Chapter 7: The Hunt

"Attention all trotters! A pseudogiant has been sighted in this immediate area. All guard hooves report to decks three and four immediately. Report any and all sightings."

Nopony needed to be told twice. Indeed, every able-bodied mare and colt had already grabbed their gear and headed out before the message had even finished blaring through their radios. Fog had closed in, shrouding much of the surrounding landscape in white.

Night was among the first ponies out. A pseudogiant pelt could buy a lot of supplies. A lot of supplies meant he could take a break from his barrel-to-hoof-to-mouth existence and just get lost for a while.

On the face of it, this was many a stalker's dream employment: a straightforward hunting trip. But Night knew better. Hunting a giant wasn't like taking down a flesh or a bloodsucker.

"You didn't tell me about pesudogiants, Night!" Snow huffed as she appeared behind him.

"Because they don't come this close to the ship." He retorted.

"Well I don't want a repeat of-"

"No, that's not gonna happen again." assured the stallion.

Less than a minute of walking later, Night's PDA suddenly picked up an incoming radio message.

"Jupiter, this is Amazon." Night's PDA picked up a strong female voice over the waves. "We got tracks by the cranes. Uploading coordinates now."

They had to start somewhere. And the best chance they had was to get up high and have a look around. With a cursory nod towards Snow, Night checked the circle on his PDA map and began to make his way across the desolate riverbed.

...

Before the Disaster, the Ponyiat River served as the main trade route between the city and the rest of Equestria. Rusting cranes marked the station where ships like the Jupiter would dock and trade their wares. Like everything in the Zone, it did not long survive Cheernobyl's devastation.

The towering dock cranes would be a perfect lookout.

Looking to his PDA again, Night noticed that it was picking up another radio transmission.

"Jupiter, this is Amazon. We've picked up more tracks leading east."

"Hey, what's that? Over there!" Another voice suddenly interrupted the mare's.

"Where?"

"Through the bushes, right there!"

"There's nothing there. What are you talking abo-"

His words short by an ear-splitting roar and a series of screams.

Then the radio erupted into chaos, a frenzied cacophony of roars, static, and hoofgun fire drowning out everything else. Even without the PDA, the two ponies could hear the tak-tak-tak of bullets in the distance.

"Amazon, this is Horns. I picked up your transmission, do you copy?"

Static.

"Amazon, this is Horns, do you copy?"

More static.

Snow hurriedly prepped her hoofgun, "Time to move."

Night had already begun to gallop up the steep slope to the base of the towering dock cranes.

The surrounding buildings and warehouses were almost barren; anything of value that had survived the Disaster had long been looted, leaving only scraps that nobody wanted but that time itself seemed unable to erase. Rusted shoes, boxes of soaps for scrubbing ships that no longer existed, a pitchfork with a shattered handle, a cart.

According to the PDA, the pair were on top of the circle. Night didn't sense anything as he crept forward, animal or pony. That made him nervous.

Snow stepped beside Night, L85 at the ready while she view the devastation before them. "Where are they? This is where Amazon said, right?"

Then Night smelled something, a foul and putrid stench that filled his nostrils and caused him to flinch. Moving around a derelict cart, the smell began to get stronger. He recognized it all too well.

A footprint several feet across lay sunken in the ground. Next to it was a splatter of fresh blood and a particularly gruesome sight.

He froze. "I think I found Amazon."

Then he heard Snow gag loudly behind him. "I think I found her too."

Night turned around to find Snow standing above the front half of the poor mare, entrails scattered around, laying next to another animal track. Literally nothing of other ponies remained but tattered pieces of body armor, splashes of blood, and a severed hoof. One earth pony's body, still whole but broken in a physically impossible shape, had defecated on the ground in its death throes. Several more track lay sunken in the dirt nearby. It told the duo everything they needed.

Snow turned from the sight and groaned. "Fuck that smell..."

"These giants are getting bold." Night crouched down to take a better look at the bodies. "Really bold." He didn't get any closer, the stench horrid even to his jaded senses.

"Hey, you two! Yeah you, colt with the horns!"

Night spun with his hoofgun aimed at the ponies who snuck up on them. A tan unicorn stallion, garbed in a familiar pine-green uniform, froze in place with his right hoof up high. Behind him, two other ponies approached; a pale-blue earth pony colt and a brown pegasus colt.

Night slowly lowered his weapon. "You heard it too?"

"The radio? Yeah, we were just passing through and heard something going on."

"Came up here to investigate it myself too." The Freedom pony looked at the remains around him. "Didn't think I was gonna find this."

"Hey wait a second... Bloodflag? You're-" Snow suddenly perked up. "I've heard of you! You're that... that markspony who led First Company against those colts in the Garbage, right?"

The unicorn laughed it up. "Oh stop it, you're gonna make me blush."

