> Fallout Equestria: Apsides
>  by Symphony_in_152mm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1: By the Skin of Her Teeth
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


“For many of us, the road is a difficult one; but the path is always there for us to follow, no matter how many times we might fall.”


…..

….

I heaved and I gasped; air filled my aching lungs and a rough itch of something in my throat spurred on a painful fit of coughing. There was considerable weight pressing against my chest and made every follow up breath a painful challenge. My ears were filled with a high-pitched ringing; I opened my eyes to a stinging, blurry haze of obscure colors and shapes.

There was a mix of the iron taste of blood and a chalky, burnt, earthy taste of ash stuck to my tongue. I coughed and spat the muddy mixture of old blood, saliva and ash until the pungent flavor was diluted enough to be less noticeable. A terrible, pounding, ache in my head proceeded to permeate any thoughts I mustered, and it coaxed a groan from my aching jaw. My head wasn’t my only source of pain, but it was the most prominent at the moment. 

I blinked several times in an attempt to see more clearly; when that didn’t work, I squeezed my eyes shut and scrunched my face up a few times, despite how much it hurt to do so. When next I opened my eyes, I could see much more clearly; the first thing I did was glance down at myself. It appeared that a heap of debris was laying atop of me, and that I was lying in a partially dried pool of blood that I could only assume was my own on account of much of it being stuck to my coat.

Looking around, I took in my immediate surroundings and I saw that I seemed to be in the decaying remains of an old building. Much of the ceiling had long since rotted and fallen out, exposing portions of the interior to the cloudy skies above and a light precipitation of what seemed to be ash and cinders. There was a large hole in the wall, with notably fresher breaks in the construction compared to the rotted-out wounds of the structure everywhere else.

My mind was a mess of disorientation, fog and misery from numerous sources of pain all over my body. The pain in my head briefly flared as images came and went; information that didn’t connect to the images- without any context to them- passed through my thoughts as quickly as the images did. Once they cleared, my headache lessened, and I could think of my own accord.

The pain in my breathing asserted itself as the most pressing concern, so I elected to make this pile of rubble laying on top of me my immediate priority.

I called upon my magic, though doing so proved to be a difficult task. With a strain that felt like my horn would unravel itself off my head if I pushed myself, I got a spark of magic going. My horn lit up in a moderately bright shade of purple and I cautiously pooled just enough magic to cast a simple telekinesis spell. As if the magic strain weren’t bad enough, the pile looked a bit on the unstable side, and I didn’t know how much of it was actually pressing against me. The last thing I needed right now was to have this pile of debris shift and crush me more than it already was.

I cautiously removed the outermost parts of the pile, piece by piece. My headache flared a few more times and I felt nauseous as I worked, making the process take just a bit longer than I wanted. Eventually I had enough of it cleared to safely shove the rest of it off of myself fully with my kinesis.

From there, with a shimmy and a groan of pain, I rolled over to my front and attempted to stand up.

Pain shot through me immediately and in several places; I yelped aloud and dropped back to my stomach.

My headache flared again, and my vision started to fade…

More images and sounds flashed through my mind, cutting through the blackness I’d found myself in; I could feel magic exertion, casting combat spells, gunfire... I’d been in a fight. I remembered the sounds of muzzles discharging projectiles through the air from various directions. I couldn’t remember who I was fighting, or why.

I wasn’t aware I’d fallen unconscious until I opened my eyes and found myself with my head lying on the floor again.

It was at that point where I noticed that some of the more intense sources of pain I felt were coming from a spot just behind my shoulders; my wings, one of which lay limply on the floor by my side. I tried to move my wings, but the pain spiked sharp enough to force a whinny from my lips and I immediately ceased my effort to move them.

I pooled some more of my magic, the ache in my horn now barely noticeable next to whatever was wrong with my wings. I delicately grabbed for the feathered appendages in an envelope of my magic, but my magic only managed to grab the one I could currently see. I tucked the limp wing against my side and tried to command the limb to stay there, though the pain shot down the length of my wing again at my efforts and it simply fell to the floor once more.

As it lay there, it ceased hurting and there was numbness in the appendage; I realized this was not the source of the more severe pain. I looked to my other side to see what the state of my other wing was in, only to find a bloody length of hanging bone and muscle where my other wing should have been.

‘Oh.’ Was all I could think to utter.

I tenderly wrapped the mangled limb in my magic and carefully tried to tuck it against my side; there was just enough muscle there to hold what remained of the grotesque thing in place of its own accord, but it was incredibly painful to do so.

The loss of the appendage was a significant setback, but it wasn’t a permanent loss. Under the current circumstances it may as well have been, as I had no means of repairing it for the time being.

Looking back to my still intact wing, it didn’t seem broken at least at first glance. I gently grabbed hold of it with my magic and- shaky as my kinesis was- I held it up and eyed it over. There I found a distinct lump and signs of swelling at the base of my wing. 

I had a great deal of difficulty recalling the medical knowledge I needed at that moment, but I chalked it up to being a result of whatever had happened, that which caused my mind to be the mess it currently was. All I could really gather with my mess of thoughts was that this remaining limb was dislocated and effectively as useless as the mangled one until I could fix it.

There wasn’t much I could do with the mangled remains of my other wing; no amount of healing magic I could have done would suffice, and I wasn’t about to try anyway, not with my magic as… weak as it was. If I tried to cast a healing spell, assuming my magic didn’t immediately implode on itself from the strain, I might do more harm than good with my mind presently lacking the knowledge I once had at my disposal.

There really was nothing I could do about it: I was effectively grounded, possibly even crippled.

The rest of my body was equally a mess as my mind and wings had been. There were scrapes, bruises and mild burns, along with scratches that, judging by the stain of dried crimson in my purple coat, used to be much larger gashes. I pieced together that perhaps the same applied to the other injuries I had, they must have been much worse earlier.

I glanced to my forelegs, one of which was swollen and bruised. I could feel a residual soreness and sting in many places throughout my body, mainly in the places I’d seen old injuries. The persistent ache still in my head made it difficult to think. 

All in all, I’d say I was severely injured, incapable of flight, magically stunted, but otherwise functional enough to get moving and sort out the rest of my situation.

‘What happened? What do we do now?’ I instinctively asked in my mind, anticipating an answer.

The silence that followed caused a deep sense of unease, a steadily growing distress in my core. For the life of me, I couldn’t seem to fully understand why. I knew the silence was…. off, wrong even. No, this was worse than wrong, it chilled me to the bone even in my ignorance of why.

I sent a probe into the depths of my mind, frantically feeling around for thoughts and ideas in the murk that clouded everything. I was rewarded with another flare up of my headache and my vision fading once again. I fought against the coming darkness and struggled to keep myself awake.

To my relief, I managed to keep myself conscious, but only just. My ears rang and I could feel something dripping from my nose, but at least I kept my eyes open and my awareness intact.

Once the headache subsided, I went back into the depths of my mind and ventured a bit more cautiously.

Gradually the silt that obscured the thoughts of my mind started to give way; I looked for information that I felt I had once recalled and realized with no small amount of fear that much of the information wasn’t there anymore. In my desperation, I turned to instinct. I sought out voices and thoughts of those who I knew, those who once filled my mind, only to find that now there wasn’t even an echo of their presence. A silent emptiness and creeping sense of dread resided in place of the clearing fog and disorientation; emptiness, where there should have been guidance and a calming clarity making itself known in coordinated and confident fashion.

I sat in a puzzled stupor at this comprehension, a puzzlement that was joined with encroaching panic and uncertainty. It was so immensely disturbing to me, in an intimate way, of which I was unable to fully comprehend.

I felt like I was missing a large part of myself, but also a part of someone else. Brief memories fluttered through my mind, faces and voices in my head… my sisters.

I remembered my siblings, but just barely; no matter how hard I dug into my mangled memory of them, I could not remember their names. Their faces though, I remembered that part well enough: they were beautiful, all of them, all of us.

