The Conversion Bureau: The St. Louis Massacre

by Cloudhammer

06 - An Ideal Dies

Year 5, Week 19, Friday

Staff Sergeant Theodore “Teddy” Franklin was starting to feel more confident. The police officers he’s been tasked with containing had been a thorn in his side, but now things were back under control. He’d nearly pinned them down at the intersection of Routes 30 and 336, but one of his trucks had been overeager, and given away the trap before the net was completely closed. They’d chased them north, toward the I-44, and had managed to pin them in against the gridlock of traffic that had been caused by the chaos in the city.

“All elements, this is Charlie-Actual. Hold your position, do not allow the police to leave. Weapons are free if they return fire. Acknowledge. Over.” Nodding as the chorus of assents came back over the radio, he opened the door, taking up his own defensive position behind the engine block. “There’s nowhere for them to go now.”

One hundred feet down the road, Helen Whitt was equally aggravated. It figured that the I-44 would be choked up, but they’d not had much of a choice except to head directly toward it.

“What are we going to do Helen?” She turned to the officer beside her, his face twisted with worry.

“We’re gonna hold, Johnny. Not much else we can do,” Helen said sharply, her palms sweaty as she gripped her pistol. “Can’t let these guys have a chance to hurt the civilians.”

“Fuck, where’s the goddamned National Guard when ya need em?” Another officer, Sam, remarked sharply.

“Guess they’re still on their coffee break. Gives us more time to show them what it means to work for a living,” Helen said with a short laugh. The other officers chuckled for a few seconds, but their eyes remained grim as they watched the armed gunmen.

“Yo, so what the fuck’s the plan Carlos? We ain’t exactly cut out to go against the kind of firepower that the TV says these guys got.” Ricky said, using his switchblade to make a careful adjustment to the Uzi. “I think the Uzi will work, but gotta be careful not to go nuts with it. Might explode.”

“Eh, nothin’s worth doin’ if it ain’t dangerous,” Carlos said with a raspy laugh. He looked around at the others. “Alright, so here’s the deal. We got a deal with the Boys, we stop tryin’ to kill each other for a day to deal with these stuck-up motherfuckers who think they’re hot shit. This is our town, and if anyone’s gonna fuck it up it’s us.” He racked the slide on one of his pistols, slid it into its holster, then picked up his real pride and joy, a Bushmaster M4A3 semi-automatic assault rifle. It’d taken a lot of work for him to get it, and he’d carefully stockpiled the ammunition, until he had twenty clips worth for it. “Besides, it’ll be fun to take a whack at some bitches who got better shit than the Boys do. Might be able to swipe most of it and be able to step up our game.”

The other Homicidas started chuckling, slapping their magazines into the motley assortment of pistols, machine pistols and submachine guns. Carlos looked with pride on his gang, then settled his green bandanna on his head. “Alright, let’s go get this shit done.” The gang followed him out the door with a chorus of cheers, the twenty or so kids spreading out to their varied vehicles. With a roar of engines and rap music they set out, following Carlos in his Escalade. He’d stolen a police scanner a few months ago, though he’d never thought that he’d be using it to come to the rescue of a bunch of cops.

“Alright boys, now let’s show these guys what it really means to fuck with the St Louis Police. Officer Jacobs, Simmons? Show our guests just who they’re messing with,” Chief Nance said firmly.

“Yes sir,” the two chimed in unison, their bolt-action rifles braced on the floor in the hallway. As the officers double checked their earplugs, the two snipers fired their weapons. The heavy slugs each caught a minigun truck’s gunner in the face, sending them pitching back, then falling into the interior.

“TAKE COVER!” Nance bellowed as the terrorists outside began to put suppressing fire into the precinct. A few officers were slow and took stray rounds, one through the head. “Shit, take the wounded to the back!” he barked to the riot shield officers, who carefully rolled their two riot-shields into place while others dragged the injured officers to safety.

“Well, we definitely have their attention now sir,” one of the junior officers replied.

“Yeah, but they’ll be smarter now, keep their miniguns out of our line of fire. I want you to keep hitting them you two!” He shouted to the marksmen, who didn’t even nod, too focused on reloading their rifles and punishing those who stuck their heads up.

“Sir, not to question your plan, but sitting around here doesn’t seem like a great idea. The radio calls we keep hearing aren’t encouraging,” one of the senior detectives, Henry Krakoviak said as he settled into the cover next to Nance.

“We’re working on it. I’d hoped to have the officers roll the SWAT trucks out, but they weren’t built to handle firepower like this. Sure the frame held up, but a couple thousand rounds doesn’t mix well with the tires. So, right now all I think we can do is keep as many of the bastards here as possible.”

The assembled officers looked up as a faint buzzing noise made itself heard, before there was suddenly a series of loud explosions from outside. The all too familiar bandsaw howl of the miniguns responded, but there wasn’t as much of it.