"I've been in the Valley for the past few months helping against Yoga, so I heard all about you. The name's Snow."

"The ponies round here call me Horns," Night introduced himself, "but I'm okay if you call me Night Stalker. By the way, that's a nice gun you got, the Dragonuv."

Bloodflag glanced at the scoped long-barreled hoofgun on his leg. "Oh, well thanks. So you use your real name." The stallion smiled, "Guess that makes two of us."

"I'm Dixon. This is my little bro-"

"Leeroy." The brown pegasus introduced himself before the blue earth pony finished speaking. "Ready and willing to kick some ass!"

"Well I don't mean to cut our little date short," Night checked his PDA, "but if we wanna catch up to that giant, we need to get moving."

Bloodflag cocked the charging handle of his Dragonuv. "Follow the blood."

...

"... Out here, everything is dangerous. Your survival ultimately depends on your own ability to react to hazards. Do exactly as we tell you and you should be fine."

"I'm not a foal, Dixon!" Leeroy facehoofed. "And I ain't afraid of no giants."

Night was trying to ignore the arguing between the two ponies, lost in his own mind as they followed the path of their quarry east across the river valley.

"There are worse things than giants out there." Bloodflag suddenly butted in. "Let me tell you something kid. Before I was in Freedom I used to be a mercenary, a good one, but just being good doesn't cut it out here... Two years back my old team and I almost died near the area we're heading for now. We walked into a spot where space was twisted into a loop – every direction we tried led back to the place we started at."

Snow perked up. "I've heard stories of those. How'd you get out?"

"Our fellow mercs and some Freedom guys found a way to get us out after a few days, but that's not an experience you forget in a hurry... So you see, no matter how smart or fast you are, the Zone is never a picnic. Always keep that in mind."

"Wait... If you've been to this forest before," Leeroy complained, motioning towards Night, "why do we really need them?"

"Good question." Snow slung her L85 on her leg. "Do you believe in miracles?"

"Not particularly, no."

She gave him a wry smile. "You will."

...

The fog lifted by early afternoon, revealing the landscape of the western Zone beneath a sky of rolling, angry grey. The fire team walked above it, traveling single-file along one of the twin tracks of the old Percheron Line.

All around them, the rubble of vehicles and building created shadows and obstacles. Night regularly had to check his PDA to make sure they were still headed in the right direction. Even Leeroy grounded himself to avoid losing the others. In all directions they saw collapsed and gutted buildings, blackened chariots and wagons, detritus and blown litter.

The living creatures, ponies and animals alike, had been reduced to nothing more than radioactive ash, mixing with the ash of Ponyiat's holocaust as it carried by the winds of Cheernobyl all those years ago. Only the occasional suicide - bodies still swinging from trees, old corpses with hoofguns lodged in their mouths - broke up the solitude.

Night signaled a halt when the entourage came to a tree-shaded gate on the road next to the rail line, briefly checking around the abandoned taxi stop before slouching against its concrete face.

The checkpoint happened to be sandwiched between a bloodsucker-infested marshy area and a rocky hill marked the border of the Jupiter's communications array. Past this place, they would be on their own.

"Jupiter, this is Horns. Pseudogiant tracks spotted outside Dead Mare's Alley." the horned pony gave a final report to the ship. "We should hold here, and check equipment."

"Good idea." Bloodflag obliged. "Anything you guys need to fix, fix it now."

Ignoring the impatient looks from Leeroy, Night took advantage of the break to adjusted the slings which supported his hoofgun on his leg. His Enforcers were pea-shooters, useless against a walking tank like a giant.

Fortunately, he always had other weapons on hand. He rummaged through his pack, and soon found what he wanted. His AN-94 Abakan - thoroughly cleaned and maintained - sat ready. Its hardened straps slipped onto his leg like a glove. He slipped a 5.54 ammo battery into his beloved partner and it glowed with approval.

Typhon, he knew it as. The words inscribed on it did the weapon justice; "None are beyond reach, None are above death."

"How far is it to the Red Forest from here?"

"In the old days, not far." Night shrugged. "There were roads running right to it... Now it depends."

"Depends?"

"On what's in the way," Night supplied.

Snow nodded. "If we're fortunate, we'll get there before dark."

"And then?"

"We'll have to camp," said the mare. "If I'm remembering this area right, there should be a few good places to hole up provided the critters haven't claimed 'em."

When Night appeared ready to move on, he straightened. He took only a few steps forward before he sensed it, and immediately threw a bolt in front of him. It began to fizz before it even landed in the dirt, magical corruption spreading over its surface within a few seconds.

"This way," said Night, cutting to the right. "Let's go."

...

In the days after the Cheernobyl Disaster, massive deposits of radioactive material and ejecta thrown out by the exploding plant killed wide swaths of the region's pine forests. Those trees were long gone - destroyed by the energy blowouts during the first years – but their dying colors inspired a name whispered in terror by those foolish or suicidal enough to journey there.

