It was after darkness fell that the hovercraft arrived. Like a lone raven, it spun darkly against the ebony sky, then hovered up to the massive deck of the Steel Wing. Two enforcers in messenger vests trotted out, glaring evenly across the startled crew.
Captain Filta was ready to meet them. He marched up, standing tall and proud in his uniform. The pair of stallions addressed him, and he responded with a nod. One produced a holopad from his satchel. With a wave of a manastone, the circle of equine faces floated above the pad, glaring with disapproval. Triple sound stones broadcasted a terse message, and the light show was over just as swiftly as it had begun. Filta's features paled, but eventually straightened back out in an irreversible show of anger and frustration.
All of this, Enforcer Evans watched from afar. He craned his neck, gazing with pursed lips at the distant exchange. As soon as Filta swiveled around, his heart skipped a beat. However, the angry captain wasn't marching towards him. Instead, he made a bee-line towards the rear cabin doors of the ship, tailed shortly by the twin messengers.
Once Filta reached the nightlit entrance to the cabin, he banged his hoof repeatedly against it. "Shell?! This is Filta! Open up! The Council of Ledo has a message for you!"
Silence.
Every stallion on board the deck stirred nervously.
Fuming, Filta turned around. The crew members flinched, nervously returning to duty.
At last, Filta motioned towards the messengers. The two stallions approached the door. With both of their horns glowing, they forced the handles to unlock from the outside. Then, with identical precision, they flung the chamber open.
Filta marched in before them, and the stallions followed. The cabin's interior was dark, with a rustic stench filling the air. All three ponies waved their hooves before their muzzles.
"Nnngh... what in Queen's name...?"
"Shhh. Be silent and light the room up," Filta commanded.
Both stallions complied, their horns casting a cold, pale luminescence over the wooden contours of the room.
Their combined aura swam over a wooden table, a snuffed candle, and a chair that had been knocked over. At last, they caught the glint of gray coat hair. A body was huddled in the center of the room, rocking gently back and forth.
One messenger whispered something hoarsely under his breath. He silenced himself as soon as Filta took a thunderous step forward. "The Council of Ledo has spoken, Enforcer. It's over." He motioned firmly towards the stallion at his left.
"Ahem..." The uniformed messenger held up the holopad. "Prime Enforcer Shell of the Ledomaritan Defense Forse?"
All was silence and shadow, until a whispery sound rustled back, "Yes. This is Shell."
"Official as of seventy hours prior to this message's delivery, the Council of Ledo has found it in their wisdom to strip you of all command in the Experiment Extraction Campaign, the reasons being attributed to 'excessive delay, refusal to communicate with higher authorities, extreme loss of military personell, and inexcusable levels of collateral damage within and around the metropolitan district of Blue Nova.' You are to report to the Council within the Queen's Capital City in under thirty-six hours by any transportation necessary, or else both your life and position will be forfeit, and you shall be punishable by court martial, leading to imprisonment or even public execution."
Shell said nothing.
"Is the nature of this message clear to you, Prime Enforcer Shell?" the messenger asked, frowning.
"Did you hear him, Shell?!" Filta growled. "It's over! This mad-capped expedition has come to a halt!"
At last, something spoke from beyond the paleness. "My expedition... halted?" Shell's shoulders heaved, and a hissing voice came loose in two octaves at once. "That is not remotely possible." He turned around and looked up, half of his face caked in blood and tears. "I haven't gotten the target yet..."
"By the Sp-Spark!" one of the messengers jumped back, immediately reaching for his pistol.
Filta grimaced, his eyes narrowing. "Good heavens, soldier..." His eyes fell towards a lump of flesh on the floor. "What... what happened to her...?"
"She..." Shell's one eye twitched, and the rest of his face followed with it. "She wanted to go home..." Like a golem thawing from the ice, he rose up and trotted towards them in spasming little jerks. "So, she did. But I can't..." He shook his head, several strands of gray hair falling loose, dribbling blood onto the floor. "Not yet. It's flying away too fast. Just... just need to carve a door through it..." He raised a limp, broken forelimb into the silver light. "Like... a hole into the sky. That's why it's always been evading me, you see? It's... magic. Chaos. Demon magic."
