Death has no Shadow [Ended]

"Huh? Either way I'm actually lucky and met somepony decent, or it is going get even worse than i could imagined... well, so much for the avenues of escape".

As he slowly walked towards the campfire on the roof, he considered whether he should or should not disclose his allegiance to Stableton, and what possible outcome it would have.

"Well... we didn't really had much time to make a name for ourselves, at least not in bad light... but, then again, someone might have managed to fuck up something while i was gone, or say something somewhere where he shouldn't... nah, i won't lie, but won't trumpet it out either".

The end of this train of thoughts has left him in front of the campfire. The griffin he saw earlier was looking through remaining parts of a window, clearly lost in his thoughts and not caring about him, or alternatively, appearing as such to look inconspicuous.
Close to the fire was the wounded pony in a cape, now red from his wounds. "Well, bastard's pretty mashed, that's for sure", he thought. Lastly, the place was occupied with his host for the evening, an earth pony pointing a shotgun in his direction.

"Hello, I won't try to be trouble, certanly not after I seen your little battle and the result of it".

Nodding silently Kes stood and followed Trails, leaving just a few seconds after after him. He had again taken up residence in the window looking out of the corner of his eye at the newcomer, doing his best to appear lost in thought or something.

After the newcomer began to approach Kes judged that his little act had worked.

From what the ol' gryphon could see from his vantage point the unicorn appeared to be clad only in leather armor and carrying only one weapon, an old knife, with him. He was no threat, the way the pony talked Kes guessed that he was young, new to this whole exploring the wastes thing.

Great, a rookie. he thought to himself before turning around and making his way back to the fire.

Cross stirred with some voice calling out to them, but Trails would take care of it, Cross was too tired to worry. Still, the pony came into the light of the campfire and Cross lost interest, just a another boring pony looking for handouts.

Trails had his gun trained on him and Kes was still watching him.

Cross would sleep now, he could always just kill the unicorn in the morning

Trails holstered his shotgun and gave the unicorn a once over. They had an air that creamed "rookie". Trails shook his head and went to his saddlebags. He returned to the fire with some radigator and prickly pear fruit. He sat back and started whistling a slow tune while he grilled.

"You're lucky to have run into us and not one of those slaver parties that have been springing up lately. You're a long way from Stableton." He said after a few minutes.

"That obvious?" ,he asked, sensing the atmosphere around was not very inclined to him trying to hide his origin. "After all, honesty can't kill me" ,he thought.

"Yes, I am from Stableton, and yes, i am as green as i look", he said with what he intended to be voice of "you guys clearly know how this place runs, and i'd like to not get killed around here", but as he himself didn't believed to be worth an ounce of scrap to them, he decided to focus his atention on the radigator instead.

"Funny... year ago i was living scared shitlles in a Stable, and now i am outside and not much has changed...
though... the food has at least some flavor... could hav-damit, almost again".

As his internal monologue decided to take a break, he gathered all courage he could and asked:

"Anyhow, do you have any plans to which you could use somepony who may be green, but knows his way around old tech?"

once again realizing how riddiculously he was pushing his luck, but once more, the Lady Luck hasn't betrayed him yet.

Cross tried to sleep but just couldn't ignore the conversation, the two ponies discussed for awhile but as soon as the new pony mentioned pre-war tech Cross shot up, "You say something about Pre-war tech?!?!?!" Cross's eyes beamed at the new pony and he glared at him until he received an answer

If there were any working cameras left, and if there was one last unused film picture left in Equestria, the face Arc Weld made when the hooded one practically came back to life would be worth to make a picture.

"Oh. Crap. Flapping your jaw faster than thinking again, aren't we?", shot through his head."A'right, mitigate it, mitigate it, mitigate it...".

"I hate to disappoint, but while I was talking about pre-war tech, I have no information about any useful one. I made the remark only because I have some previous experience with maintaining it. As your colleague correctly guessed, I come from Stableton, and as I believe is already common knowledge, we left our Stable year ago. Back there, i was in the reactor maintenance crew for six years, but still, it was Stable-Tech equipment and infrastructure, build to last centuries."

Cross just stared at the newcomer

"Another damn mechanic?, look we have those nearly a dime a dozen in Equestria , what makes you so special?" Cross stood up now, he felt better, but that could just be the blood loss talking.

"Look newblood, you want to survive around here, you have to have something to offer." Cross turned to Happy,

"Hey Trails you have anymore Sparkle-Cola?"

"Special? Well, I can rebuild microwave oven to work as a death ray designed for leisure and personal amusement, but seriously, no, there's nothing making me "special". I can disassemble spark reactor and then place everything back so it works, and i can program diagnostic routine for it so the containment field hums "Oh, Equestria", but beside high energy management and some basic networking and coding, there's just your usual mechanic, knowing his way around tools. As you said, bit a dozen."

"So that's it, if there's something with the word "energy" or "plasma" in it, there's a good chance i might be of help."

"How'd you know I had sparkle cola, for that matter what do you mean more?" Trails' voice steadily rose as the sentence went on. "That was my damn cola you ask before you take for shits sake. No, I don't have anymore, all have is moonshine and some purified water. Besides after all that bloodloss you need to eat something not drink irradiated cola."

Cross glared at him, and tossed him a few caps. "Duly noted, well I thought you wouldn't have minded... Didn't Kes loot your caravan anyway?"

Cross sat back down, trying to keep his head down, he didn't want them to put out the fire, he was cold, but damn the smoke would be blocking out the moonlight. Giving their positions away for miles

"Yes and I fractured his skull for it. Do you maybe see a warning sign?" Trails retorted, tossing the caps back at Cross. "Far as old world tech there's a metric shit ton in my bomb factory. Bunch of old robots that have been decomissioned by foreman time. If you're looking for loot I've got you covered. I 've barely even explored beyond the atrium."