Dead Mare's Alley was the trotter name given to the only passable area of the Red Forest, the only part not turned into an impassable deathtrap by skin-melting radiation or anomalies or madness-inducing horrors that could not be physically described in words.

The world was quiet and still here. No birds sang, no critters scurried about. Even insects did not nest. Ash covered the rotting trunks, the ground almost entirely bare of life. Beside the ravenous mutants, some of the most frightening anomalies occurred here. Night himself had only heard rumors of them, but those rumors were more than enough.

"So... This is Dead Mare's Alley." Leeroy tried to lift the silence.

"Yep, still dead." Snow quipped.

"Masks on everypony. We don't want you sprouting another nose." Night took out his gas mask and fastened it tightly over his head. The other ponies with him quickly followed. "Filters?"

"Got enough for seven hours." reported Dixon.

"More than enough time to get through the worst." Bloodflag readied his Dragonuv. "Snow, any readings?"

The earth pony mare looked at her PDA and tapped it a few times with her other hoof. "I'm getting a signal just a few dozen yards away."

Night checked his own PDA; he saw a red dot. "Let's finish this quickly. We really don't wanna stay here long."

...

The fire team was entering the outskirts of the Forest now. Night felt a tiny pang of disappointment that he couldn't properly see the rest. Snow and Bloodflag had taken the lead. His frequent attention was as much to spot hostile creatures as to navigate.

The forest's own terrain wasn't going to make the hunt easy. The ground was uneven and rocky, with few reliable paths. A deserted gem mine offered potential shelter to any takers who didn't mind clearing out dens of snorks, though the lookout post across the river offered superior warning of unwanted company.

Here and there, half-frozen puddles of radioactive sludge steamed and sizzled. The sun shined dimly through the cloud cover on them.

"Well?" Leeroy demanded after some hours of walking, following Night's meandering path among whatever menaces lurked just out of sight. "How much further?"

"'The sun was low in the sky," Dixon dramatically intoned, describing the group's surroundings in a solemn voice, "and its rays shone dimly between the twisted branches overhead.'"

When nobody laughed, he let out an annoyed sigh. "This is the edge of the Alley. The real hazards are straight ahead... Night?"

"Yes." Night pulled out the folding stock of his Abakan with his teeth and moved the fire selector to the automatic position with a quick swipe of his other hoof.

The path ahead led into a narrow pass, the steep slope on either side crowned by dense vegetation. A gravitational anomaly lay ahead, sitting just to the left where the pass gave way to more open ground, its presence betrayed to the casual observer only by a subtle rippling in the air. For Night this was no challenge.

"Stop," the loner commanded, bending to pick up a stone from the path.

Classical physics dictated that the stone would follow a downward arc upon leaving his hoof. Zone physics scoffed at that and instead sent it spiraling into a tight vortex: a hissing filled the air as the upset anomaly pulled in all the loose leaves, pebbles and clumps of soil within reach, the force of its suction drawing a harsh wind over the onlookers. The noise grew to a fevered pitch, then ended altogether with a sharp crack as the matter exploded.

Within a few moments the anomaly had reverted back to its idle state as Night placidly cut to the right and walked past the patch of warped space.

A flash of gray shot past them from behind - a magnificent flying creature both terrifying and graceful which spread its wings and circled as if taking the group in measure. Its multiple eyes seemed to glow and licks of saliva fell from its curved toucan-like beak. Its oversized talons raked effortlessly through dead underbrush.

"What is that?" Leeroy asked with a tone of awe.

"Harpy," Snow replied, whistling slightly. "Strange place to find one."

"Imagine having one of those for a pet." said Bloodflag.

Night shook his head. "They like to stick their beaks down your mouth and tear out your throat from the inside. Good luck."

The bird completed its circle, then swooped down and away as it threaded through shadowed alleys of dead trees. That's when Night began to sens-

SPLAT!

The animal instantly fell to the ground with the speed of a bullet, its body promptly exploding into a million bloody chunks. Gore spiraled through the air in an arc, carried up by another example of Zone physics.

"Oops." Dixon quipped, with Bloodflag and Snow chuckling. "Well, we're not going that way."

They began to move again around the gravity trap, all except Leeroy who just stood there as if mesmerized. Eventually, he broke from his trance and rejoined the group.

The fire team soon approached a large clearing where a past outburst of the Zone's deadly magic had plowed a twisted furrow in the ground, seeding a raging cloud of anomalous magic. The air shimmered and undulated, with hundreds of tiny rainbows exploding and dying. To the north of the crater was a nearly pristine ponycopter sitting inexplicably among the trees, and past that was the old home of Forester.

Night saw a mound of… something coming out of the ground in the distance next to the furrow. It was a pale grey color, whatever it was. With a wary glance at each other, he and Snow slowly made their way over.

