Chapter 24 update, Cutting room edition. · 10:19pm Nov 21st, 2014
As much as I'd like to, not everything makes it into chapters. Due to complications, general incompetence, and IRL nonsense, editing hasn't gotten very far. Needless to say, this section got cut out of Chapter 24 due to it being simply too boring and fluffery. Here you go.
The memory opened in a locker room, occupied by me and a male pegasus I didn’t immediately recognize. My first instinct was to pace around and search for answers while I could, but this time all I could do was watch. I was in the middle of tugging on some form of protective barding when the other pony spoke. “Be on your best behavior. You’ll be working with a few ponies that you haven’t met before, but consider them within parameters.”
Emotionlessly, I responded, “Understood.”
“Good.” The pegasus tugged on my barding and turned me to face him. He was yet another one of those pegasi with the inbred-blue coats and the standard-issue crew cut for his reddish-brown mane. Both of us were wearing pared-down variants of combat armor that had a strange sort of spaced mesh woven into the barding. “Looks like you’re good to go. Let’s not keep the boys waiting. Double time, Winds.”
Nodding at him, I turned back to the locker beside me and retrieved an old battered air rifle and the two miniature air canisters beside it. So it seemed like we were on our way to a practice match or a skirmish—these air rifles fired paint pellets to mark opponents. I slammed the locker shut and silently followed the departing stallion posthaste.
Traveling to our venue transformed into a mysterious blur. Everything I passed had no definition, and ponies were simply pony-shaped colorless blobs until we trotted through a set of double doors. Several ponies were waiting and milling about, and they seemed to be relieved to see us.
Three of them were dressed similarly to us, while the fourth hovering pony beside them was dressed far more casually. Specifically, the ones milling about were in standard-issue fatigues and pushing around standard-issue brooms. The arena itself was built of snow and ice—modular and easy to clean. Its current arrangement seemed to be closely-stacked buildings broken up by a large straightaway.
The hovering pony flapped closer, fanning himself with his hoofball cap. “Hey, nice of you to show up. I almost had to give your slots away, Twelvie.” I couldn’t make out anything about him, which bothered me greatly. Was my memory faltering?
“Don’t call me Twelvie,” the pony I was following snapped. “And I told you I had some last-minute things to take care of. You’re the one that moved the queue ahead of schedule. Are we still up against the same squad?”
Hoofball-head pulled a notebook out of… somewhere. A pocket, most likely. “Let’s go with yes.”
“Falcon Flight?” Twelvie asked for confirmation.
Pausing for a second, Hoofball arched an eyebrow at his notebook and replied, “Oh, so that’s not a write-o. Huh. Yeah.”
“Great. Get us our helmets and protective gear and get this match over with.”
“Got it.” Hoofball keyed into the PA system and his voice echoed throughout the field. “All players present. Team leaders, ready up once your team is prepared. Reminder, today’s rules are Realism and Tilt.” After that, he glided toward the sparsely populated stands overlooking the field.
We trotted over to the other three ponies that were presumably on the same team as us and overheard, “What? I hate Tilt. Aren’t we on offense? Don’t we just lose by default? Why are we wasting time here then?”
“Cheer up, Guardian. Get your head back in the game!” the mare in the middle chirped.
The first stallion grunted. “That’s what you say every time, Blue Jay.”
Curiously enough, the last stallion was trying to pick his nose, to no avail. I would have normally prodded at him, but for some reason my neutral expression didn’t change.
“Gentlecolts, I am Operative Gauge and this is Operative Winds. I’d rather not have to deal with your nonsense, so I’ll be assigning our names for the duration of the skirmish.” He pointed at the leftmost one and then moved on to the next two, flatly stating, “You’re Mister Red. Mister Green. Mister Pink.” Pointing at me, he continued, “Mister White. And I’m Mister Blonde. Understood?”
I crisply saluted. “Affirmative.”
“Why am I Mister Pink? She’s the mare, so that means she should be Pink,” Nosey whined, pointing at Blue Jay standing next to him.
Violently exhaling, Twelvie jabbed his hoof at Nosey and snapped, “You’re Mister Pink because you’re a fa—”
“Can’t we just pick our own colors?” Mister Pink continued to complain.
Blonde rolled his eyes. “No, because then I have the three of you fighting over who gets to be Mister Black.”
The mare, Blue, raised her hoof and hesitantly asked, “But why am I Mister Green? My name’s Blue, and I’m sort of blue. And why ‘Mister’?”
