as we got in the door, lamenting that we should have come sooner. They were both running all over the place like they were on a shopping spree, loading countless items into carts. The rest of us did some browsing while they got it out of their system.

"What do you think?" Swift said, levitating down a John Deere baseball cap from a shelf and settling it on her head. "Now do I need a tuft of wheat sticking out from between my teeth? And a habit of saying 'ya'll'?"

I laughed. "Only if you're going to sit on a tractor," I said. "But if you're doing that, I want a straw cowboy hat."

"Cowpony hat," she said. "We've been over this, remember?" She started looking around the store for one.

"You people are nuts," Rich observed, and Serge sagely nodded beside him.

"While everypony is going loony," I said to them, "let's see if we can find chicken wire, and wooden stakes. Plywood we can make a coop out of might be nice, too, but we can get that closer to home if we need to."

The three of us set off to locate the coop equipment. When I got back with the wooden stakes and an industrial staple gun, Serge had found a couple rolls of chicken wire and already had it on the trailer. Jeff and Karin had two full shopping carts - each! - and Swift was helping them pack it into the truck with her magic.

"No sheets of plywood, boss," Rich said. "But like you said, we have some at home."

"Right," I nodded, inwardly wincing at being called 'boss'. "What about the cow pasture... I wish there was a book we could consult." I rubbed my chin with a hoof. "I guess we use the existing fencing..."

"You know, if the cows have gotten as smart - proportionally, I mean - as Buddy has, you might not even need fences. Just gather 'em up and tell them to hang out there," Swift suggested.

"Now that's something I want to see," Serge said. "Go over here and eat this grass."

"Grass seed," I said, and would have snapped my fingers if I had some. "Let's get several bags, or boxes or containers or whatever. A field's a big area to cover."

"On it," Rich said, darting into the store.

"We can feed them with corn from the garden," Jeff contributed, "but a water trough is probably necessary."

"Milking supplies," Karin chimed in.

"All good ideas," I agreed, as Serge went to follow Rich. "Let's not get ahead of ourselves though. We can probably hold off on milking appliances and storage for now, until the cows are ready."

"We still have to find some cows and some hens," Swift pointed out.

"I know, we'll do that next," I said. Looking over to what was being loaded into the bed of the truck, I asked, "What is all that stuff, by the way?"

"What isn't it?" Karin smiled. Looking closer, I could see why she said that - hoes and rakes and manual seeders and fertilizers and all kinds of products designed to make your green thumb even greener were floating from the carts into the pickup.

"Cool," I said.

"So, what else do chickens need? Anypony?" Swift asked.

"Don't they want warmth inside the coop?" Karin said.

I frowned. "We really need a book, or Google. Jeff, get on that. Rebuild Google by nightfall, please."

"Uh, yeah, no sweat," he deadpanned. "Want redundant servers too?"

"Whatever will let me type in 'how to build a chicken coop' and get results is fine by me."

"Sawdust," Swift said while failing to hold in a laugh. "And straw. Mix them for the floor. Straw for their nests of course. Yes, they want heat and light in the coop, but we can get that back at Ponytown. Food and water too."

"There's likely all sorts of feed across the road," Karin suggested, nodding towards the outbuilding flanked by a silo. "Does it go bad if it's been sitting for months?"

"Only one way to tell," Jeff responded. "Not sure what we'll do if the chickens and cows refuse."

Rich came back out from the store, with three large bags of seed draped over his back, and three more caught in his magic field. "I feel like a rented mule," he said.

"Of course you aren't," Swift reassured him, taking the bags from his magical grasp and setting them in the pickup bed. "Renting implies you're getting paid."

Suddenly there was a loud scraping noise from the outside of the store. It repeated a few seconds later, and we walked over to see what was going on.

As we rounded the corner, we almost bumped into Serge, who was backing up while pulling two stacked-together, large bathtub-sized galvanized steel troughs towards us, the handle on one end of one in between his teeth.

"Oook wha I pound avound vack," he said.

"Any more of them?" I asked. Jeff hurried to help with the other end of the troughs.

"'Vout hav a vozen," Serge said, nodding with difficulty.

Swift looked to Rich. "Up to trying to move some heavy stuff?" she asked him.

"Let's go," he said, trotting that way.

I couldn't help but laugh as Jeff and Serge went one way, and Rich and Swift the other. Karin looked at me and smiled.

"Seems like this project is going well," she said.

"I'm glad," I acknowledged. "We should have thought of this sooner, but that's the only thing that I can say bad about it."

By noon, we had all the stuff loaded on the truck. And I mean all the stuff - there was barely room for us all to ride any more.

I elected to give up my seat by flying - come on, you had to see that coming. Jeff said almost exactly that when I leapt into the air upon leaving the feed lot.

From there, we went to our chosen field. It had been most recently planted with wheat or some kind of grain crop, judging by the stubble, but we'd sort that out in short order. With all six of us trampling the stubble down while we walked along spreading grass seed, soon the field looked like a flat expanse of dirt with seed strewn everywhere.

"Now we wait for rain," Jeff said, wiping his brow.

I grinned. "You're partly right," I said, lowering my goggles onto my eyes and shedding the seed bag.

"Oh no, look out," Swift warned, and I didn't hear the rest as I shot into the sky looking for clouds. If this was going to work, I'd need more than just a couch-sized puff like I'd experimented with the other day.

It took about fifteen minutes to gather the necessary moisture into a dark cloud. Pushing it over the field and giggling madly, I hollered out, "Here comes the rain again!" and began stomping on the top of the cloud as hard as I could.

After a few moments, it began to drip, and then the drip turned to a steady stream - or, more precisely, many steady streams, as the rain pelted down from the cloud onto the soil below.

Some of my friends stared in surprise and disbelief. Others dodged the deluge at first, but then when they realized it wasn't going to harm them, got underneath and enjoyed a shower along with the field.

After I got the cloud draining, I began to shove it about, making sure the water covered all the areas we'd just laboriously spread seed upon. Laughing my head off, I couldn't help but think that this life was going to be fun after all.

Author's Notes:

Sorry for the delay on this one. Had to make sure I wasn't going to cause trouble with someone whose story I was collaborating with "in between" chapters. (That's the 'guests' mentioned in the story - ThePrinceOfTheNorth's characters from the story Starlight paid a brief visit.)

Next time: Why did the chicken cross the parking lot?

Cold Front Building

AUGUST 12

I wandered into the bedroom area to find Jeff and Rich manipulating wall panels. The unicorn had an entire panel in his magical grasp and was repositioning it.

"Whatcha up to?" I asked them.

"Making one room from two," Jeff said plainly. "Trying to figure out how to place this panel, if we need two doors or not. If we don't, it can replace the outer wall with it."

"Ah," I nodded. Then I noticed whose rooms were affected - Jeff's and Karin's. "Oh. Oh! Um, congratulations?"

"Thanks," Jeff smiled sheepishly. "We weren't trying to be secretive about it."

"That's fine; peoples' relationships are their own business," I said, nudging his shoulder, "but good job nonetheless."

"Um...?" Rich said, straining to keep the panel in the air.

"Oops, sorry," Jeff apologized. "Let's try it with two doors for now, so just lean it against the other panels for the time being."

"I'll get you of your way," I said, backing away from the pair. "Are you guys going to be ready at ten for the great cattle and or chicken roundup?"

"Sure," Jeff said, helping steady the wall as it descended. "Have you found any?"

