A Normal Day... [Closed][Finished]

"Nah." Trails coughed. He could taste blood, not a good sign. "They got me good with the shot they had though, eh?" Trails spat out a thick glob of blood and swore to himself. "Where the fuck is the god damn medic? Will I dream?"

"We're here!" Starry shouted from the end of the hallway. She came galloping in with Techno. She looked furious. "What in the all bile-infested pits of Tartarus were the two of you thinking charging in to face raiders without us?!" Starry shouted.
She caught a glimpse of Happy Trails, and winced painfully. "Are you alright Trails? Doctor, take care of him please." Starry turned to address Rodeo. "As for you, Sir Pounds-the-fuck-out-of-ponies-a-lot, you're lucky those raiders didn't cripple you as well. Didn't it even occur to you to maybe wait for us? That maybe the doctor, the dragon, and the explosives expert might come in handy? Maybe you should spend less time pounding the fuck out of ponies and more time pounding the fuck out of books."
Starry sighed. She really wanted a chance to be part of the action, but she suspected the two of them would continue without her.
"I'm more angry at myself, honestly. I knew the two of you would run off and play cowboy without us. I don't know why I was hoping you'd save some of the action for me."

Silver heard a cannon fire and got curious as to what the racket was. He left the warmth of the fire and trotted down the hallway to where he heard the noise. He saw the commotion at the doorway and flew and hit his head on the ceiling that was still there. "Damn that hurt." He got back on the ground, and shouted as loud as he could, "Is everypony alright?" he was concerned about his new compani... no wait, they were friends at this point. He was concerned about his new friends.

"And maybe you should become 'Miss Doesn't-scream-at-everypony-cus-she's-pissed-a-lot' n' spend more time gettin' the fuck out of mah face! Shoutin' ain't gonna fix nuthin'!" Rodeo turned his gaze back to Happy. "We didn't expect no fuckin' canon ta blow holes in ponies," he admitted.

Techno ran in a bit out of breath and quite behind Starry. "Alright... Alright, I'm here, who's dow-" he was saying until he saw Trails. "Ah. There's my answer, then." Techno walked over to where Trails was laying crippled on the ground, a pool of blood forming around him. "Okay, I expected you guys to get hurt one way or another, but you went and got yourself crippled. Surpassing all expectations at every turn, eh?" he said, pulling out a healing potion and giving it to Trails before pulling out some Gauze and getting to work. "And don't you think of moving before I tell you too, got that?" he said with a cross look on his face.

Starry's face flushed red in anger. She held her breath, glaring angrily at Rodeo. She felt like a bomb about to explode. Luckily, she had disarmed far more complex bombs in the past, so she let her anger subside a bit, before sighing deeply and offering her retort in a low, steady voice. "Okay, first of all, I'm not aiming to fix what happened here, we have a doctor for that. I'm aiming to let you know that the next time you hear raiders, you call for some bucking backup before you burst into battle. Second, why in Equestria would I give myself a ridiculous name like that?"
"Hi, my name is Miss Doesn't-scream-at-everypony-because-she's-pissed-a-lot, nice to meet you," Starry said mockingly.
"That's just ridiculous. And for that matter, who names their colt Sir Pounds the Fuck out of Ponies? That name is ridiculous, and you should feel ridiculous."

Rodeo turned and faced Starry, giving her a blank, disappointing stare. "Ya really think that's mah name?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "Whatever... Ah only came in cus he opened the door n' them raiders saw us. After makin' sure mah head was still gonna' be where it was s'posta stay, Ah tried ta help him. But what can Ah do ta stop uh cannon blast?" Rodeo blinked, still shocked that they even had one.

"Ah don't even know how they could've gotten that," he added onto the end.

Spark Fire was the last to notice the commotion and turned to chase after the fleeing ponies, getting down on all fours just to keep up.

When he finally arrived, it did not take him long to realize what happened. Those raiders used their "party cannon"! The worst part was that he was the one to find it... He showed it to the raiders in exchange for a small bed and some extra rations for a week.

