Scarlet eyed the mechanical constructs around her curiously, and seemingly oblivious to the extreme danger they posed to her, appraising their workings with interest. “Hmm, interesting creations of yours, what powers them?” She looked around some more, “Ah, but I forget, you’re asking the questions right? Let’s see…” 

Scarlet continued walking, keeping up her current oblivious air, nonetheless she eyed the large swords held by Tsan and Lambda, and her mind left nothing to the imagination of what the result of a fight between herself and this armored column would be. “I am Scarlet Ink, or Aлый Чернила, and I came here to find adventure, drink vodka, and conduct a rescue operation. Unfortunately, you southern ponies don’t have any good vodka, and my rescue operation appears to have gone awry, so it seems I am left with finding adventure of some sort.”

“You sound Stalliongradian I’ll give you that, so I’ll take your word for it. Otherwise you haven’t really answered my latter questions.” pausing to take in a glance at the unconscious Dr Lens straddled over the back of one his children he frowned, “It does appear that this ‘rescue’ has gone awry in a manner of speaking, If she’s a friend then I am afraid she is in deep trouble, and depending on what I find she might not make it through tonight, given the situation she lead me straight into.” He turned back to the mercenary, the frown still digging deep ridges into his brow, fixing her with a decidedly dangerous glare.

“Now back onto point, who do you work for?” 

“In theory,” Scarlet began, “I work for myself. However, as you claimed my ‘blade skills reek of Alicorn magic’ -very astute by the way, well done- I do work for an alicorn so to speak.”

Scalpel stopped in his tracks and raise one hoof with that announcement, and with near complete synchronicity the column halted, turning to face Scarlet with their expressionless gazes. He took a moment for the weight of those words to sink into him before replying, clipped and with a voice as cold as ice, staring directly at her in what might have been a neutral expression if not for the threat that lay behind it.

“Which. One.” 

Scarlet raised an eyebrow, “Touchy much…” she grumbled to herself, “Armifera, the Imperatrix. Lady of Battle, the Martial Arts, Swordplay, Passion, whiskey, and a couple other things I can’t remember. Pretty sure all she’s done so far is crush cultists and bisect bandits.”

The tension behind the moment quickly dissipated after that announcement, the column returned to its previous position and began the march again. Scalpel’s face which had been as taut as a drawn bow relaxed slightly. “You would be too if you knew who was currently watching me. That bloody forest goddess seemed to have gotten all riled up over one offhand statement, If it wasn’t that they were Inquisitors I would have guessed that they might have been her lackey’s back there.” He grumbled a moment longer, the frown deepening once again, “Oh well, at least you serve one of the better ones, half of the new gods come across as violent and deranged to me. Regardless, what’s your connection to Dr Lens here?”

She nodded, “They do seem a smite-y lot, don’t they?” 

She glanced back around at Lens, “Well, long story short I was traveling near Whitegold territory, when a small army of bandits saw fit to attack me while I was sleeping. Had I been a bit more prepared there wouldn’t have been an issue, but as I was finishing them off one му дак пизда managed to land a hit with her crossbow, and hit a thin section on my armor.” She paused momentarily to gesture at the small hole in the armor on her thigh, “So I nailed her skull to a tree with the knife she had sheathed at her side and teleported, in hindsight it’s a miracle I’m not dead. Anyway, it seems I’ve managed to teleport myself halfway across Equestria by accident, and so I dragged myself into the nearest town I could find, and Lens happened to be there, and fixed my leg.” 

She looked back over at Scalpel, “I can assure you she’s no Inquisitor, nor on their side. They can be good actors, but when you’ve been on the run from them for a decade you learn their mannerisms. I found the pony Longsight replaced drugged in a closet, and that’s more or less why I’m out here.”

Now that she was looking at Scalpel, something struck her, “You seem familiar… I think I recognize you from somewhere…” she paused, “I’m going to assume it wasn’t a bar in Stalliongrad.”

Scalpel nodded “Everything you’ve told me matches up with what my contacts informed me briefly of earlier, and I don’t have much need to doubt your word in regards to your purpose, yet.” he suddenly let out a deep sigh, his frustration clear as day regarding the circumstances of the moment, “I am afraid I just can’t take your word for it regarding Lens, even if she wasn’t directly involved, the Inquisition could be seeded well into her organisation, I need direct truthful information on the status of her scholarly unit, which will require extensive investigation.” 

“I can promise you that if she doesn’t have anything to hide then she will be fine, however the same does not apply if anything turns up. A message needs to be set across to her organisation, inefficiencies and treachery like this cannot be tolerated, even if she is not guilty directly.” 

Turning back to her he looked at her more closely, lips tightly locked in a frown as he scrutinised her, “I’d believe I can say the same about you… you certainly look familiar to me… but perhaps its better that we pretend we don’t know each other. In fact it’d be more likely to be in your interest to forget this entire situation ever popped up.”