"I scouted a few places early this morning and heard a rooster. I presume that means there's some hens nearby. Cows, I still have to find, but I figure I can do that while you guys're out cruising for chicks."

"Ha ha," Jeff said. "Okay, see you at ten."

I was in the kitchen munching on some cereal when Swift came in.

"You'd better not be eating right out of the box," she joked.

"Why didn't feed bags ever catch on with us?" I asked, poking fun back at her. "Just put a couple of strips of Velcro on the sides of this and hook 'em together behind your neck, and you can eat while you're working."

She shook her head and changed the subject. "Did I hear you go out early this morning?"

"Yeah," I said between bites. "I had a hunch which I think paid off. I heard a rooster crowing out in the country, which I've got narrowed down to three or four houses. I'm hoping where there's guys there'll be girls. As for cows, I'll look around while you guys try to catch some chickens."

"Of course, we get the hard work," Swift grinned wryly. "Just kidding. I bet I can catch them pretty nicely with magic. And no, I won't hurt them," she hastened to add as I opened my mouth to protest.

"All right," I said. "I figured we'd go out about ten."

"Sure thing."

Ten o'clock rolled around and all seven of us ended up assembled at the auto bays.

"You gonna help us out, Buddy?" I asked of our resident Dalmatian.

"I figured he could be of use in either roundup," Karin suggested. "Right, Buddy?"

An assertive bark confirmed his intentions to come along.

"All right." Jeff had the truck and trailer ready, and ponies were climbing aboard. "You good to follow me?" I asked him.

"I guess so," he said. "You sure like flying, don't you?"

"Do you have to ask?" I grinned, lowering my goggles and taking to the skies.

Up to Taunton Road I flew, staying low to allow the truck to keep me in sight. West on the sideroad, counting houses - the fifth, sixth, and seventh ones on the north side were my suspected candidates, and I circled above them while I waited for the truck to arrive.

I landed in the grassy ditch along the road, skidding to a stop like I'd meant to do it, to hide my abysmal landing skills. "One of these," I said, gesturing with one hoof as I climbed out of the ditch.

"Split up into pairs and each check one?" Jeff suggested. Everyone nodded or affirmed, so we divided as such.

"Got any idea where you're going to find cows?" Serge asked me as we took the left house.

"I'm gonna search over towards home," I said, gesturing northwestward. I inwardly flinched as I realized he didn't know my past. "I mean, my human home. It's abandoned. Well, obviously. I mean, I've moved on-"

"I understand," he said, pushing aside a gate for me. "Some of us have pasts that would do best to be memories."

I looked into the eyes of the big pegasus, seeing the same thing I knew had been in mine after visiting Sue's house - a tortured soul missing a family. All I could do was nod.

"Shed or garage?" Serge asked, indicating the two outbuildings, one on each side of the back yard.

"One for each of us?" I responded, gesturing with a wing towards the garage nearest me. He nodded and smiled and headed to his left, to the shed.

The garage was a relatively sturdy building, but a swift kick, even from a non-earth pony, defeated the door knob on the 'man door' fairly easily. I shouldered the door open after that, and had to wedge it from closing to allow light to enter the building.

No chickens here. As my eyes adjusted to the light, I let out a laugh. At least, not the kind we need.

Inside the garage, up on jacks and partially restored, was a 1978 Pontiac Trans Am Firebird - the car The Bandit had driven in the iconic road trip movie.

Various car parts lined the shelves along the walls, and a workbench at the back had some tools and the typical license plates, calendars and photos, and such.

Ducking back out of the door, I saw Serge leaving the shed. He saw me and shrugged. "Just a rusted-out lawnmower and a broken weed eater," he called out.

Before I could say anything, a cacophony of barking and frenzied clucking reached us from the other side of the hedge. "Sounds like we found 'em," I said, turning and making a wing-assisted hop over the shrubbery.

Karin and Jeff were in the middle yard with Buddy, and the latter was sitting by the door to the larger of two sheds. He'd only barked a couple of times, enough to point out his find, and then sat and went silent, so as to not agitate the birds further.

"How are they alive after all this time?" Karin wondered, listening to the excited creatures inside.

"Only one way to find out," Jeff said, and as Serge rounded the house followed by Rich and Swift, he reached out and shoved the door open.

It wasn't exactly a pretty sight. It was far from the happiest flock of birds I'd ever seen in my life. There was some kind of automated feeding system and some lights on a timer, apparently driven by solar power. Feed hoppers were in the back of the hut, near to being empty. The hens were in sad shape healthwise - not near death, but not in tip-top shape either. And between the spoiled eggs that had been laid for many, many days, and the waste from the birds, the place was, shall we say, a mess.

"Good God," Serge uttered.

"Can they be saved?" Swift wanted to know.

"I think so," Jeff said. "It'll take some TLC and gentle handling. We certainly won't be producing eggs this week, that's for sure. Can somepony keep Buddy back by the truck? I think they might freak out some more with him around. Bring me some of the pet kennels." We'd acquired a couple dozen animal carriers to try to help in moving the creatures.

"I got that," I said, urging Buddy to come with me. He obediently lay by the truck as I clutched the handles of three carriers - two in my forehooves, one in my teeth - and flitted back to the barn.

"I'm gonna leave these with you," I said, putting them down. "Honest, it was my plan all along to go looking for..."

"Lucky you," Karin smiled, wrinkling her snout at the stench. "I bet at least five ponies in this hut would jump at the chance - excuse the pun - to join you anywhere but here."

"You sure?"

"Just go," Swift insisted, "before we change our mind."

"Thanks guys," I choked out, spinning and flying away, gulping down fresh air as I climbed into the atmosphere.

Durham Region rolled underneath me as I flew away from the disaster area. Okay, it wasn't that bad, but I truly felt ill after being in that coop for just a few moments. My friends were going to have to put up with the foul stench for quite some time, until they rescued all the birds and got them out of the mess.

I still felt like I was abandoning them, even though I did have an excuse to move on, and they were willing to let me go. I'd have to make it up to them - hopefully by finding some decent milking cows, relatively close to our preferred meadow. Still, the area I was searching was more than 16 kilometers away from the pasture, and that might be a tedious hike, especially if the cows were as bad off as the hens.

What you need are wild cows that found some good food and fended off predators, I told myself. Hopefully a herd of bovines would be easy to spot from the sky.

I passed over the hiking trail, then the town of Whitevale, and then the town of Green River. Durham Region gave way to York Region, but the farmland ensued.

There were signs of cattle having used the fields - many a crop and/or patch of grass had been eaten away to nothing. Fences and gates in various places had been broken open. I tried to remember if they were that way when Swift and I had come up this way in the SUV when going to my sister's house, but that was a lifetime ago.

I flew over a property that had several unusual features - two swimming pools, a number of tennis and basketball courts and baseball diamonds, and a number of one-story buildings. Ultimately, I realized it was Camp Robin Hood, a kids' camp I'd often heard of, but never actually knew where it was situated, even though it was a ten minute drive from my house.

At the edge of the property were several dozen small white boxes. Finally it dawned on me. Oh! Bees, I realized. Why the camp would have beehives was beyond me, but they were there. Maybe we should come see if there's any bees to salvage. Honey would be a nice treat.

No cows, though, so on I flew. In a few seconds, I found myself over home. The Mennonite church sat just north of the property, and Sue's place across the road, all of it looking unchanged except for the overgrown lawns. Like Serge said, it was best left to rest in peace, as far as I was concerned.