"St-stay back!" the stallion with the gun stammered. "You've been ordered to st-stand down, sir! So do it!" he squeaked.
Shell's bloodied face tilted towards Filta.
Filta blinked. With a glowing horn, he slowly unsheathed his rapier.
The stains on Shell's muzzle cracked darkly as he flashed a frown. "She's home!" he bellowed, and his horn erupted like a cannon. Every loose object in the room flew forward. "You will not take her from me!."
Filta yelled, flinging a rapier into the madness. The soldiers beside him fired blindly. It was too late, for Shell was soon upon them with the gravity of a hundred screams.
Outside, a wave of noise rolled across the deck. Every stallion gasped and stopped what they were doing, swiveling to face the rattling cabin doors. Among them was Evans. The Enforcer held a hoof up, keeping everypony at bay. With a nervous shuffle, he galloped forward, stopping just ten feet before the door. The noise had ended as violently as it had begun. The silence to follow was frigid, penetrating.
With a gulp, Evans made to open the door, only for Shell to burst through, bloodsoaked and hyperventilating.
Several gasps flew across the deck. Stallions and crew members alike gawked at the Prime Enforcer.
He looked past them all, one twitching eye slicing across the east horizon like a determined falcon.
"Sir... what on earth—?" Evans reached for him.
Shell shoved his way past the stallion. He fell to his bloody knees, gulped, and wheezed forth, "Betrayers..." He gritted his teeth, heathed. "Snkkkt... they... th-they sought to assassinate me..." He raised a pair of hooves, laden with raiper wounds. "Nnnngh... the Xonans... yes..." He flashed his frenzied eye at the speechless ponies. "They h-have infiltrated the highest order of our Confederacy! The Council..." He choked on vomit, swallowed, and grunted, "The Council of Ledo is compromised... and th-they sent your captain... your captain and those..." He spun and pointed a quivering hoof into the cabin. "... those cowards to assassinate me." He seethed several times before resting his face into his bloodied hoof. "...and my daughter... they... they k-killed my Imre..."
Evans blinked. He turned towards the cabin and shone his horn in. Several more stallions looked in, and each of them gasped upon seeing the bodies of the messenger, the Captain, another messenger, and at last Imre's body... a dozen feet from where her horn lay across the ramshackle room.
"By the Spark..."
"Have you ever seen such a massacre?"
"In the Queen's name! What do we do?"
"Do?!" Shell hissed. He spoke while sucking in breath, "What do we do?!" He shot up on wobbling hooves, then spun about with an icy frown. For once, his breath had collected, and the old menace was again filling his lungs like a fine wine. "We do what it is in our powers to do... for this Confederacy that's betrayed by spies and turncoats on every side." He tilted his shimmering horn up. "We chase down that pegasus... that winged abomination! And we shut down this Xonan plot from the inside out! Don't you see?! They tr-tried to stab us in the heart, and they failed!" He stamped his hooves. "By my daughter's broken body... will we stand for this?! Will we accept defeat at this... th-this atrocity?!"
The stallions shared stunned glances.
Evans glanced once more into the bloody cabin, shivering.
"Enforcer Evans..."
The stallion jerked about, his eyes shrinking to pinpricks.
Shell loomed above him like a crimson totem in the moonlight. "Do I have your allegiance... your sworn devotion to serve me until we and we alone have eliminated this dire threat and brought glory to all of our brothers and sisters?"
Evans shook, shivered, then nodded with moist eyes. "You have it, Prime Enforcer." He gulped. "Your cause is mine to serve until the bitter end..."
"The bitter end..." Shell's nostrils flared. He slowly, coolly wiped the blood and muck from his face and flung it to the deck. His eye rose towards the stars as he snarled. "There will be an end, my brothers. But it won't be bitter. No... it will be righteous."
One by one, the stallions on board—just seconds ago frazzled and nerve-wracked—collectively stood at attention, their faces hardened like the thick hull surrounding them.
Shell marched ahead of the group, shouting left and right to the crew members. "Arm the cannons! Bring us about and plot a course..." He stood before the bow, his eye brighter than the stars, and just as far away. "Due east, nonstop! All power toward the rising sun!" He hissed quietly now, through his teeth. "For one of these mornings, blessed Imre, it'll light her death for you..."