“Because you can go buck yourself.” The dismayed expression on Mister Green’s face went unnoticed since Blonde turned over his foreleg and tapped the little display on it. “Let’s get to the briefing. I took the time to research our competition, and if we stick to the plan then there’s literally no way we can lose.”
Before Blonde could continue managing the team, Red interrupted, “Who put you in charge?”
“I did.” The pegasus with the hoofball cap called out as he swooped back to us and dropped a pair of gear-stuffed helmets next to Blonde. “Good luck, guys. Other team’s ready.”
Blonde picked up the helmets and passed one to me. “Give us a few minutes. Still getting through planning.” It was almost like I was on autopilot or something—I yanked out the pair of goggles in it and pulled them on, then safely secured the helmet onto my head. “As I was saying, this team shouldn’t be too much of a problem. They play fast, aggressively, and relentlessly. If we sit back and let them come to us, then we’ll be golden.”
“But they’re on defense. Why would they push?” Green asked. “They’ll just sit and watch tunnel and camp long like everypony does.”
At this point, nothing was going to stop Blonde from continuing his plan. “Our ideal scenario is a five versus three, as per usual.” A map had been taped to the wall across from the doors we’d come in from. “Here’s our play—we’re going to counter their double-single with a three-two split. White and I will head Alpha side. She will linger Middle and try to pick off their roamer first, but one of you three smoke Middle in case a countersniper is waiting.”
I nodded and began to load paint rounds into the air rifle that I had brought with me. “Affirmative.”
One of the stallions hefted a smoke grenade. “Smoke mid everyday. Got it, whatever.”
“The three of you will hole up in Temple and wait for the two in Bravo to push through. If White catches two in Mid, watch the Underpass.”
“We could push through Underpass, through Defender Deployment, and up into Alpha. That way their sniper watching Long is useless,” Red suggested.
“Or push into the back of Bravo,” Green brought up.
Blonde tapped his chin, then shook his head. “Nah. Both paths are too exposed. More than likely there’ll be two on either site, and there’s no cover while we rotate. Stick to the plan—we’ll modify it if we need to. Once there’s only two on Alpha, White will join you in Temple while I make noise at Long.”
Normally I would have voiced objection to this plan, but all that came out of my mouth was, “Roger.” The huge red band I was pulling onto my foreleg only seemed to make me more visible, but all of us were wearing them. I guess we were red team, but why did Blonde have a stripe on his? I wanted a stripe.
“Then whoever isn’t dead will push at the one minute mark. Defend the site while Red arms the device. Remember, it takes a minimum of five seconds to arm the device and five to disarm it. Stick to the plan, and we’ll all have an easy win and a free beer.”
“And this time, remember to plant it outside of cover,” Pink snapped at Red.
“These fillies have all the cool toys, so expect ‘lasers’ and reduced effectiveness of smoke.” At the sound of ‘lasers’, I noticed Red rolling his eyes and groaning but Blonde didn’t care, continuing, “Remember, the suits will also be tracking friendly fire. Be careful and watch where you’re aiming. We’ll only have our five tickets, and our scoreboards are disabled. Confirm your kills and communicate.”
“Yeah, yeah. Sure,” Red grunted.
Green excitedly pranced in place. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go then.”
“Roger that.” I saluted again and then adjusted my goggles.
“For the record, I still hate you,” Pink begrudgingly responded. “Let’s get this over with.”
Now that the plan had been agreed upon, Blonde flagged down Hoofball and yelled at him for a bit. I was more preoccupied organizing my kit—smoke, paint grenade, flash, ammunition, canisters. Likewise, the others were also doing the same thing.
“Match begins in ten seconds.”
“Remember team, stick together.”
Blonde performed his own weapon check as we all trotted into position inside the dotted square of our deployment zone. “Thank you, Red.”
“Roger that,” I automatically responded.
“Match is live.”
Green and Red dashed away to the right toward site Bravo, with the latter cheering, “We will make them cry!”
As I hovered into position to overlook the empty middle street from my already high ground, I caught a glimpse of Pink flapping into the air and flinging a smoke grenade before dashing after the other two. Right on cue and exactly as planned, I spotted two ponies blitz past the ajar double doors at the end of the street. A third pushed his way through the heavy doors and tried to bolt toward me, but I was ready.
My aim was dialed in from the moment I saw him. “One Middle.” I mechanically took a breath, adjusted slightly for wind, and sent a pellet downrange into his visor. The stallion stumbled and crumpled to the ground as the suit seized up and immobilized him. Good use his heavy weapon was. “Contact eliminated. Four targets left. Two spotted going to Bravo.” There were a few extra seconds where Middle was still unsafe to move until the smoke grenade finally landed and covered the entry through the doors. “Heavy weapon down in Middle.”