I went as far north as the fairgrounds, and found nothing. I decided to try my luck closer towards our desired meadow, and banked right to head that way.

Claremont came up in short order, and there was nothing new there from a couple days ago. Turning right again, I angled towards a farmstead that was settled in the 1600s, trying to remember its name. Naturally it wasn't relevant, but it was occupying my mind.

I was so wrapped up in that, that I almost missed the creatures in the field the next farm over.

"Woo!" I cheered to myself, banking and turning to circle over the cattle again. There were about twelve, and three calves. They were milling about in a yard - as I passed over the house and the driveway that led up to it, I saw that it was identified as a wildlife sanctuary. Maybe they figured this was someplace they could find something to subsist on. Any port in a storm?

I bounced off the turf a few times and staggered to a standing position, a good distance away from the cows so as to not frighten them. As I turned to face them and raised my goggles, I hoped the look I was getting from them wasn't truly one of bemusement like it seemed.

At that instant was the first time it occurred to me that the cows might have some greater sentience, either on the level that Buddy's intelligence seemed to grow, or even higher, to be on par with us. As I trotted up to the cows, I smiled brightly and tried to think of something to say.

"Good morning!" I said. "How are you all?"

They all, to the last, stared at me.

"Okay then," I mumbled to myself after a moment. "My name is Stormy and I represent a group of people - well, we used to be people, now we're ponies. Maybe you think that's funny or just desserts, maybe not. But it occurred to us that we haven't had any fresh milk in a good long while, and you probably haven't had anyone care for you or pay any attention to you at all, since the Event. How'd you like to work together to solve our mutual problems?"

One cow chewed on something for a few moments.

"Um," I said, not sure if I was selling them on it or not. "We have a field we've set aside that will have plenty of grass and soon enough some milking equipment so we can attend to your needs. It's over this way a couple miles. Are you up to walking a couple miles?"

I stood there with my hoof pointing towards the field near the park in Brougham. True enough, my circuitous flight had taken me to a place just about three kilometers from where we'd planned to house the cows. Possibly they could have even found it on their own, if left to their own devices long enough.

Finally, at long last, after several uneasy moments, one of the cows stepped sideways, turned ever-so-slowly, and lumbered towards the edge of the field. She let out a sudden, prompt "moo", and in a far-from-coreographed maneuver, the cattle all turned to follow their leader.

"...Great!" I said, jumping up to a hover and following them slowly. "I know you're going to like it with us."

The animals didn't need much herding; they managed to stay together as a group and follow my directions for the most part. Still, every time I had to stop to open (or worse, find and then open) a gate, it took a couple of minutes to get everybody moving again.

The Ponytown Cattle Drive of 2015 took a little over an hour and a half to complete. By that time, my compatriots had rescued all the hens and taken them back to Ponytown, and sent Jeff out to the pasture with the truck to look for me.

"Took you long enough," he called out, standing on the hood of the truck watching me approach from the far side of the field.

I was hovering over the herd as they loped southward; though once they spotted the fresh, tall grass, they seemed to quicken their pace a bit. "These guys seem to want to go their own pace," I explained, keeping up with them.

"Looks like you had success."

"Yeah, relatively close by, too, otherwise I'd be out here til nightfall. These guys seem to be willing to dance with us - funny thing, they almost seem like Buddy."

"I think I know what you mean," Jeff said, nodding, hopping down from the truck and walking over. "The chickens seemed thankful once we got them out of that hellhole."

"How bad was it?" I asked.

"Two we couldn't save. Three more malnourished, and eleven relatively healthy. Damnedest thing, the malnourished ones probably would've gone the way of the dead ones if they hadn't been force-fed."

"Say what?"

Jeff nodded. "The other chickens were keeping them alive." He walked up to a cow. "Hello ma'am, mind if I take a look?" With no response forthcoming, he ducked under her and began inspecting her udder.

"This is gonna be a little surreal," I said, stumbling to a landing, watching him work.

"Tell me about it," Jeff's voice came from under the cow, who was standing there chewing away disinterestedly. "Oh, man, maybe we should have gotten the milking equipment straight away."

"You're kidding, they're producing still? Now? Whatever?" I said.

"I don't know how good of product it would be, but this poor girl's swollen and probably pretty sore."

I held my forehooves up and looked at them. "Please tell me we'll get a machine. I don't know if I can figure out how to milk manually with hooves."

"It's probably for the best if we do. I don't suppose there was one near where you found them?"

"I can go check, but I got the feeling they were kind of nomadic, standing out in a field as they were."

"If you don't mind. Worse comes to worst, we can go looking tomorrow. Or maybe Swift and Rich can help relieve these poor girls."

"There's a thought," I said.

"I'm gonna look them over and see if there's anything urgent we can do for them. Go look for a place that has a milking parlor. If need be we can take the worst-off ones to it, if it's decently nearby. Otherwise, when we find one, we'll try to uproot it, and bring it here on the trailer and install it with a generator or windmill from Ponytown."

"Got it," I said, throwing a mock salute and taking off again.

It took several hours, but I finally found a barn with a milking machine. On the way I'd come across a lot of creatures that'd not made it without human intervention, and I got pretty depressed for a while, even feeling guilty; thinking about us playing house in a shopping mall while these poor animals died of starvation or disease.

You can't save everybody, I tried to remind myself. Even if we had been able to go door-to-door, the best we could have done for most of them was set them free to fend for themselves. I certainly didn't know how to care for pigs or llamas. Dogs and cats I could have let loose, as I said, but what would I have done with a pen full of hungry goats who'd eaten everything in their paddock down to the dirt?

Jeff was still with the cows when I got back with the good news about the machine. Karin and Swift had joined him, driving up in the Prius. Swift was sitting nearby, watching bemusedly as the two Earth ponies were seemingly chatting with the cows. Of course, they were having a one-sided conversation, but it was the same kind of talk any and all of us had had with Buddy. These animals seemed to understand us a lot better than before, and their visual communication cues between one another and us were scarily detectable now.

"I wonder if it's them that got smarter," Swift said as I came to sit down with her, "or if we've moved closer to their level now that we're ponies."

"Whoa, that's deep," I observed.

"You know what else is deep?" she said, holding up a hoof. It showed signs of vigorous scrubbing with a scouring pad, and there was still gunk from the chicken coop in between the sole and the frog.

"Oooh," I winced. "Want me to whip up a deluge?"

"I'll get a shower later," she said dismissively. "But nopony can say we haven't worked hard today, that's for sure."

"I still feel bad leaving you guys behi-"

"Don't," she insisted, cutting me off. "We all had our parts to play. You did what only you could do, flying around to find these guys."

"I just don't want you to think I was having fun flying all over the place."

"Oh, horsepucks," she shot back with a smirk. "You had the time of your life and nopony will believe otherwise. But you were working at the same time, so that's cool."

I smiled faintly. "Thanks then, I guess," I said.

"What's got you so mellow?"

I gestured with a hoof to the cows. "Thinking of 'these guys' and all the other creatures that have been wandering around out here while we've been making good lives for ourselves. Me giggling over being able to fly while these poor cows are staggering around trying to find something to eat and feeling like they're about to burst."

"You can't blame yourself for any of this," Swift insisted. "We've had a hard enough time surviving on our own. You've got to look out for yourself before you even try to help anypony else. You can't be of any use if you're not in good shape yourself."

"I guess that's true," I conceded.

