> The Sons of Discord
>  by Gapeagle
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

>  The Story Now
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am A.K. Yearling. Some of you know me as Daring Do. I am a former archaeologist, now I'm an Assassin. For years I have been diving into tombs and crawling into ancient dungeons in search of history. One day, I found my ultimate discovery: the Tree of Harmony. In my ignorance, I did not realize I had found the hidden truth of this world. I took the Elements of Harmony that the Tree possessed and was about to announce my discovery to the world.

I did not have the chance, though. Before I even reached civilization, I was captured by the Templar Order, or like how they call themselves now: Ahuizotl Industries. I was blindfolded and handcuffed when they took me to their HQ in Manehatten. There, they separated me from the Elements and forced me into this device called the Animus. The Animus allowed me to access the memories inside the Elements. Because I was the first person to touch the Elements in 500 years, the artifacts gave me all sorts of information describing a warning. I was soon able to travel back in time 500 years ago and watch the last six Bearers of Harmony. These fateful Assassins were Twilight, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Applejack, and Rarity.

There was another Assassin I followed: Den Master Octavia Melody of Canterlot. She was not a Bearer, but she had written her life story as it went along. Ahuizotl was kind enough to let me read her stories and discover more about the Elements. However, I soon realized they were using me to access the Elements' incredible powers. I was helping them plan to take over the world. 

One day, the ghosts of Twilight, Pinkie, and Rainbow Dash came to me. They told me that there was a reason why the Elements are not to be used. Soon Rarity joined us and we planned to escape. I fled from the building without the Elements and went down to Baltimare, where the next set of Octavia's writings were hidden. 

As soon as I discovered that there are six more Bearers of the Crystal Heart: Celestia, Luna, Chrysalis, Tirek, Scorpan, and Discord. These six were the victors against the Shadow King Sombra, who ruled about 1500 years ago. From what I was told, they were immortal and some of them lived still. Not only did I discover these Bearers, but also the smaller Element-like crystals called "shards" that were much less rare than Elements but almost as powerful. With this new information, I started my return route to Manehatten to free the Elements of Harmony.

We were captured once more, but now I had hundreds of years of Assassin training in my head from the Bearer ghosts telepathically giving it to me. It was easy to escape again. I found the Elements of Harmony and used them to fight my way out of Ahuizotl Industries. 

Since all six Elements were united once more, I went to the Everfree to return them to the Tree of Harmony. The Bearers thanked me and that was the last time I spoke with them. 

I started to use my Assassin training to help other people. I became a vigilante that could strike from the shadows. I was a real Assassin now. Since I learned that the Brotherhood had disbanded 500 years ago, I thought my dealings with the Templar/Assassin war was done. 

That was until I met Vinyl Scratch, a friend of Octavia Melody who had been granted immortality by the Lord of Chaos, Discord. The Brotherhood never died, but renamed themselves the "Sons of Discord" and fight for Chaos instead of Harmony. They continue to seek shards and Elements and use them against the Templar who fight for Absolute Order.

That is where I am now. I joined the Sons of Discord. They are no longer the valiant Assassins of old, but I did not have a choice to reject Vinyl's offer. My quest is now to aid Chaos. I am a Daughter of Discord.





Gapeagle presents:






The Sons of Discord







> Chapter I: Present Progressive
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I opened my eyes slowly. As I regained my senses, I was instantly struck by a massive headache that made me instinctively grab my head. Huh? Well, I would grab my head if I could. Something was restraining my movements. Was I pinned to some table? I wasn't sure. My eyes still could only make out some hazy colors, but it was so blurry my vision was useless.

"Hello?" I tried to say. My throat was so dry that only weak croak left me.

"Oi! Is she up?" a gruff female voice asked another.

"Guess so, she's squirming back there," an even gruffer voice responded.

I could hear some movement around me. Soon, a thin woman with a purple bandanna over her face came into my vision. I blinked at her and she blinked back with her glowing red eyes. She had purple hair that was longer in the front than the back and she had two swords crisscrossed on her back. I could barely make out some sort of white hoodie that had orange lines running through it.

"Hey! You okay?" she asked and tapped my arm.

"Who are you?" I barely uttered.

"Oh, come on! I'm Scootaloo! Remember? You're Akay Yearling and-"

"I know who I am!" I tried to yell, but my voice was still weak. "Scoots?"

"There ya go!" she patted me. "Don't ya worry, ya gonna be fine. Some Ahuizotl punk tried to off you with some berserk juice, but we tied ya down."

"Berserk juice?" I squinted in confusion.

"I can see ya still a lil' off by this. Hang tight, Vinyl's at the wheel and we headin' back to base."

When she said this, my body took a lurch. We were in a van and I was not on a table, but an oversized seat! After the wheels went over the large bump, my head hurt even worse. A moan left my throat, much to the woman's amusement. I started to remember now. We were in Manehatten and on a mission. What was the mission? I couldn't remember it right away.

"What were we doing?" I asked.

"Tryin' to hook in a generator that powers Ahuiztol Industries," Scoots explained. "They knew we were comin' though and ya got shot by a sniper. Vinyl couldn't get in the power and so we left. We're gonna have to stay away from these parts of town for some days now."

"I got shot?" I asked worriedly. "Where?"

"Oh, nothin' but a dart," she pointed at my arm. "The sniper for some reason used darts that have berserk juice, a chemical that makes people go insane. Sniper got ya right in the arm and ya tried to kill us."

Vinyl called from the driver seat. "The sniper is a girl named Rosy Thorne, a Templar operative. It ain't the first time we met."

Ah yes, the Templar. That was who we were fighting. I was starting to regain my strength and I gestured to Scoots to untie me from the seat I was in. Scoots understood and extended a wrist blade from under her hoodie sleeves. In no time she cut me free. 

"Got some water?" I asked.

Scoots reached towards the front seats and grabbed a soda drink we had gotten from a gas station earlier. I quickly drank not because I was thirsty, but because my throat was painfully parched. After a few swallows, my voice had come back to full strength.

"We messed up didn't we? I mean, how did they know we were coming?" I said.

"That's what I'm tryin' to figure out," Vinyl spoke as she made a hard left turn. "Bastards usually never know where we are. I guess they hacked into a network or something."

"They didn't chase us neither," Scoots followed. "We're close to the hideout now and no Ahuizotl goons came after us. The police probably will be suspicious though." She turned to Vinyl. "But that's why you're driving, right? Ya gotta make us look like we're not being chased, right?"

"Shut it!" Vinyl snapped. "I'm not going that fast."

She made another tight turn, making slide me in my seat. I was thankful they had put the seatbelt on me as I would have already fallen out otherwise. I rubbed my head as the memories started to slowly crawl back in. I knew my name and I knew the two women in the van, but I had to force myself to remember anything more. Why were we fighting the Templar? Why was I involved? I ran a hand through my thick black and grey hair. It was going to be a long day...

"We are the Sons of Discord," I forced myself to speak. "We are the new Assassins. There is no Creed, no special tenets to follow. Uhh...Discord is our leader. He is the Bearer of Chaos..."

"And you're the youngest here," Scoots helped. "Because Vinyl and I are immortal. See? Ya starting to remember!"

"And the Templar want Absolute Order, we want...we want..."

"Chaos!" Scoots excitedly finished for me. "We make sure the world never stops moving. Ever since Vinyl and Discord found us 500 years ago, we've been helping the world turn on and on. You are the newest member to one of the oldest conspiracy teams in existence!"

"Because I know about the Elements of Harmony," I concluded.

"Yup!" she clapped. "I can see the berserk juice's effects are wearing off." She snapped her finger. "Oh! I almost forgot to give you back your phone. I took it when ya yet crazy."

She reached in her pocket and handed me a slender smartphone. Yes, this was my biggest weapon. The Sons of Discord were not like the Assassins of old, they didn't use smoke or daggers, but hacking and guns. This was my most vital tool to survival. The world I lived in was all connected. Computers, cameras, power lines, telephones, traffic lights, everything. This phone was my hacking device. It was specially designed and programmed to hack into just about anything. I could take any private information if I wanted to. I could turn a city block off with a touch of a button. I could ruin anyone's life without even breaking a sweat. I thought I held ultimate power when I used the Elements of Harmony, but that was until they gave me this innocent looking but devilish device.

"Thanks," I simply said when she handed it to me. 

"No problem, Sis," Scoots said. I now remembered how often she called me "sis" or "sister."

A voice was heard in the headset in my ear. I was a bit startled by it, but I soon recognized the masculine voice. It was Neon Lights's voice, another member of the Sons of Discord.

"I see you guys got out of there. At least that, am I right?"

"Yeah, baby," Vinyl answered. "Didn't get it done, but eh, we can try a different time."

Neon was not only a high-ranking member, but also Vinyl's boyfriend. I didn't know if they ever married in their 500 years of being together. From Octavia's writings and some of Loyalty's memories, Neon was a pirate and a friend of Rainbow Dash way back when. From how he was portrayed by Octavia, he did not change much in the recent centuries. That couldn't be said for Vinyl or Scoots.

I rubbed my face again as the headache only slightly subsided. All of a sudden, my vision turned a blurry blue. Scoots and Vinyl were glowing a solid yellow as everything else faded into one shade of blue or another. Just as fast as it came, it left and mad my vision was normal again. It flashed again here and there, but after rubbing my eyes, it was all gone.

"More memory flashes?" Scoots asked sincerely.

"Yeah," I answered.

After dealing with the Elements of Harmony, I had gained some of their abilities permanently. I could see things in Elemental Vision. It was like blocking out everything that was distracting and only highlighting things and people that actually mattered. It was hard to explain. I could not control it well either. Just like now, they had been popping up when I least expect it.

"I'm sure Discord could take that stuff away if you become a Survivor of Chaos," Scoots suggested.

"No!" I harshly answered. "I'll never be a Survivor. I don't care that Discord gave ya guys immortality and glowing red eyes, I am just fine the way I am, okay?"

"Fine. No need to get defensive, Akay," she crossed her arms.

"We're here, losers," Vinyl told them.

The van went down a ramp and through what looked like a garage door. I leaned forward to see through the windshield. I braced for impact when I saw a speed bump coming towards us and Vinyl refused to slow down. Her reckless driving made the vehicle bounce up and down, making my already terrible headache even worse.

"Hasn't 500 years of living taught you how to drive?" I growled at the blue-haired woman.

"Ha! Ya think my driving's bad? Pfft, you haven't seen bad driving then."

"Well, it could be better."

"Ya should have seen Vinyl drive Model T's," Scoots laughed. "That was the worst."

The van came to a sudden stop as Vinyl slammed on the brakes. Scootaloo, who had not been wearing her seatbelt, flew into the front seat she had been behind. With a curse, she rubbed her head at the spot where it collided with the hard seat. Vinyl wasted no time in jumping out of the van and opening the back doors.

I unbuckled my seatbelt and exited the van through the same back doors. We were in some dark garage with no windows and only a concrete floor. Scoots followed me out and we both checked our phones. From the lack of nearby signals except one, our location in the city was pretty remote. The nearest cellphone signals were about half a mile away.

The signal that was just a few meters from us was Neon Lights. He came from some back door in the hideout and his face was lit up by the cigarette in his mouth and the glowing red eyes under his long black hair. As he approached us, he removed it from his lips and let out a stream of smoke from his crooked nostrils. The flame-shaped tattoos on his arms could still be seen well in the low light.

"Missed me?" Vinyl smiled at her boyfriend.

"Like always," he grinned back, showing yellow teeth. "Now, about this mission..."

"It wasn't our fault, Neon!" Scoots huffed. "We uhh...well..."

"Discord won't be pleased," Neon shook his head. "But hey, when is he ever?"

"It was my fault," I said. "Made a rookie mistake and took a hit." I knew that this was probably not true, but I only thought it would be a reasonable excuse.

"Cameras didn't show that," Neon raised a thick brow. "But hey, you've been on the team for less than a month, ya still gettin' the ropes."

"Yeah," I awkwardly responded.

I then looked about. There wasn't much in this hideout. We had many bases like it spread throughout all of Equestria. Small refuges where we could gather our thoughts and equipment for another showing tomorrow. The networks indicated I was in southern Manehatten on the mainland and not on the large island where most of the city was located. I probably could see Manehatten Bay from where I was, but the hideout had no windows, so I couldn't tell for sure.

"So what's the plan?" I asked.

"Come along and you'll see," Neon gestured at us to follow.

We all followed him down a small hallway and then through a tall but thin door. On the other side was just what I expected. It was a single round room with a bunch of monitors on a center table. Computers, screens, TVs, and just about anything else could be found there. Along the walls were three huge screens. One had the Equestrian stock market, one had a news station, and the last one was turned off. From a woofer speaker played electronic music that Neon was so fond of. Just like all the Sons of Discord, he loved loud music.

"Nice setup," I said over the music.

"Yup, pays to be a Son of Discord," he laughed. 

He flopped into a computer chair and made the wheels take him over to the table. Vinyl bobbed her head to the beat of music and kept close to him. Scoots and I stayed back a little and crossed our arms. I had been in this situation before and all I wanted to hear was the briefing on the next mission.

Without turning down the volume, he shouted to us from the table. "So, we couldn't hack into Ahuizotl's generator, right? Tough luck and all, but we can't give up just like that. While you guys were gone, I found out some details on an Ahuizotl Templar named Abacus Cinch. She's an old coot and looks it too. Hehe. Well, anyway, she's got a private mansion just west of here. It's about two hours away."

"And what does this have to do with anything?" I asked.