He could smell the blood oozing out of Trails, he could taste the residue of gunpowder in the air, but all he could hear was shouting. Useless shouting that was getting in the way of that medic.

"SHAAD UUP!!!" Spark Fire screamed, punctuating with some fire aimed at the ceiling.

"Now if you don't mind, I think the medic would like some extra room." he growled, more pissed with himself then anypony else...

Starry put a hoof to her chin, and lost herself in deep contemplation. "Hmm, I wonder," she spoke to herself, "If they have a cannon here, what other sorts of weapons might they have here?"
She turned to Techno, abandoning her line of thought. "Hey doc, is Trails gonna be okay? Any permenant damage?" she asked, walking up to Trails to get a closer look at him. "I wanna say something funny, but I'd like to know if he'll be okay before I make light of his injuries." Starry seemed entirely oblivious of Sparkfire's command that they give the doctor more space.

Techno, his face contorting in several different ways as he worked, finally ended up with a small smile in the corner of his mouth. "He should be fine, Starry. He probably can't walk on his own, nor should he try," he said, casting a glance at Trails as he said it, "but he should make a good recovery. However, his front right is crippled for the time being, so that'll take a while to heal up properly, and it'll slow both him and us down quite a bit. Nothing to be to worried about if you have good backup."

The update out of the way, he turned back to work. "Oh, and yes, I would like a bit more room, if at all possible. Thank you Sparkfire."

Silver Hoof backed out of the room and into the hallway. The doctor wanted space and Silver was happy to oblige. He was a little that he still didn't know what happened. Over the commotion between that white stallion and starry, his voice was left quite as a mouse. He backed up against a wall, and sat down. He took off his busted pipbuck and put the shell of the new one on. At least its lamp spell was still working, and it hummed the familiar hum against him that he was used to. He adjusted it with his teeth and fluttered his wings happily. It calmed him down so much that he could almost block out the stress of all the yelling.

Rodeo looked back to the medic, then he looked over to the canon and the bodies of the raiders. He turned back to Happy Trails. "Ya say he's gonna be alright?" Rodeo rubbed at his cheek with a hoof, then stood. "Ah best stay outta the way, then."

He trotted over to the door where he found a raider's body, then leaned over to search it for supplies to scavenge. He looked up and spotted Silver Hoof sitting alone. He was doing something with his Pip Buck, but he seemed distressed.

Rodeo tried to go back to searching the raider's body. But then he looked up again. That was the pony he had trampled on his way out. "Hey," he called to Silver. "Y'all right over there? Why ya sittin' all by yer lonesome?" He blinked. It wasn't very good for the image he was trying to portray to the others, showing concern for Silver. "Ah mean, ya gonna get lost, er find ya more raiders," he said, and blinked again. He waved a hoof and shook his head, then turned back to the raider's body.

(need a redshirt to tell me what's on the raider's person)

Techno chuckled, still focused on patching up the huge gash in Trails' side. "I guess mister shoots-a-lot here does have feelings. How 'bout that."

He finished bandaging up the wound, and turned to pull out a couple of the healing potions. "Take these," he said to Trails, "or I can't guarantee that it'll heal right.". After giving the potions to Trails to drink, he proceeded to pull out the second-to-last needle of Med-X. "I'll be down to one after this, so don't go complaining if I don't give another to you later. You never know when somepony will be in a large amount of pain and need 'em." he said, sticking it in and injecting the painkillers into the general area of the wound.

He then got up and took a look around, and went to examine the cannon.

Starry stayed quiet while Techno worked on Happy Trails. She had moved away to the side a bit to give him some room, but still stayed close, examining the procedure closely. She had read a book or two on medicine, but this was he first chance to see a doctor perform first-hand.
As Techno finished, Starry followed him to the cannon. She was interested in speaking to him, but she was also interested in finding any gunpowder by the cannon, or anything she could use to craft explosives.
"That was an interesting procedure. I'll try to remember what I've learned from that just in case I blow any of you into bits by mistake," Starry said, trying to make small talk. "You know how explosives are."