Jeff came back, followed by Karin. "Well, the good news is, nobody is sick, and nobody needs immediate attention. Other than the fact that they're all bloated and miserable. But we can solve that after we get the parlor moved here and running, hopefully tomorrow."

"How big is it again?" Swift asked, looking to me. "I can probably pick the whole thing up and put it on the trailer myself if it's not too monstrous."

"I'm pretty sure the main workstation you can handle," I said. "It seemed to be hooked to some ancillary equipment as well as what I presume were holding tanks. I think they'll need to be transported separately."

"Probably three trips," Jeff nodded. "Four if you count the generator coming up from Ponytown. Sounds like an all-day affair."

"It'll be worth it," Karin said. "They're eager to get milked and get back to work."

"You can tell?" I asked.

"Haven't you ever talked to Buddy? Same thing," Karin smiled back.

"If you say so," I shrugged. "But if any of these guys ever acts like they're laughing at me, so help me, I'll-"

"Take it like somepony who knows they're three times your size and could step on you until you cry for mercy," Swift interjected.

I couldn't help but feel like at least two or three of the cows who'd overheard the exchange were leering at me.

Speaking of all-day affairs, it was nearly five PM by the time we got back to Ponytown - Jeff and Karin in the truck, and me and Swift in the Prius.

"As much as I hate to encourage your crazy behavior, messing with nature," Swift said as we pulled in to the parking lot, "we probably need some rain on the garden here tomorrow."

"Messing with nature," I echoed with a dumbstruck tone. "You mess with nature all the time, making shit that shouldn't float float."

"I know what I'm doing and what my limits are," Swift argued. "What if you accidentally make a tornado or a hurricane?"

"Come onnnn," I replied. "When have you known me to get out of control?"

"Do you want that alphabetically or chronologically?" she smirked.

I batted at her with a hoof. "Oh shut up," I said with a grin.

She changed the subject abruptly, nodding towards the windshield. "Hey, look who stopped by."

I looked up to see a familiar black flatbed vehicle stopped in front of our entrance door, with Rich and Serge standing or sitting nearby. The platform was conspicuously free of any cargo except one small item.

"Hmmm," I said, then nodded in the same direction my friend had. "Pull up."

The two vehicles stopped near the HPI drone, and all four of us climbed out to join our other two friends. "She's here now," Serge called out. "Everybody is."

"Good," came a tinny voice from the device on the flatbed. "You all need to hear this."

I walked up to the platform; Serge had been looking at me when he said 'she's here', and nodded from me to the device. I blinked when I saw it. It was a piece of equipment that looked like a cross between a phone and an old-school laptop computer; I mean the old ones that had bulky screens and thick connecting and peripheral cables. The folding part was a display, and on it was the weathered face of a sixty-some-year-old balding man, with wire-frame glasses and a troubled expression.

"Aha, Ms. Storm," he said, and I found myself taken aback. The concept of seeing a human talking was such an alien one these days. "We finally meet face-to-face, as it were."

"Dr. Baker," I said, recognizing the voice. "Hello. Neat contraption."

"It's little more than a satellite phone with video capabilities," he said. "It does the job, though."

"We have a handful of satphones," I interjected, "but we never got them to work."

"Oh? Perhaps you didn't have the right numbers to call. We have a number of them working across the continent... around the globe, really, what with the outreach team in the EU," he said offhandedly. "However, I have to bring us back to the reason I'm calling, and I apologize for cutting right to the chase. We've... well, the best way to put this is we need your help."

"I'm sure we can assist," I said, looking around at my friends. "What's the matter?"

"I'm afraid it's a rather big ask," Baker said. "And trust me, I did not want to do this. My orders are coming from higher up."

"What is it?" Serge said with impatience.

"We've overextended ourselves," came the reply. "We knew we were sharing with you - and the other large colonies - more than we could afford, but thought it would be something we could resolve with a little bit of rationing. Unfortunately an... incident recently caused us to re-assess our food stocks and supplies situation, and... well, the numbers just don't come close any more."

"So what are you saying?" I asked.

"Your colony, and the other larger ones, are very close to being completely self-sufficient, to the point of even being able to trade your excess product - to have an excess product in the first place. You'll recall we have an agreement to share the crop from your new garden we helped build. I absolutely loathe doing this, but we are going to have to demand more than our fifty-fifty share of the first crop."

I held up a hoof to silence the cacophony of protests erupting around me. It eventually worked, but took a few seconds. "How much?" I asked.

"Eighty-eight percent, no less."

"That doesn't leave us a lot. And is that a permanent thing or a one-time 'request'?"

"I hope to God it's a one-time request, miss," the doctor said fervently. "I have no desire to give you the short end of the stick after we've worked so hard together. But my superiors insist it's necessary for our survival. If we don't get what we need, not only will we have to break off our co-operative relationship with you, but..." He chewed on his words a little before speaking further. "Rumor has it that future missions to accumulate supplies for our survival will take on a more aggressive nature."

"What does that mean?" Swift wanted to know.

I looked the man in the eye - or at least in the camera lens. "What he's saying is, if they know of a resource they need, they're just gonna take it, and it doesn't matter what's in the way, or who gets hurt. All for the greater good of the HPI. Am I right?"

"I so wish it wasn't this way, miss-"

"Yeah, you and me both. So basically you helped us get self-sustainable, and now we need to return the favor. Am I right?"

"That's about the size of it," he nodded grimly.

"What assurances do we have that if you get what you need, we can go back to a mutually beneficial relationship?" Jeff asked.

"I swear," Baker nodded vigorously, "Get us on our feet, and I'll personally see to it that we return to being the best of allies in perpetuity, if I have to go to Raven myself."

"Raven?" someone behind me echoed.

"Never mind," I told them. "So, we need to make sure this crop is the absolute best we can deliver, and harvest it the second it's ready, and give you nine-tenths of it."

"...Plus anything from previous shipments that you've ended up not using," Baker added reluctantly, as if he'd 'forgotten' to mention that.

"Of course," I snarked. "Do we have a deadline?"

"We know your crops grow faster than they did in post-Collapse Earth due to your innate abilities," he said. "Twenty-four hours after harvest, maximum."

"Or else the gunships come and take what you need in force."

"Don't say it like that."

"We'll get it done," I promised. "After that, we'll need to talk about our future arrangement."

"I understand completely. Trust me, miss Storm, I am on your side here. I argued against this as long as I could - probably longer than I should've. If there was room, or time, I'd probably have been censured or charged. Regardless, I have your back. Help us, and I will do everything in my power to make sure it is worth your while."

"We'll get it done," I repeated.

The rover lifted its robot arm, grasping the video-phone, and held it out. "I have to take the RVR back, but please keep this for future contact. It's simple to operate and charges from standard AC mains power, which I believe you have in abundance."

Swift took it when I made no move to.

"Thank you, miss Quill," Baker said. "My, this looks interesting from this angle," he mused distractedly, referring to the phone being caught in Swift's magical glow. Then the call ended and the rover backed away.

Everyone flinched when I lashed out with a hoof and kicked at the phone. It must have been made of sturdier stuff than it looked, because it didn't break - just wiggled a little in Swift's telekinetic grip. That, or I'm a weak kicker.

"Don't get so upset," Jeff said, trying to calm me. "We can do it."