As they approached, they could see that it wasn't a mound; it was a pit. A pit with the faint green glow of pure mana emanating from within. Both of them promptly sidestepped and bypassed the obstacle, followed by their companions

"So," Dixon muttered once the lethal trap was behind them, "where shall we pretend to pitch our tent? The mine or the river outpost?"

"The outpost," Night opined.

"Fine by me, if you can justify the extra distance."

...

"What's that?"

"The edge," Bloodflag answered curtly. "The edge of the world, as far as we're concerned." He turned away from the churning fog beyond the railroad embankment and the rusted drawbridge which disappeared into its swirling whiteness. It was oppressive, terrifying, bearing with it a subtle impression of things long dead.

"Stay away from it." said Snow.

Leeroy wasn't quite ready to give up. "So what's over there?" he demanded, looking to Night.

"There used to be a town. Skyfall, I think." The loner was no more verbose than Bloodflag. "Now, nopony knows."

Dixon looked across the river thoughtfully. "And I'm not sure if we want to know."

Night ascended the decaying steel steps of the outpost's watchtower. It had weathered the winter well, numerous bullet scars regardless, and it appeared that no other party had already staked a claim to the structure – he'd been right to prefer this place over the old mines.

"All quiet?"

"Yep," Bloodflag reported. "We can settle ourselves and get these damn masks off."

"Guess it's my turn tonight," sighed Snow as she trotted down the stairs of the tower. "See you boys at oh-four-hundred."

...

Night Stalker settled into a corner and drew his long coat close around him. The others were sound asleep. Sleep, however, had not been prompt in visiting the trotter. Instead he found himself thinking back to Leeroy's earlier question as he leaned on the watchtower's balcony.

Skyfall wasn't a place where the average whinny could make some bits. Between the walls of secrecy and anomalies, many trotters had never heard of Skyfall or thought it a mere legend even today. The old pegasus town had been completely inaccessible until a blowout shifted some of the anomalies surrounding the ruins just after the Cheernobyl explosions. Night himself had been on the far side of known territory when the town reappeared, drawing swarms of trotters eager for a shortcut to the Center.

It was just as well that he missed out on the action – the last of the post-Cheernobyl emissions resealed the path over the bridge by the watchtower, taking all who rushed into the unexplored wasteland with it. Duty and Freedom platoons, bandits, mercenaries - none of them were seen or heard from again. A fog shrouded Skyfall during the following night and remained forevermore, neither spreading nor dispersing. Those who walked into it never walked out. Even Heaven Eyes and her cultists, who marched with impunity where none else could survive, forsook the town.

But there was a great pony who once lived out here. Forester, they called him. His disappearance still haunted Night. "Another youngster comes to dedicate his life to the cause," the old hunter had chuckled when the two first met. "What can an old stallion do for you?"

He shook away his thoughts as he reached into his pack. Be strong, he repeated to himself. Be strong. Be strong.

Night lit up two cigarettes and stuck them in his nostrils. A good deep smoke would clear his head. Narcotics filled his throat and lungs with every snort. He felt better now.

A snork howled mournfully in the distance as Night left the balcony, returned to his corner, and fell asleep.

...

"There." Night pointed across the wide clearing as the thicket on the far side began to move. "It's coming out."

Bloodflag was already in place, the other ponies backing him up. They had let the Freedom sniper get the bait for them early in the morning, in the form of three mutant pig carcasses heaped near the eroded anomaly crater. It'd taken ten minutes to set the offering out and nearly an hour for the real target to show itself.

The pseudogiant was a horrid caricature of nature; part pony, part bear, part dinosaur. A thick lump of a body with a vaguely equine face, it stomped about on two enormous overgrown arms that doubled as its legs. Its raindrop-shaped form was covered in sagging, pale skin spotted with red and brown patches. Its eyes bulged with a serene, almost idiotic gaze. The teeth - each the size of a pony's hoof - were smooth, perfectly sharp, and creamy white. Despite its huge muscles and bones, the monster could outrun a pony several times over. Einstein and his colleagues at the scientists' bunker had long debated how the rare creature sustained the massive diet its prowess logically required.

And somehow, with no discernible emotions or expressions to speak of, it still managed to look angry all the time.

"Good Goddess..." Leeroy breathed.

"It's times like this I wish I had a horn." Dixon whispered. "Set that thing on fire or turn it into a rabbit, ya know?"

Night gave him a puzzled look. "... You do know magic doesn't work against giants, right?"

Bloodflag raised his beloved Dragonuv to his cheek, the blissfully unaware monster just beginning to messily feed upon the bait. Leeroy and Snow quickly jammed their hooves into their ears.

Whaboom!

The pseudogiant rocked backward, blood running from the expertly-placed hole in its forehead. It swayed on its feet for a moment or two, then let out a piercing roar and charged up the hill. Tree trunks and rocks flattened before its unstoppable rage.