"I was gettin' there lass," he chuckled. "Oh wait, you blokes don't say 'lass.' Whatever. In short, she's got a shard locked up in her mansion."

Vinyl seemed surprised. "Shard? Wow, the Templar just have one over there?"

"Yup."

Scoots rolled her eyes. "How ya know if that's true? I hope you don't send us on a wild cockatrice chase."

"A Discord supporter told me about it. He uhh...texted me."

"Neon!" I facepalmed. "That isn't a lead."

"Wait!" he pointed a scarred finger at me. "It is! He sent me a link also of things inside Cinch's mansion. Apparently she's got a private collection that was started by her great-great-grandfather. I also followed her ancestry. All of them were known Templar and Templar affiliates. Her having a shard isn't unlikely. We just need to find out which shard it is."

"How we do that?" Vinyl seemed exasperated.

"Easy, we break in and steal the shite and then identify it later," Neon nodded. "We could easily hack her security and take out any guards. We're Assassins, we used to do this stuff without electronics. It's gonna be easy compared to most things we do."

"I hear ya," Scoots said. "Give us the address and we'll get to it. Shard or no shard, if we get to kill us some Templar, I'm all game."

"That's the spirit!" Neon smiled. He then pressed some buttons on his phone. "There, I gave ya the address. When ya get done, could ya get me a six pack on the way back?"

"I got ya," Vinyl patted him on the shoulder.

"Thanks babe. Now, ya better get some guns. We got some rifles in the closet. Some night-vision goggles as well."

"Hehe, with pleasure," Vinyl winked.


*.*

> Chapter II: Modern Equivalence 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"C'mon, hurry up."

I watched with boredom as the gallons of gas slowly rose on the meter. We were out of Manehatten and the unmarked white van was low on gas, so we had to stop to refill it. It was a little embarrassing for a bunch of would-be thieves to be sitting at a lonely gas station along the highway, but that's what happens when the van only gets 8 miles per gallon.

As I waited, I looked down at my phone. There was no website on it or any text messages, but a long list of people. Names, private information, salaries, and other tidbits were all there for me to read. The cashier of the convenient store that accompanied the gas station was a young man named Hunter Skies. He was born in Cloudsdale and moved to Manehatten to attend Sun's University. The poor guy fell into debt and failed his courses, so he dropped out. Was arrested for cocaine possession about eight years ago. Still had student debt and was being paid minimum wage. 

Another was Sandra Hook. She was standing by a silver sedan, also waiting for her car to be filled up. She had three boyfriends. From the images on her phone, she had been screwed by each guy at least once. Hm, one of the dudes was pretty handsome, but he seemed too shallow  by his social media pages. I had the ability to expose her cheating to these guys, but I decided not to. Let their drama deal with them.

The gas pump clicked as it was finished. I looked up at the price. 60 bits? Nah, I wasn't paying for that. I accessed Sandra Hook's credit card number and punched that in the machine. From her accounts, it seemed this particular credit card only had 20 bits left on it. Whoops. Well, she'll soon know she overdrafted. I wanted to feel bad, but she was a cheating little jerk.

I finished the payment and took the receipt. When I was all done, I opened the door to the van and entered the back seats. The music was roaring from the stereo up front. Vinyl and her hard rock from thirty years ago. As I buckled myself, she was busy doing a dorky air guitar. In all her years of living, she probably did know how to play the guitar, but I only saw her composing dubstep and electronic tunes, so I didn't know for sure.

"Let's go, Vinyl," I said.

Like always, she made the van lurch as she pressed on the acceleration. As the van went up a ramp to get back on the highway, I reached for a rifle that was resting beside me. It was a pretty modern rifle too with a grip in the front, scope, and several other accessories. I pulled out the magazine to see to 5.56 mm caliber rounds. It was a powerful rifle meant for the military and it was just sitting in my hands. I put the magazine back in and set it down. I then picked up an ammo vest and started to put it on. We were thieves in this mission, but we always prepared for the worst.

"From the look of things, the driveway is from the north. That's where the gate would be," Scoots informed us as she inspected her phone.

Bobbing my head to the radio's music, fashioned the night-vision goggles to my head. After a quick test to see if they worked, I I reached back and pulled my hood over my head. 

"We'll plan not to go loud and proud, Akay," Vinyl told me. "Don't pack too heavy. We'll probably need to do some climbing."

Fair enough. I checked my sidearm pistol and then activated my two hidden blades. Yes, they were still in use by the Assassins. I had a pair of my own before I joined the Sons of Discord, but they were as ancient as the Bearers of Harmony. Vinyl decided to give me new ones of the modern design. Simple and effective. 

"From Neon's instructions," Scoots began, "the shard is deep in the mansion. It could even be guarded by a vault. From the looks of its location, it's in the basement on the east side."

Vinyl chuckled. "A vault shouldn't keep us out, even if it's non-electric." She tapped on Scoots' twin swords.

"Hehe, yeah," the other replied.

I leaned back. It would be a lie if I said I wasn't nervous. Sure I was used to danger and situations of violence, but the stakes felt much higher. I didn't have the guidance of the Bearers of Harmony. I didn't have the Elemental powers save one that I could barely control. I knew it was odd thinking, but I didn't feel as safe with a gun in my hands as some mystical crystal.

"What'll we do with the shard when we get it?" I asked.

"Easy, we'll stash it in our HQ in Ponyville," Vinyl answered. "Discord likes the shards going there. And if he doesn't need it, well, we'll give it to someone we could use."

"You'll just make someone a shard user?" I was unsure. "That sounds dangerous. I remember Octavia's tales. How Apathy, Doubt, and other shards turned decent people into monsters."

"True," Vinyl looked back at me through the rear view mirror. "But those shards were just nasty to begin with. Also, there's a technique to fighting shards. Just because you have one doesn't mean your mind is gonna be altered. The Sons of Discord know this well. I've seen plenty of shard users come and go and never change because they fought the will of the shards. It's not hard actually."

"Still doesn't seem like something we should risk messing with," I shook my head.

"Well too bad. Ahuizotl Industries use shards whenever they can get them. Well, except this one apparently, which probably means it's not a good one."

I wasn't convinced. I had seen too much of the shards for my life time, and I had never even encountered one. These small magical pieces of crystal had minds of their own. Users, as we liked to call them, could have their minds affected by the shards. It could turn a joyful woman into a nihilistic killer or make a doubtful Assassin into a crazed lunatic. However, Octavia the Assassin was a shard user and she seemed fine according to her writings. That and Scootaloo's twin swords were forged with the shard of Wrath, which gave them magical abilities. So maybe they weren't all bad.

With a sigh, I leaned back and closed my eyes. Tonight was going to be a long one. The old rock was still blaring, but the current song had a soothing melody that made me drift off slightly. I never actually fell asleep though. We rode onward to our destination. Right now, I had to prepare myself mentally.





"We're gettin' close."

I leaned forward to look out through the windshield. We had turned off from the highway about 20 minutes ago and were heading down a two-lane street that had rich houses on both sides. Each one had tall fences surrounding it and each had their own fancy gates. Of course, none of these gates were an obstacle for us as they mostly were electronic. The worst gates would be the ones that had to be manually opened, but we brought tools for that too. 

"We're take a right up at this stop light. From there, it should lead us right to Cinch's mansion," Vinyl told us.

"They'll have guards at the front gate, won't they?" I asked. 

"Templar are protective," Scoots agreed. "But we're use to that stuff. It ain't gonna be a problem."

"We won't go guns blazing," Vinyl said. "We're take out any guards tactically. We may be Chaotic , but we are professionals."

She took the right turn she had talked about. I saw Scoots putting on a silencer for her rifle and so I did the same with mine. As I did so, I started to wonder how the Sons of Discord paid for all its equipment, but then I remembered we didn't really need to pay for any of it. That was for other people to do. The perks of clever identity theft.

"Let's park here. Before anyone go out, turn out the street lights and any cameras."

I nodded at Vinyl's orders. With a few touches of the buttons, we disabled the lights in the streets. The rich neighborhood became pretty dark after this. Another click allowed us to hack the street cameras and any cameras from the rich neighboring houses. All we needed to do was have them loop old footage. Once that was done, we opened the doors and exited the van.

"Now, that's Cinch's mansion," Vinyl pointed at a large mansion at the end of the street. 

The mansion was much larger than any other house. The fence was made of brick, so it was actually a wall. In the darkness, I could see faint outlines of two guards standing in front of the wall's massive gate. None of the other homes had such protection. 

I then remembered the night vision goggles. With a slide of my hand, I put them in front of my eyes, making the world turn a whole different color. Vinyl and Scoots were front of me. Together, we crouched low and approached the Templar mansion from the sidewalk.

There was still light from the other homes, so we had to keep to the shadows. However, we were Assassins, so this wasn't a problem. The years of experience given to me by the Bearers let me keep close to Vinyl and Scoots' movements. The two guards were suspicious about the dead streets, but they held their places. It was a decent distraction for us to get close to them.

"As we get close, ready ya blades. I'll flood their headsets," Vinyl whispered.

Scoots and I separated. She went across the street in a swift and quiet motion. Vinyl went off to my left. I went directly to the closer of the two guards. The only thing that was hiding me was the darkness as I moved through the middle of the street. If any wandering car came by, I would have been screwed, but fortunately, the street remained empty.

Scoots and I were close to the guards. They were chatting about something I didn't care about. I extended my hidden blade and readied myself. The next second, they were screaming and clutching her headsets. I could ear a high-pitched ringing coming from them. While they fought to free their ears, I took my target by surprise and stabbed him in the back. I covered his mouth as I did so and he fell limp in my arms. Scoots did the exact same to the other one and we promptly dragged their bodies to a bush where we dumped them.

We then gathered at the gate with Vinyl. She was looking at her hacking device and making sure everything was in place. 

"Alright, I'm gonna cut all power from here," she told us. "We won't have all the time in the world after that. Once we enter the home, we go straight for the basement. All targets inside are fair game."

She didn't wait for Scoots and I to acknowledge her orders. She instantly started to make the gate slide open and when it was wide enough for us, she made all power in the block go off. All home lights were shut down immediately, leaving the whole neighborhood in complete darkness. It was shocking just how dark it became. 

We sneaked in through the small opening and ran across the wide yard. Vinyl gestured for me to go up. I understood what she meant and strapped the rifle around my chest. It was climbing time. With a running start, I ran up the mansion's brick wall and jumped to a window. The window had no blinds and so I could see inside. The coast looked clear, so I used my hidden blade to open the window by cutting the lock. While one hand held me up, I used the other to open the window. With a grunt, I threw myself inside.

The mansion was one complex place. Stairs and stairs and more stairs. I was on the second level of what seemed to be four. That wasn't including the basement. The design of the place was of an ancient era, probably 400 years ago. This place was old but newly refurbished. However, I could not stand by and admire the place's furniture or wallpaper.

I was inside so that I could open the front door. Damn conventional locks. They were so loud. The place where I stood was not far from the front door. All I needed to do was climb over a banister and jump down to the main hall. I was about to do just that, but the world became a faded blue. The Elemental Vision had taken over me once more. 

Red outlines of armed figures filled my head. I could see them through the walls. I could hear their faint cries as they panicked about the power outage. One guard was coming towards me. He was on the other side of a door and was about to open it. I raised my rifle and shot several times through the door. I saw his red outline fall over and fade away. My vision went back to normal right after.

"Aw, damn..."

Without wasting anymore time, I jumped down and unlocked the door for Vinyl and Scoots. The three of us started to sneak about the mansion. I was a bit shaken up by just how close the guard was to me. Well, if he was a guard. I tried to not let it stick with me as I followed my two companions. 

The Elemental Vision flashed once more, letting me get one quick glimpse at the locations of nearest guards. None of them were ahead of us, so I kept silent and let Vinyl lead us on. We went through a tight hallway that led into an open room full of glass cases. My goggles could make the images of paintings on the walls. It was like we stepped inside a museum. My history-buff side wanted me to stop and see what artifacts and pieces of history were here, but I couldn't stop. 

We went silently passed this room and deeper into the mansion. Vinyl stopped us before we entered a hall that went perpendicular to the way we were heading. A blinding light was in the hallway and I couldn't see anything. I lifted my goggles up to simply see that a guard was in the hallway with a flashlight. He was also talking on a walky talky.

"What cut us off?" he said with a Baltimarian accent. "Is it just us?"

"Nah, whole block's down," the guard on the other side answered. "These things happen ya know."

"Yes, but we can't take any chances. Those Chaotic bastards could be doing this!" 

"Fine. Hunter Squad inbound."

"Good."

He let go of the walky talky and was reaching for something in his belt. Vinyl extended her blade and rushed him. Before he could react, she pounced on him and stabbed him in the neck. His flashlight fell on the hard floor with a loud clang. I was quick to pick it up and turn it off. Vinyl cursed under her breath, but in the quietness, we could still hear it perfectly.

"Shit! We gotta hurry. Guns free."

We started moving through the mansion standing up. We would point our rifles down every hall to make sure it was clear before moving on. Finally, we reached some steps that went to the basement below. With haste, Vinyl led us to the bottom where it opened up to a large completed room. Not much was in it, save for some furniture with white drapes over them and a few sitting paintings. There, on the other side, was a shut vault.  

I ran over to it and tried to open it. It was still locked despite the power shut down. This meant that there was no way to hack into it, so we had to bust it open. Scoots pushed me out of the way and drew her swords out from her back. The intense light that came from them made Vinyl and I remove our goggles. The twin swords began to heat up to a ridiculous temperature. They looked like they had been sitting in a furnace for hours. I had to block the heat with my hand, but even that wasn't enough, so I took several steps away.