"I'm not mad at that, or at him," I snapped. "It's... it's his bosses! And this whole thing." I paced in a little circle, wings spread wide, ranting. "First the chickens are near death, then the cows are sick, and now we need to drop everything and save people that knew this whole friggin' thing was going to happen and hid underground while the rest of us-"

I was cut off when I felt a pony step up to me and put a hoof around my foreshoulders. "Relax," Swift said softly, hugging me. "We've got this. Together we can make it work."

"I know," I frowned, quieting down. "But part of me wants to trust him and the other part of me wonders what's going to stop them from saying 'Wups, we partied too much last night, we need all your food again this week' over and over again!"

"Stormy," Swift said, quietly, in my ear. "We're not going to let that happen. And if by some inexplicable chance they end up actually doing that, we can just pick up and go somewhere else. As small a group as they are, there have to be places they're not able to reach."

"I hope it doesn't come to that," I said.

"We all do," Serge spoke up, and I realized I'd all but forgotten they were all there. Now they were crowding around me and Swift.

"Jeff and I will just have to put in early and long days this week," Karin said. "No big deal."

"We'll all pitch in," Rich said.

"I don't think they know about the livestock yet," Jeff mused. "If we can get them producing by tomorrow evening or Friday morning at the latest, then we'll put it in with the crop on Monday morning, and hopefully 'wow' the HPI into dropping the hardball routine."

"Yeah," Swift nodded enthusiastically. She started to guide me inside. "Sound okay?"

"I guess," I mumbled, as the group began to disperse.

Swift leaned against me as we walked along. "Don't sweat it. It's gonna work out. The farming wizards are going to make corn and beets and potatoes and tomatoes and everything else appear right before your very eyes. The chickens, they're gonna be okay after a couple days' rest. And the cows... well..." She smirked. "They weren't cows anymore. They were waiting to be, but they forgot. Tomorrow they'll see the sky, and remember what they are."

I chuckled. "Thanks," I said.

Author's Notes:

Well then. Not to spring this on you suddenly, but this is the second-to-last chapter of The Coming Storm. That's right; the next chapter is the end of this story. It will be longer than the other chapters and thus take a little bit more time to come out.
Rest assured though, there will be a sequel called After the Storm, which picks up not much later in the timeline. And of course there's also The Longest Highway if you're hungry for something else to read!

Sudden Storm

AUGUST 13, 2015
05:12AM

I lay there in the darkness, staring up at the ceiling of Ponytown far over my head. There was no sound, except for the Dalmatian snoring lightly nearby. He'd been sleeping in the room of his running partner in the past, but now that she was sharing a bed herself, he apparently felt three was a crowd, and came to where he figured the most comfort was needed.

Everyone else was asleep, and here I was, lying awake in bed, as I had since I was roused from slumber sometime before four. It was a surprise that I didn't wake anypony else up with my shouts, but they were just in my dream - in my nightmare.

Where's the dreamwalking princess now that I need her? I wondered to myself.

I went over the thoughts that were crowding around each other in my head, one more time. Four days. Ninety-six hours. To make a bumper crop, resuscitate a flock of chickens into productivity, and make a herd of cows content enough to provide as well. And come up with a diplomatic plan to avoid getting on the bad side of a grumpy, hungry bunch of people cooped up in a secret, hidden, subterranean lair with superweapons. Sure. Any other miracles you need done?

After lying there for a couple dozen more minutes, I abandoned any pretense of getting sleep, and instead threw aside the covers, unintentionally covering up Buddy as I got up and fluttered my way to the kitchen - avoiding making noise with hooves on the floor.

A couple of glasses of water later, I stood there looking at what we'd accomplished in not quite three months. Six of us had come together, renovated a space into a home, found a means to generate power, and grew our own foods to complement the packaged stuff we'd rescued from our new home and various other locations in and around the mall. With luck, our foodstuffs would be even more 'back to normal' in short order if the animals turned out okay. The only thing that was really still a question mark was a steady water supply - the mains had long given up, of course, and while we had plenty of bottled water from both our own scavenged supplies and the HPI's care packages, we all knew we'd have to provide for ourselves soon enough. There were suggestions that we collect rainwater on the roof (and I had visions of myself stomping on clouds to help that along) or, if we found some way to treat it, draw water from the lake.

Besides that, though, we'd done pretty damn good for a bunch of people who didn't even know one another before the summer, let alone know how to survive without the luxuries of an industrial society surrounding us.

"What are you doing up?" came a tired voice as I surveyed the kitchen. Flinching, I turned to see Swift walking sleepily into the space.

"Can't sleep," I said quietly and plainly.

"Don't fret too much," she responded. "We'll get things sorted out. It's what we do. And y'know what? Even if our partnership with the HPI ends, we can still make things work. We got along fine before they came into the picture."

But they weren't openly vying for the same supplies we are, I kept to myself. If it came to us versus the HPI, what would they do for their needed items - take their chances that some other site near us had what they needed, or come where they knew they could get a working whatever-they-wanted?

"I can tell you're still brooding over stuff," Swift said, coming closer. She gently put a hoof on my temple. "Quit chewing on things up here so much. Give us a chance before you write us off in your head."

"I'm not writing us off," I said, ears folding back. "I'm just trying to be realistic."

"Hey. Is there anything to be accomplished from fretting? Or 'trying to be realistic'?"

I frowned and blushed, looking away, mainly because I knew she had me. "No," I admitted.

"So put it out of your mind. Let us do our best and let the chips fall where they may."

I sighed and tried to put on a smile. "If you say so," I told her.

"There we go. Now, since we're up, how about we go check out the birds?"

I nodded and agreed, and we both walked out of the store, and down the corridor of the mall, lit only by Swift's horn.

"What do you suppose we do about all this?" I said, looking around at the shuttered stores and businesses we'd left virtually untouched since the Event.

"Use 'em as storage lockers?" Swift answered. "Dream big. Each one is an apartment for when Ponytown's population is in the triple digits."

I chuckled a little. "Fair enough," I said. "We'll have to work on our power and water, then."

"We can do it. Stop looking for all the hurdles we have to leap."

I took the hint and shut up for the time being, and we walked towards the exit. Outside, around the back where the loading docks were, we'd fashioned a coop and a pen for the chickens. The roof of the building had a partial overhang of the sidewalk here, allowing for some natural cover besides what we fabricated. The chicken wire was run between two "No Parking - Fire Lane" signs and attached to the wall of the shopping center there, forming a three-sided pen with the fourth side being the mall's exterior wall. A ten-foot-by-eight-foot section at one end of the pen had a roof and plywood sides to give the birds a fully-sheltered place where they could roost and do their thing. It was from inside this coop that some gentle clucking could be heard.

"Mornin', ladies, how are ya?" Swift asked softly, bending her neck down so that she could see in the doorway that led from the pen to the coop. "Is that better than where you were?"

There was some more earnest clucking promptly, and Swift laughed and said, "Yeah, I thought so. Let us know if you need anything."

"Don't tell me you can speak chicken," I deadpanned.

"Oh, no," she laughed again, glancing at me. "But who's to say that Jeff and Karin are the only ones who get to talk to them like they're people?"

"I guess that can't hurt," I shrugged. "But if they start answering you back, I'm out."

"You so would not be," she said accusingly, walking around the outside of the pen, making sure it was still intact and ready for use. "Your mind'd be blown, but you'd enjoy it just like the rest of us."

"If you say so," I smiled.

She turned her attention to the field, jutting out of the parking lot a few dozen meters away. Heading towards it, she said, "This is looking good."