Whaboom!

Snow, Night, Leeroy, and Dixon all opened up at once, firing head-on at the raging mutant, but eighty magical rounds were not nearly enough.

Leeroy broke his old double hoofrifle open while Snow and Night yanked out their empty magazines with their teeth. Whatever his sundry other faults, the young trotter was at least a decent shot and a quick reloader: the old rifle was up and on target before Night had reached Typhon's charging button.

There was a double blast that left ears ringing, and the giant finally broke off its assault before retreating down the slope and disappearing behind some fallen logs.

"Fuck," Snow muttered hoarsely, eyeing the blood covering the bushes. "That secondary brain or whatever it's got, that's really something!"

"Well we can't let it get away." Leeroy cried out as he charged down the rocky hill.

Dixon cursed as he followed. "Faust damnit, Leeroy!"

But as the fire team came to a slow cantor, they found nothing in the clearing. Not even tracks were visible on the ground.

"Where'd it go?" Leeroy spun around, trying to make sure he didn't get jumped.

Something grunted loudly behind Night. Something alien. And something big. Night just knew it had to be big. In fact, that particular grunt sounded familiar-

A large rock behind the group promptly exploded out in a shower of dust, and an enraged pseudogiant twitched and snorted irritably. Or furiously. Night wasn't very good at reading the emotions of mutated monsters.

It whipped over to look at him like a surprised Tom glaring at Jerry.

Night didn't even think. He galloped away, looking for some sort of mouse-hole. He found one in the form of a literal hole, albeit partly blocked by dead branches and rocks. Behind him, Snow and the others fired at the distracted mutant.

Hefting his Abakan around as he galloped, Night spared only the quickest glance over his shoulder at the approaching horror.

He jumped, turning mid-leap and blasting away, nearly getting caught in a tangled web of ash-covered branches before sliding on his back like a baseball player reaching for home.

Was that right? Reaching for home? Maybe it was stealing home. He had no idea and he didn't care at the moment.

The beast was coming for him and obliterating his cover with every step, so Night scrambled out of his natural protection and vaulted dramatically (and painfully) over a fallen pine tree, coming to a crouching stop.

There were times when Night wished he had the invisibility bloodsuckers had and not a sixth sense. Now was one of them. He glanced over as the raging pseudogiant bore down on him, and Night sprang back so he was laying on the ground, facing the monster.

Everything around him seemed to slow down to a crawl. He fired two shots, aiming at the eyes. His bullets made their mark, but he wasn't in the clear. By the time Night had scrambled to his hooves, the creature already appeared on top of him.

The giant raised its right leg high over its head, and slammed the ground with the strength of an angry goddess.

Night felt the ground leave his hooves for a few moments before violently slamming into a tree trunk. Pain shot through every bone in his body and he could see open cuts all over his unprotected body parts.

Machine hoofgun fire sounded, and Night hoped to Faust the others were firing at the mutant monster. Bringing his blurred vision forward, Night managed to eschew himself into a sitting position, crawling as he watched the smudgy battle unfold.

The pseudogiant turned and heaved in desperation, its two overgrown, lumbering legs obliterating the rocks and bushes around it. Bullet holes and thin trickles of blood covered its body.

Finally, with a low, raspy groan, it seemed to wander aimlessly for several seconds, then lost its balance and crashed to the ground, rolling backwards down the slope.

"YEAH!" cheered Leeroy as he charged the monster, "HERE COMES THE PAIN!"

He and the ponies with him poured several more rounds into it. Only when the giant stopped twitching did they hold back.

Snow helped Night to his hooves. "You okay?"

Night stretched. "Yeah, just making sure all my bones are still here."

He moved with dizzied unease to the steaming bloodied corpse before him. His hoofknife sprung from its sheath mechanism, and with great care he began cutting across the leathery flesh.

Finally, when he was satisfied with the size of the skin flap, he wrapped the pelt in a plastic bag and slipped it into his pack. He shook the blood off his legs.

"All right," Dixon announced. "Now we just need a picture." He produced a camera from somewhere on him and handed it to Snow. "If you'd be so kind..."

Night silently prayed that they would hurry up and finish having their fun: by now the entire Red Forest probably knew they were here.

"Go ahead," Night murmured. "I'll watch your back."

The mare nodded, following the colts back down to the crater. Leeroy and Dixon quickly struck their poses beside the fallen mutant, the former cradling his shotgun and grinning nearly ear to ear, while the other trotter peered through his scope.

"Say cheese!"

Something at the edge of his sixth sense's range caught Night's attention, a faint signature across the clearing behind the others. It ceased moving and was joined by a second, then a third.

That smaller animals would be drawn to the kill was nothing strange, but even in the Zone few beasts had the courage to approach a pseudogiant - even a dead one - and so soon after the gunfire. That meant it was probably either snorks or pseudodogs...