The names though… no, they didn’t have names, they hadn’t needed names; names were irrelevant. The missing part of myself grew more unpleasant with the gaping emptiness that once was filled with thoughts. I attempted to call out to my sisters in the manner I was accustomed to, sending forth a projection of thought, of feeling; I did not receive any answers. My headache spiked with enough pain during the attempt I was half expecting to find myself with my head on the floor again. Luckily, that didn’t happen this time, but I elected not to try that again for safe measure.

"Sisters...?" I hesitantly spoke the word with an aching throat, averse to the sensation of doing so. It felt wrong, redundant even, but that which it should have been was not available to me. “Sisters!” My voice sounded off, a bit hoarse from the dryness in my throat; the ringing in my ears certainly didn’t help in that regard.

I desperately wished for that reassuring presence I was missing to come in and cradle my thoughts as it once had, to guide my will as if it were its own once more like it used to. I craved it so desperately, I wished for it so badly that I thought I might just will it back into existence through sheer exertion.

“Sisters, we cannot hear you! Sisters?” I called out again.

There came no reassurances or guidance, not even a sense of direction; neither did I receive any response from my siblings. “Sisters! Please, hear us!”

‘What do we do?’ I vainly asked of the void in my mind.

As I ventured back into my mind in search of answers, a single image flashed in my mind’s eye. I saw a cluster of large buildings and connecting structures, pipes running along the ground, giant spheres clustered together and a massive conical structure atop the larger of the buildings. It was a complex of some sort, nestled in the ruins of an old city. I recognized the imagery, knew it held a great deal of importance, but I couldn’t figure out what or why. All I knew is that I had desired to find this complex.

No, that wasn’t entirely correct, the desire wasn’t mine, but… wasn’t it? Clearly, I wanted to find this complex, but the desire came from a place outside of myself. My sisters then? No, it went deeper than that, I remembered their thoughts mingling within my mind. Perhaps it was that which had given us guidance and made its will into our own? It felt as if my desires and the desires of the other had been one and the same. The desire had been shared among us. 

The complex in the ruined city… I did not know its name, nor could I recall where it was. I needed to find this place, somehow; Not on my own, not in my current state, but I needed to search for this place when I was capable. It was my task, my purpose for being here and I would not fail my task. 

I needed to find my siblings; they would be able to help me. They would make sense of the broken remains of my mind.

Shakily, I attempted to rise to my hooves; The second I put the slightest bit of weight on my bruised and swollen foreleg, I was hit with a spear of pain originating within the limb. I cried out from the suddenness and fell back to my haunches, tenderly cradling the damaged appendage. Once the pain died down, I carefully looked over it: my leg didn’t seem broken, but it was definitely damaged, not that I would be able to know for sure with my current mental defectiveness. For now, I’d need to keep my weight off of it.

Once more, I rose to my hooves, keeping my weight off the swollen one this time. ‘We are most definitely crippled.’

The ringing in my ears persisted, giving no indication whether it would go away on its own; My headache fluctuated in its severity, determined to not allow me to forget it existed. The substance dripping from my nostrils continued to leak from me and onto the floor. ‘We need to figure out where we are, then we need to find our sisters.’

Cautiously, carefully, I set hoof towards the hole in the exterior wall. Peeking out of the sizeable void in the structure unveiled a view that raised more questions, but also offered up more pieces to the puzzle. The building I’d been in was a small part of what I could only assume was some sort of encampment, or maybe a town.

Scattered in the immediate area in front of me were bodies; many, many bodies.

The ache in my head throbbed again, the corners of my vision were fading, and I could feel myself slipping away. I braced myself against some furniture nearby and fought to stay awake. More images involuntarily flashed through my mind. I swam through the pain and took in what I could remember… a burst of light, a heavy measure of force impacting my body…. The force had flung me into the outside wall of this structure, then there was nothing. 

I opened my eyes and stood up, thankful that I’d propped myself against the furniture. The images might have explained why I was in this building, why I had been covered in rubble, but it didn’t do much else.

I fully stepped outside; every which way I looked showed what seemed to be the aftermath of a vicious battle that took place here. All around me were the remains of deceased ponies and griffons and a small sea of spent shell casings of various calibers littering the ground around them. There were scorch marks where I could only assume combat spells and explosives had missed their marks; grisly piles of viscera and charred body parts lay where spells and explosives hadn't missed.

The air reeked of the stench of blood, gore, and all manner of things I really didn’t want to think about; there was also the faint hint of something akin to ammonia. The smell in the air alone could have made me sick to my stomach; but combined with the nausea I already had, it was a bit more than I could handle. I heaved and retched, discharging the contents of my stomach into a small puddle at my hooves. 

I groaned and I spat, clearing my mouth of the remaining foulness and bile. My head started throbbing, again, but this time my vision didn’t begin to fade. Instead, memories rose from the fog in my mind; images, sounds, shared thoughts amongst myself and my siblings… 

I recalled their voices, my siblings, they were speaking to the lesser beings living here… the locals had agreed to help us find something, we needed their assistance in locating whatever it was. Much to my frustration, the images and sounds faded before I could determine the subject of our venture. I considered the image I’d had in my mind of the complex from earlier and assumed that this was likely what we were looking for.

My thoughts returned to the world around me. Noting the presence of the street and sidewalks, I imagined this had most definitely been a town. Yet, the more I took in, the more I realized such a simple description didn’t quite fit what I saw. 

I could see piles of splintered plywood, bent metal and other materials in heaps where I guessed once had been makeshift shelters or houses. My guess was confirmed once I spotted few of them that were still standing. There was a collection of these scrounged together structures centered around an old concrete bunker that had seen infinitely better days. The bunker itself had been repurposed, reinforced, and modified- by whoever had called this place home- into what looked like a makeshift hub. Several overhanging constructs acted as connection points for the shacks around it, seeming to bring each part together into one larger structure.

Just beyond that structure lay a series of office buildings, two of which were connected via walkways; one of the buildings had all but collapsed in on itself. Hanging over the entrance of the closest building was a centuries old sign with several letters missing; what was left read: “Fo-t F-irWi-d-”

A good distance down the road to my right was a centuries-old town by the look of it; the road’s entryway into the town was barred by some kind of large fence made of shipping crates and vehicles. Had I both of my wings operational, the fence would be a trivial obstacle; but as I was currently it would be difficult to bypass. I turned my attention back to the office buildings for the time being.

Further back from the offices and off to the side were several rusted out metal shacks of uniform construction. Near those was a reinforced building with a tower that had an overhanging glass observation deck and several vanes and poles jutting from its top.

I put the pieces together, wherever I was must have been some sort of military base from the old world.

Far into the distance was the looming silhouette of a mountain. It was difficult to make out just how large this mountain was, due to the ever-present cloud layers obscuring the peak.

I turned to my left and noted that a short distance down the road, there was what looked to be more of that fencing that barred the road to the town, although this portion was made with different materials. This section of fencing was comprised of assorted cuts of wood and scrap metal; it stretched for a good distance and, as far as I could tell, seemed to surround this old-world base. 

That being said, some sections were of shoddy quality and gave the impression like it was held together solely by the anguished prayers of those who built it. One of these segments appeared to have been blown apart with explosives, judging by the amount of debris scattered about the opening.

I didn’t need to get all the pieces of this puzzle to figure that, somewhere along the line, vicious fighting had broken out. That much was blatantly obvious, even an idiot or one of these lesser beings would be able to comprehend that.

I recalled from the earlier visions that played out in my mind, the massed gunfire and combat spells coming from all directions. I remembered the pained screaming as metal met flesh in gruesome fashion, the mighty spells and weaponry of my sisters filling the air alongside the firepower of those we’d sought the aid of.

There were still many questions unanswered, but some of the pieces to this puzzle were sliding neatly into place.

I continued to venture through the sea of death and rubble in search of answers, when out of the corner of my eye, I spied the mangled form of an equine with charred wings and a broken horn. A lump caught in my throat as I moved in to investigate, and my heart began to sink as it came into full view. 

There, in a crumpled heap, lay the broken and bloodied body of one of my siblings.