I followed and this time, had nothing to complain about. Stalks of corn were upright before us and about a foot tall, despite having just been planted the night before. Wheat, carrots, peas, potatoes, tomatoes, and other plants were in the other parts of the field, too - I had no idea how it was possible to grow everything so close together. I was never much of a green thumb, but what I remembered from my parents' and grandparents' efforts back home, they had things in specific rows - but never so jam-packed beside one another like we had it in our own plot. And to boot, as far as I knew, the plants grew at different rates and under different conditions. I had to trust our new experts, Jeff and Karin, and the wizardry their earth poniness granted them.

"I hope it's enough to keep-"

"Hush," came the instruction from my friend.

"All right," I acknowledged. I knew she was right - it was just so hard to steer my thoughts away.

Later that morning, after we'd had something to eat, my body demanded a little bit of rest, so I went down for a nap while my fellow ponies took to their tasks. Again I felt guilty for not being involved, but Swift pointed out she and I had done a bit of our share early in the morning, so I was coerced into not feeling quite that bad.

Still, as soon as I woke up, and made sure the chickens were still OK (with Buddy watching over them earnestly), I took off towards the cow pasture.

As I neared, I could see Jeff and Karin milling about in amongst the twenty or so cows that were still there. Then I did a double-take. Wait - wasn't there only about 15 last night?

"What's up?" I said to Karin after extricating myself from the grass after yet another unsuccessful landing. "Besides our head count."

"I don't know," she answered. "Maybe the other five or so heard it through the grapevine and moseyed on in. Maybe we'll have a huge herd here tomorrow."

"Julia, I gotta go. We got cows!" Jeff quipped, cantering over. "And they're all in good spirits, it seems, considering their condition. But we'll fix that soon enough."

"Is that where everybody else is?" I asked. "I thought I saw a dust cloud on the sideroad as I came in."

"Yeah, they took the truck to start getting the milker," Jeff nodded. He gestured to a large diesel generator sitting outside the fence. "For now we're going to run it with this, until I can figure out how to bank enough solar power up here to not need it. Our diesel is still pretty good, so I'm not too worried about that quite yet. I'm hoping these girls won't mind the racket - maybe we'll just run it during milking sessions."

"Sounds good to me," I said, nodding and smiling. "I'm gonna go check out the milker work, see if I can help out up there - unless you guys need me for something here."

"Go on, we're fine," Karin said, waving a hoof. Then she added a smirk. "I'd say 'break a leg', but judging by your landings, I'm afraid you'd take me literally."

"Ouch!" I shot back with a grin as I lowered my goggles, turning to depart.

I found the pickup truck, trailer, and three more ponies exactly where I expected them to be - at the site of the milking machine we were planning to liberate and transplant.

This time, I landed on the shoulder of the road, barely avoiding doing any 'gravel angels' before I trotted into the farmyard. "Hey," I called out.

Swift looked up and waved; Rich just waved, staring instead at a wrench surrounded by a blue glow, adjacent to a wrench that was in Serge's manual grip, the big pegasus lying under the milker where the hoses connected it to the storage tanks.

"Hi," Swift said. "Hey, as much as I hate to encourage your crazy behavior, you might be useful here in a bit."

"Useful's good," I nodded. "What's up?"

"These bins are rancid," she said, gesturing to the poly-plastic twelve-foot-tall tank that sat beside the milker. "We found the cleaning chemicals in the barn and put some in it, but it needs some water to mix with."

"I can handle that," I grinned.

"Not 'til we're out of here," came a strained grunt from beneath the machine. "I don't have much desire to lie in mud."

"You just don't want to mess up your pretty white coat," I teased Serge.

"If you're that concerned about my looks, you can come down here and do this."

"Oh wait," I quipped, "I think I heard a raincloud calling."

Rich interrupted our banter with actual work. "It's almost budging," he told Serge. "Try one more time."

With another grunt and a clank, the inch-and-a-half steel-braided hose finally came free of the machine. "There," Serge barked triumphantly. "One down, five to go."

"Anything I can do?" Swift asked.

"We need to unhook it from the power," Serge declared. "There's a screwdriver in my kit. Storm, you should know what the power leads look like, right?"

"I can manage," I nodded.

"Okay, show Swift which ones to disconnect and tape off. If you can label them, that'd be even better."

"You got it," I said.

Half an hour later, we had the milking machine itself being levitated onto the fresh lawn in the pasture.

"It's not ready yet, girls," Karin was saying, trying to keep the bovines from rushing the entry gate. "We still need electricity and a place to put your milk."

"I'll go back and rinse out those bins," I said, hovering before the group. "You guys are going to stay here and hook it up?"

"Yeah," Jeff said. "With luck, maybe we can run it without the bins long enough to give these poor ladies their relief. That way we don't have to clean the bins again before fresh product is ready. Just give us a shout when you're ready for us and we'll come get them."

"You got it," I said, and shot off.

It was late afternoon by the time the machine was set up and running. While the cows were working their way through it, I dumped a little moisture into their water trough to top it off.

"It's automatic?" Swift was saying, with an impressed voice, when I returned.

"Yup," Jeff smiled. "Whenever Bessie gets an urge, she just walks up, and the machine does its thing. I think we must have stumbled onto some great luck here - the cows' collars are recognized by the machine. They must be from the same farm." It was only then that I noticed each animal had a thin strap around its neck with a small box attached to it - except the calves, of course.

"That's crazy," Swift said. "What are the odds?"

"I know," Jeff laughed. "Once we make sure this works right, we should go back to that farm, and maybe some other farms, and see if we can't find some creature comforts for them. Salt licks, things like that. There's this neat thing that looks like a car wash brush that they can use to give themselves a kind of a neck and back massage - if we could get one of those, that'd surely make them happier."

I tried not to think of sneaking into a cow's den to lean up against a rotating brush for half an hour or so of bliss. "So this is working?" I asked.

"So far, yup," Jeff said. "No milk in storage yet, but it's far too soon for them to produce. Come back tonight or tomorrow and see what's in the tank then."

"Awesome work, everypony," Karin said, clopping her forehooves together. "Thanks for your help!"

"By the way," Rich said with a smirk as we headed for the truck. "Which one's Bessie?"

We were all in good spirits for our supper that evening. All of us had worked through lunch, so we decided to chow down before we tended to the field as our nightcap.

"Feel better now?" Swift asked me as we ate.

"Yeah, a bunch," I smiled. "A lot of weight off my shoulders now that we have stuff working."

"You were worried?" Karin asked.

"She was up all night fretting," Swift said. Gee, thanks, friend!

"You've got nothing to worry about," Karin said with a dismissive wave of a hoof. "We could even probably harvest tonight, most of the stuff, and let it ripen off the vine, and plant again to ensure a bumper crop."

"What does that term mean? Bumper crop," Rich interjected. "I mean, I get the slang definition, but where did it come from?"

"Who knows?" Serge said, dipping his head to his meal. Just before he took a bite, he said, "Not like we'll be able to find out any more."

"That brings up a point," Swift said. "Sorry to give you all whiplash from the change of subject, but we need to document what we're doing and where we're getting the information. And do our best to keep our old way of life at least in memories. The other guys don't have to be the only ones with 'preservation' in their mission statement. Most of you, if not all, know that I keep a journal on what we do. Does anypony object to me making a kind of Encyclopedia Ponifica out of it? Using our stories as reference material? And publishing it to anypony that asks for or needs it?"