Or else...

"Snow," he called, pointing over the others' heads. "Company!"

The first two shots came at nearly the same instant, hitting Dixon neatly between his shoulders. He went down with barely a sound.

Less than a second later, Snow fell behind the pseudogiant, swearing incoherently while light automatic fire whizzed around. She held a bloodstained hoof on the base of her neck, groaning loudly. Night jumped into the cover of a large rock, frantically wondering when and where these assailants had taken a level in subtlety.

"DIXON!" Leeroy cried as he tried to get near his companion, only to be met by a hail of projectiles.

"Don't move!" Night called out. "Snow, you hit?"

The mare quickly got to her hooves. "I'm fine, I'm fine!"

A near miss prompted more curses out of her mouth. She popped up long enough to squeeze off a burst with her L85. The return fire hit only cooling flesh and gave Night a better fix on the attackers' position. Leeroy had dragged the completely incapacitated Dixion by his tail behind a rock.

"Bloodflag," the loner shouted, fumbling with the Abakan, "can you shake them up?"

"Just a sec..." The other trotter swapped his magazines and took a deep breath. "Freedoooooom!"

The suppressive fire worked admirably, forcing one of the enemies to displace as Bloodflag's bullets zipped through the concealing bushes. Aiming over the top of his rock, Night zeroed in on the flurry of motion, tracked it briefly and squeezed the hoofgun's firing button with his leg muscle.

Pow!

The lone trotter was already slamming his bolt closed on a fresh battery as a struck assailant fell and tumbled down into the clearing. She wore not the brown vest and mottled urban camouflage of a cultist, but the gray and blue of a mercenary. Night wasn't sure which made less sense: that a groups of neutral loners and a respected Freedom member had been ambushed in Dead Mare's Alley by assailants, or that said assailants were out in Dead Mare's Alley at all.

"We gotta fall back!" the loner shouted to his companions.

"Working on it!" The Freedom sniper grunted, reloading his hoofrifle again.

"Okay, get ready!" Night laid his pack against the rock's well-weathered face. "Now!"

Snow and Bloodflag broke cover, zigzagging up the hill while Night fired short bursts at the mercenaries and enemy bullets peppered the dirt under their hooves.

"Nice work," the horned pony panted, rolling behind a shielding rock. A bullet promptly glanced off it, flinging chips of stone at him. It wasn't until they had gotten into cover that they realized that Leeroy hadn't come with them. He was still by the body of Dixon.

"Wait, what the... Leeroy, get your ass back here!" Bloodflag yelled.

The pegasus turned, bloodstains covering his jacket. "Not without Dixon!"

"Okay okay... fuck!" Night nearly yelled, "Alright, we'll give you cover. Get to the mine entrance, we'll try to meet you there!"

"On three!" Bloodflag called, "One... Two... THREE!"

All three ponies rose and unleashed punishing suppressive fire on their assailants. With dizzying speed, Leeroy heaved the colt on his back and flew up the hill out of sight.

The Freedom markspony swore under his breath as he crouched again and pushed the Dragonuv's muzzle over the top. "Those clowns better not be from my old crew!"

Night didn't expect it to make much difference, the bandits of today being who they were.

"Let's retreat to the mines and try to shake them off," he suggested.

"Good by me." Bloodflag fired several shots, then another and ducked. Then he started fiddling with his rifle as it started glowing bright-green.

Sparks suddenly began flying from his hoofgun's barrel. "Hang on, I'm jammed... Piss – not jammed, broken!"

Night, digging into his pack, tossed him a low-grade spare Kora 919 hoofgun with his teeth. "Use this."

"Thanks." Bloodflag snuck a fast peek around the rock while slipping his new weapon on his leg.

"They're advancing... This is gonna be fun!" Snow put a fresh clip in her own hoofgun.

Fun wasn't the word Night would use. There was no adequate cover between the rocks and the mine entrance up the hill which offered their best – if not only – path of escape: they'd have to make that dash completely exposed. The mercs – at least ten of them – were rapidly closing the range of engagement, breaking cover but spread so wide that a thirty-round magazine wasn't enough to effectively suppress all of them.

The loner leaned out and pulled a snap shot with the Abakan, narrowly missing his mark. Bloodflag must have come to the same realization, since he switched from suppression to aimed fire and dropped two opponents in rapid order before the first of the survivors made it to the cover of the cooling pseudogiant.

"I'm almost out of ammo," the Freedom trotter warned. "Soon or never, buddy!"

"I know!" Night's next shot struck a crouching merc's exposed shoulder, putting him out of the fight. By his reckoning, that left the odds at two against seven.

"Let's – wait... Bloodflag, do you hear that?"

Somewhere in the distance, a horn was blowing. The remaining mercenaries could also hear it, per the sudden lull in their shooting.