"Make it fast, Scoots. The light's only gonna attract them," Vinyl said.

Scoots nodded before drawing the swords back and then stabbing them into the vault. The powerful magic of the broken shards in the handles made the swords melt through the hard steel. Scoots still grunted as she pushed them in, but it was clear they were penetrating the vault with relative ease. She started to slice through it slowly, making one large circle. It wasn't a quiet process. The sounds it made reminded me of a welding torch. 

"Almost there..."

A couple of seconds later and she had completed the circle. She withdrew the blades and triumphantly kicked the metal circle, opening the hole. I physically cringed at the loud noise the whole thing made. There was no doubt the guards in the mansion heard it. 

"Get it and let's scram!" Vinyl ordered.

I looked inside the vault. There, on a stand, was a glass case with a single shard in it. It was a pinkish color. Scoots reached and took the whole case and we turned to escape the building. We could hear the footsteps of the guards above us. Vinyl reached for her hacking device when we reached the bottom of the steps.

"I'll overload their communications. It'll give us a little time. If ya see one, kill him," she said.

With a press of a button, I started to hear the faint ringings of their headsets. Their screams of pain followed swiftly. It was a sort of signal to us that we could proceed up the steps. At the top there was a guard who was fighting to take the headset out of his ears. We quickly shot him down and moved on. 

"You know what? Prepare your eyes, girls. It's time to bring the light back in," Vinyl pulled her phone.

I took my goggles off and squinted my eyes. It was like broad daylight the next moment as all the lights turned on. We took shelter behind an overturned table and waited. We had to leave soon. Once it was clear that no guards were coming at that moment, we took off down a hallway. 

"They're in here somewhere!" a guard shouted.

"Sergeant's down! Found two dead in the bushes!"

As we went down the hall, another guard popped up. He raised his rifle, but he did not get a shot off as his head burst open from Scoots' bullets. In the light, I could see the Ahuizotl insignia on his shoulders. Vinyl spat on the guard's body as we went by.

"I'm cutting the lights out again. This constant change will mess with them."

Vinyl turned off the power again and I had to get my goggles back over my eyes. We went by the open room with all the historic artifacts. After that, we were soon to the exit. It was unspoken that we weren't going to leave by the front door. Instead we climbed up to the second floor where I entered. Without slowing down, we jumped through the open window. A guard had spotted us with his flashlight and started firing, but we were out of the window unscathed.

I rolled upon hitting the grass. There were two guards outside. As they turned around to face us, Scoots tossed the shard into my hands and pulled out her swords. Two blindingly bright blades ran at the guards with furious speed. Scoots impaled them both at the same time. As the blazing swords stabbed through them, their bodies went up in flames. 

I carried the shard and its case from then on. Guns fired at us from the windows of the mansion. The whole neighborhood was most likely terrified. We ran with all our might down the street to the van. The van's lights turned on and its old engine roared as Vinyl turned it on with her phone. 

"Get in! Get in!" Vinyl yelled with a shrill voice.

Some bullets flew by me and hit the back of the van. I opened the back and basically threw myself inside. The goggles on my head were ripped off by a bullet that barely missed my head. With one valiant heave, I close the doors and kept myself low. Vinyl entered the driver's seat and we took off with a burn of the tires.

The gunfire ceased then and the loud noises were replaced by the sirens of a police car. I looked back through the van's back door windows to see an Ahuizotl armored van come after us. This was no doubt the Hunter Squad that was called in. The hair on the back of my head stood up on end.

"Vinyl! They're coming for us!"

"Yeah yeah! I know!"

"Why can't we get a faster vehicle?" I complained. "This thing is like thirty years old!"

Vinyl growled back. "This van's my baby!"

"Well, it sucks!" I told her.

"Back then, these vans were all the rage..."

"Back when hippies drove them!"

"Oh shut it!"

The van's engine growled as we flew down the street. The armored vehicle closed in on us. A soldier hung himself out of a side window and began to fire at us. I returned fire, but my aim was off and only cracked the bulletproof windshield.

"Any ideas?" I panicked.

"Yeah! Just watch, kid!"

She took a hard turn and we sped down another street. Cars that were obeying the speed limit seemed like they were standing still to us. The Ahuizotl van swerved around the slower cars like we did and easily kept up with us.  Bullets flew by us and around me. I changed magazines as I emptied one clip. I finally hit the Ahuizotl scum that was shooting at me. His body flew out of the window and was lost. 

Suddenly, I realized we had entered a intersection. All the cars were entering it. We hit one small sedan and brushed it aside. As the intersection crowding with more cars, the Ahuizotl van stormed through and hit a speeding pickup truck. The truck was flipped over and smashed onto another car. The Templar van was stopped dead in the center of the intersection. My eyes widened as a horrid crash developed behind us. 

"You asshole!" I shouted. "Vinyl, you did that, didn't you?"

"What's ya problem?" Vinyl asked back. "It got the Templar off us. I'm sure those unfortunate blokes are jus' fine."

"You just used innocent people!"

"For a good cause! Akay, we aren't Assassins like the ones that you read about. I ain't like Tavi, and I certainly ain't like the Bearers. This war has changed, alright? In this modern age, we gotta use everything ya got. I was jus' usin' my resources. Turning all the lights green is a nice and easy trick to get some sods of ya tail."

We were in the clear now. Everything seemed peaceful once more. I sat back down in my chair and tossed the shard in the air absently. All this for a little crystal that could be completely useless to us. With a sigh, I leaned back and rubbed my eyes. The heist was not as long as I thought it would be, but my notion that it was going to be a long night still stood. I wondered how many were injured or how many died in that crash. It wasn't noble and it certainly wasn't Harmonic. However, that was the new war, like Vinyl said. Innocent blood was always on the table, whether I liked it or not.


~

> Chapter III: Chaotic Tendencies (Part 1)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I inspected the shard in its glass case. It was faintly letting out a ringing noise through the thick glass. I could only guess it was trying to communicate to me. It was spawn of an Element. What Element, I had no idea. Neon had tried to look into it after we came back, but his toil through the night proved worthless. It was still unidentified and we were too scared to let it out of its cage.

"So, which shard do ya think it is, Akay?"

My head turned to see Vinyl had entered the room. I casually tossed her the shard and shook my head. 

"I have no clue," I then paused. "You know, that reminds me. Didn't Celestia and Luna have dozens of shards hidden in the Grand Royal Palace? Do you have any idea what happened to them?"

Vinyl kept her eyes on the shard while she answered me. "Yeah, I do. After Octavia was kicked out of the Brotherhood, she knew jus' what to do. Her and Trixie assigned some trusted men and women to hide the shards around the whole world. Ya know, bury them in a random field in the middle of nowhere. We've found some of them, but most are still missing. This one's probably one of them."

"Heh, Octavia didn't want ya to get a hold of them, huh?" I chuckled.

"She was pretty paranoid."

From the tone of her voice, I could tell she didn't want to talk about her old friend. Perhaps "old friends" was not the right term as I remembered how they separated after the death of the Bearers. Maybe she still held a grudge against Octavia?

Vinyl leaned on the and gave an unimpressed look at the shard. Her other hand  gently scratched her bare abs as her top barely reached the end of her ribs. The midriff was just one part of her usual outfits. I had noticed she liked to wear sleeveless white hoodies and black, fingerless, thin, leather gloves. She often just wore short jean shorts, but she would also wear her ripped up black yoga pants. Her shoes changed the most. I had seen her wear high tops, converse, high heels, sandals, and even work boots. Her style was most unpredictable.

Her nails were all uneven as she obviously had a bad habit of clipping them with her other nails instead of using a nail clipper. Her bare arms showcased muscles that only an athletic woman would possess. The only tattoo she had was on her left shoulder muscle. The tattoo was of the symbol of Chaos: eight arrows going every way out of the center. 

Her ears were heavily pierced. Gold and silver rings lined up the edges, but she was pierced no where else. Her lips were always wearing blue lipstick that match both the eye-shadow she used and her electric blue hair. Her punkish hair style had not changed at all since I had first seen her in the memories of the Bearers. Overall, she did not appear like an agent or even an Assassin, but more like a party animal DJ.

Her red eyes looked at me. "So, Akay, how's ya liked the Sons of Discord so far? Pretty exciting, huh?"

"You guys are crazy, I'll give ya that," I replied.

She chuckled. "Hell yeah! Trust me, ya ain't seen nothing yet."

I made a face. "Huh. Ya know, after that Thorne punk shot me with the berserk juice, my head's still been hazy. So what exactly do we do that makes us so important? I mean, apparently our cause is more important than people's lives. So could ya remind me why the Sons exist?"

Vinyl sighed. She knew I was lying about my memory loss. "Akay, progress comes through trials. We are the trials. If we let this world just become boring, then nothing changes. We like Change. That's why we fight for Chaos. Chaos is not good nor evil, it's right there in the gray. If Ahuizotl gets what they want, we won't have Chaos but just a bunch of dictating Order. It would suck if that ever happened."

"So we create Chaos for the sake of Chaos?"

"If ya want to interpret it like that, sure. Everyone looks at it differently. After 500 years of livin', I've lost care if one of us doesn't get it. I'd say, you'd have to be a Survivor to fully understand what we are gettin' at. But I don't see red eyes on you, so you still ain't a Survivor."

I shook my head. "And I'll never be one."

"I know that's ya choice an' all, but don't be scared of becoming one," Vinyl said as she lit a cigarette. "Not only do ya become immortal, but ya get to see the beauty of Chaos. C'mon, Discord would want ya to be one too. Think of it as an honor."

"Sorry, but I've seen what it did to you. You weren't always like how you are now. Sure, I'll take long life, but I don't wanna lose myself. Ya used to be a very different person way back when."

Vinyl breathed out some smoke and sat down beside me. Her other hand placed the shard's case on the cold floor. Those bright red eyes of hers looked at me with a sideways glance. It was easy to tell she did not appreciate my words. After making herself somewhat comfortable, she let out a soft sigh. She wasn't angry in the slightest, but rather on the edge of being annoyed.

"Don't ya go on 'bout how I used to be. That was over 500 years ago. Ya pretty ignorant in all this. Being a history buff, ya should know just how much has passed since Octavia's time. The Crystal Revolution, the Equestrian Civil War, The Griffon War, the Gargoyle Treaty, the Great War, the Second Great War, and the Western Bloodshed. It's about time ya forget about Octavia being so righteous and all. Even those Bearers you talked to have been dead even before her. You have outdated information. It's time to think ya level zero again, hun."

"You don't like talking about Octavia, do you?" I leaned back and rested my head on my arms behind me.

"Not really. If she was still alive, I'd still call her my friend, but we didn't end on the best of terms. That girl got me through the first thirty years of my life. I still regret that I couldn't get her to become a Daughter of Discord, but hey, it was her choice. I'd just like to keep her as a fond memory than a reason to fight or something higher than that. She was a friend of mine that passed away. That's all there is to it."

Looking at the 500-and-something-year-old-woman, one would never guess that she had some ancient wisdom in her. She probably didn't, but the usual conclusion was that with age and experience comes wisdom. Perhaps her being a Survivor of Chaos did not let her become such a wise guru to follow. 

I decided to fake a smile and change the subject. "You know, most people from 40 years ago or something would never dress like that. You come from so many time periods and stuff. Yet you look as modern as can be."

"I have to adapt. We all do," was the reply. "I've gone through just about every style out there. I was a hippie, a classic gangster, factory worker, chimney sweep, ya name it, I've worn it. Since we don't age none, it's hard for us to keep to time periods that are long dead. In twenty years, I'd probably look pretty different and even more different in the next twenty. But so far, this has to be my favorite look. I feel so free and comfortable. I've been through times where women had to where some pretty uncomfortable things. Now? Now I can look as lazy or professional as I want and no one cares."

"Now that I think about it," I said. "You guys must have really kept yourselves secret to last so long without anyone noticing, especially with today's technology."

"Well, the Sons of Discord have never become as large as the Assassin Brotherhood did at its prime, so that's helped. I don't think we've ever gotten more than a hundred members at one time. And we've always been ahead of the government in terms of tech, so they're hardly a problem."

"A hundred? You mean there's a lot more hackers out there like us?" I was a bit surprised.

Vinyl chuckled and took another puff of her cigarette. "Oh yeah. We have guys and gals stationed in all six of the major Equestrian cities: Baltimare, Canterlot, Manehatten, Vanhoover, Cloudsdale, and Dodge City. We even got boys in the small towns like Ponyville, Hollow Shades, and Appleloosa. We aren't the only hacking group out there either. Well, if ya could call us a hacking group. There's Erebus, an anarchist hacker group that we have loose ties with. Then there's the Krystal Blu..."

The venom in her voice made me sit up. "Krystal Blu?"

"They are an enemy hacking group. They refer to themselves as 'Fixers' or 'Anti-hackers.' They've worked with the Equestrian government and even have worked for Ahuizotl Industries. Krystal Blu and the Sons of Discord were the first organizations to use such extensive hacking abilities. We wanted to use it for Chaos, they wanted to use it to stop crime and monitor everything. They are fully against privacy and will hack into people's own homes for surveillance. They can turn that little webcam or your cellphone into a camera and spy on you. We got pretty loose morals around here, but we don't like doing stuff like that unless there's a true reason behind it. Krystal Blu jus' wanna be a Thought Police. Worst of all, they've killed more Sons of Discord than we have killed them. It's an uneven score that needs to be settled."