I forced myself forward, limping towards my fallen sibling. ‘No…please, don’t be dead.’ I spooled up magic and ventured it out to the brutalized form of the fallen mare, feeling for even the tiniest possibility of life still within. “Sister? Sister, wake up! Please!” I grabbed hold of the broken body with my magic and tried to shake her, ignoring the growing pain in my horn. “Sister, we cannot hear you. Please, wake up! We are damaged, we need your guidance!”

I reached with my damaged foreleg, wincing with the movement, touching it to the alicorn’s cheek. “Sister…?”

The body was cool to the touch, but there was still some heat to it; she must have expired mere hours ago.

I uttered a pathetic whimper and looked upon my surroundings for any hint of my other sister.

There was none, and I quickly ceased entertaining the hope to find her after finding my first sibling in such a state. For all I knew, my other sister was one of the scorch marks or piles of flesh and gore. I couldn’t hear her any more than I could hear the one that lay before me.

Both of my sisters were gone, dead; a fate which I had very nearly suffered myself. Why did I survive when they were deceased?

I sat on my haunches and softly wept for the loss; Loss of companionship, loss of connection... I rapidly fell into the clutches of grief with the realization I was left here in this place, alone without my sisters or the other to guide me. 

I was alone and I was afraid.

Somewhere along the line in my grieving, I lost consciousness again. I wasn’t aware of it until I’d reopened my eyes and found myself lying on the ground beside my sister’s deceased form.

I wept again, begging the uncaring void in my head for guidance, for the missing presence that should have been there to give me instruction and clarity. So much did my heart ache, that I found myself wishing I had perished with my sisters for the sake of not having to be alone and lost as I was.

For the faintest moment, I very nearly convinced myself that I’d heard someone speaking to me…

Even as I sobbed, I forced myself to my hooves; I still had a task at hoof: I needed to investigate, to uncover what had happened here. I needed to learn what it was we were searching for and why we had been attacked. More importantly though, I needed to get out of this place, to return home and reunite with the rest of my siblings and the great and powerful Other who guides us.

My heart was heavy in my chest, but I pushed myself forward. If I didn’t, then my fate would be the same as my fallen siblings; my survival would have been for nothing. Despite my wishing previously for it to be so, I would not allow it; such a fate is not what the great other would have wanted. I wiped my eyes free of my tears and looked to the corpses and examined them with a heightened scrutiny. 

As I looked them over, sniffling and battling the tears away from my eyes, I noticed that the lesser beings didn’t all wear the same attire. Some wore various odds and ends of clothing adorned with strewn together bits of scrap metal fit to their forms and scavenged combat barding and each had a familiar symbol emblazoned on them. I couldn’t tell what the symbol meant, but it was very familiar to me.

The details helped take my mind off of my grief, so I focused on them and continued my observations.

Others in the deceased masses wore distinct uniforms with an unusual camouflage pattern to them comprised of polygonal shapes of grays and whites; they also possessed refurbished combat barding with a strange symbol that I didn’t recognize decorating their shoulder plates.

Between the obvious differences in attire and where they lay in relation to one another, I believed that this battle may have been a confrontation between two opposing factions. My siblings and I had been aligned with the lesser beings who wore the scrapped together makeshift armor and that symbol I seemed to recognize; we had fought against those with the gray camouflage uniforms and combat barding. It was difficult to say with certainty, but the damage that my siblings and I had dealt seemed to be focused on the faction with the white and gray camo uniforms.

I considered the information I had on hoof: had we simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time and been caught in a fight between two factions? Had we willingly engaged in this fight? Perhaps this was an attack on us, and the other group became involved unwittingly? Did we order them to aid us?

It was clear that we’d been active participants in this fight, my sisters and I; whether we’d willingly joined it or had been caught up in it by chance, I couldn’t say. The lack of potent magical damage on the scavengers led me to believe we were either on the same side, or at the very least facing a common enemy. As best I could tell, we’d both been fighting against those who wore the uniforms adorned with the polygonal gray camo pattern. 

If that was the case, then perhaps we’d enlisted the help of the scavengers; that then made sense as to why we’d fought as allies, and why I recognized the symbol on the scavenger’s outfits. 

The pieces of this puzzle slid into place and it all seemed to fit adequately enough, so I stuck with my explanation of events for now.

There was the unmistakable report of a gunshot originating from somewhere in the distance. The sound seemed to come from the general direction of the town, but it was hard to say for sure.  My mind briefly considered the notion that it may have been a member of one of the groups present in the previous fight; perhaps, even, one of the scavenger’s we’d requested the aid of. What if they could help me?

Then again, it could also be one of the lesser beings that had been adorned in polygonal camouflage and had launched this attack.

Furthermore… I realized I was presently standing alone amidst a sea of the corpses of both factions. Neither group was likely to look kindly upon me with the current circumstances. I was in no condition to fight, and I was alone.

‘This is... not good for us.’

There wasn’t any time to seek further answers for my other questions. When whoever was approaching showed up to investigate this site, I needed to not be here. With a pull from my magic reserves, I illuminated my horn and cautiously tested my magical strain to see if I was able to utilize more complex spells than kinesis.

Teleportation, even just a short distance, would be a good test to see if my magic was in good enough shape to defend myself with. I closed my eyes and imagined the image of the roadway just up ahead, focusing my magic on the spell. A sharp ache permeated my temple, going into my horn and caused my magic to implode before I could gather enough magic to perform the spell.

‘That is especially not good for us.’

Under any other circumstances, I was certain I could defend myself adequately with my magic. Unfortunately, that wasn’t an option; with my mind in tatters and without the assistance of my sisters, in addition to my pained horn warning me against anything more complicated than telekinesis… I was very hesitant to rely on my magic to do anything strenuous. 

The solution to this problem was simple: ‘We need a weapon.’

I looked over the numerous bodies and the weapons they had on hoof; an automatic rifle caught my eye almost immediately. I reached out and held it aloft with my kinesis, luckily I believed I retained enough knowledge of the device to know how it functioned. I knew enough at least to know which end to point towards hostiles, and to NOT look directly down that end like an idiot. ‘We could always hit them with it if all else fails; or we can throw it at them.’

My magic gripped the rifle and I quickly gave it a once-over. It seemed relatively clean and well kept, considering the environment I found myself in. With the current drizzle of ash and smoldering flakes falling everywhere around me, I expected there to be some kind of accumulation of the strange precipitation and some manner of filth on the weapon as a result; there was neither, though it was battle-worn and mildly rusted. 

When I held out a hoof in curiosity to catch one of the flecks of ash, the thing disintegrated into nothing; not even specks of dust remained. I looked around and likewise, there was more lack of any indication of the precipitation accumulating, yet it still continued to fall.

It was odd, strange even, ‘If the precipitation doesn’t accumulate… then why was our mouth full of ash when we awoke? Is there different forms of this precipitation?’ There was a cry of some creature off in the distance, or perhaps just outside the town limits… or closer. ‘There’s no time to think about it. We need to get what we can and get out of here.’ I grabbed the rifle’s charging handle and yanked the bolt back, then peeked into the ejection port only to find the chamber to be empty. I pulled the magazine free, finding that too to be empty.

I swore aloud and looked over the deceased pony the rifle once belonged to. I swore again when I saw the empty magazines around him, the implication being he’d spent all of his ammunition in the fight prior. “Useless!” I scolded the dead pony and threw the rifle down at him. “We were not serious when we suggested using the weapon as a club!”

Rather than try to find ammunition for this weapon, I elected to determine which ammunition was available first, and then grab a weapon that used whatever ammo I could scavenge up.

There wasn’t much time, I wasn’t sure how much time I had at all, really; I could have already been out of time for all I knew. ‘Don’t think, act!’ I quickly rummaged through the bags and pouches of a few of the deceased lesser beings, starting with the one’s closest to me. I took count of the ammo they had; there wasn’t much: two full magazines for a pistol, a clip of several rimmed rifle rounds, a single full magazine of what looked like the middle ground between rifle and pistol rounds, and a bandolier with a large hoof-full of 20 gauge shotgun shells. 

I poked around and quickly found a shoddily put together shotgun on the ground a few paces from where I’d found the bandolier. It was a “gun” by the barest minimum of standards; two pipes serving as improvised barrels, held together with welded cable wraps and duct-tape, then fastened to a wooden frame. This frame was then connected to a bent metal grip with a barebones firing mechanism to complete it.