"Time's up," Bloodflag muttered. He bent to pry a fist-sized stone from the soil beside his hoof, then wound up to pitch it. "Let's play... catch a grenade!"

It was a brilliant feint: Night heard a startled yelp as the "grenade" landed and saw a merc dive away from the assumed center of blast – leaving him wide open to the loner marksman.

Typhon's old butt thumped reassuringly, magical power blasting through the flank of the unfortunate colt's charcoal-tone vest like a fist through a wet paper bag. Night Stalker's nose filled with a sulfurous stench.

Then he realized that Bloodflag wasn't at his side any more. The Freedom trotter must have started moving as soon as his decoy was in the air, running while the enemy was distracted.

Night felt like an idiot: he'd squandered his chance to retreat so that he could get a few more shots off.

Worse, he now realized that he had neglected to pay attention to what his sixth sense revealed about his surroundings – Bloodflag had moved out of range, and new company was coming in fast.

"Glory to the Zone!" A battle cry rang out clear as a brazen bell among the trees. "Punish the heretics! Crush the unworthy!"

Heaven Eyes and her fanatics never skimped when it came to launching raids against the outer parts of the Zone, always attacking in great numbers with nary a care for their own survival, giving no mercy and expecting none.

There was one rule for dealing with them: kill them before they kill you.

And now the odds had seesawed from two against one to one against twenty and counting. His empty Abakan wasn't up to this task, and there was no time to get his Enforcers out.

Night Stalker waited just long enough for the ponies pouring from the woods to engage the remaining mercenaries, then started galloping away.

He covered all of three and a half meters before a soft pocket in the ground caught his hooves and sent him tumbling. A projecting rock jabbed into his ribs as he landed, the impact only partially dampened by his thick coat and vest.

The loner rolled over, gasping in pain, and was greeted by a dumbfounding sight.

Five of the fanatics stood only a few feet from him. But they weren't shooting at him; they weren't even aiming at him. In fact, the nearest one was raising a hoof as if in greeting.

Night simply sat where he was, completely baffled, as the clear leader of the group directed his companions with a series of hoof signals. Half of them spread out, taking up defensive positions around the clearing while the rest began checking over the bodies of the fallen. The leader watched these proceedings briefly before approaching the trotter, the muzzle of his AK and attached grenade launcher aimed at the ground. He was followed by a young teenager with a Shortbred carbine.

The teenaged pony scanned him over in a strange mixture of fear and awe. "Is that... No, it cannot be so..."

"You're not hurt." The captain's voice was deep, in a way which reminded Night of an opera singer. "What happened here?"

Night just blinked, wondering if he hadn't actually hit his head and knocked himself silly. The adept, however, didn't look the least bit silly when he flipped out his hoofknife and held it to Night's face.

"Answer him, Marked One," he spat.

Those two words struck many conflicting emotions into Night's heart. They knew who he was.

"We were hunting a pseudogiant," said Night hesitantly, too muddled to concoct a plausible lie in a hurry, "We came out here and the mercenaries attacked us, and then you came. That's all."

The adept's expression of contempt and revulsion only expanded. The captain's face was hidden behind a sturdy gas mask, but he actually seemed satisfied.

"Of course," he said, nodding to himself. "You speak truly, Marked One."

The adept snorted. "What does it matter if he speaks the truth? There is no good in letting the Archenemy stay alive to blaspheme the – "

Something abruptly clicked in Night's mind.

"Save your breath dumbfuck," he cut in flatly. "You ponies are just as crazy as she is." Might as well say his part while he was still alive, he reasoned. The one round left in his trusty Abakan couldn't save him now.

The confrontational colt had obviously made up his mind before the fact. "You are no less a blasphemer if you seek the granter of wishes, vermin."

Night had never been one to be easily insulted, but that retort pushed exactly the wrong button.

"I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about," he muttered dangerously. Raising his head, the loner glared straight into the junior fanatic's hardened eyes. "But whatever dragon shit Heaven Eyes or whoever is feeding you, it's wrong."

The adept's breath hissed through clenched teeth as he drew back his leg. He would have spit Night on the blade for sure had the captain's hoof not blocked his path.

"Silence!" the latter ordered. "Forgive him, Marked One. It is not long since he was enlightened, and the Zone does not bestow its wisdom all at once."

Turning to the adept, the higher-ranked follower addressed him like a father correcting an errant child. "You are right – our duty is to protect the Zone with all our hearts and souls... But we never harm the children of the Snake, the ones borne with the Mark."

"What...?" The adept looked from his commander to the equally nonplussed Night Stalker and back again. "Brother, what do you mean?"

The captain didn't answer directly, instead bending to gently pull Night upright.

"Only Our Lady has the right to challenge him," said the former. "That is the path which the Zone has set, and its reasons are its own."

His voice, while respectful, became serious. "We cannot remain here. If there is nothing you require, we must depart. I ask only that you not speak of this to those who are unworthy."