What could I say to this? I had only heard of such organizations in fiction novels or TV series. Knowing that the Sons of Discord were not the only ones who had hacking abilities made me shudder a little. I had already seen plenty of how the Sons can cause Chaos and destruction with only simple button presses. Imagining two hackers fighting each other seemed like a recipe for complete devastation.

"Ya probably won't encounter them though," Vinyl continued. "It's rare to fight a Fixer. Sure enough to say you won't find one here in Manehatten."

"So, it's been back-to-back missions ever since I joined. I'm guessing you guys got another job to do?" I changed the subject.

"Not really. I mean, there's always somethin' to be done, but we're in no hurry. Ahuizotl will be pretty mad about losing the shard, so I wouldn't be surprised if we start seeing more of them patrol about." She paused and pointed a bruised finger at me. "Tell ya what, I got somethin' for ya. Could ya go by Karl's and get some pizza?"

"You guys want pizza?" I was disappointed.

"Yeah. There's one close by," she stated casually.

"I am a trained Assassin and you want me to jus' go out and get ya pizza?"

Vinyl chuckled. "Ya a newby, Akay. You should remember how Novices were treated in the Brotherhood. We ain't the Brotherhood, but we are based on them. If this errand is soooooo below you, it shouldn't any problem."

"You just want me out of the base, don't you?"

"No, I want pizza," she quickly corrected. "So would Neon and so would Scoots."

I pulled out my phone and searched to where the closest Karl's Pizza was. It was about 16 miles away. Our base was pretty isolated from food chains and I could only sigh at this. It was too far to walk (especially across the dumb bridge) and I needed a car.

I rolled my eyes. "I'll need the keys to your van."

"Ya ain't touchin' my van, kiddo," was the cold denial.

"Then what will I drive?" I asked.

"Anything ya find out there," Vinyl said casually as she gestured at the walls.

"You want me to steal a car just to get you some pizza?" I couldn't hold back my astonishment.

"We need a new car anyway. You said so yourself last night."

I stood up and shook my head. "I meant buying one. Aren't we like some heroes meant to protect humanity from Absolute Order? What about Harmony?"

"Harmony doesn't exist. Now get off ya high horse and listen to some orders for once."

My shoulders drooped and I grunted in frustration. Her words both infuriated me and disturbed me. So far in my Sons of Discord career, I had only seen violence without cause and criminal activity. Well, could I be surprised? The leader was Discord, the Lord of freakin' Chaos. I guess I had more faith in the new Assassins, but that faith was diminishing rather quickly.

In my frustration, I gave Vinyl a obscene and immature sign with my hand, causing her to chuckle even more. I went over to closest where we kept small weapons. I did not feel like putting on two hidden blades, so I strapped on one to my right wrist using Velcro straps. After that, I walked over to another closest where we kept most of our coats and jackets. It was warm that day, so I simply took a light black jacket to go over my beige tank top. To finish off with a white bandanna around my neck and a pair of cheap sunglasses, I was ready to go out.

I walked by the smirking Vinyl once more. "Not taking a gun with ya?" she asked.

"Why would I? I'll be right back," I told her.

"Pays to be prepared, I say. Here, take mine."

She tossed me a small pistol. I was startled by her lack of safety and snatched the weapon out of the air like it was a piece of expensive glass. Now that I had the gun, I looked for a place to hide it on my body, but I couldn't find one.

"Where am I gonna conceal it?" I asked.

"In ya jeans," she shrugged.

"Ya know these are skinny jeans," I snarled. "It'll be tough to put a whole gun in there."

"Not my problem."

I rolled my eyes once more, making her chuckle once more, and stuffed the pistol in my jacket's pocket. It was quite loose in there, but it was the only place it could fit. Now that I was fully prepared to leave, I promptly left.





There was a commuter's parking lot close by to our little base. With Manehatten's skyscraper's in the distance, I approached this lot with reluctance. I knew it wasn't right to take one of these cars, but I also knew that it would be a pain and then more to walk 16 miles for two boxes of pizza. Not only that, if Vinyl didn't get her food soon, I felt like I would not be alive tomorrow. So, using this logic and determination to escape the situation unharmed, I chose to steal a car.

Of course, I wanted a good car. As I inspected the lonely cars parked there, boiling up in the noon sunlight, I pitied them. All their masters were away at work in the nearby shipyard or somewhere else entirely, and they simply sat there, being nothing but idle. However, I was about to take one lucky car for a joyride...or pizza-ride.

I passed by mostly old or used cars. Some had rust, some had ugly paint jobs, some were just not "cool" enough for my liking. If I was going to be some agent of Chaos and a hacking extraordinaire, I might as well have a car to match. I whistled a tune while I tried to find my perfect car.

There it was! It was a yellow two-passenger sports car that was far too extravagant to be seen with the junkers around it. It made me wonder why this car was here in such a poor and misshapen part of Manehatten, but then again, the poor can still lease a car. The owner probably had dozens of payments on it or was renting it, so tough luck I say. I pulled out my phone and started the hacking process.

It took only a few seconds before it roared to life. I then unlocked it and threw myself right in behind the wheel. The newer cars were always easier to hack than the old ones. Car companies kept adding more and more wireless or electronic features which just gave hackers more doors to get in. This car must of had a remote ignition key, because it was far too easy to control.

With this nice car, it did not take me long to get on the road and head towards my dull destination. There weren't many obstacles in my way since I could control all the street lights. I had green lights all the way to the pizzeria. Of course, I didn't pull any stunts like Vinyl did with the street lights. I made sure all the lights still had their reds and greens. 

Since Karl's was on the edge of downtown, I had to parallel park. In the sports car, it was not that hard, but as always, it was a bit frustrating. After that little bit of annoyance was over, I got out and locked my precious new car with my phone. My phone blew up with all the signals around it. Hundreds of Manehattenites walked on the sidewalks with all their electronics and phones in their hands. Emails, texts, voice conversations, and all source of other goodies filled my phone.

I walked inside the pizzeria. Before I arrived at the commuter's lot, I had ordered the pizza on my phone and apparently they still had not finished baking it. So I kept standing there, waiting for my order. I was not one to patiently stand anywhere, so my eyes wandered. There was a flat-screen TV up high in the corner of the room for those waiting to watch. It was showing the news and I soon realized what they were talking about.

The TV was mute and they were showing images of the wreck Vinyl caused last night. Not only that, but all the gunfire that took place before the wreck. Because we forgot to turn off the street lights on the road, our unmarked van was there in full light, though still pixelated in the poor quality. Using my phone, I took the audio from it and streamed it through my phone. Raising the phone to my ear like I was talking on it, I listened to the news without anyone noticing.

The anchor on the news was an older woman with short hair. I glanced at her occasionally, but I kept my eyes towards the floor. 

"We have not identified the culprits of this attack. Police and Wonderbolts and still trying to find any leads to these criminals. Authorities are also saying that the armored vehicle is not po-wait? Excuse me, the armored vehicle is police force. The reason for the horrid wreck is still unknown, but we suspect it was a malfunction of the street lights. We will have more information in six minutes."

I shook my head. Once they were about to mention Ahuizotl, they stopped and called it something it wasn't. Either the police and Wonderbolts were Templar, or this news channel had ties with Ahuizotl. I felt like it was the latter. Why? Well, why would Ahuizotl have its own military if all they needed was to call for the BOLT squads? It seemed like a waste of man power. 

My order was up and I walked over to pay for it. This time I used cash and decided to not rob anyone of credit. It was much riskier to hack like that when there was a cashier, so I only used it when I was working with a machine instead of a vigilant human. 

I walked out while whistling a tune. Without much care, I threw the pizza boxes in the car and was about to head in when my phone started to pick up a distinct signal. I looked down to see that it was a police transmission. This made me look about to see if any police cruisers were going by, but there was nothing, not even sirens. Whatever they were talking about, they weren't on top of. I hacked in the transmission and brought the phone to my ear.

"There has been two reports of a rapist in the Horseway District. The victim described him as tall, black-haired, and is wearing a blue hoodie jacket with matching pants. Last seen on George Avenue. We believe this man could be Curt Nightway."

Curt Nightway eh? George Avenue was hardly a ten minute walk from where I was. I got off the transmission and searched his name. I soon found him and man, he was nasty. He had already gone to jail due to domestic violence and alleged sexual harassment. Guess he wanted to take it a step further. He was a man preying upon the weak. A man the old Assassins would definitely not approve of. I was an Assassin, so I didn't approve of him either.

I took a glance at the pizzas. They would keep warm, I thought. I shut the car door and started heading towards George Avenue. It was time to get back into my vigilante ways. I was a trained Assassin, not some puppet of Discord. If I called myself Assassin, I might as well act as one. My hidden blade was ready, I was ready, and the manhunt began right then.


> Chapter IV: Chaotic Tendencies (Part 2)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

This Curt Nightway couldn't hide from me forever. Everyone was a pair of eyes for me. The cellphones, the street cameras, and the home securities. Any way he walked, I could follow. Any time he talked, I could listen. Any place he decided to hide, I could find. Well, that would be the case, if I knew how to use my hacking abilities better.

"Stupid thing..." I muttered.

I would admit to anyone, I was still a greenhorn to all this. Technology wasn't my forte in any circumstance. Yeah, I hacked all those things before, but that wasn't special. My device did everything, I only pressed buttons. Starting a car was easy, just ignite the engine. Making audio from a TV go to my phone? Easy, just direct the audio away from the TV speakers. Finding a guy in humongous city? Yeah, that was going to be a problem.

The best first step to take was to find his phone. Of course, I was not sure he was even carrying his phone, but most people do. Using my phone, I started to search for all the nearby phone signals. Thousands alone were in the same block as me. I would have to check all of them one-by-one until I found him. Of course, I could just wire his phone number.

I did so. His number and information was easily taken from the police department. I searched for it and nothing came up. The number was a dead one. I cursed at this and kicked a piece of broken cement down the sidewalk I walked. This guy got out of prison knowing that he wasn't going to change at all. It was easy to tell he was prepared to be tracked by the police.

"I'm not the police though..."

I started to spread out my search. If he didn't have a vehicle he wouldn't be far. Quickening my step, I went faster through the empty alleys and busy sidewalks. My Assassin skills allowed me to traverse over any obstacles like fences, boxes, or even people. To them, I probably just seemed like some impatient woman who couldn't keep her eyes off her phone. Typical. 

George Avenue was close, very close. I paused in my movements and looked around. Street cameras that watched the intersections has better viewpoints than me, so I hacked into them. There was about six in the area. Manehatten was dense with security which was all the better for hackers like me. I went from one to another, zooming in on any suspicious figures and peeking around corners I couldn't reach. 

My searching came up empty, but I knew he was around here. I took a deep breath and tried to calm myself. Maybe he already knew the police were after him? In some desperate attempt, I hacked into one guy's phone, checked it and then moved to another. Silas Knight, Ferris Hawk, Mark Hunter, yadda...yadda. This was going nowhere for sure. 

I did this for some time. Wasting minutes upon minutes when every second counted. I left George Avenue and headed down another wide street. I was now on Orange Lane. After crossing the street at a crosswalk, my phone started to pick up another police transmission.

"Suspect spotted. Eastbound on Orange Lane."

My heart skipped a beat. He was walking right towards me. My body tensed up as I started to lose control of my vision. The world turned a dull blue once more and there he was, about a hundred feet in front of me, shining in bright hazy orange. That tiny moment was all I needed. My vision returned back to normal and I hacked into his phone.

It was an older phone, but the guy made the big mistake of taking selfies. I searched his files to find Curt Nightway's face on all the pictures. This was my target. A rapist, a suspect, a fugitive, just walking peacefully down this Manehatten street. Well, his nice walk was about to end.

Now, I didn't want to fight or kill him right then and there in the crowded street. Or did I? I looked down at my hidden blade. I could just stab him when while we walked by each other. Just like the old Assassins did, right? As he approached, I extended my blade and waited for him.

"He deserves more..."

At first, I thought that was my mind telling me something, but the sly chuckle and cunning accent said otherwise. It was like time froze there. I stayed staring at Curt Nightway and he kept looking downward. My heart started beating faster and faster.

"Stabbing is so cliche, my dear. Give him something more...memorable."

"Who said that?" I said aloud. 

"Go on! Give him the death he deserves. No man who takes advantage of a woman or any person for that matter should carry on living. Make all a witness of his folly."

I couldn't pinpoint the voice. I was used to voices being in my head thanks to the Elements of Harmony, but this was completely different. It felt cruel and full of passion. It wasn't controlling me, but it did make me feel...more alive. Nightway was walking right to me. I had to act fast. Some sense made me look back at the street. There was not many cars on this particular street except one large pickup truck. I now knew how I was going to deal with this punk.

With my device, I hacked into the truck's throttle signal, making it speed up. I only had a second or so to do this. Nightway was right next to me when I hacked in the vehicle. He was not a large guy, not at all. In all sense, he probably should have went to the gym to bulk up some. I turned around and grabbed him. That split moment, I saw his shocked face at my attack. It was only a split-second because I then threw him off the sidewalk and into the street, right in front of the oncoming truck. the truck was probably hitting sixty by now when the grill hit Nightway in the face. 

I heard bones crack as his legs were caught under the tires. The people on the sidewalk screamed as they witnessed this horrid man meet a horrid death. His head rolled underneath the back tire, making his neck turn 180 degrees. He was mangled and broken by the truck and left sprawled on the pavement.