The raiders body contained the following:

A note
2 Healing potions
Ammo
9mm handgun
Knife

Silver heard Rodeo talk to him and he responded to the first part flat out ignoring everything else he had said. "Well, uhh mister hat, I wanted to make this whole trip a silent in and out mission, and everything turned out...wrong."

Rodeo nodded. Then shook his head. "Y'now, you should learn the importance of scavenging. It might get uh little loud er dangerous every now n' again, but you can make you uh nice profit, too."

Rodeo did a hoof-pump when he saw what the raider had been carrying. A new knife, a good one. Better than the one the raiders had taken from him and cut his eye with! Rodeo stuffed that into a fold of his leather armor, and took the pistol to inspect. It was in poor condition, but would be good for parts. With this pistol, Rodeo would be able to make the one he had currently in decent condition.

The ammo and potions would be useful as well, and he pocketed that. Then he spotted a note... A note? What did it say?

(need redshirt to show me note)

Techno gave a small chuckle. "Well, if you're so good with explosives, I don't think you need to worry about that. I'm just wondering what this thing here fired. That was a really nasty shot; it crippled his leg in one blow, and that's kind of hard to do. What'd Sparkfire call it? The 'Party Cannon'?" he inquired to no pony in particular, wandering around the cannon, examining it. "If we can turn this thing around and secure this room, we'd have a really nice home base for our time here. What do you think, Starry?"

Trails let out a growl of pain as he rose to his feet. "Never was good at following doctor's orders." He answered before Techno could ask. He limped up to the corpse of the raider that had shot him and spat on it. "See you in Tartarus, bitch."

Trails limped over to the doorway to check on the rest of the group. His chest was a dull pulsating pain, the thorn in his side more of a gaping hole. Trails lit a smoke and hobbled over to the far door, pulling out his shotgun and reloading it on the way. "Haven't finished the sweep yet." He called back at the group.

Silver sighed and revealed to Rodeo something he'd been keeping to himself, not really caring who heard him either. "Well I am good at finding good things but once this thing died, I was about as useless as a filly in a bar fight." Silver stood up and trotted past Rodeo, "So you and Trails were scavenging right?"

Techno walked slowly up to Trails. "You are not going anywhere. You are unable to fight effectively at the moment, and sure as Celestia's great sun, you will be nothing but a liability in any gunfight you come across. You are staying here and letting the others go. I don't think you could take too much more anyways, and if you keep moving around, you'll open the wound again and cause more bleeding, and then I'd have to keep you from going into shock. And that's kind of a bitch since we are not in a hospital and I don't have good-quality medical equipment, so sit down, shut your trap, and let me take care of you." he said, all in one breath. Stopping to breath for a moment, he finished, "Besides, I think the majority of us would rather keep you alive and safe here than go and try to get killed, right?" he said, looking around the room at the ponies (and dragon) within it for support of his claim.


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Footnote: Level up!

Trails stared at Techno for a second before pushing him out of the way. Stable Ponies, don't know how to cowboy up. Trails pulled some healing powder out of his pack and rubbed it into the wound. He pushed open the far door and walked out. "Long as I can stand and pull the trigger I'm good. Damn sight more than you've been in a fight."

Starry was too busy inspecting the party cannon to take much notice of Techno's question. It wasn't until he trotted away to speak with Trails that the two caught her attention.

Starry trotted up to Techno, and, while focusing her attention on Trails walking out the door, leaned towards Techno as though she were intending to whisper to him.

"So..." she wasn't whispering. In fact, she was speaking quite loudly. "What's the plan? Should we let him keep walking 'till he collapses? Or should we tackle him and force him to stay put?"

Damn cowponies don't know when to stop. "Either one. Not sure which would be faster, though." he said, responding to Starry in like. "Oh, and by the way, Trails, if you didn't notice, you're kind of having trouble standing and I *ahem* don't want to take Starry up on her suggestion." he said, punctuating the statement with a small grin.

Spark Fire hurried to Trails side, "Well what ever happens, I am going to stick to Trails like rice on white, he seems to be a trouble magnet, and I am plenty tough and plenty mad." He said defiantly.