Scarlet, being Scarlet, had been talking under her breath to herself and had managed to more or less miss Scalpel’s ‘advice’, “No, no, not a brothel, not an arms dealer, not a… wait,” she looked back up at him, “Weren’t you that colt at Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns? The one who always lurked in the libraries? Damn,” she looked back at the mechanized undead, “you’ve certainly made a lot more friends in the interim.”

Scalpel gave her a blank look, “I am pretty sure you were the loud angry one which was constantly shouting or punching something, or mixing both together at the same time. Regardless I don’t have anything to keep you here, just keep your mouth shut and some poor innkeeper won’t have to wipe your brain matter of his walls at some point in the foreseeable future.” He gave a signal to his children and one side opened up leaving room for a pony to leave the column “You’re free to go, I’ll be keeping an eye on you though, and if you mention this to a large turquoise alicorn I will murder you, very slowly and very painfully.” 

Scarlet gave a longing look at the mechanical parts of the undead, before turning away with a slight stoop, before stopping. “Actually, no.” she turned around, “I owe Lens over there a favor, and I’m going to see it out. Try killing me if you want, but if she’s not going to make it tonight I’d at least like to repay that favor, otherwise it’s going to drive me crazy. Besides, you still haven’t told me what powers those creations of yours.” she stood glaring at Scalpel, before her eyes widened as she let out an enormous belch. Smacking her lips, Scarlet mused out loud, “Hmm, ethanol, 80 proof, apple based. It appears that I am drunk.” she hiccuped slightly, as if on cue to prove the point.

Scalpel gave her a semi-incredulous look, as if he was amazed that someone could be both so utterly stubborn and stupid at the same time, “You’re standing in the middle of a forest, surrounded by creatures you just saw rip an Inquisition team into chunky meat lumps, and trying to stare down a pony you just saw feed peoples souls to a dark creature beyond this dimension… and you’re trying to get me to tell you how parts of my creations work whilst arguing about giving Lens a favour… Wow… just… Wow.” He raised one hoof to his face and rubbed it in pain in response to the audacious stupidity he had just witnessed, “Alright, what’s the favour?” he asked, muttering under his breath, “Are you just that stupid or is it the drink talking?”

“Hmm… about ten shots of 80 proof cider, another five or so of something I don’t even know what, and poor sleep. I’d be inclined to blame the booze.” she chuckled to herself, “Didn’t I just say the favor I owe Lens? Scroll back up and see if you doubt me.”

Scalpel rolled his eyes, “The leg. Right. Well I can’t let you come along, so the other two options are that I turn you into meaty chunks… or...I have my soldiers beat you into unconsciousness.” With that Scalpel’s legions closed ranks, turning inward again and advancing towards the lone mare. The situation did not look good for her.

Suddenly a rustling from the bushes just up ahead redirected all of the Risen and Scalpel’s attention, suddenly it wasn’t just hooves being presented, it was blades.

“Who’s out there!” Scalpel roared, furious at the interruption, “Show yourself!”

Another rustle from the foliage, and then two recognisable figures slowly emerged from the forest, a giant of a stallion covered in far inferior technology to the current Risen, and a small filly with two intricately designed metal back legs and a oil lamp gripped in her mouth.

“Honey…?” Scalpel asked, surprised more than anything, “What are you doing out here, dear?”

Scarlet’s head whipped around to the noise, and her eyebrow shot up as she took in the sight, “Okay, now I’m curious.” she muttered quietly to herself.

Making her way through the crowd of now relaxed machines, she barely gave the corpses a glance as she sidled up to Scalpel and gave him a hug, “I saw lights in the sky, and the orbs told me that something had gone wrong, I was worried.” 

Surprisingly Scalpel’s face softened considerably, he almost looked benevolent rather than the paranoid murderous scientist he had been before, “You shouldn’t have worried Honey, I’m alright, although I can’t say the same for those Inquisitors.” He eyed her up a little concerned, “How are the new legs? They responding okay?” 

Honey gave a sort of ‘Hmmm’ “They’re better than the wheels uncle, but I must admit they’ll take a while to get used to, plus I think one on the left one needs another oil.” 

Scalpel gave a small lighthearted laugh, “fair enough, I am glad you were wise enough to bring Grunge with you, the woods is no place for a filly.” 

Honey raise an eyebrow at that, giving him a grumpy glare “I’m not a foal uncle…”

He smiled, running a hoof lovingly through her bronze and gold hair “I’m aware, but you know how I worry.”

Scarlet’s eyebrow now appeared to be trying to achieve liftoff, “What.” she muttered to herself, completely and utterly perplexed.

Nonetheless in the back of her mind, she was already analyzing the legs on the new arrival, trying to piece together their function from what she could see.

As if noticing the attention she was getting, Honey turned towards Scarlet and responded by giving her an equally intense stare, “Who’s this?”. Suddenly noticing something, she lead to the side to look behind Scarlet, “Lambda, you know its not nice to punch guests in the back of the head, please put the hoof back on the ground where it belongs.”

Bizarrely, the machine pony almost looked embarrassed, “Apologies miss Honey” it replied in a reverberating voice, kicking at the sod in an awkward manner like a reproved child.