Night wanted to gun the cultists down on the spot, but he knew it would probably be suicide.

"Fair enough... Uh, can I ask you a few questions before you go?"

"You may," the earth pony replied graciously, "but I cannot promise that I will have answers."

"Fine." Night cleared his throat. "Do you know what happened to Forester?"

The cultist shook his head. "It is said that he walked into the deathly fog, though I hate to believe a colt capable of such madness could be the same graybeard who dwelt in this forest."

It was true, then. "I see... Then you don't know what's past the fog either?"

"It is a cursed place," the adept interjected darkly.

"Indeed," the captain added. "We know not what dwells there now. But the Lady has desired that we find a way."

"Thank you," Night returned, hoping he sounded sincere. "One last question."

"Very well."

"Where is Heaven Eyes?"

"Ah." His tone of voice suggested that the captain knew. "That I cannot answer. Forgive me."

"I... Okay," the loner replied quickly.

"Then we part ways here." The captain stepped back and, surprise on top of surprise, saluted. "Farewell, Marked One."

"One last thing!" Night called out to the ponies who had spared him.

The captain turned around while the adept under him kept moving. "Yes?"

Night knew exactly what to say. "If you see her, tell Heaven Eyes... there can be only one."

"Of course." The captain nodded. He promptly vanished into the gray of the forest with his adept in tow.

The cultists had already stripped everything from the merc corpses and made off with the pseudogiant corpse. It was only a matter of minutes before his senses told Night that he was quite alone in the clearing.

After reloading his weapons and collecting the empty magazines from around the bullet-chipped rock, he made for the mines.

...

"Bloodflag...?"

A flashlight clicked on, revealing the barrels of several hoofguns aimed at the tunnel entrance.

"Wait, hold it... Night Stalker?" the addressed hissed, aiming around the bottom of an overturned mine cart.

The stallion heard a familiar mare nearly gasp in relief. "Thank Faust..."

"It's just you, right?" Leeroy popped his head up from behind a rock.

"Yeah, it's just me," Night confirmed. "The bandits didn't linger."

"Phew," Bloodflag breathed. "I thought you were right behind me till I got to the mine and turned around!"

As Night's eyes adjusted to the darkness, he noticed Snow laying against the wall with a bandage wrapped around her neck. Next to her lay a motionless Dixon.

He approached. "You alright?"

She grimaced as she sat up, but still managed to crack a smile.

"Oh c'mon, I've taken worse hits!" She chuckled weakly. "How'd you get away from them?"

"I fell on my face." It was technically true, and the amount of dirt on Night's already earthy-hued clothing lent credibility. He scanned the cave, his eyes soon falling upon Dixon's motionless body. Blood oozed from his forehead.

Snow lowered her eyes. "He's in bad shape. Bloodflag stopped the bleeding, but he still might not make it."

As Night looked into his pack - still reeking with pseudogiant flesh - he got an idea. He took out a small bright-pink crystal, its glow illuminating the cave.

Bloodflag immediately knew what it was. "A Meat Chunk?"

Night tossed it to the colt. "Try this."

Without delay, the brown pegasus held the artifact to his brother's injury. For a few seconds, nothing happened. Then it began to glow, and the skin began to fold and slowly mend itself. Then the pony shifted about.

Leeroy gasped, "He's alive! Thank Faust..."

"He's a lucky bastard, that's what he is." Snow got up and swept her own flashlight around the mine tunnel. "Let's not wait for them to make another pass, eh?"

"Yeah..."

Bloodflag shook his head. "I'm really not looking forward to the flak back at base," he admitted. "Knuckle will be pissed 'cause I didn't get a report, Screw will be pissed 'cause I broke my shooter and Skinflint will be pissed 'cause he'll have to get me a replacement."

"It wasn't your fault," Night pointed out. "Anyway, there's nothing around now. Leeroy, grab Dixon and let's hurry out while we can."

...

"Home sweet home," Snow sighed as the river valley and the Jupiter came into view, painted warm orange by Celestia's sun plunging towards the treeline. Leeroy had already gone ahead to the ship without them.

"Guess I'd better get straight to the boss... Oh, and you can have this back," Bloodflag surrendered the Kora. Night accepted it with no objections.

"You can stay the night at Jupiter if you want." suggested Snow.

"I'll be on intelligence duty for a while after this," Bloodflag replied glumly. "I think I'm just gonna get going."

"Okay... Well, nice meeting you. See you around, I guess." Night began to walk away.

"If you need anything, you know who to call."

The grizzled stallion grinned, "Of course. Nice meeting you too, Snow."

Heading back to the Jupiter seemed like the best thing to do now. Night needed a safe place to mull over what happened. He still wasn't entirely sure how he could be alive at this moment, but it didn't matter. The pelt wasn't going to sell itself.