“What in the world?” Nance wondered as one of the officers he’d posted upstairs came sliding in next to him.

“Sir! You won’t believe it, but there’s an Army chopper outside, they just blew a fuckin’ crater in their formation!” He shouted, real happiness in his voice now. The other officers started murmuring excitedly amongst themselves.

“Alright, let’s not let it go to our heads,” Nance took a glance out the door, where the black trucks had pulled back in the face of the Apache’s attack. “Alright, let’s try and press the advantage. SWAT officers to the front! The rest of you provide supporting fire! And for God’s sake try and take one of these pricks alive! I want to find out what made them want to go through all this trouble in the first fuckin’ place!”

As one the officers rose to their feet and moved toward the front of the lobby, the more armored SWAT officers trading assault rifle fire with the me in the street. Overhead, the Apache rolled to the side to avoid a stream of minigun fire from the ten trucks that were still mobile, before it fired a couple more rockets toward them. The pilot swore as the trucks managed to avoid the salvo and continued firing at him. These bastards were more nimble than he’d expected, and he wished the brass had thought that through when they’d armed him with only unguided rockets.

The air inside the suburban Bureau was silent, none of the citizens who’d peeked in wanting to stay in such a charnel house of death and misery. The scattered applications littering the floor began to stir as the wind picked up. A dull hum filled the air as flickers of light began to spark off the solid surfaces and the bodies of the fallen guards. With a sharp snap the PER team appeared out of thin air, several ponies immediately retching at the stench and horrifying sights.

Rampart tried hard to keep his own bile down as he surveyed the wreckage of the lobby. “A-alright everypony. You know why we’re here. Let’s fan out and see if anypony survived.” He carefully trotted down the hallways, trying his best to avoid stepping in the pools of blood. Spent bullet casings clinked against each other as he stopped next to the body of a stallion lying slumped against the wall. Reaching down, he gently closed the vacant eyes, his hoof starting to shake. “What kind of people could have done this?” He looked up as a voice called out hesitantly.

“R-Rampart?” It was Chamomile, one of the earth pony mares who’d been helping with obtaining the newest versions of the training regimens from the Bureaus before coming to the main HQ. He turned and hurriedly made his way toward the sound of voice. Rounding the corner, he stopped for a second. Chamomile was on the opposite side of the hallway from a partially open door, her eyes wide with fear.

Slowly walking up to her, Rampart leaned down and nuzzled her to try and snap her out of it. “Chammy, what is it? What did you see?”

Not even responding, she slowly raised a shaking hoof to point into the room, the other clamped over her muzzle. Rampart lifted his head, hesitantly making his way into the room.

None of his fifty-three years living along the border between Equestria and Scythion could have prepared him for what he saw. His legs trembled, his stomach convulsed and he vomited at the sight of the little bodies, twisted into grotesque parodies of the lives that they had held. Wiping at his muzzle, he made his way across the floor, every step nearly being too much until he finally fell to his knees next to a little earth pony colt. Picking the body up, he felt tears streaming down his face as he shook it gently, sure that this was all some sick lie, that the foal would blink his eyes and laugh, that the hole in his face wouldn’t be there if he could just hold tight enough.

“M-mommy?” The voice was whisper quiet, almost lost in the deafening silence. Rampart’s heart wrenched as the colt drew a shallow, shuddering breath.

“It’s... It’s okay. You’re safe.” He managed to whisper back, clutching the colt to his chest in an attempt to keep life in that fragile body. Turning his head toward the door, he shouted, “SOMEPONY BRING THE UNICORNS! RIGHT NOW!”

“It’s so cold... I’m scared.” The colt’s breathing was getting weaker. His forelegs managed to find their way around Rampart’s neck, clinging tightly to his cobalt coat.

“Just hold on, you’re going to be alright. You’ve got to be alright.” Rampart swore he could feel it, the last, soft sigh of air as the colt went limp in his hooves. He was aware of somepony bellowing in incoherent rage, and after a moment realized it was him. He could hear the hoofsteps of the others, and their own gasps of horror as they saw the horrific sight.

He finally quieted and gently laid the colt’s body down, though he continued to shake with rage. Rising to his hooves, he turned to face the others, his forelegs stained with blood. “Gather everypony. We’re leaving.”

“W-where are we going? The central B-Bureau?” One of the pegasi, Cloud Climber was her name, asked haltingly, her eyes still fixed on the bodies.

Rampart strode forward, his eyes alight. “No. We will find the ones who did this. And punish them. All of them.”

Comments

[AegisExemplar]

Special Bonus Side-Short to this chapter:

TCB: 255: Purist

[Ocean Breeze]

God damn. Just... god damn.

[djthomp]

[Midnightshadow]

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