Scarlet glanced behind her and then back at Honey, giving her a small nod of thanks. “Seems I owe you one. I like my morning headaches as small as possible.” 

She began again after a small pause, “So what’s Scalpel doing all the way out here? He’s got a lot more em, friends, than last time I saw him in Celestia’s School…”

Honey raised an eyebrow at her, “As if I’d tell you, as for friends…” she glanced about, eyeing up the numbers around her, “there are a lot more of them back home. Speaking of which uncle, is that mare coming with us?”

Scalpel shrugged, “I wasn’t planning on it.”

Scarlet interjected, “Okay, look, sorry if this is rude, but what’s with those legs? They’re orders of magnitude more advanced than those things,” she gestured towards the undead automatons, “... I just said the wrong thing didn’t I?”

Scalpel’s glare could have frozen the limbs off a Windigo, “The legs are custom made, spent a lot of time making them just perfect. Very precise, very complex.” He gestured at the others, “Most of the fellow Risen are augmented with more mass producible models- well asides from Lambda and Tsan over there, but you can’t really see that behind all the armour- otherwise creating them would take much more time.”

“As for why…” Scalpel continued, only to be interrupted by Honey as she gave her own little glare at Scarlet.

“Earthborn night attack, Moon and Star campaign five years ago.” she replied “Uncle got there in time to save my life and just enough of my horn, not quick enough to save my legs.”

Scalpel gave a visibly pained expression at that, and Honey noticed and she gave him a squeezy hug. She couldn’t blame her uncle, he had been on the far side of the camp dealing with the injured when the Earthborn had begun the assault.

Scarlet didn’t react immediately, her head hanging down slightly, though it would’ve been hard to miss the darkening of her coat and the whitening of her mane even in the sparse light. She looked up, exposing two eyes lacking pupils, the irises looked almost to be bleeding. She spoke calmly, evenly, almost completely unlike how she normally spoke, “And, are any of them still alive?”

Both Honey and Scalpel eyed her up in surprise, neither had seen such a display before and it took them off guard for a moment. “Well...I think out of the original ten there are about five who are still alive, six if you count one under a technicality. I dealt with the other four viscerally many years earlier, been slowly tracking down the rest ever since” Scalpel answered, eyeing up the brooding mare and giving her a somewhat nervous glance as he did so. “I didn’t have time to deal with them at the time, Honey’s injuries were too severe.”

Scarlet thought on that for a second, “And, do you have any idea where any of them are now?”

Scalpel nodded after a moments hesitation, “Not all of them, only two really, with rumor of a third. I have no idea where the other two are at all. Last time I heard from my sources Steel Mane was a drunken wastrel in Manehatten and Cotton Tail had risen to a relatively high position in New Ponyville, I think an Overseer-Governor or whatever the ranking system is with the Earthborn. The only other news I have is a rumor of Grape Shot in Rusty Horseshoe.”

“I see…” she mused for a moment, “And, what state would you like them in? Dead? Chopped into bits? Or bring them back here for even worse?”

Scalpel gave her a confused smile “Are you offering your services?... well I don’t see the harm in hiring you, preferably I’d want them alive to impose my own tender mercies upon, but if they won’t come quietly I won’t be too put out if you kill them, just make it visceral.” He shrugged his shoulders in at this, a concentrated frown settling onto his brow again, “What could I offer you in return? I’m open to suggestions.”

“If I bring them back I hope those mercies are especially tender.” she began, “It depends really, much as I… detest… what happened to… Honey, was it?” she looked over at Scalpel, “I do think legs like that might be interesting, if payment is a thing.”

A look of surprise crossed Scalpels face before it settled into a small smile, “Another enthusiast it seems, I must say I don’t entirely understand why given you have perfectly functional legs, and normally I wouldn’t give away my secrets, but given its of a… personal nature, I’ll bite. Given you are going to be doing me a service in this regard, I’ll even sweeten the deal further with the promise of Dr Lens’ survival. Deliver all five, or part of all five in a recognisable state and I’ll see about installing the machinery.”

Scarlet nodded, “Please do go easy on Lens, she’s a good pony. Is there a good spot you know of for me to show up with these Earthborn? It’ll be much faster and more efficient if I teleport them than if I drag them across Equestria.”

Scalpel scratched his chin in thought, “Well I have numerous contacts across Equestria, I could arrange some drop points for you to deliver them to and into the hand of my captains” here he nodded towards Lambda and Tsan. “ Alternately if you give me until tomorrow I might have something which you can use to directly contact me once you have one, my scouts will be spreading out soon, and they can deal with the pick up, it also lessens the possibility of my contacts getting in a tight spot or losing my best Risen.”

“As for Lens, I’ll go as lightly as I will on her, but if she is a traitor she’ll likely not see the light of day for a long time. If not, then the book will be confiscated as a response for her group leaders failure, but she’ll go free. I did actually like her before this… mess turned up my doorstep.” 

“Anyway...” Scalpel’s face became businesslike and officious, “Do we have a deal Miss Scarlet?”

“We do.”