In a lucky break, I was able to get a gun that wasn’t made of scrap: a semi-auto pistol; it looked like the magazines I found would fit it; what’s more, it seemed to be in good condition too.

Not the best selection of weapons, but it was adequate enough to defend myself with until my magic was back in action. I wasn’t about to risk running into a threat in my current state by attempting to scrounge for better options. ‘Far from ideal, but this will have to do.’ 

I grabbed a large satchel from my little pile of bags and threw it on; then I swiftly took a few of the heavier, more promising personal containers and proceeded to dump their contents into the main compartment my new satchel, hoping that at least some of what I’d get would be useful. I knew there was some food and medicine in one of those bags I’d grabbed… at least I thought there was.

I deposited the ammo into the pouches along my bandolier and slid the shotgun into my satchel’s side compartment. The pistol had more ammo at its disposal, so I kept that at the ready and held it aloft in my telekinesis.

With a careful flick of my magic’s grasp, I pulled back the slide: one round in the chamber. Another flick and I released the magazine- again thankful I remembered basic firearm operation- then I pulled it free and counted four shots remaining. From there, I double checked the magazines I found; they would indeed fit the pistol. I slipped the half empty magazine into a bandolier pouch and slid one of the full ones into the pistol to replace it. With one round already in the chamber, the tool was ready to function.

Now moderately armed, I cast a glance to my surroundings once more; not that there was much to see besides the old worn-down buildings, scrap structures and corpses. I needed to leave, but there was one last thing I needed to take care of first.

I looked to my wing, still hanging limply by my side, dragging along on the ground in its numb state. A simple sling would suffice; thus I grabbed hold of one of the deceased beings and tore free a section of fabric from their attire. Material in hoof, I grabbed hold of my wing with my telekinesis and, as gently as I could, tucked it against my side. Utilizing the strip of fabric, I wrapped it carefully around myself and tied it snug against my wing to keep it still. I wanted to do the same for my mangled stump on the other side, but that could wait.  

There was nothing else to be done, it was time to leave. I aimed in the opposite direction from which I recalled the gunshots originated and set off at a swift pace. Not a full gallop, on account of my damaged foreleg, but hopefully fast enough to keep significant distance between myself and whoever or whatever it was that was approaching.

I took a small detour off the road so as to utilize the hole that had been blown out of the fence. Once I was outside the scrap barrier, it was easy enough to  get back to the road. With that out of the way, I continued along my route at speed, without much concern of anything else. Just beyond the fence was several rows of old houses, or garages. I didn’t have the time to stop and look them over.

I instinctively tried to flare my wings to ready myself for flight as I raced through the streets, forgetting that one of them was mangled, the other was tied down and injured, and both were useless. The deep pain resonating between my shoulders helped to remind me. ‘If we can get to somewhere safe and find a-’ but my thoughts were abruptly interrupted.

There was the sound of rushing air and a bright shimmer of light as the world around me turned to an angry whirlwind of dust and debris; I felt myself suddenly yanked off of my hooves and thrown through the air like I was a foal’s doll. It all happened so fast that I didn’t have the time to react before I found myself impacting off the wall of a nearby house and then falling to the ground with a heavy thud. There was enough time for me to grunt in pain, only to then be dragged across the ground and tossed through the air yet again.

I flew into a smaller building than the one I’d hit previously; my body broke through the corroded structure and I landed hard on my front, on top of my swollen forehoof. The sharp spike of agony that shot through my already damaged hoof made me scream. If my forehoof wasn’t broken before, it certainly felt like it was now.

Whatever force had acted upon me, it ceased and left me laying there in bewilderment. I got myself off of my forehoof and noted that it was at a bad angle; between that and the unbearable pain that throbbed in my limb, it was definitely broken.

‘What in the world was THAT!?’ I cried out indignantly in the empty spaces of my mind, to which I received no answer. The cold reminder that I was very much alone was… disheartening.

Looking over to where I’d just been, I saw the faintest rippling of air and bending light around a spherical shape hovering just above the roadway. Had this odd shape- whatever it was- not just thrown me around moments ago and broken my leg, I might have thought the visual phenomenon to be pretty.

As it were, I glared at the ever bending and twisting light and made a mental note to give the thing a wide berth; and to be vigilant in avoiding running face-first into one of these things in the future.

I stepped clear of the debris of the shack’s wall and set hoof back on the road. I resumed moving in the direction I was headed before, albeit at a slower pace so as to watch for any additional hazards. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t go much faster on account of trying to avoid excess movement that would aggravate my leg.

I continued on just long enough to reach what I could only assume was the outer limits of the town and military base I’d been in. The houses ceased, though the sidewalks continued for a short period until they eventually gave way to grass. Further out lay what looked to be trees and a wooded area where I could possibly seek refuge.

Once I was fully out of the town and closer to the treeline, I took a moment to catch my breath; I was grateful that the falling ash and particles wasn’t dense enough to hamper my airflow. My idle mind briefly considered the possibility that, had I laid unconscious under that debris for much longer, I might have suffocated. ‘No, that’s not helpful, let’s not think about that.’ 

Now that I was away from that military base and its town, I just needed to keep moving… but to where? I hadn’t thought that far ahead, but at least I was out of immediate danger. I continued on my way, keeping my eyes peeled for the indication of another one of those hazardous shapes.

There was a thunderclap in the distance, I looked up to see a wall of cloud encroaching over the treetops at a much lower altitude than the never-ending overcast. ‘Just when we had enough to worry about…’

I pressed on, despite the implications of a coming storm, up until the point darkness encroached upon my vision far too quickly for me to react.

…

I woke up, in pain, on the ground yet again; I elected to consider myself not out of danger just yet. A groan left my lips, followed with whimpers that forced their way out of my throat thanks to the excruciating pain within my damaged leg; not that I could hear it over the deep ringing that filled my ears. 

I could feel in terrible detail the broken sections of my leg bone being pressed against each other, everything hurt on a scale I didn’t think possible. Carefully, painstakingly even, I moved my weight off of the limb and rolled onto my side. With my free hoof, I wiped away more of the clear fluid and snorted out what remained inside my nostrils.

The pain gradually subsided, and with it the ringing did too. This fluid though…

‘Whatever this clear fluid is that keeps leaking from us, this has to be a bad sign for our health.’

I glanced back to where the military base was, only to find that it was out of sight. I glanced around and noticed that the environment was very different from the one I’d just been in. I had just left the town outskirts, hadn’t I?

I couldn’t tell, as there was a thick fog that obscured my vision past the point where I imagined the last row of houses should have been. On that note, when had the fog set in?

How long had I been unconscious for?

A bright flash followed by a thunderous, rolling bang filled the air and interrupted my thoughts. I reflexively reeled myself in, my firearm at the ready to defend myself; my ears were plagued with the ringing again and I could only wait for it to pass. It took me a moment to remember the wall of clouds I’d seen earlier, and I allowed myself to relax knowing it was just thunder and lightning.

I was still on the road out of the old town, that much I was sure of; but, I was also now surrounded by a denser grouping of trees and other vegetation on either side of the road. I took a step over to the right side of the road and gazed deeper into the woods; there was a small body of water in that direction. I went to the opposite side of the road, it was brimming with woodland vegetation, but there was something not quite right about what I was seeing. Everywhere else I looked seemed to be the same. 

Many trees had an unusual color to them, a reflectionless sheen like matte paint; there was more to it than the color palette that made me uneasy looking at these trees, but I couldn’t put my hoof on what it was. As a strong breeze swept by, it hit me; the trees and their branches were all completely stiff, seemingly frozen in place. I glanced up and there wasn’t a single branch swaying the way a tree should.

As if that weren’t enough to test my nerves, there was something distinctly wrong about the body of water to my right; it wasn’t all one flat surface like it should have been.

The water in one spot along its edge seemed to almost lift upwards towards the air, forming a lump of water that sat as neatly as if it were as flat as the rest of its volume. There was also dirt, or sand, or whatever it was that made up the water’s edge that joined that part of water in its strange lumpiness. It was like someone had grasped a piece of canvas, pulled it upwards and held it there; as I watched it, I could have sworn I saw it move at one point.