"Well, there's not much for me to add to that. If you're willing to invest time to it, I'll be happy to accompany you."

"Still, i believe you have currently more important matters to discuss among yourselves. If you wouldn't mind, I'll take the first watch."

"Cross glared at Trails, you.....OWN....a factory?" Cross was horribly confused, was there even legal ownership of anything anymore?

"Um...what kind of equipment would you say is in there? I've been looking for some knock-out AKA party grenade blueprints, I've only seen one pony ever make them and she won't tell me how to make them...."

"..And nice try asshole, I'm staying up too, I'll be watching your ass, dreg" he glared at the newcomer

"I honestly don't know what all is in there. I've only searched the atrium and a few adjacent rooms. But yes I own a factory, killed 4 raiders and survived getting shot by a cannon point blank for it. If you want I'll get my friend Starry to help us with the search she's the explosives expert."

"Starry....um no, I'm not good with strangers, let's just try to see what we can do ourselves shall we?" Cross maintained a blank expression, he wanted to help but he also wanted to get at least something out of it.

Kes, who had been silent through most of the others little exchange, decided to just keep the silence up. His job was done for now, The sniper was dead, trading along this route of Wasteland could continue again unhindered. His pay for services rendered, the upgrades to his rifle, was more than enough he thought.

Now the group seemed to be discussing going to explore some sort of Factory. The prospect of finding some interesting gear in said Factory would be, for now, enough for Kestrel to go along with all of this.

As the discussion between the two seemed to be able to sustain itself without his help, Arc decided to think about the oncoming matters.

"So... what do we have? Probably derelict Robronco factory... hm... he mentioned that his flank was handed to him there, the security systems must still be working, at least few sensors, some central coordinating computer or few, and power station has to be working, or at least backup supply. Certainly worth the risk, but how do we get in? Explosive expert would be a solution, but that might bring the whole building down... hm... what does the caped guy do anyway? Someone into tech, clearly, but what kind? And they don't seem to know each other, not for long at least."

Arc got up to his legs and walked to the argument.

"I hate to interrupt, but before we dismiss this explosive expert, do we have a way of getting in?"

"What part of I live there don't you understand? We walk through the front door." Trails looked at the young buck like he was stupid.

"Oh. I... right, I must have misheard you first time, i apologize, thougt there was some issue with getting inside after the atrium. Please continue."

"Irrelevant Noobie, I built explosives back at Tenpony Tower for security all the time, If theres anything more complex than for your meager comprehension....got that?" Cross smirked a bit, this new unicorn was beginning to rub him all the wrong ways.....2nd of all, he had the same colors as Trails, which was just horribly disturbing, Cross had a dislike for flat-colored ponies...

"You know what, I've gotten enough rest between earlier and now Trails, you guys should sleep, its not much longer till morning, I'll keep watch for any 'outside'" looking at the newcomer, "....threats"

Trails raised an eyebrow. He was okay with a little friendly chop-busting, but Cross was just being an asshole. Plus Trails had a preception on Tenpony ponies, bunch of 'rich' snobs hiding behind old war tech and doing their best to ignore the outside world. Somewhere just below raiders on his list of ponies he'd drink with.

"Oi, leave the buck alone. He's as green as you were no doubt te first day you stepped out of that damn tower. At least he learned some fucking tact along the way." Trails put a fore hoof on Arc's back and gave him a reassuring pat. "Far as being better that's the stims talking, get some sleep. I'll take first watch."

"Great job rookie, now we all gotta deal with Red." Kes thought to himself, listening in on Cross's little tirade about being skilled in building explosives and such.

In all honesty, Kes was not exactly convinced that Cross was what most would call a demolitions expert. The gryphon had never seen any evidence that Cross has anything more than basic skills with explosives.

He was not going to call out this opinion of his though, he was not stupid. All that would accomplish is another rant from the unicorn, and Kes was honestly tired of hearing the others talk.

In the end Trails went and said what Kes was thinking anyway; heh, funny how that worked out.

Kes decided to just lay down his head and get some rest. He was a light sleeper, and when his turn for watch came up he would be eaisly awoken. Till then he would relax as best he could, and close those cold, predatory eyes of his.

"Look all I'm saying is we needed someway to learn how to keep the raiders away, I didn't spend too much time there myself. I was caravan guard with my dad. Besides....thats one of the reasons I left in the first place, they...just like hoarding...stuff, I was doing this stuff since I was foal, I don't ever remember a time I wasn't exploring the wasteland.""

Cross drew out his canteen and unscrewed it, using his magic to pour just a bit of it over the fire.

"Good night Trails, and whomever you are.....sorry, I'm just pissed today since I keep getting shot at by some trigger-happy leadheads" Cross looked at Trails and pointed at his bandaged up leg, "But I'm glad we could become such gooood friends" He muttered, non-sarcastically, but still a bit low

The rain was coming down in sheets now, so thick that visibility was near zero. Trails doubted that the light from his small fire would be noticeable in these conditions. The rain always took him back to days long ended. He laughed darkly as he thought of different snapshots in his memories: curling up with his first mare friend underneath a tarp in the outskirts of Manehattan, sharing a smoke and drink with some friends in Stalliongrad's ancient trench system, and of course shivering in Old Appleloosa as H yelled at him to run. Couldn't say he missed all of those days, but he did miss the ponies in them.

"Hope you guys are sleeping well." He toasted, taking a long swig from his flask.

He checked the repeater he had just gotten over, deciding to DCOA it just to be safe. The action was covered in carbon residue, same story with the barrel and even the feeding tube. The pony he'd gotten it from never cleaned it from the looks of things. Trails started cleaning the gun, humming a slow dirge while he worked.