"Haha! That was a good one! Good show to you! Haha!"

My eyes widened when I understood what I had just done. Yes, my intent was to kill him, but not like this. I was expecting stabbing him and then telling him why he was wrong, trying to understand an evil person. This felt like a straight up murder with no purpose. Everyone saw it. There was no hiding what I had done. You might as well put me on a stage with spotlights. 

I took my phone and fixed the throttle on the truck before it collided with anything. The driver, an older man, jumped out and ran from his vehicle like it was a monster. He must've felt like he killed Nightway. It happened too quick for him to know the truth.

Everyone was staring at me. Nightway was a complete stranger to them. They thought I had just killed some innocent man. I wanted to ease their fears, but I knew it would work. One woman reached for her phone, which made me disable it before she could dial the cops. I did that with all the nearby signals. 

"Out of my way," I told them.





I returned to my car. Yeah, it was still there. The pizzas had to been cold by now, but that didn't stay on my mind. Neither did Nightway for that matter. I was used to killing people. I took out many a goon when I was a vigilante after the Elements of Harmony were placed back in the tree. That time seemed so simpler than now. Nah, what was on my mind was the voice in my head. It was foreign, it was cruel, it inspired me to do worse than even I thought I was capable of.

"It had to be Discord. It had to be," I muttered to myself.

There was no doubt in my mind. The Lord of Chaos had finally started to play with me. I knew him from Octavia's writings. His horrid beast form, his evil laugh, and his wicked sense of humor. It was all words, so I never heard his voice for myself. I was a mere mortal in his game of pawns and rooks. I hoped I was a rook. Vinyl was most likely his queen. 

I started the car and drove out of the city without any trouble. I heard sirens of course, but none came close to me. I was already wanted. I earned bounty on my head before I went to find Octavia's second set of writings down in Baltimare. So a little more didn't bother me. As long as I could still buy pizza, I was good, right?

I reached the commuter's lot and parked the car right where it was before. I didn't think about taking it back to the base. If the rightful owner knew it went missing, someone was going to track it down.  Well, at least he would have the smell of pizza in there. After I left the car, I carried the pizzas to the base by foot. 

The backdoor was unlocked and I slipped right in. Instantly, the smell of soda and alcohol smacked me in the nose. Neon sure knew how to stick up the place. I was a craft beer only kind of girl, so I often avoided the heavy drinks. Neon didn't however. I could only guess that pirate blood of his made him impervious to getting drunk easily.

"Finally, ya back!" Vinyl yelled from somewhere. 

"Yeah, I know. Heavy traffic," I muttered.

"Heavy traffic, my ass," Scoots said. "You did something else."

I placed the cold pizzas on a table and watched the others come in through different doorways. Scoots was only half-awake and wearing a orange tank top with baggy black sweat pants. Vinyl was chewing some bubblegum and looked at me with suspicious eyes. The literal glow in her eyes made me uneasy.

"So, who ya kill?" she asked knowingly.

"You know?" I tried to sound innocent.

"Well yeah, what else would you do? I know you ain't one to lollygag or go to the park."

"Lollygagging is a great hobby of mine actually," I replied. 

"C'mon, Akay. Was it Templar?" Scoots asked.

"No," I said simply.

"What a waste then," Vinyl shrugged. "Next time ya go hunting, pick someone worth the time."

"He was a criminal, a rapist," I pointed out in my defense.

Vinyl rolled her red eyes. "Your point? My pizza got cold."

There was no use in arguing with her, but I never backed down from any challenge. "Discord told me to kill him."

Both Scoots and Vinyl froze. The latter blinked in shock. "Really?"

"Yup."

"Ain't that interesting," Scoots spoke first. "Guess he's startin' to like ya!"

"Is that what it is?" I tried to seem confused. "Huh."

Vinyl walked over to me. "He don't usually speak with non-Survivors. I mean, you're not the only Daughter of Discord without red eyes. Huh, guess he thinks more of you than I thought he would. He's unpredictable, so..."

Neon stumbled in the room with a bottle of cider in his hand. Since he had been up all night, he was barely awake. He looked at me with a lazy smile. A slight chuckling noise left him before he spoke.

"The Lord of Chaos is watching you, Akay. That's pretty cool."

"Cool? I think it's rather creepy," I said.

Scoots laughed. "Aw! Don't be like that. Discord's the best pal ya can have, even if he sometimes goes off the rails. I'd see it as an honor."

I was going to comment on this, but I decided not to. These Survivors were pleased about this. Seemed like this was some milestone for me or something. So, I kinda just nodded and all and left them their cold pizza. It was just passed one o'clock and I was not hungry. 

My feet carried me to a back room where there was a large old sofa for me to fall on. Without remembering what was in my pocket, I heard my pistol hit the floor. My mind told me it fired, reality told me everything was fine. Still, it was best not to treat a weapon with such idiotic carelessness. I picked it up by only moving my arm and removed the magazine and then pulled the slide back to empty the chamber. 

I heard Vinyl complain about her hunger and her less-than-pleasant pizza, but I couldn't give a damn. With the pistol resting on my chest and my phone being held above me like I was texting, I simply laid there. 

The sun had was still halfway over the sky and I was already tired of the day. Everything had been moving so fast. Who knew that the boring days of climbing into tombs and such would seem so wonderful? There was no one pointing guns at you, no mysterious killer artifacts, and plain ol' guiltless innocence. The world was magicless and free. It was so convoluted now, ever since I stepped my damn feet into a cave I was never supposed to enter.

Oh, I wish Octavia could see how it's all changed. A woman of integrity that I never met but was more a friend to me than any of these red-eyed fools. They cared more about beating Ahuizotl than helping people. I never thought I could relate to the Templar's hatred of Assassins until now. The Sons of Discord seemed like what the Brotherhood was on the surface. Plain old killers without a goal. Now I was one of them and so I was a merciless killer as well.

"Octavia..." I muttered.

My attention returned to the shard we got. Could it be Valor? Could it be the shard that Octavia wielded? I knew she had it removed from her hand according to her last entry. I scrambled to my feet and went to the room where it was being held. In the light from a single window, it was gleaming in its case. 

I extended my hidden blade and started to chip away at the glass that surrounded it. I knew I couldn't touch the shard with bare hands, so I was prepared to jump back if it was freed. I kept attacking the case until the glass shattered. The shard broke free and fell on the floor. With a triumphant laugh, I leaned over the pink crystal.

"Valor! Valor is never alone! Umm...Octavia!" I tried to get some reaction out of it.

Of course, I had no idea how to communicate with it without sacrificing my hand. Shards were nasty in that way. A shard had to bury itself into a person's palm before being able to be used properly. Unless...How did Vinyl use the shard of Hope? If I recalled correctly, she used it without having it in her palm.

"C'mon, Valor! Speak to me. Give me some sign that you are Valor," I told it.

No hum left the crystal. I must have sounded so stupid in my excitement. After repeated my words over and over and even pounding the floor, I gave up. I sighed in defeat and simply stared at with disappointed eyes.

"It's not Valor, dipshit," Vinyl said when she came to investigate my madness.

"I could have guessed..."

"Valor was never in that collection that the Empresses had. It coming into Templar hands would be bizarre and inconsistent to what we know."

I crossed my arms. "Well, maybe if ya told me about this 'information,' you could have saved me from looking like a moron!"

"From what we know, Empress Trixie was the last one to see Valor, well besides me. After Octavia's death, Trixie lamented the loss and decided to make some memorial after Tavi. She made a statue in southern Canterlot and it's called the Nameless Captain. The heart of the statue has Valor planted in it. It's completely covered, so no one can see it."

"So? Some Templar could have just taken it then," I suggested.

"The Sons of Discord there always check on the statue. It's a dead drop for us. The statue is still there in best of shape. There's been no evidence of anyone trying to take that shard."

"Why don't you take it?" I demanded.

She snarled. "Because I won't mess with my friend's memorial."

Ha! So she did still have feelings for Octavia! I was glad there was still some humanity in her after being a Survivor for so long. I nodded in understanding, trying to hide what I was actually feeling. Both our eyes returned to the mess of glass and the pinkish shard in the middle of it. 

"Now clean this up," she told me. "And make sure you don't touch that thing. I don't care if ya become a shard user, but you may care about it."

She turned to leave, but I stopped her. "Vinyl! How did you use Hope without it going into your palm?"

She raised a brow. "Easy, Discord never let it go into me. If ya remember, I had just lost a battle to Spitfire, so I was bleeding out in the Palace dungeons. Losing anymore blood to the shard ripping my hand open would have killed me. Discord let me use the shard without me losing more blood. I owe a lot to Discord. You may look at Discord with distaste and all, but he saved my life, more than once too. Now get cleaning."

She left without another word, leaving me to my chore. Huh, the day was looking up for the sole reason that I saw someone in Vinyl for once. There was still something there that I read about in Octavia's writings. The witty, nonchalant, and rebellious Assassin was still there, just buried under a pile of Chaos. Perhaps I could unbury slowly but surely?

The day had began slow, became terrifying, and then went back to a slow pace. Such was the Chaotic tendencies of my new occupation. After I cleaned up and returned to the lounge room where I kept quiet and away from my comrades, I inspected the shard closer and closer. There had to be some way to make it speak. I remember Empress Celestia could understand shards. Maybe we needed a Bearer to tell us what it was?

"Maybe, we need Discord..."


*.*

> Chapter V: Z3sty
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

A week went by from when I killed Curt...whatever his name was. Things had started to settle down even though we kept working hard against the Ahuizotl Templar. My trips to the island of Manehatten lessened and we kept to our vicinity. Night and day we studied the Templar patterns and intercepted their business transactions, communications, and general deployments of Hunter Squads.

Because of my interest in the shard we acquired, I was in charge of taking care of it. I placed it on my desk in my room where I was allowed to sleep. Still being new and all, I did not have that much in it. I was never a clean person neither, so it appeared like the result of a tornado wrestling an earthquake. Clothes were never put up, pizza boxes and beer bottles lined up the walls and corners. My laptop was almost buried under trash. The only open spot was my bed, because well, I slept there.

As the days went by, the little headquarters became a little cozy and homely for me. It was never warm and we refused to install actual lights, but it was just a place to stay. I did not know why I liked it. I guess because it wasn't an Ahuizotl room or any place with an Animus. Yeah, that was probably the reason. 

I drew closest to Scoots before the other two. She was by far the friendliest of all three. Even though she was 518 years old, or was it 517? Well, anyway, she looked younger than me. If anyone saw her, they'd think she was seventeen and just a punk teenager. I could only guess that her looks were kept because of her being a Survivor of Chaos. Discord's influence kept her as young as when she became a Survivor. That would explain why Vinyl and Neon looked older than me. I knew Octavia and Vinyl were in their early to mid-thirties when the former started to write about her adventures. Being a Survivor just kept you at the same body age.

"Ya know, Scoots, according to Octavia's writing, you were friends with two other girls. I think one was Rarity's younger sister and one was Applejack's lil' sister, right?" I asked her one day.

Scoots, who was sprawled upside down on a couch glanced at me with wide eyes, as if startled by the question. She rolled off the couch to right herself and sat on the couch's arm with a shrug. "Yeah," she uttered.

"Well, did they become Survivors like you?" I asked nicely.

"Yup."

"Cool. Where are they stationed?"

"They aren't," Scoots muttered. 

The curtness made me blink. "Then where are the-"

"They're dead."

"Oh..."

"About 130 years ago, we were southwest of Appleloosa. Sweetie, Apple Bloom, and I were assisting the Buffalo Tribes. It was the last tribe of them and Appleloosans were coming in for the kill. You may know not this, but Buffalo people had Discord as one of their gods. They liked Chaos, jus' like us. Discord liked them and wanted us to save them. 

"Out in that badlands, we fought the Equestrians for like, two weeks straight. I had to have taken out like, thirty to forty guys. We were holdin' up fine until some Templar showed up to support the Appleloosans.

"Sweetie Belle was a shard user. She wielded Patience. It was a time-manipulating shard. Apple Bloom was an engineer. She was never that good at fighting. The Templar had...much more powerful soldiers. One of them could control green fire. A man with green hair and yeah. But it wasn't him who got us, it was...I don't know what it was."

"Huh?" I interrupted, but allowed her to continue.

"During one battle, it was all gettin' nowhere. We fired out guns at each other and no one could aim worth a damn. That's was when I saw it. It was like a pile of crows that was in the shape of a person. Everyone on both sides was scared of it. Well, the Buffalo chief thought it was the Spirit of Death. Certainly seemed like that. 

"This thing came after the three of us, not even going for the Buffalo people. The crows left and there was a shadow of a woman and she was wielding a sword. Gutted Apple Bloom before she even had a chance to react. Sweetie put up some fight, but was killed easily. I faced her down, but my blades never hit her. She gutted me too and then left me to die on the dirt and sand. The Buffalo peoples were completely wiped out after that. I was brought back to Appleloosa and they wanted to hang me for treason against Equestria. Vinyl busted me out of the sheriff's cell and well, I got better.

"We may live forever, Akay, but we Survivors can die just like anyone else. I've always considered myself lucky for surviving all the wars and stuff, but I can't forget those who didn't."

"I'm sorry..." I said as it was the only thing I thought I could say.

She dismissed this with a hand. "No need to be. It happened a long time ago, even for me. They rest in Chaos and well, it happens. All of us have lost friends. Vinyl lost Octavia, Neon's lost his whole crew and the pirate captains, and I lost my two friends. But we all do it for Change and Chaos. Wouldn't have it any other way."