Green’s voice over the radio helpfully added, “We’re at the rally point.”
“Take a seat and wait. Great shot, White. Rotate to Bravo—” The tell-tale pitter-patter of practice charges melting snow interrupted Blonde. “Gah! Change of plans, rotate through Catwalk to Alpha and pick off the one by barrels. Double time, they’ve got me pinned!”
“I understand. Moving.” I slung the rifle over my shoulder and glided downward toward the side street connection between Middle and the elevated area known as Catwalk.
Somewhere in the distance, I heard gunfire and laser discharges, followed by several grenades going off. “What’s going on over there?” Blonde snapped over the comms.
While I stealthily scaled the short stairway to the clearing above, Red grunted, “Ah, that stings. Yeah, Bl—er, Green’s out for the count and I’m super lit. Passing the bomb to Pink. And my rifle. That means give me your stupid subbie box, Pink.”
I raised the rifle to my shoulder and hovered myself around the corner just enough to catch a glimpse of a suited-up sky-blue pegasus perched behind a pair of barrels with an energy version of the rifle I was using. “Enemy sighted.” She was still taking potshots at Blonde, so she hadn’t noticed me. Weird, because with that cute little ear-mounted green monocle thing I would have thought she would have noticed me. Hm, just like the other one did.
Unfortunately, I hadn’t checked my corners.
“Get your dirty sights off Tailwind!” somepony from my left screamed, unleashing a hail of laser fire in my general direction. I ducked and weaved away, but I needed to tug a flashbang off my bandolier to drop at my hooves. That moment of hesitation allowed her to land two good shots on me, immobilizing my left leg and wing.
I heard a panicked cry of “Snap!” in the distance. At least the flashbang going off gave me the window to leap off Catwalk and scamper down Underpass. For safety, I yanked a smoke grenade off my bandolier and deployed it to block vision as well.
“Took damage, rotating to Bravo through Temple,” I notified everypony else. “Hostile is in pursuit.”
“Copy that. I’m going to back up to mid and see if a pincer on Bravo is possible.” Pausing, Blonde added, “Report in, team.”
I coughed and peeked over my shoulder. “Reporting in.” Nopony following, perfect.
“Still alive, but just barely,” Pink muttered. “Howdy there, White.”
I trotted up the semicircle of stairs and curtly nodded at the stallion perched on top of a pile of ‘boxes’, right in the blind spot during ascent.
“I’m here. Want to rush Bravo? Time’s ticking, and we already wiped the two on this side.” Red motioned at the two blue-marked armored ponies at the ground, then at Green, who was still spasmodically twitching. “We have advantage four to two.”
The readout on my leg screen said I had thirty four health, whatever that meant. “I don’t know. They have health advantage, and we’d be rushing with a long rifle, an assault rifle, and a spraybox. They’ll have their sniper in Defender by now watching the entry. Red’s still got smoke, but do we have any flash left?” Pink insisted.
“Negative.” Instead, I showed him my paint grenade.
“Great.” He sighed, then looked to Red. “Let’s go for it.”
Red shrugged. “You in?”
I blinked, then asked into the radio, “Orders, sir?”
“Stay put. I’m almost in position,” Blonde quietly spat. “Smoking Defender in ten seconds.”
Apparently that was good enough for me. “Roger that. Holding.”
We’d already wasted a good amount of time standing around. “Screw it, let’s move! On me, White. You too, buddy. Go, go, go!”
“Affirmative. You lead.” I stowed my paint rifle in favor of the little backup pistol strapped to my right foreleg. Red galloped down the short tunnel out into the big empty square of site Bravo, Pink and I following close behind. The mound of snow opposite of us didn’t have anypony behind it, so we tried to get to the pile of “boxes” on the far end of the square, right by the slightly open double doors.
“Damn it, hold! Hold! Not yet!” Blonde swore.
Jumping the gun was definitely a mistake. An energy bolt streaked right past my nose and nailed Pink in the face, sending him sprawling backward into the open. “Taking fire. Friendly down.” I managed to dive into cover against the wall, another laser barely grazing my tail. “We dropped the device.”
Gunfire opened up to my back, coming from the area where Blonde was trying to push through. “Damn it, stay down! Shit, shit, she’s lit! Sniper’s l—” His transmission cut out with an almost frustrated gurgle.
For some reason, I seemed to be lost and confused. I stared at the door, then finally at Red. “Orders?”
“The buck do you want orders from me?” Red groaned. He glanced at the dropped device, then at the door basically overlooking Defender where their sniper was waiting. “We gotta come up with somethin’ good. Do you think you can countersnipe the other one?”