I was already growing very uneasy at the trees and vegetation, now the water was adding to it and making a convincing argument in my head to flee as fast as I could. Yet another part of me was growing quite curious, morbid curiosity perhaps, but still. This wrongness, the alien-ness of this; what I was seeing wasn’t supposed to be like this and part of me wanted to know more, I wanted to know why…

‘No! We don’t have time for this, not now.’ I jolted myself upwards, and I swiftly forced myself to my hooves. The pain pulsed in my broken leg, reminding me that it was indeed still broken. ‘We’re still in danger, we need to move…’ I paused short of continuing my progress and stared off towards the water again; an idea struggled to piece itself together in the dark of my consciousness where there should have been guidance. I made my way off the road and towards the little abnormal body of water as my mind made sense of this idea.

There was another thunderclap, my ears were filled with more of that accursed painful ringing. I grit my teeth and scrunched up one side of my face in hopes it would alleviate the pain; It didn’t, but the ringing eventually subsided of its own accord.

A few moments later, the wind briefly picked up in speed; it flowed through the trees and where there might have been the calming sounds of branches gently swaying, there was naught but the whistling of wind navigating through the narrow spaces.

It chilled me to hear it, but I knew it was just the wind. Wind couldn’t hurt me. Unless… ‘No, I’m not thinking about that.’ I shook my thoughts clear of it and my mind went back to the body of water.

I pondered the aspects of the water and considered my current state, from there I remembered just enough of the boon of the great other’s machination for the idea to make sense; Oh that great, amazing, powerful other. The magical fallout that remained after the world ended, radiation; my body and the bodies of my sisters were immune to its danger. Not only were we immune, but we could also consume it, even heal ourselves in its presence. All I needed was a significant source.

The problem being: this stagnant water wasn’t likely to be a significant source of radiation. ‘Perhaps this water will suffice for our lesser injuries?’ Really though, any amount of radiation should allow me to at least nourish myself and help me regain my magical strength to an adequate state to protect myself. I cautiously extended my broken leg out towards the water, wincing from the pain, and dipped my hoof just under the surface; out of all the parts of this body that needed to be repaired, the bone in my leg took priority.

I held it there for a moment, but there was no sensation to be had besides the relatively pleasant coolness of the water against the swollen forelimb. Not that I disliked the refreshing cold and the pain relief it offered (mild as it was), but I felt none of the indications of radiation present in this water.

I sighed in disappointment and frustration, but I did not allow myself to lose hope. All I needed to do was locate a good source of radiation and hunker down for a bit until I was rid of my physical injuries. ‘That should be simple enough, radiation is everywhere.’ My other problems, such as the lonesome emptiness of my mind, would have to wait.

Until then, I needed to be extra careful with how often I was blacking out; if I fell unconscious near a threat, I was done for. The sooner I found a suitable source of radiation, the better.

I pulled my limb from the pool of water and leaned my head down to get a quick drink. I had hydration going for me now, it wasn’t much of a consolation, but every little bit helped. On a side note, I finally was able to rinse my mouth free of the taste of ash. For a moment I considered taking the time to try and gather some of it for later consumption; I heard the sound of a heavy thumping and shrieks of some kind of creature that ended in a deep crunch off in the woods nearby, thus I was convinced otherwise.

With a brief check of my saddlebags and ensuring my weapons were still accounted for, I made my way back to the road. I cast a glance to one end of the road, then the other. The fog was still relatively thick, just enough to not know what lay ahead or how far I had travelled from the town. I could continue down the road in the direction I’d been heading, assuming that was in a direction away from the town; its paved and consistent surface was very enticing, much more so than anything the woods had to offer. ‘Yes, that will do nicely; the road it is!’

I set my uninjured hoof to the road and got myself moving to a steady three-legged trot. As I followed the road, my mind went back to the grisly scene back in the town.

Between the two factions in the ruined city, they had incapacitated me and killed two of my sisters in our previous confrontation, in addition to mutually destroying one another in the fighting. If a group from one of those factions came out from the city after seeing their colleagues deceased, well, I wouldn’t humor the idea that they’d be happy to see me.

I didn’t need the guidance of my sisters or the great Other to do the math on how badly the odds played against me now that it was just myself, and in an injured and magically deficient state at that. I cast a glance to either side of me, into the woods as far as the fog would allow me to see. While not “spooky” or notably hostile, there was still enough of an off-putting element with the plants and the trees to give off a bad feeling in my gut. I supposed I could dart into the woods and hide myself from any wanderers who came down this road if I needed to.

I came to a stop for a moment and pooled my magic into my horn; I let the energies flow freely as they may, feeling around for my limits. My magic was still unable to perform up to par with what I believed I could do, but it was not as weak as it had been when I first woke up. I estimated I could pull off a short-ranged teleportation, or a shield spell if I kept it minimal.

Satisfied with my assessment, I got myself moving again at my steady, not-quite-running pace.

My mind wandered back to radiation as I went. ‘We just need a good source of it, a potent source. What should we look for?’ There was the obvious green-and-glowing, that was always a reliable indicator of radiation. I remembered the symbol, the hazard indicator that they often placed on old world waste barrels. Maybe the ruined town I came from had a good source of radiation in it? ‘We would be very upset if that were the case.’ It was too late to go back and check, but there had to be another town somewhere down this road. I could only hope at this point.

A silhouette materialized in the fog and snapped my attention away from my contemplation. As it stepped out more into view, two others of similar stature joined it. The three ponies rose to meet my gaze, mine lowered to meet theirs; All four of us abruptly halted and froze.

“Oh… oh Dear.” The pony at the front managed to say.

Within the time it took for my heart to thump in my chest, we had, all of us, drawn our weapons and aimed them. I tried in vain to cast a shield spell, my magic was there and should have been capable, but the spell wouldn’t execute no matter what I did.

Just as I thought to try and attempt to teleport behind them, the closest pony raised a hoof with a defensive posture.

“Whoa, easy now mutie… lets calm it down.” The front-most pony suggested with an additional gesture of his hoof. “We’re all just passing through, yeah?” He made a gesture to me with his gun as he spoke. “Why don’t you lower that shooter and we’ll lower ours?” The pony then made a show of lowering his weapon.

The three ponies were adorned in leather padding fastened over loosely fitting garments, with frays and splotches in the fabric. None wore any patches identifying them with any of the groups from the town. Each of their faces, what I could see of them under their hoods, were in degrees of surprise, confusion even.

One of the lesser beings that stood before me was a unicorn, that much was obvious with the glow of their magic and their weapon held aloft in telekinesis much like I held my own. The other two ponies had long-guns, rifles by the look of it; both weapons were held by some kind of mechanical trapeze attached to their sides. The unicorn had a more compact looking rifle with a drum magazine, it might have been a submachinegun. 

Meanwhile, all I had trained on them was a pistol, and it was just me… alone. If my magic was less strained, I might have been able to wield both the pistol and the shotgun simultaneously; Alas, that was not the case and it was too late to unpack it now anyway.

One of the ponies next to the leader of this little group eyed me with an expression that made me more than just a bit uneasy. “A nine mil? Really?” The lackey jeered, “Sweet succulent sunflanks above, the mutie looks like it's got one hoof in the grave already. Think we should just put it out of its misery and take its stuff, Gauge?”

The lead pony paled and temporarily broke his gaze with me to slowly turn his head with an expression of utter disbelief and terror aimed at his companion. “Are you retarded? Do you not realize what that thing is? Do you want the Alicorn to rip your heart out with her kinesis and eat it?”

The unicorn quipped, “No, no, Gauge, you’re thinking of raiders. I heard Alicorns burn a hole in your brain with their laser eyes, or they beat you to death with your own skull.”

“That’s not the point! Also, that’s not funny.” The one I could only assume was Gauge responded and frantically waved a hoof at the both of them. “The point is, the Alicorn could eat small time scavengers like us for an afternoon snack and still have room for dinner!”