The tale was haunting. Such powerful beings were on the Templar side? A person that powerful could not have been a normal shard user. There was no doubt in my mind that the "Spirit of Death," was a Bearer. According to Octavia, there were four Bearers out there since the Bearers of Harmony were all gone. One of those Bearers was Discord and one I had never heard of. That only left two possible answers. Could the Two Sisters, Luna and Celestia, be with the Templar? I shuddered at the thought.





"Hey, Akay, could ya get in here?"

I stretched upon hearing Vinyl's calling. "What ya want?"

"I think we got a new mission. C'mon in the control room."

I stretched for a little longer and followed Vinyl through the hallways. It was mid-afternoon and I had been interrupted in my nap. With the constant late nights and inconsistent schedules, my sleep hours were short and long in between. I had gotten into the routine of napping around two o'clock just to gain some more rest. My companions didn't mind me napping, and never disturbed me until today.

She led me to the control room where Neon and Scoots were sitting in front of a monitor. The computer screen was a young girl with bright green hair and equally green eyes. She was also in a purple school uniform. Absolutely the last kind of person I thought to see communicating with the likes of us. Her eyes shifted in the low frame rate and she waved. Her cute little face bright and happy in the poor quality of her computer camera.

"Is this our new recruit?" she asked in a gruff, but also mischievous voice.

"Yup," Vinyl answered. "This is Akay. Akay, this is Lemon Zest."

I waved at the webcam with boredom. "Hi."

"Lemon here is in Canterlot. She's got somethi-"

"You can't jus' stop intros like that," Lemon interrupted Vinyl. "Hey Akay! Now, I know what ya thinking. Why is this girl with the Sons? Well, don't worry, I'm..."

"A Survivor and 500 years old? I'm used to it," I shrugged.

"No, silly! I'm not a Survivor at all! And I'm actually young. I turn eighteen next month!" she giggled.

"Shouldn't ya be in school then?" I chuckled. I was not buying her at all.

"Puh-lease!" she rolled her eyes. "I used to take classes in the Crystal Republic. Dropped out of that a year ago. Best choice ever. Now don't judge too quick. I'm an electronic musician and DJ, just like Vinyl. I've been owning this lifestyle! They call me Z3sty!"

She made a "3" symbol with her finger to show me the proper spelling. Now, I was not one to ever like a dropout. I was a graduate from Vanhoover University with a master's degree in archaeology. Yeah, I was called a nerd and dork for that, but I got the jobs and money. Well, until I went on my own way and becoming a sort of adventurer. So hearing say this with such ease made me slightly sick, but I tried to not care. I was still not a dropout. That meant I was still better than her. Right? Yup, I thought so.

"So 'Z3sty,' what's the deal in Canterlot?" I asked.

"Alright! Here's what's up," she started excitedly; "I've been snooping around the Ahuizotl branch that's here. These past few days, I've been seeing more and more Templars. So have the other guys as well. I me like, it's totally obvious. They got the guns, the men, and those walkie-talkie things that no one under forty uses. You know what I'm tlaking about, right? Right?"

"We get it," Vinyl said. "Now get to the point."

"Oh! Well, Lily found out that the Templar have this box thing. It's completely protected, like some bank safe. I have like, no idea what's inside. Like seriously, there's nothing for me to guess about. At. All. Anyway, they have it locked up in their tower here. I tried hacking into the systems, but it's so tough! Ya would've thought the Equestrian president lived in there or something. I'm calling you guys because, you're besties of course, but also because I need your help. The Templar have made this branch unhackable. Like not at all, don't even try it. Trust me, I know this. I spent all day walking around the tower. I even got a parking ticket because of it. Damn tickets..."

"You're a pretty good hacker, Lemon," Scoots remarked. "Are ya sure we can help?"

"Don't be like that, Scoots," Lemon Zest huffed and made a pout. "I would really, really appreciate you coming to help. I could even get ya guys donuts. I mean, not for me of course, those thing are bad for my shape. You guys don't have to worry about that though."

"Are ya calling us fat?" Neon seemed offended.

"Come on, Neo, you should've lost that beer gut ages ago," Lemon said casually. "Chicks don't dig the beer gut. I mean like, never have never will. Well, unless the chick's into some round bellies."

"I bet I could find some lasses who do. Besides, my gut is pretty good. Heh, especially for my age."

"Shut up you two," Vinyl said before looking at the screen. "Lemon, I'm not sure if we can help ya jus' yet. If it's as tough as ya say, we'll need bigger guns."

"I understand. I think this'll be just great!" the girl clapped her hands cheerfully. "Yay! Love ya guys! Well, I'll see ya later cause I gotta prepare to rock this club tonight. Uh, Chaos is Eternal and shit! Woo! Canterlot is gonna have a partyyyyy~!"

She cut the connection before she ended her high-pitched note. I was left there blinking in confusion. This was really our ally in Canterlot? She seemed like one of those girls who took selfies all day. She was fighting for Chaos? I concluded that she most likely had a pretty sick sense of humor. 

"So what's the plan?" Scoots asked Vinyl.

"Simple, we need backup. Whatever Ahuiztol is guarding, it belongs in our hands. We need every person we can get. And by that, I mean we get the best of the best."

"What hacker is better than us?" I asked.

Vinyl placed a hand on my shoulder and a grin stretched on her face. "We don't need a hacker, Akay. We need a cracker."

"A cracker? Isn't that a derogatory term?" I was undoubtedly confused.

"Not that kind, you idiot!" Vinyl growled and her smile disappeared, only to resurface again. "No, a computer cracker. The ones who make hacking possible. We may be hackers, but we didn't make the equipment and programs to hack with. Someone much more skilled than us did that."

I was still confused. "Where are we gonna find one of those?"

"Don't worry. I got in mind a cracker that started in the Erebus faction. She crossed over to the Sons about two years ago. She'll be perfect for this."

"And where is she at?"

Vinyl laughed with her red eyes. "The Baltimare Bay Penitentiary."


~.~

> Chapter VI: Rock N' Roll
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"How....How are we gonna break into a prison?" my eyes twitched.

"Not as easy as it used to be," Neon agreed. "Captain Caramel and I used to do it all the time. That was when prisons were just basically holes in the ground."

Vinyl gestured for us to be quiet. She still had her devilish grin and her eyes flashed with mischief. Scoots, Neon, and I waited with excited patience for her answer. 

She finally answered. "Come on guys, we're Sons of Discord, we got this. If we do this right, none of us will get into trouble."

"But the prison is Equestria, not Ahuizotl. Aren't we kinda attacking our allies?" I asked worriedly.

"Pfft, Equestria's been against us since our existence. We have no allies where governments are concerned. If ya gave me the opportunity, I would shoot the president twice. One bullet for each eyeball," Vinyl told me. "If we cause Chaos and maybe a few cops die, it ain't our problem."

"I see," I sighed.

Vinyl continued. "Now, what we should do is set up the van outside the prison's fences. Ya know, get us in good range of the control inside the place. There are some Erebus hackers in Baltimare, and we'll get them in on this too. Every plan has a backup plan. If our hacking of the control room doesn't work, we'll have guys by the Baltimare Bay generator. We still have advantage in no electricity."

Vinyl started to mess with the computer. Soon enough, she had a 3D model of the prison up on the monitor. Surely this was classified information, but like always, that never stopped us. Equestrian cyberspace security sucked. She expanded the model for us to see. The prison was massive, one of the largest and best guarded places in Equestria. 

"The gate's over here. Now, it'll get pretty hard to get in anywhere but the front door. We'll, only confront the guards here after we hacked into the place. Make sure the guards can't call backup while we slice their asses open. Me and Akay can lead the charge into there. But before we get there, we should have some cop uniforms because any moment of hesitation from them is worth it."

She went on, but the length of it was far too long for me to listen to at that moment. I lost track of her about halfway through it and simply nodded in false understanding. The longer she went, the faster she spoke, and the less I could comprehend. I could guess this was why Octavia loved the quiet so much.

In a few hours, we already started our packing for out little expedition to the south. From Manehatten to Baltimare was about an eight hour drive. Well, that was with good traffic. What took some days to travel in Octavia's time was shortened to a third of a single day. Yup, and that was even with Vinyl's garbage can on wheels.

We spent one more night at the small base before departing early in the morning. The snooze button was smacked pretty hard and Vinyl basically dragged me to the van. We suited up, gunned up, and was ready to fly. Since no one was allowed to drive the van beside ol' Vinyl, she drove us and blared her rock n' roll. 

The ride was pretty boring. Of course, when talking about traveling, that was a good thing. Neon spent most of the time talking on his phone to other Sons of Discord and those Erebus dudes they all kept mentioning. From what I could gather, there was one named Double Diamond and another simply named Favor. The cracker we were getting was a former member of this hacker group. They sounded like they were anarchists from how they talked, but then again, I only heard their voices over the speaker of the phone. There was another mentioning of the Krystal Blu. Apparently there was a Fixer in Baltimare and the Erebus guys warned us. 

We also would listen to the radio whenever we could actually convince Vinyl to turn down the music. Our exploits in Manehatten were being reported like usual. Nothing was mentioned of me chucking the rapist into the truck. This odd exclusion of stories felt weird to me, prompting me to ask what I thought was a valid question.

"So what's up with the media? Why don't they, you know, expose us? Expose the Sons or Ahuizotl?"

"Two things," Vinyl answered. "One is that not many know the truth of our secret war. Second is that Ahuizotl wants to keep the Sons hidden. Why? Well, because that would draw attention to themselves. If the public knew what the Templar did in their corporate towers, Equestria would try to drive them out of business. So revealing us would be like blowing a bomb up in their home. Yeah, it'd take us out too, but the damages to Ahuizotl would be too great to recover from. The Templar require public favor. If the people don't like them, they don't have power."

"Then why don't we tell everyone 'bout Ahuizotl?"

"Easy. Who would believe a group of hacking terrorists? We'd be sending ourselves to the firing squad whether they believed us or not. We're criminals, Akay, no one'll listen to us."

"I'm not a criminal," I huffed.

The three others started laughing at my words. Scoots, who was sitting next to me, nudged my shoulder playfully and her red eyes gleamed with silly mockery.

"Oh yeah? Then what are ya?"

"I'm...I'm..." I couldn't convince myself for long. "Yeah, I'm a criminal..." I sighed.

"Great to be comfortable with yourself, am I right?" Scoots chuckled. "Once ya start accepting yaself, everything gets better, right? Well, at least that's what they say."

"I'm not sure that's what they mean, Scoots," Neon frowned.





Due to some plan made before we left and Vinyl's laziness, we decided to stay in a motel in Fillydelphia. It was actually my first time in that city, but it was pretty generic and not memorable at all, but that could of been because of the dull part I was in. The motel was nice, far better quality than I expected. I thought it was going to be like in the movies where the low thugs get the rooms with blood on the sheets and constant smells of meth. Don't forget the magazines with lingerie women. However, this place was decent and clean, so I did not mind it at all.

When we checked in and had a guy from Appleloosa pay for it, we went up to our room. This was some special room, according to Vinyl, as it was a drop spot for Sons of Discord. A sort of "hideout" as she put it. Well, once we opened the door, there was another already in the room.

"What's up?" she asked with a gruff voice.

Sitting on a seat in the middle of the room was a woman with thick arms and a manly complexion. Her hair was grey and spiked up in a wild manner. Her clothes were a simple pair of loose jeans and a simple white tanktop. Lines of tribal tattoos lined her muscular arms and her hands were broad like a farmer's. Even her neck was thick and hard. Her skin looked hard and lumpy like that of a boulder. She looked over at us while wearing thick red sunglasses. No smile formed on her angular face, but a soft frown was present.

"I see you guys are finally here," she grunted and removed the sunglasses to reveal glowing red eyes.

"Nice to see ya too," Vinyl chuckled. "So, how's it been down here?"

"Boring like usual," the woman said and looked at me. "Guess this is our newest member? Hmph, they keep getting weaker every generation."

"Are ya sure you should be in here?" I asked her. "Cause I don't think cows are allowed in the rooms."

"Har. Har. Real funny, jackass," she snarled.

"Good to see ya two are on a good start!" Scoots interrupted. "Akay, this is Lime. Lime, this is Akay."

"Lime? Ya named after a fruit?" I continued to mock. 

"Nah," she stood up and walked over to me. She then stretched out her large hand to mine. I hesitantly took and then I instantly regretted it. Her skin was hard and jagged, but not coarse. It was like touching tempered glass. I could not move it at all. I felt my hand started to be crushed under her strength. As she saw my misery, she smiled, revealing unusually white teeth.

"I'm Limestone. I'm named after a rock, smartass."

"I can see why..." I breathed as she squeezed my hand.

"That's enough, Lime," Neon said. "I think the rookie's got the idea."

Limestone smiled and let me go before throwing herself on the bed, which sagged like she was three times the weight she looked. My hand was not awfully bruised and throbbing as blood finally flowed back into it. I wanted to scream out in pain, but I dutifully held it back and simply grimaced.

"So ya guys are gonna get that crazy cracker out of Baltimare Bay, eh?" Limestone said to create conversation. "I wouldn't waste that much effort on her."

"That's because ya don't understand hacking, Lime. Never have and never will," Vinyl replied. 

"All this fancy technology ain't worth my time," Lime huffed. "Humans have always been about the direct and humble approach. Guess ya can call me a traditionalist."