I shook my head. “Negative.”
“Do you know how good these guys are?”
“Negative.”
“Welp, there’s no injury in trying. Cover me, I’m going to do something dumb. Toss your nade at them, maybe that’ll give me time to grab the bomb and plant.”
I switched to the rifle again and kept it at the ready. “Copy that,” I flatly replied as I pulled the grenade off my bandolier.
“Wait two beats, then go on my mark. Uh, you know what I mean.”
Slowly, I stood and began to hover in preparation. Red got down close to the ground with his pistol balanced in his open hoof, ready to sprint.
“Mark.”
Red threw his pistol at the open door, then bolted with freakish speed. Just as he’d said, I waited for two beats before I pushed myself over the wall and chucked the grenade at the prone pony covering her eyes at the opening of Middle. Another hail of wild rifle fire from just below me forced me to seek cover.
Before I could connect the dots, Red was already sitting out in the open slightly away from the sniper’s line of sight. An accurate burst of laser fire threw him to the ground, right before he was finished arming the device. A fraction of a second later, my grenade finally went off.
Silence.
“Report in.” Desperation tinged my voice, to my confusion. “I need backup. Report in.”
From the other side of the wall, I heard the other pony yell, “Tail? You okay back there? Tail? Shit!” There was a short pause, followed by continued shouting in my direction, “Wait, was that you, stripey? You want it, let’s dance!”
The only thing I could do was drop the rifle and keep my pistol ready. “Negative,” I loudly called out. More quietly, I keyed my mic again and asked, “Report in. Orders?”
I wasn’t sure what I had been expecting, but I already knew no response was coming. An angry whirlwind of fur and feathers landed on my back and jammed a stiff rubber knife into my neck while I was confused.
“Match over. Falcon Flight wins.”
Time, sound, everything froze. I found myself trapped underneath the angry pegasus—Snap, was it? I still couldn’t actually do anything, but that question answered itself with a different angry pegasus. An angry pegasus that looked a lot like me in fancy dress uniform.
Officer Frosty glared at me, surprise and confusion in her eyes. “How the buck did you access this? I’m going t—”
A familiar series of guitar noises came to my rescue in a gust of snow. “Hey! What’s red and bad for your teeth?” It wasn’t exactly what I was expecting from my revolver-toting guardian angel, but a save was a save.
“Wh—”
“A brick!” Ice taunted, then followed up by throwing an actual red brick out of nowhere at a very confused Officer Frosty. It nailed her right in the jaw, knocking the hat off her head. She snarled at him and began to charge. “Ha!” Ice galloped away, madly cackling, “Get out of here; she’s gonna blow!”
I wish I could read this, but I'm two chapters behind right now. I started Heroes earlier, and need to finish that one too.
2609004
Read faster! We're all counting on you.
2609010
Because I am the perfect person to do this.
endlesspicdump.com/original/bombing%20yourself.gif
Chapter Me
Counter Strike much?
2609576
You're welcome, random citizen.
2609577 You play it?
I'm so many chapters behind in the rewrite this makes no sense beyond my knowing what game you've been playing and therefore vaguely knowing what your referencing.
Gosh darn it Bobbu/frosty-san, why do your chapters take so much scrutiny when I read them?!
2609700
I dunno I just finished fondling a turkey
so
y'know
iunno.
2609707 Weird, people generally don't give out that information given the ramifications of misunderstandings; some of us may start thinking you're preparing for thanksgiving instead of what you've said you're doing.
This section was obviously an experiment to see how zombie Frosty worked with others on a complex operation such as a mission like that. It was fun to read, and I'm pretty sure there was a lot of gaming references. I thought the color green for Blue was funny. And she did die early. That was nice to see. :P
A good bit to cut out, but with some fancy editing skills and some rearranging, I think you could fit in a scene like this back into the story to show how complex the enclave can use mind controlled Frosty. Like, her limits and stuff... I'm not being very precise in my wording here, but you know what I mean. ;)
Quaver Ava
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That was basically the intention, yeah. Apparently it wasn't good enough so it'll live here until I upload it to AU Adventures.
2613340 I think the execution was just overdone honestly. In my writer's group they've stressed to write in bulk, but edit to thin. So essentially, write a huge book, and then chop it down to the details that matter. Sometimes whole scenes would need to be rewritten and re-sized because the point is good but the execution not so much. But as a one-shot, or a bit to a large fanfiction as yours, I think it was good and it'll fit well in the AU. You can still say it's cannon, just that it didn't fit into chapter 24. :)
Quaver Ava