I lowered my pistol and interjected, “For the record, we do not shoot lasers from our eyes: we shoot lasers from our horn.”  If I could avoid having to waste ammo and my weakened magic reserves on this bunch, that would be ideal. “We have no quarrel with you, step aside so that we may continue on our way.”

“See?” Gauge said with a desperate smile to his colleagues, “There’s no need for us to start shooting at each other. Lower your guns and let’s let the nice mutiecorn pass.”

“You know what? I call bullshit.” retorted the not-unicorn companion to gauge; he had a grin that made my blood start to heat. “Look at you, mutie; you look like a strong breeze would kill ya. You’re nothing like those big scary monsters of campfire stories they make you out to be.” He paused and dropped the grin for a second and added, “You are pretty damn big though, and easy enough on the eyes, I’ll give ya that.” 

I couldn’t decide whether it was bravery or sheer stupidity that possessed this buffoon to stare down a being such as myself, one that towered over all three of them, and try to act tough. ‘Perhaps it was both bravery and stupidity working in tandem? Or… are we worse off than we thought?’ Either way, I wasn’t impressed by them nor was I happy with the outcome of my efforts. 

I weighed my options, yet none of the options I could think of were particularly appealing under the circumstances. They all had better weapons than me, and it was three against one; in my current miserable state, I did not like those odds.

To both my and Gauge's dismay, the Unicorn seemed spurred on by his companion’s foolhardyness, “My pal is right, you’re looking pretty tired there, mutie; why not let us carry that loot for you? Make it easy on all of us; we get your stuff, you don’t have to put more weight on that busted leg, nobody gets shot and maybe we can be friends… everyone wins!”

“No, that is not going to happen.” I replied sternly; while I didn’t want to have to fight them, the two fools at either side of the clearly more intelligent lead pony were making things difficult. My chances in fighting them head-on were bleak without my shield spell, I would need to flee if diplomacy failed. “Move yourselves out of our way!”

Their leader looked between his comrades and gave the expression suggesting he wished he were anywhere else at that moment. “Fellas, we’re scavengers; Scavengers. The whole point in coming out here was to rummage through the aftermath of a fight, not pick a fight.”

“YOU are a scavenger, Gauge; I’m not.” The not-unicorn argued, “She’s probably taken the good stuff from Blast Pit already, look at her bag!”

The unicorn nodded in agreement, “He’s right, I’m sick of missing out because you always want to play it safe, Gauge.”

This charade was quickly getting out of hoof and diplomacy seemed to have failed. I needed to get out of here; I knew my shield spell wasn’t functioning for some reason, but with my magical strain in its current condition I might still be able to teleport if the distance was short enough.

I hoped my teleportation spell would work…

I slowly tried to back away and distance myself from the antagonistic idiots and formed an image in my mind. I remembered the little body of water I’d encountered earlier back down the road I’d just came from; that should be close enough to reach under my current strain, but far enough away from this lot to be out of their line of sight with help of the fog cover. I readied the spell, but now the unicorn stepped forward intent on making things more difficult.

The horned fool moved in front of Gauge and motioned threateningly with their SMG towards my satchel and bandolier. “Enough chit-chat, stop the spell and hand over the bags and guns or we take them off your corpse.” He didn’t wait for my response as he advanced towards me.

With my spell on the verge of activating, I raised and aimed my pistol directly at the unicorn’s head. 

The not-unicorn off to Gauge’s side aimed their rifle at me.

Gauge cried out in terror, “Nonono wait! Wait!!!”

Time seemed to stand stiller than the unmoving treetops as they pulled the trigger and I pulled mine.

Our weapons discharged, and in that next moment, I felt both my magic displacing my form and a painful buzzing sound filling my ears. In the blink of an eye, I found myself standing in front of the pond with the lump in its surface. I grit my teeth and held a hoof to my head while I waited for the buzzing to stop; With the timing of my teleport, I was unsure whether either of us had landed a shot.

An awful kind of pain soon filled the core of my horn, like someone were gripping the top of the magical extension of myself and trying to compress it into my skull. I must have overexerted myself in teleporting like that, but at least I was out of that situation. I allowed myself to fall to my haunches and let out a deep exhale.

My troubles were made worse once I became aware of the feeling of a burning ache in my shoulder; warmth gently trickled down the leg from where I ached. I looked myself over to check for the damage; it was made clear that one of us had indeed landed a hit, and that it hadn’t been me.

The half full pistol magazine had taken the brunt of the impact; the metal sleeve of bullets was all but destroyed, and a few of the bullets it contained didn’t fare much better. There was further damage to my bandolier itself by the look of the frayed pocket and fabric. Just under the sling of the bandolier, I had a bleeding hole in my shoulder where the bullet had lodged itself.

Despite how much my horn ached, I called on my magic and gently pulled the slug out of my shoulder; it hurt the entire way out, partly due to how strained my magic was now, but it needed to be done. Once the thing was out, I had to find a way to stem the bleeding.

I grabbed both my satchel and my bandolier with my mouth and pulled them off of myself to set them onto the ground. I’d intended to sort through what I had in this satchel when I was someplace significantly more safe and secure, but at this point I might not get a chance to do so. Hopefully there were bandages or even a rag I could use to put pressure on the wound. Really though, I was praying to the great Other that I hadn’t ended up filling my satchel with junk.

As luck would have it, the bags I’d dumped into this satchel weren’t completely full of junk. Well, they had mostly been full of junk, but they also contained some useful items mixed in with the miscellaneous components and trinkets. It could be said that some of the components looked promising on second glance, but there wasn’t time for that now.

Among the more useful items were a few cans of food and potable water, a bottle of off-brand alcohol, a working flashlight, a container of orange fluid with a label reading “radaway”, a bottle of “Potassium Iodide” tablets. In a stroke of luck, I happened to find a single packet of magic infused gauze, a roll of bandages and an injection kit with a half full ampule of Med-x.

I grabbed the bandages and got to work with my mouth and single hoof the best I could and as quickly as I could. I estimated I'd be safe long enough to get these bandages situated at the very least, but that was debatable.

As I fumbled with the gauze and wrap, my mind went back to the standoff between myself and the scavengers. Had they aimed a bit higher, that shot could have ended up in my neck instead of my shoulder. I carefully placed the gauze over the hole in my shoulder and pressed it into place, biting back the sounds of pain that wanted to leave my lips.

‘That could have ended very badly for us.’ Indeed, I was lucky that the worst to come of that altercation was a broken pistol magazine and a flesh wound. Indignation filled my thoughts, aimed at those ignorant fools. Seeing as I was now short one pistol magazine, and I had expended a bullet with no assurance I had even hit anything; my indignation was quickly overshadowed by anger.

I wrapped over the gauze with the rest of the bandage roll and tucked it under the other layers to keep it temporarily held in place. The straps to my bag and bandolier would ensure it stayed in place.

Shadows crept into the edges of my vision, and my heart thudded heavily in my chest as I could feel myself slipping away again. ‘No you don’t, not now.’ I shook myself as hard as I could in my effort to fend off the pending unconsciousness; I even went so far as to put pressure onto the bruised section of my wounded foreleg. The sheer intensity of the pain that shot through my broken leg was more than enough to chase away the dark in my eyes, and the threat passed.

My eyes went right to the injection kit; luckily, I retained the knowledge of what Med-x was and what it did. ‘Potent combat painkillers.’ I didn’t know how potent the half-filled ampule would be, or the proper dosage necessary for someone like myself… but really any amount of pain relief would be a welcome one.

Without thinking twice about it I gently opened the kit and looked over what was left of the instructions; the “kit” was so simple that I imagined a foal could have used it. I delicately connected the ampule to the injector’s receptacle with my mouth, letting my magic continue to recover, and carefully twisted it securely into place.

Once it was put together, I held the injector in my mouth and deftly craned my neck to give myself a poke with it. The second the liquid entered my body, I felt the wonderful sensation of the pain that had plagued me thus far starting to melt away.

The burning of my bullet wound simmered down, my headache receded to a dull discomfort, and even my broken forehoof eased the worst of its complaints. I slumped back on my rump and I couldn’t help but smile with the moment; A deep sigh of relief left my lips and my miserable body drank in the painkiller’s effects.