"So what do you want, Lime?" Scoots questioned. "I know it's just evening, but I wouldn't mind hitting bed early."

"I jus' really want to know if ya serious about releasing the loony in Baltimare Bay," she answered.

"Of course we are," Vinyl told her. "Lemon Zest needs her in Canterlot. She needs all of us."

"Vinyl, that cracker is out of her mind, even by our standards!" Lime protested severely. 

"Am I missing something? What's the cracker done that's worse than ya guys?" I asked them all.

"Well, we've stopped her most of the time before she didn't anything...insane," Scoots told me with a shrug. "She did hack into a government facility and electronically locked it down before disabling the fire safety stuff. Yeah, some propane and her cigarettes caused that place to fall pretty fast."

"She killed a building's worth of people? Why?"

"She's an anarchist, anything that has any authority she despises. Real insane if ya ask me," Limestone finished.

I shook my head. "Why am I not surprised ya guys allowed her into the Sons of Discord? What happened to the integrity of the Assassins?"

"Went out when those damn Bearers died," Limestone harshly shot back. "We ain't the Brotherhood kid, so stop comparing us to them. If ya want that pitiful excuse of an organization again, then go make a Brotherhood of ya own. Ya should be thankful about the Sons. We're the only reason why the Templar don't control the world."

I didn't know what to say to this. So I did as the husky Survivor of Chaos told me to and shut up. As I continued to rub my aching hand, the others talked about how the operates of the past went. It seemed like Limestone was one of the only Sons of Discord in the city. As she talked with them and they talked with her, I started to get a sense that I knew who this woman was. There was something oddly familiar about her. My guess was her smile and her cheeks. I had seen someone with a similar facial structure. 

I suddenly interrupted their conversation. "Um, Limestone, what's ya last name?

"Pie..."

Yup, that's what I thought. Her facial structure was similar to the Bearer of Laughter, Pinkie Pie. Limestone must have been one of Pinkie's sisters that never went into the Brotherhood. This made a myriad of questions rise in me, but from the growl in her voice and how Vinyl treated me when I asked her about the past, I respectively did not ask any of them. 

"Oh...Alright," I merely muttered.

"Don't ya get any ideas by it!" she snarled. "Remember that ya only in the Sons because ya-"

"Heyo!" Vinyl interrupted loudly. "Can't waste time on such pettiness, can we? Hey, Lime, I think it's time for ya to head out."

"Why? We haven't even discussed the important stuff yet," the large woman stated.

"Maybe some other time. Now, as your leader, I tell ya to leave."

"Fine."

Limestone grunted and got up from the bed, making the furniture spring's moan. With a glare to all of us, she promptly left and the room became quiet. When the door was shut, Vinyl let out a massive sigh of relief.

"What will we do with her?" she asked the air.

"What's her problem, well, besides being Pinkie's sister?" I asked.

"Crap, ya know," Vinyl sighed again. "Well, Lime was pretty swell before Pinkie fell off of Canterlot. She was actually the first one to find the Bearer's mangled body. Octavia and I found her crying over Pinkie. I was the one to separate her from the corpse and I don't think she's ever forgiven me. She rightly blamed the Brotherhood."

Scoots took over the story. "Yeah, we didn't see her much after that. Not until it was found out she was the last Pie sister left. Maud disappeared in the sea and Marble died of disease. The Sons of Discord were about seven years old by then. Lime came crawling to us, trying to find something worth living for. Vinyl and I rejected her offer as she wasn't right in the head, but Discord overruled us. He saw somethin' in her we didn't. She instantly decided to become a Survivor and well, that's that."

"Just another poor sod washed up," Neon commented. "There's two kinds of Sons of Discord: those who fell under tragic times and those who are just damn insane. Most fall under the first category."

If those were the only two categories, then I must have been insane. This short but sad tale caused us all to be quiet. It was apparent Vinyl was tired of speaking and threw herself on the same bed Limestone had been laying on. As I expected, the bed hardly moved. 

We unpacked and settled in quite nicely. Pistols were by the TV and the lamps, laptops on the coffee table, and our clothes thrown about everywhere. If our mission was to trash up the room, we accomplished it with honors. I couldn't help but wonder if the damage we created was reparable, but I refused to comment on it.

Vinyl and Neon took one bed while Scoots and I took the other. I'll say, it was not a good night for sleep's sake. Something was going on in my head. Every time I fell asleep, I would soon awaken with a start. My back would be sweaty and my breathing hard. It started to annoy Scoots so much that she went to the van to sleep. 

These dreams were bizarre and unrealistic. Every time I dozed off, I seemed to awaken with a new dream memory. Most of them I forgot upon my arrival to reality, but some stayed there. My only guess was that my time with the Elements of Harmony were doing a number on me. My eyes felt heated and my throat was dry. These dreams were but dreams, but they fascinated me. 

I shall do my best to recall them.


*.*

> Dream Chapter 1: Mafia Intentions
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Hard drinks have never tasted better. I guess outlawing alcohol was the best move for the businesses."

"Certainly. Never thought illegal activity could be anymore simple."

Two stylish women sat at a bar in downtown Canterlot. The bar was a small one, cozy and welcoming. The bartender was cleaning his glasses and talking with another patron. Unlike many bars in the capital, this one refused to obey the newly established laws against the serving of alcohol. Because of this, the bar was always full. However, there was another reason so many fine men and women were present.

The signs could be seen if one was observant. The bartender was flashing a fancy golden ring. Some patrons dressed identically with another and their coat pockets sagged with pistols. Some of the tables had elaborate carvings of broad crosses. The women's restroom was always unused and empty, leaving it to be a private location. This was more than a simple bar, this was a Templar hideout.

"My, my, Sister, drinking that fast and you'll be out like a light," one of the stylish women said to the other.

"You know that it is hard for me to become drunk. I've practiced the art of drinking for many years."

"Yes you have."

One of the women was a bit taller than the other. Being attuned with the fashion of the time, they were glossy black high heels, long one-piece dresses, nude-colored panty hoes, long black evening gloves, and their hair was pinned up. To finish it off, they each wore a small hat, but these were placed on the bar counter. Their bright red lips were turned up in smiles as they talked.

"Do you girls need anything?" the bartender asked them. 

"Not at the moment, but thank you," the taller one said. "Maybe you could help us in a way?"

He leaned on the bar and listened. "What ya need?"

"Well, we love gossip," the smaller one explained. "We love it. Usually the bartenders know a thing or two. You know, little snips of information."

"I would love to, but sorry sweethearts, in this place, gossip's only reserved to a select few," he shrugged casually.

"May the Father of Understanding guide you," the taller sister whispered.

"Ah, so you are Templar," he nodded. "Well, what ya need to know?"

"It's about Grandmaster Hopkins," the taller sister said. "He seems to have some wild plans. I've only heard things, but never had any confirmation. It seems he wants to start a business, no?"

"You are right, girl," he said. "The Grandmaster thinks we should start a major business to earn some respectable money. I don't think he's decided what kind of business. I would go into banking, but that's just me."

"The Templar should go with the gangsters and sell booze," the smaller one chuckled. "There's money in that."

"Aye, but I think the Sons of Discord have already jumped on that bandwagon," the bartender explained. "Why are ya gals so out of the loop? 

"Failure to communicate, that's all," the smaller chuckled. "And my sister and I have been dealing with issues."

"Hm, your missions been going poor?" he asked.

"Not really. However, it seems things are getting rougher out there," the taller one remarked. "Canterlot is getting more dangerous with each passing day."

The bartender chuckled and said something, but neither sister heard him. They both felt a disturbance outside, in front of the bar's entrance. A running engine rattled outside, car doors slammed shut, and several clicks of expensive shoes echoed on the sidewalk. The sisters weren't the only patrons on edge. Some of the men pushed their women back and slowly drew their pistols out of their coat pockets. 

After the initial noise, there was a brief moment of silence. The two sister glanced knowingly at each other. The taller sister reached under the skirt of her dress, where a pistol was strapped to her thigh. The bartender gave them confused looks, as he still was oblivious to what was about to happen. 

"Why you gals on edge all of-"

Both front windows shattered as bullets screamed in. Bottles, tables and signs were all shattered by the flying lead. The two sisters threw themselves over the bar and to cover. The bartender was one of the first to fall and his body fell limp on the floor, riddled with bullet holes. The Templar in the bar returned fire, but it was nothing compared to the machine gun fire that rained upon them. 

Not even the screams of the unfortunate women could be heard over the deafening gunfire. Tables were broken in pieces, the pool table crumbled as one of its legs was sawed in half. Hundreds upon hundreds of bullets filled the once cozy bar. The two sisters could only hunker down as sharp glass from the bottles fell on them. However, they would rather have simple glass cut them than the alternative bullets that ripped through the patrons.

The taller sister poked her head a little to see that they were the only ones left. The men and women were sprawled on the floor, letting their oozing crimson blood slide along the wooden boards. Some had tried to turn the tables for cover, but the old wood was no protection against the enemy. She did not have her head up for long as the bullets still screamed in with terrifying speed.

After this attack, the guns ceased firing. All the noise was suddenly gone, leaving the two sisters' ears ringing. There were no sounds until some hard clangs against the pavement could be heard. It was no doubt the intruders reloading their weapons and letting their drum magazines simply hit the ground. 

The door was forcefully kicked open and some enemies cautiously entered. Their shoes stepped on the bits of glass, making crackling sounds. Even their breathing could be heard by the two living sisters. The enemies stopped moving and stood in their positions as another came walking in.

"Oh my! Such poor, poor Templar!" a man with an accent cackled. "Thought they were safe here, didn't they? Such is always their mistake."

"I think the bar's clean, my Lord," a gruff woman's voice said.

"Don't worry, it's not in the slightest, my dear. There's two behind the bar," the leader laughed.

This caused the the two sisters to spring up and point their pistols at the goons. They pointed at five people, two of which were women. The goons raised their Tommy guns back at the sisters, but neither side fired. The lead man, who was wearing a mismatching suit and carrying a bent cane, chuckled deviously. His yellow and red eyes displayed immense amusement.

"Celestia! Lulu!" he called to them. "After all this time? I should have known I would have found you in a bar, drinking your ancient lives away, hehe."

"Leave us be, Discord!" Celestia threatened. "You know bullets don't exactly scare us."

"Don't lie to me, Tia. With me here, you are no more invulnerable than the dead Templar on the floor." He gestured at one gaping woman.

"What do you want?" Luna demanded.

"Why the hostility? I just saved you some work," he chuckled. "Is this how you treat an old friend? In your years, I see you two have become crabby. What finally pushed you over? Was it the Griffon War? Was it the Gas Era? Please, I would love, simply love to know."

"We weren't going to kill these Templar, Discord!" Celestia said. "We were about to retrieve some important information from the bartender. But you just come in here and shot him dead!"

"Me?" Discord gestured at himself with a mangled hand. "I didn't shoot a single bullet. Vinyl must have shot him."

The woman next to him who was wearing a black wooden mask and had bright blue hair shrugged. "Sorry, I guess? These guns aren't too accurate."

"Enough foolery!" Luna slammed the bar with her fist. "Discord, your Sons and Daughters do nothing but drive everyone back! We both have a common enemy, but you don't see it that way. Why is it that you believe you and your Chaotic family are against the world? Do you Fear having allies?"

"I'm sorry, Lulu, but what's that ring on your finger indicate?" he pointed a gold ring that both sisters wore. "Yes, those rings are Templar rings. You two are proud Templar. You even say so yourself. Here we have Celestia, the Bearer of Wisdom, the grand Father of Understanding. The very deity the Templar Order worship. Then we have Luna, the Bearer of Fear, the second-in-command. You see, we are no allies and never will be. You represent Order, we represent Chaos. Just like the good ol' days when the Assassins represented Harmony and the Templar represented Absolute Order. To ally ourselves would break the boundaries of nature. Even though I love change, there are some things better left the same."

"Our Order is a beneficial one, not the filth the modern Templar have turned it into," Luna replied. 

"And simply because I am the Father of Understanding, doesn't mean the Order listens to me," Celestia also said.

"Sounds like tough luck for you two," Vinyl chuckled. "Now I'm gettin' bored with all this 'higher cause' talk. Time to do what we actually wanted to do."

The four Sons of Discord pulled the triggers of their machine guns and fired at the sisters. The sisters ducked back under cover. Luna, using the powers of the Element of Fear, vanished into a shadow. Celestia, using her Element, caused the room to become severely bright, making the attackers close their eyes in pain.

"Welp, time for a show," Discord whispered.

Luna formed back next to a Son. She grabbed him and placed him in between her and the other attackers. His body was soon riddled with bullets from his allies. A magical blast from her hand sent the Tommy guns flying out the attackers' hands. 

Vinyl growled and lunged at the Bearer of Fear. Two hidden blades appeared from under her suit's sleeves. Luna dodged the first vicious swipes. Seeing an opening in the attacks, she grabbed the former Assassin and expertly threw her into a table. Vinyl grunted and cursed as she fell over.

The other Daughter of Discord rolled her black sleeves up, showing that she had no hidden blades. Her skin started to darken into an inorganic material. Almost all of her forearms were metallic.  Luna was not surprised at all by the magic of the Daughter. She simply stood back and prepared for the Daughter to make a move.

"A shard user?" she mocked. "I thought better of you, Discord."

"No you didn't, Lulu," he said.

"You're right."

The shard user swung her small, but heavy fist, chipping off a piece of the wall. Luna was having trouble finding fighting room in the small bar, but she dared not go on the streets. This fight was not meant for public eye. 