There was a round of agreeable noises about the table.

"'Ponifica'?" I asked her, eyebrow raised.

"Give me a break, I was making it up as I went along," she smirked back at me.

After supper and an appropriate amount of time to digest and regain some energy, we went out to address the field and some other things - like cleaning off the truck from its muddy jaunt through several fields. There were clouds on the radar, and I suggested we make quick work of our tasks. Rich and I started with the truck, working it over with a bucket and a couple of brushes, while the rest prepared to harvest the field - as Karin had given it one more once-over and declared its goods almost entirely fit for plucking.

"We need a root cellar," Jeff said out of the blue. "Especially if we're going to let things ripen off the vine."

"What do you need for that? An airtight space?" Serge asked.

"No. Definitely not airtight, but it needs to be cool - underground is often better - and have good moisture content."

"Can we make something down near the lake?" Swift suggested.

"Maybe I'll scout some sites tomorrow," Jeff said. "This batch isn't going to be staying around long enough to worry about, anyway, what with the lion's share of it going straight to the men in black."

The sun was low in the west but not quite close to setting yet. That was why it was a surprise to have its light and warmth suddenly diminish greatly.

I turned to look past the mall and saw the clouds that had formerly been blips on the radar, now grown into thick, dark masses of steel wool in the sky.

"I don't like the looks of these clouds," I muttered, scanning overhead, watching them closing in on several fronts.

"Maybe it'll blow over," Swift suggested.

"I dunno," I said, ears folding back. A lump was forming in the pit of my stomach - not the one that heralded the arrival of an HPI vehicle, but true worry and fear. In the sunlight, which had broken through again for an instant, I could see what looked like thick mist reaching all the way from the clouds to the ground, about two kilometers west of us. I didn't need to be a weather expert to recognize heavy distant rain.

Just then, the rain began to fall locally - first a few drops, then more and more, darkening the pavement as it dampened it. In moments, the skies had opened up and made us feel like we were standing beneath a waterfall.

"Let's just get this stuff picked and inside," Serge said, hurrying to pull plants from the soil.

"I'll be back in a couple minutes," I told them, reaching up for my now-everpresent goggles. "I'm going up to take a lo-"

WHACK!

Everyone flinched. Several of us turned to see what had made the noise, and saw a chunk of ice on the ground.

There was a pregnant pause while everyone stared at the ice. I was the first to recognize it. "Hail," I said.

"What?"

"Hail!" I whirled around as I began to get pelted with little stones of ice.

"Cover the crops!" Jeff yelled in a panicked voice. "Protect them!"

Swift was pulling seven or eight plants at a time from the ground in her magic, wresting the fruit and vegetables from the earth and tossing them to Rich, who was putting them - plants and all - into baskets which he'd moved under the overhang by the new chicken coop. Karin ran up to Jeff and together they tried to come up with a plan. Serge stood over the crop he hadn't plucked yet, spreading his wings wide and taking a beating for his efforts to shield our harvest.

I started to run to the field to mimic Serge, but something occurred to me at that moment, as I spread my wings and felt the air calling to me.

You can start it, I thought to myself, slowing to a stop, the frenzied shouts and cries of pain ebbing away from my perception, being replaced by the sensory inputs of barometric pressure, wind speed, temperatures, and humidity. Does that mean...?

Without another word, I slapped my goggles down over my face and took to the skies.

I angled to get through and away from the hail that was battering both me and the ponies and product below. The air currents filtering through my primaries and secondaries told me precisely where to go in order to be safe. The storm front had no choice but to define itself to me, making its peripheries obvious. It stretched from the Rouge Valley to downtown Oshawa, and from the 407 to the lake and beyond.

This air is saturated with moisture, I realized, feeling more like I was swimming through it rather than flying. Winds were battering me from several different directions at once. Clouds above me were nearly black with fury, and as I focused, I could visualize almost every water droplet falling from them. I blinked in surprise, recognizing their mass, velocity, and even composition - how much was water, how much was dust in the air, and so on.

Then, even more bewilderingly, I realized I could see those droplets changing direction - moving upwards in the sky. Of course, I understood instantly. This is how hail forms. Water is blown higher by strong updrafts until it freezes and clumps together to form ice. True enough, there was a current below me that was sending me continually higher, along with the water around me.

Glancing down, I was startled at how high I'd flown in just a few seconds. The entirety of Ponytown was visible below - my five friends running around trying to save our livelihood, the truck parked beside them - sustaining a shattered sunroof just as I looked at it, and then the windshield erupting in a myriad of spiderweb cracks; wind pulling at the metal flashing around the edge of the building's roof, threatening to take pieces of it away; the radio antenna bending and then snapping from its mount with a coincidental hit from a ball of ice on the U-bolts holding it up, sending it to slap against the side of the building, hanging from its cable.

All the while, I was being beaten nearly senseless by hail of all kinds of sizes going past me in both directions.

"Oh no you don't," I muttered - at least I think I did; any vocalization was lost in the din of the wind and the ice clacking against itself. I looked upwards and strained my wings harder, ascending into the darkness.

Somehow I knew that I could choose which clouds to pass through and which I could land on. It was something inherent to my species - my magic. And from my past experience creating rainclouds, it was obvious that dispersing them would lessen their rage.

Yeah, it may give meteorologists fits and cause them to rail at us "Weather science doesn't work that way!", but all their knowledge and science had a new corollary it had to live with now. Physics and science had to share the stage with magic.

Us pegasi held some of the cards, too.

Forehooves ahead of me, I shot into the thick black mass in a Superman pose, visualizing it blasting apart in my mind's eye as I passed through. Not like me drilling a tunnel through the cloud, but as a shockwave spreading through the whole thing, rippling and pushing the cloud mass next to it further away as well, cascading through the entire front.

It worked, to an extent. It didn't shatter and disperse the entire storm as I'd hoped, but it did cause a large part of it to lessen. I dipped a wing and banked, going at another dark section and pummelling it into submission - or at least a gentle shower instead of a fierce hailstorm.

The temperature of the storm clouds rose - no, more precisely, the clouds participating in the storm were moving into warmer air. The updrafts didn't have the ability to push the moisture higher into the cold climates any more. Because of me.

Thunder rumbled as I flew through the clouds, altering their static charges just by my presence. But black and navy-blue clouds were giving way now to dark grey and even some light grey. I was soaked to the bone, but every bit of moisture taken from the clouds was one less bit that it could dump into the storm.

After several minutes, I felt a strange, warm sensation on my backside, despite the wind and rain. Was I being stung by hail? Struck by lightning? I hadn't sensed either of those elements of the storm in several moments - at least, not in close proximity to me.

I glanced back and did a double-take, then laughed and flew on, continuing to shove the dark clouds aside.

After about ten minutes of hard flying and bruise-inducing battering by the remains of the storm, the sky was under control. I blinked as I realized what I'd done. There was still a decent storm going on, but it had been literally shoved away from affecting Ponytown. Heavy rains showered the nuke plant, the mall across the road, and the lake, and thunder rumbled in the distance, lightning strobing against the clouds, but over the mall that had become my home over the past three-plus months, a 'mere' steady but manageable rain was dropping. The clouds it was emanating from were no longer the color of darkened steel, but simply dirty cotton balls.

I landed on the rooftop, overlooking the garden plot. Even through the yellow tinge of my goggles, I could tell that the lion's share of the crop was salvageable. We could deliver what was needed, no problem. As for putting food in our own mouths, Jeff and Karin would catch us up; I knew they could do it.