The pain didn’t completely leave me, likely due to not having enough of the substance available, but having it dialed back in its intensity was a very welcome experience.

I took a moment to revel in the relief and looked over to the water and its lump. It was then that I noticed that the ‘lump’ from earlier was now a floating globule of liquid and dirt; the water’s surface looked to be back to some semblance of normal. ‘Water definitely isn’t supposed to do that. Neither is dirt for that matter.’

A sense of unshakable curiosity drove me to grab a stick with my mouth and attempt to poke the floating blob of water and dirt. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but what I found was that the water and in turn the dirt both acted in the same manner as if I had pushed the stuck into the body of water still left on the ground beneath it. The water rippled and moved with the stick, and the dirt gave purchase to my wooden apparatus.

The only thing truly unusual about this glob of water and dirt was that it was defying the laws of gravity. I even went so far as to taste the water, and it tasted perfectly fine. ‘Fascinating, but we cannot waste any more time poking things with sticks.’ With my curiosity temporarily satisfied, I returned my attention back to my more immediate concerns.

Free of the worst of my pain, I needed a new course of action to deal with the scavengers. I thought for a good moment and considered that it was feasible for me to simply take a detour into the woods and avoid them altogether, or I could hide and wait for them to pass… ‘No, we cannot risk that; other fools like them may have heard the gunshots. It would be best not to draw this out and chance encountering another band of opportunistic ponies.’ 

My ears perked up at the sounds of voices coming from the direction of the road. It was difficult to make them out on account of the ringing still plaguing my ears from time to time, but the voices were there and I wasn't imagining them.

“Fuuuuuck…” the unicorn scavenger from earlier groaned, “My head feels like I got skull-fucked by a griffon.”

The scavengers were here much sooner than I expected; I no longer had the time to plan out my course of action.

“The mutie is probably long gone, let’s just count ourselves lucky and get to Blastpit before we run into any more trouble.” Gauge reasoned with his companions. "Sooner we get off this road the better."

They were far too close. 

Without thinking, I grabbed the straps to my bag and bandolier and leapt to my hooves. I quickly glanced around for anything large enough for me to hide behind. Luckily, there was a sizeable patch of jutting rocks near to where I was, so I moved to duck down and hide behind them. 

I held my breath for a moment; I heard the hoofsteps on the road approaching, moving at a fairly speedy pace. ‘That was far too close.’

“I knew I should have just shot her in her stupid oversized head; Fuckin’ teleportation spells.” I heard the third scavenger complain. 

Gauge spoke, “I can’t believe she ran; I was half expecting the mutie to cast some kind of super death kill spell or something.”

“Fuck her, if I see that gigacunt again, I’m gonna…” The unicorn trailed off, “Guys hold up, lemme top off my canteen in the pond down here and rinse what’s left of my fuckin ear.”

“Yeah, sure, we’ll keep watch. Don’t take too long, I don’t want to find out who heard those gunshots.”

A set of hooves diverged and stepped off the road. I breathed in and sat silently behind my cover.

“The hell is this?” I could hear the unicorn say. “Hey, Gauge, someone’s been here. Found a busted mag and fresh blood.”

“Yeah? So?” the other pony called back.

I looked to my wound and the pouch on my bandolier. In my haste, I’d left the broken magazine behind when I ran to hide. I could only assume I’d also left behind a trail of blood from my wound. 'Hopefully he ignores it and moves on.' I reached for my shotgun and slowly drew it from its holster in case he didn't.

“I’m gonna go take a look, might be an easy mark if they’re hurt.” I heard the Unicorn announce to his companions.

Gauge responded, “Alright, just be careful and hurry it up, will you?”

My heart raced and I could hear the hoofsteps of the unicorn as he drew closer to my position behind the rock. Any hopes that he wouldn't find me were nonexistant; but when he did, well, my shotgun would be ready. If I had to fight the scavengers, at least I had solid cover to work with.

I extended the firearm out towards the edge of the rock, just in time to meet the unicorn as he rounded the end of my cover. I thrust it forward and the muzzle caught him in the snout with a dumbfounded look on his face. The poor fool took a few seconds to register what it was he had come face to face with, and the impending doom he was staring down both barrels of.

“Oh fuck me…” ended up being the last words the unicorn uttered.

I pulled the trigger. 

The two shells of buckshot from my shotgun ripped through the front of his face and his lower jaw with vicious ease. When the gunsmoke and crimson spray cleared, there wasn’t much left of his face that wasn’t little more than shredded meat and bone.

“What in the sugar-frosted fuck!?” gauge shouted in alarm.

I raised myself up and peeked over my cover to take aim with my pistol. I fired off a few shots at the surprised scavengers, though they all failed to connect despite my best efforts.

“Oh shit, it’s the Alicorn! MOVE!!” Gauge blurted out as he dove for cover.

“Fuck you, mutie-corn freak!” The lackey shouted over the cracks of his rifle’s muzzle as he too took cover on the edge of the road.

The three of us exchanged rounds, but neither of us managed a hit.

Gauge made a move, running to a nearby tree while his ally fired at me. Once in cover, then the lackey moved and Gauge peppered my position with shots from his own rifle. They repeated this tactic and it dawned on me what they were trying to do.

The two scavengers were steadily advancing on my cover; I broke open the breech of the shotgun and replaced the spent shells with fresh buckshot. When one of them rounded the cover on me, I’d be ready.

“All I wanted to do was pick through Blastpit for an easy and safe score, but noooo, you morons had to fuck that up by picking a fight with an alicorn!” Gauge shouted in between the discharges of his rifle. “Un-fucking believable! Why did I even bother to bring you idiots along?”

“Because you needed a unicorn in order to safely navigate the route to Blastpit?” The remaining lackey answered between bursts from his own weapon.

“It was a rhetorical question!” Gauge snapped.

I peeked from my cover and took a shot at Gauge with my pistol again. This time I actually managed to hit him, but his armor took most of the impact. He grunted from the pain, but he kept fighting.

At this rate, it might just be easier to let them get closer…

I could feel the darkness creeping in on my senses, the edges of my eyes darkening and my eyes growing heavy. ‘No! Stars above, no! Not now!’ I begged and pleaded as I fought desperately to keep myself conscious.

Out of options, I did the one thing I could to keep myself awake.

I shoved with all my might into the rocks I took cover behind, aiming right into the fleshy stump of my former wing. The pain was a bolt of lightning to my system; I screamed in agony as the bone and tissue were smashed between my hefty weight and the rockface’s unforgiving surface.

In an instant, the darkness was chased off with the throbbing pain enveloping my mangled wing. It only lasted for a moment though as the Med-x went right to work at diminishing the misery in my now broken wing-stump. I was beginning to understand why the lesser beings would want to keep such medicines on hoof.

“I think we’re winning Gauge! She’s hurt bad!”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the other lackey running to cover to try and flank me. I aimed my pistol and pulled the trigger as quickly as I could in rapid succession, hoping to stop him. Although I failed to land any of the shots I took, I at least managed to force the fool to abandon his endeavor and he quickly rushed back to where he’d been previously to take cover.

I turned my attention back to Gauge, he was in the process of reloading, I tried to take aim and land a shot on him, only for it to glance off the side of the tree he hid behind. My ammo was running low by my count and I was failing to produce results with what little ammo I had. 

Either this pistol was defective, or had far worse injuries than I realized. I reached out with my magic and grabbed hold of the unicorn’s submachine gun.

It was another short-ranged weapon, looking the part of another thrown together crude weapon like my shotgun. Unlike the shotgun, this weapon looked as if the craftspony who made it had actual gun parts at their disposal. The weapon had a hollow magazine that left the bullets exposed to the elements, but made it easy to keep count of them. There were roughly twelve bullets in it from what I could see; thirteen counting the one in the chamber.

Not great, but better than what I had.

I immediately turned the weapon on Gauge as he and his lackey both advanced on me at the same time. Gauge ducked back into cover as I pulled the trigger and my new SMG spewed half its magazine’s contents in his direction.

