Linkin Pony - Recharge: Revamped

Chapter 22

It was late afternoon when Team Xero and their refugees made it back to the camp. Ash and Jet had seen the Pegasi flying, and raced off to meet them. CharmingRhythm carefully jumped to the ground and faced the two young recruits.

"You took our cab without asking me first?" Ash questioned irritably.

"Hey, I asked Jet. He said it was okay," Rhythm asserted.

Ash shot a sneer at Jet and returned to the ponies in front of her. "Well, I hope these are new recruits then."

"Recruits?" Blackout contended. "You're fucking joking right? There's no way we'd join you."

"Now calm down..." Iridescent tried to appease her brother, but he just stomped off further into camp. "I'm sorry about him."

"This is your camp?" ThunderCharm asked. She examined the scene in front of her with curiosity. "It looks so barren. Where are the ponies?"

"It's sort of... in the works," BlazingFlair clarified. "That's also why everything is such a mess."

"Used to be worse," SpinningNote added. "We've done a lot of work. And we'll get more recruits soon."

"I hope you're right," Rhythm sighed. "Hey, Spin. You think you can help me take this off?" He dangled the crushed foreleg in front of him. He and Spinning made their way to the base building.

"Here, you can stay in one of these apartments," HyperBlitz offered, pointing with a wing.

"Stay? You expect us to stay?" Blackout growled, appearing around the side of a house.

"I don't mean forever. Just for the night, or for as long as you feel comfortable," Hyper told him. "C'mon."

Hyper showed them the inside of a building. It was the cleanest one they had after the one they had given to Jet and Ash. Hyper felt a bit ashamed that it wasn't in any better condition.

"The beds are old, we haven't gotten around to replacing them. But we do have some blankets to cover them. Hold on-" Hyper dashed back out of the apartment.

Hyper entered into the base building. Inside, Spinning was fiddling with Rhythm's leg. He used a tool to loosen the grip at the top. Rhythm's half leg slipped out of the cylindrical clasp.

"We need to get you a workbench," Hyper commented. "You can't do everything at the computer desk."

"That's a good point," Spinning agreed. "Maybe we can put it over on that wall." He pointed across the room.

"What do you want to do with this?" Spinning asked as he levitated the broken prosthetic limb.

"I guess I'll keep it. Maybe my dad can salvage some parts," Rhythm responded.

"If you say so," Spinning said, unsure.

"Yes, Hyper? I can feel you staring at me," Rhythm stated and fluttered his eyes.

"I just wanted to know where we keep our spare blankets."

Rhythm extended his left foreleg. "There's a storage room at the end of the hall. There should be plenty of blankets on one of the shelves."

"Thanks!" Hyper swirled and sped in the direction of the hallway.

Picking up the broken leg in his magic, Rhythm began to pull the crystal out of it. After a moment of struggling, the crystal popped out with a clink, into several shattered pieces. He placed the shards on the desk.

"Here. We could still use those."

While small crystal shards were not useful for EPDs, the energy inside of them could still be used. They could be found inside generators, appliances and even in the engines of vehicles.