"Are you guys okay?" I called out to the five ponies below me.

They all looked up in unison. "That was incredible!" Rich said. "How did you know to do that?"

"How did you do that, period?" Swift wanted to know.

"Never mind us, are you okay?" Karin called up.

I turned on an angle, so they could see the new image emblazoned on my hindquarters - that of a lightning bolt surrounded by three cartoon raindrops.

"I think I know what my name is now," I told them.

Monday came, and so did the phone call from Dr. Baker.

"Good morning," I said, positioning myself in front of the camera, maintaining a neutral expression.

"Hello," he replied. "Forgive me for dispensing with the pleasantries, but what's the news?"

I had Swift tilt the phone's camera away from my face and let the picture it took do the talking - showing basket upon basket of produce, all lined up on the dry tarmac of the old parking lot. The still-damp field was being plowed under again by Jeff, and a muddy Karin was not far behind him re-seeding, but that wasn't relevant to Baker. I walked along the baskets as I talked.

"10 bushels of corn. 5 bushels of wheat. 5 bushels of carrots, 3 bushels of tomatoes, 5 bushels of potatoes, and 3 bushels of various other fruits and vegetables. So I'm told by our experts. I honestly don't know how much is in a bushel, I'm taking their word for it."

Baker looked stunned. "Very impr-"

"I'm not done," I said. "Swifty, keep going." She continued to follow me and stopped in front of some egg cartons. "Thirty-six fresh eggs," I said, as the top carton opened with a yellow glow, showing off a dozen white and brown eggs.

"Eggs??" I heard erupt from the phone incredulously.

I motioned for Swift to turn the phone back to face me. "And if you're willing to give us 24 more hours, we can add abouuut... mmm, 80 to 100 gallons of fresh milk. You might have to pasteurize it yourself, though."

The only way I knew the phone was still connected was that I saw Baker gaping, mouth popping open and closed like a fish. No sound was coming out. Finally, he found his voice. "How did you manage this?" he said. "You said this is fresh? Not reclaimed from a store?"

"I wouldn't give that rotten junk to my worst enemy," I shook my head. "I'd rather dump it all in the lake if I didn't think it'd congeal into a sea monster and rise up to kill us all. This is the real deal. Oh, and as you requested, the stuff we didn't use from the first two care packages put back on a pallet. We've got some shrink wrap left over from the store, so it's ready for the rover as well. The rest of this stuff is probably too much for the rover to take, so we'll move it out to a field - away from us - so you can send one of your flying machines to come get it."

"This is unbelievable. We'd hoped for a total of 20 bushels of produce and the pallet of remainders from the care packages. I don't know how you managed to outstrip our expectations, but congratulations are in order. No... heartfelt thanks."

"You can thank our green thumb couple. Can I call them green thumbs if they don't have any?" I smirked. "And let's call those extra 11 bushels a down payment on a renewed relationship."

"I'm pretty confident you can bank on that," Baker said, laughing a little. "Miss Storm, to say I'm impressed is an understatement. I mean this when I say it: thank you."

I waved to the others to crowd in beside me, and the five ponies stepped in close. "You're welcome," I said when we were all gathered, "from all of us. I know, it may be corny, but it was every pony you can see that made this happen."

AUGUST 18

A little more than 24 hours after the phone call with the HPI, we all sat eating supper after a tiring day of packaging up the HPI goods and effecting repairs from the hailstorm. Our meal was from week-old produce; the stuff we planted after harvesting the HPI crops would still need a few days. But we had fresh milk! I even had one glass 'straight', before adding Quik powder to the second one to turn it into chocolate milk. The powder seemed to still be okay, and I didn't even mind the milk moustache I got from it.

After the meal, I stood up, stretching, and thanked my friends for the meal and the hard work.

"Going to rest?" Serge asked.

"Yeah," I nodded, "but I have something to do, too. Something I'm going to get into the habit of."

"Okay," Jeff responded, quirking an eyebrow. "Kind of ambiguous."

"Nothing secretive," I said with a smile. "Just going over there and talk a bit." I nodded behind me.

"You sure you shouldn't go mess around with clouds?" Rich smirked. "After all, your cutie mark isn't a microphone."

"I've had enough with dark clouds for a couple days," I said.

"Good!" Swift breathed a sigh of relief. "That's freaky and dangerous."

"No more dangerous than falling off a roof," I shot back, as I walked away.

A few moments later, I lay down on the well-worn green carpet. We're going to have to replace this soon. Hopefully we could find something as comfortable, in a similar shade; the green was soothing, so it seemed.

Twisting dials and tapping buttons with practiced ease, I turned on and tuned in several radios at once. The whip antenna had been replaced by a bigger and better array, allowing us to use more radios at once and have increased range for both transmitting and receiving.

We'd sourced some good pedestal mics for the shack as well, with quality components and excellent response. Each of them had a locking transmit button, which I tapped, six in a row, as I prepared to speak.

"Hello one and all," I said. "It's six o'clock PM Eastern, on Tuesday, August 18, 2015. This is Sudden Storm, representing Ponytown. For those of you who haven't heard my voice before, we're a settlement in what used to be Pickering, Ontario, Canada. For those of you who have heard my voice before, I have some news."

"We have food and supplies - more than enough to share. We have electricity, obviously, and shelter. If you're lacking any or all of these things, you are welcome here."

"One other thing we have that we didn't before is answers. Not a lot, but a few. Enough to make a little sense of what's happened. How we can use our new skills and powers to improve our way of life. And what we don't know? Maybe you do. Maybe you have a piece we haven't heard yet. If you want to trade, be it information, supplies, or labor, either direction, we're open to the idea."

"One thing that's obvious now, is that everypony-" I cut myself off, then after a moment's thought, smiled and went on. "Everypony has to work together in order to make this happen. We may never get back to something resembling pre-Event ways of life... but we may not need to. This is a simpler world now. Provide for yourself, your neighbors... your friends. Share what you can, help those who can't, and accept help when a helping hoof comes your way."

"If you have transmit capability, feel free to answer back on this frequency. And we will be broadcasting twice daily, at noon and at six, keeping everypony updated on the latest news and developments. I know you're out there... and I don't intend to let you wonder in the dark any longer."

"So until tomorrow at noon, or sooner if you decide to answer back, this is Sudden Storm, signing off."

I unlatched the mic locks and let all the radios unkey. Eyes darting back and forth across the displays, I watched for the signs of anyone transmitting, but no needles deflected with telltale signals; no LEDs lit up with "traffic/busy" indicators.

No big deal. I knew they were out there.

Eventually, they'd respond in some fashion.

Because the people - ponies - of Earth would survive, and survive together.

It's what we do.

Author's Notes:

What a ride!

Thanks to everyone who read Stormy's exploits, whether you commented or not. Those of you who did give me feedback, I appreciated it immensely. And thanks especially to Lionheartcartoon for his beautiful art. I may need to coerce you into doing more work for me, pal, for my other works!

While you're waiting for this story's sequel, which will be known as After the Storm, I have another one in this same universe, called The Longest Highway - pony driving from remote Alaska towards salvation in Alexandria, and picking up whatever and whoever he can along the way!

I'm also chewing on something else that's in a pony AU but not at all related to Ponies after People. If it gets published it'll be a collaboration between me and another. Watch my blog posts for more on that (maybe)!

And one more time, thank you for reading!