Pain burned within my side after two deep thuds impacted into me. I dropped the SMG, wheeled on the lackey and fired my shotgun at him; several of the pellets tore into his chest and upper leg, causing him to scream in outrage and pain of equal measure.

He fell face first into the dirt and struggled to get back up.

I ducked to the side and narrowly avoided the lackey’s next shot, I grabbed my SMG and I emptied the last of its magazine at Gauge when he dared to poke his head out from the tree he hid behind. I almost got him, almost.

Almost wasn't good enough, and my new firearm was empty.

When I tried to fire another shotgun blast at the lackey, instead of the much needed report of gunpowder and shot pellets, I was met with nothing but a mechanical *click*. I pulled the trigger again, and once more I was greeted with *click*

In the heat of the moment, I’d forgotten that this shotgun didn’t have the means of firing each barrel separately.

The lackey was already getting back to his hooves and aiming his rifle. My SMG’s magazine was empty and my shotgun needed new shells… I braced for the pain and held my breath as I frantically broke open the shotgun’s breech and scrambled to get new shells in the chambers. I could already start to feel the aching pain of the magical strain in my horn taking its toll, but if I couldn't kill these fools, I was doomed.

A rifle report rang out and I winced, expecting the searing pain of the bullets wherever they may land. The pain never came, and the scavenger lackey dropped to the ground with a fresh, red hole in the side of his head.

Gauge proceeded to panic and immediately make a break for the road. “OH fuck, oh shit!” He tore across the ground with his head held low. “I yield! Parlay! Fuck this! Fuck all of this! Please don’t kill me!” He continued screaming into the fog until he was long out of sight.

I glanced around, trying to find out who, or what had shot Gauge’s lackey.

There was nothing I could see for a good moment, not a single hint as to where that rifle shot had come from. I couldn’t remember where I’d heard it from either, I hadn’t been paying attention under the circumstances. All I knew is that it hadn’t been them and it hadn’t been me, so it had to be a third party. They were either a new ally, or I’d traded one enemy for another.

A few moments passed in which I was not shot at, so I could only assume this newcomer was not hostile to me. One way or the other, I’d soon find out. “Hello? Who is out there? Show yourself!”

“Relax,” Came a voice from somewhere in the treeline, “I’m not interested in a half dead mutie.”

An Earth pony mare leaned from behind one of the trees, hunting rifle shouldered and trained on me. She wore a hooded outfit that was adorned with several leaves and branches to help her blend in with the foliage around her; likely the reason neither myself nor the scavengers had seen her until now. “Nice and easy mutie, no sudden moves. I’m just gonna take a peek at the gear on the dead scavs.”

“You… saved us?” I cautiously asked.

The mare tilted her head this way and that, humming briefly, “Something like that, sure.”

I slowly tried to get to my hooves, but I found the endeavor to be difficult. I looked over myself and could see why; the injuries I’d sustained in the firefight weren’t life threatening, luckily enough, but I was quite thankful that the painkillers were still working.

Seemingly satisfied with my lack of aggression, the mare relaxed her posture and slung the rifle to hang by her side.

Eventually I did get to my hooves, and I loaded a pair of shells into my shotgun for the sake of having it ready to go should I need it. I hooked it under my bandolier and went to find a magazine for my submachinegun, only to find there wasn’t any available ammunition for it left.

When I glanced over to the earth pony, they looked to have already gone through both of the scavengers and she was making her way back over to me.

What she said next caught me completely off guard.

“Alright mutie, lets see what’s in that bag.”

I blinked, unsure if I even heard her correctly, “We beg your pardon?”

She raised an eyebrow and gestured with a hoof to my bag, “Your satchel; I’m taking my share.”

Apparently, I had heard her correctly; I responded with an understandably incredulous tone and gripped my shotgun with magic, ready to use it. “You’re robbing us? After aiding us from near doom, and then sparing us-”

The pony interrupted me before I could finish, “Whoa, hold on, you’ve got the wrong idea Mutie. I did just save your flank from the scavs, yes,” She paused for a moment, letting the words linger in the air before continuing, “…buuuut, I’m not a charity service; I don’t do hero work for free.”

“So,” I started, gradually releasing my grip on my shotgun, “you’re seeking compensation?” While I didn’t much care for this either, it was a preferable outcome compared to being outright robbed and/or having to fight again, or dying.

“Pretty much, yes.” She nodded, “Now, the satchel, let’s see what you’ve got to spare.”

I had a lot to consider here: I wasn’t exactly in a favorable bargaining position. My shotgun was loaded and ready to go, assuming I could pull it out faster than the pony could ready her rifle- which I had no reason to doubt myself in that regard. However, the pony had elected to save me when they could have let me die or shot me along with the scavengers. She could have been a new enemy, yet she was trying not to be.

Then the sobering thought hit me; I barely had held my own against those bumbling scavengers. My ammo was running critically low, my current injuries were likely to have been aggravated in the fighting. There was also the additional injuries gained from said fight, and I didn’t know when the Med-X would wear off… 'We grossly overestimated our capacity to defend ourselves in this current state. She could potentially be a useful ally, at least until we are able to heal ourselves.’

With these elements weighing in on my decision, I elected to cooperate with this lesser being. 

I unslung my satchel, reluctantly so, and laid it upon the ground in front of the pony. “We hope you aren’t thinking of disarming us.”

“Relax, I’m not interested in making you any weaker than you already are.” The pony commented, then wasted no time in rifling through my satchel. “Lets see… scrap, junk… Carbine rounds and rifle rounds, Canned food…” She mumbled something to herself idly as she swiftly rummaged through what I had.

I huffed as I waited impatiently for her to finish rifling through my belongings.

Eventually she did finish, saying, “Alright, I’ll take the rifle cartridges, since it’ll top off my ammo count. I want those canned carrots, too.”

I allowed her to take the items without any grief, seeing as I currently didn't have use for any of it myself. Once she had what she wanted, I reclaimed my satchel and voiced my petition. “Given that we are heavily damaged and vulnerable… we wish to travel with you until we’ve healed ourselves. Do you object?”

The lesser being looked at me for a moment as if I’d sprouted a second horn.

“Our wounds are severe,” I reiterated, then added, “we need a safe place to heal. Would you be willing to assist us?”

Her eyes stared into mine, then they wandered over my form; she seemed to consider my proposal the longer she stared at me, judging by her changes in expression.

“Ok, look Mutie;” She eventually spoke in response, though she was speaking a bit slower, softer even, “I won’t stop you from following me, but don’t expect me to risk my life to save you if the shit hits the fan. The only reason I saved you back there was because it was convenient, you understand?”

I nodded, “We understand, we merely wish to improve our chances of survival.”

“Riiight…” The mare said with a grimace as she looked over my body once more, and then she muttered something I wasn’t able to hear. She cleared her throat and followed with, “Well, as much as I’d like to continue the chitchat; I’d- err, we- had better be getting out of here. It’s never a good idea to stick around after a firefight, it tends to draw attention from a lot worse than just scavengers. We can talk and sort this little arrangement once we’re out of immediate danger.” 

Her logic was sound, I couldn’t argue with that.

The pony started off in the direction of heading deeper into the woods, though briefly she paused to add, “Oh, while you’re following me, keep your guns in their holster unless I start shooting, alright?”

I narrowed my eyes at the ridiculous suggestion and was about to retort, only to see that she was already heading deeper into the woods; she hadn’t bothered waiting for me to respond. I huffed indignantly and made my way into the woods after her; it wasn’t terribly difficult to catch up and keep pace with the pony, given my height advantage and the fact that she wasn’t at a full gallop.

Much as I would have preferred the road, the Earth Pony was intent on taking her route through the woods and I doubted I would have been able to convince her otherwise. Then again, those scavengers had been using the road when I ran into them; it was entirely plausible I might run into more fools with guns and underdeveloped brains.

I kept pace with the pony through the deep woods, hoping that I would either find a source of radiation to heal myself, or some manner of healing potion. In the back of my mind, I could feel the pain from my injuries; they were ever so slowly starting to worsen with their output.

Once we were someplace safe, I'd see about dealing with my injuries more effectively.