The user swung once more and missed again. Celestia aimed her pistol and fired three times at the Daughter. All three hit, but ricocheted off the metal skin.  The shard user reacted by throwing an insult at the older sister, giving the younger a window of opportunity.

Luna sent the user flying with a magic push. The young woman tumbled over, but got up almost instantly. Even though she was metallic, she was still as flexible and mobile as ever. She raised her metal hand up. Luna was unsure of the reason for the odd action, but she took no chances and dissipated into shadow. A metal spike sprung from the floor where she was standing. It was long and thin and was sharp enough to pierce the ceiling above. If she did not act so quick, Luna would have undoubtedly been in for a terrible fate.

Celestia fired a beam of light at the user. The power sent the metal woman into the wall, where she made a large dent and cracked the brick. Her bright red eyes flashed with hatred as she got up. Almost all her clothes were burned away by the intense light, showing even more of her shiny metallic skin. 

"That's the last you'll get of me!" she growled.

Luna appeared again from the shadows. She watched the Daughter with patience. Whoever was to move first was going to lose. Celestia crept up beside her sister and they faced off against the metal woman. Discord relaxed on a riddled chair, watching the show. The only other Son was on the ground, groaning from a wound Celestia had given him.

"Yehay!" 

The metal woman pounced forward. Her shiny fist was leading the way with dominating force. The sisters simply sidestepped out of the deadly path. Before the shard user could recover from her own mistake, Celestia blinded her with a flash of light, making her scream in pain. Luna then grabbed her from behind and placed a glowing hand on the woman's face.

The woman's body began to shake violently as if electricity was flowing through her. Luna kept the hand on her face, sending all sorts of horrors into her mind. The woman's screeching came to a violent halt when the back of head exploded, sending out blood and brains over Luna's shoulder. Celestia grimaced at the violence and watched her younger sister let the body fall on the floor with an intense clang.

"Bravo, bravo!" Discord clapped. 

The sisters gracefully walked towards Discord. However, the violent shout of Vinyl stopped them. The masked woman came at them again. One of her swipes with the wrist blades was successful, cutting into Celestia's arm. The Bearer of Wisdom winced, but was unfazed. Both sisters pushed her back into the wall with their magic. Vinyl tried to recover, but the pain was too much and she collapsed unconscious. 

"Ah, good ol' Vinyl," Discord chuckled. "Doesn't know when to quit."

"We have defeated your insane minions," Celestia said. "I think it's time for you to go with them."

Both sisters raised their pistols at the Lord of Chaos. He leaned back in his chair and waited for them to fire. The sisters did not hesitate and pulled the triggers. Confetti burst harmlessly from the barrels and lightly sprinkled on the Bearer of Chaos. No reaction came from the three of them.

"Should have known..." Celestia sighed. 

"What's the matter? Go ahead, shoot me!" he laughed. 

Like he asked, they fired again, only to have small flags come out that said the word "BANG" on them. Celestia was about to giggle, but composed herself in time. It would have been inappropriate to laugh at such a time. Instead, she took a deep breath and kept her false emotions.

"Your mission of gunning us down has failed," she said dramatically. "Try harder next time."

"Of course, of course," he smiled. "I'll bring bigger guns, more men, and a truckload of hookers. If that doesn't do the trick, well then I'm stumped. Have fun hunting down whatever scumbag opposes your viewpoints. Tell Grandmaster Hopkins I said hello."

"You know he wants to start a business, don't you?" Celestia asked.

"Tia!" Luna whispered. "That's our informa-"

"That's rather interesting. He's finally going the ol' capitalistic route. I'm quite proud. I hope it goes well. More business equals more money which means more of a challenge. I love challenges. It's a good way to keep the war going and to keep Chaos in this world. As long as there are Templar, the Sons of Discord will be here."

"And we'll continue to hunt down your Survivors of Chaos," Luna growled. "Those men and women are but animals under your Chaos. They are not salvageable. Once you give them red eyes, they are no longer human."

"Sounds like you're generalizing. How rude," Discord chuckled. 

Luna huffed and started to leave. Celestia was a bit confused by her sister's sudden departure. She gave one last glance at the Lord of Chaos before following her sister out. However, before she left for good, she took one of the only unharmed bottles of booze. 

As the sirens of the police rung through the streets, the two sisters quietly walked side-by-side on the sidewalk. Their dresses were ripped, their hair undone, and their shoes missing, but they kept a regal composure. Blood trickled down Celestia's arm and pieces of flesh were on Luna's dress, but neither seemed to care.

"So, what 'scumbag that opposes our views' is next on the list?" Luna asked quietly.

"The list is quite long, Sister."

"It always is..."


~.~.~.~

> Chapter VII: Erebus
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was a cool and rough morning. Due to my awful night of sleeping, I was the last one up. And as usual, that meant that Vinyl simply threw me out of my bed and dragged me to the van. I went through her slight abuse with silence. My head still wandered in some lucid daydream. To put it plainly, I was out of it and I did not want to tell a soul about my peculiar dreams.

Baltimare was not long down the road. As I played with a knife in the back of the van, I could only think about my dreams. There was no doubt in my mind that the bar scene had really happened. Those two women were definitely the same Celestia and Luna from both history and Octavia's writings. It also went right along the timeline. Ahuizotl Industries did not start as "Ahuizotl Industries" but as "Hopkins Incorporated." The whole business was founded nigh on 100 years ago. So if it did happen, which I was certain, I could pinpoint it to the months and maybe even weeks of the year. I was an expert on ancient history, but my general history was pretty good too.

Still, it was hard to picture Vinyl going through all these generations. I saw her in my dream, sounding no different than she was now. I never saw her face and only that iconic mask she kept wearing. Talking about the mask, I only saw her wear it a couple of times, including the time when we first met in the Canterlot street those months ago. Yeah, that moment still creeped me out.

However, what haunted me the most was Luna. She was the Bearer of Fear, so this didn't surprise me. The dream made it seem that the Two Sisters were hunting agents of Chaos. I was an agent of Chaos, so they would go for me too, right? Even though I had been augmented by the Elements of Harmony, I doubted that I could stand against them for more than two seconds. They were powerful beings, Discord and the other Bearers, and I was just a pawn in their eternal games. I didn't like being a pawn.

The dream also made me think, how much hurt did this secret war cause? How much destruction is from the hands of Templar or Sons? If the Sons were the head of the gangsters of that era, that was a lot of bloodshed right there. Those shootings like the one I witnessed were a nightly occurrence in both Canterlot and Manehatten. If they created Chaos on lower levels like that, how many Chaotic events had they triggered. Every disaster, natural and unnatural, swarmed to my head. I was trying to find ways that either faction could have caused such devastation. With the shards and Elements involved, everything seemed possible.

I slapped myself to clear my head, much to the bewilderment of Scootaloo. Her dark hood made a sound as she turned to me, watching me with her red eyes. What was going through her head? I did not know. The longer I looked at her paler complexion, her glowing eyes, and her lust of violence, I saw less and less of a human. Best way to describe it was that she became more savage the more I realized how much death she was responsible for. Was she insane? Was she simply lost? Was this my future? I did not want to find the answer to any of the questions.

"What's wrong?" she asked with sincerity.

"Nothing. Nothing at all," I answered absently.

"Um...alright then?"





Baltimare was just like how I last visited it. Warm, humid, and windy. We did not go deep into the massive city, so I was not treated to seeing the skyscrapers that graced downtown. The suburb we stopped at was innocent enough; full of people, shops, and peddlers on the street corners. With lots of junk cars lining the streets, our trashy van was not out-of-place in the slightest. 

With the afternoon sun above us, we stepped out of the parked van and into what was some sort of tiny park. It had a crumbling fountain, bushes and trees that were mostly dying, concrete trails with holes in them, and a small lake with dozens of birds around it, making all sorts of shouts and honks. Hardly any people were present in this park, but those that were were smoking joints and lounging around on the surprisingly decent looking benches. Some of them were parents and they watched their children play on a little playground that brought the public area some needed color. 

We placed ourselves under a low tree with a hundred branches. Vinyl was texting on her phone and so was Neon. I was a bit confused by how we weren't speaking with each other, but they seemed to be doing something important, so I said nothing. I leaned on the old tree and checked some things on my phone before returning it to my pocket.

"They're here," Vinyl told us. 

As she said this, two young men walked up to us. One was wearing a white hoodie that seemed a little small for him. His jeans were loose and muddied. He wore high top shoes of an expensive sport brand. Bleached long white hair flowed out from the back of his long neck. He was pale all around except his burning blue eyes that seemed to be the only spot of real color on him. To finish him off, he had a snowflake tattoo on the right side of his neck. 

The other guy was much more colorful. He had a thick curly blue beard and thick glasses. His plaid shirt was sagging on one side. The shirt's sleeves were rolled up in a lazy fashion with one side being rolled up much higher than the other. His skinny jeans were lined with black belts at the waist. He walked with much more confidence in his converse shoes and appeared all around happier than his companion.

"Hey guys," Vinyl greeted them. "How's preparation been?"

"Good!" the blue one smiled. "And it's great to see you guys once more!"

"Nice to see ya, Vinyl," the white one nodded his head slowly. "Who's that?"

He pointed right at me. I took a step forward and was not going to let Vinyl introduce me again. I walked up to the two guys and shook their hands. The white one had much stronger hands than the blue one, but I made no comment on this and simply smiled.

"I'm A. K. Yearling, these guys just call me 'Akay.'" 

"I'm Party Favor, but most just call me 'Favor.' Nice to meet you!" the blue one beamed.

"I'm Double Diamond," the white one said, showing a tongue ring. "Welcome to the world of hackers."

"Thanks," I was uncertain of how to take that. "I'm guessing you two are Erebus?"

"Yes," Favor nodded. "And with the Sons of Discord, we should get Starlight out of prison easily."

"Starlight? Is that the cracker?" I asked.

"Yup, she's been a real friend to us," Double Diamond said. "We haven't seen her in a long time. I hope she doesn't think we've abandoned her."

"Well she will if we don't hurry," Vinyl interrupted. "Listen, we'll doing this for Lemon Zest in Canterlot. She needs Starlight's expertise. She's not sure how long Ahuizotl is gonna keep their precious little container in the capital, so we better get moving. Have ya found the prison's generators?"

"Yes!" Favor answered excitedly. "We've got the place all lined out. We've marked patrols by using security footage and have the names of the guards that are stationed there. We know who is a rookie and who is a ten year veteran."

"And the police uniforms?" 

"We couldn't get guard uniforms, but we got two officer ones this morning."

And that was all that was said about the uniforms. I didn't want to know how they acquired the uniforms. The two did not look like murderers in the slightest, but  then again, Scootaloo's cute face would say the same thing and I've seen her gut more than one guy. Talking about their appearances, I could see myself in a police uniform. I'd probably look quite dashing. However, I was Normal Norman compared to Vinyl. 

"Uh, Vinyl?" I asked. "You know you don't look like one that would be in a police force, right?"

"Yeah, I do," Vinyl shrugged. "And your hair is too long to be in one as well. We're gonna head over to the Erebus hideout nearby and get cleaned up."





The Erebus hideout was not any better than our hideout in Manehatten. It seemed the same size, but with all the clutter, it certainly felt much smaller. Just like ours, there were monitors, computers, TVs, and microwaves. They had hardly any lamps and most light came from the monitors themselves. The real difference was that this hideout was not underground at all. It did not even have a basement. Also unlike ours, it was not a garage, but a small house in the urban ghetto. Heh, all the Baltimare vacation advertisements failed to mention all the poor neighborhoods that were farther inland. All the rich parts were by Horseshoe Bay.

Favor acted like we all already knew the place like the back of our hands and did not even give us a short tour. We put our bags on the L couch and then Scoots pushed me and Vinyl into the bathroom. She forced me into a wooden chair right in front of the mirror. Only then did I realize how bad I looked. I still had bags under my eyes and my lack of makeup was certainly showing my recent stress. 

"I look old..." I muttered.

"And I don't look a day over 25!" Vinyl laughed.

"But weren't you in your thirties when ya became a Survivor?"

"Alright, I don't look a day over 30?" she shrugged.

"Time to turn you two social rejects into police officers!" Scoots clapped her hands.

Now, she still had her twin blades on her back. With the amount of craziness that had happened, I was suspected she would use those two swords to cut my hair. My eyes widened as she took all my long hair into her hand.

"You aren't going to use your swords to cut that, right?" I hesitantly asked.

"Of course not," Scoots chuckled.

"Thank goodness..."

"I have a hidden blade!"

She activated her wrist blade and lobbed off a good six inches of my hair.  The thick hair made an audible thump on the floor, even over my restrained squealing. I looked at Scoots in the mirror.

"My hair!"

"Don't ya worry, Akay, Scoots is a good stylist."

"I am," Scoots nodded.

"Oh yeah? Where did ya learn to do that?"

"Actually when I was a teenager. Babs Seed would cut Neon and his crew's hair. When Vinyl and Neon would bang every night on the Ragnarok, I hung out with Babs."

"Babs? Who is she?"

"She gave Tavi and I a tour of the ship when we first joined Rainbow's crew," Vinyl said.

"Oh yeah...that girl. Is she a Survivor too?"

Scoots shrugged. "None of us know what happened to her. My guess would be she had a pretty short life since she starting drinking heavy when she was just like fourteen. Rainbow shouldn't have shown her so much cider."

"Another death story added to the list," I grunted. "You guys must have tons of them."

"Perks of being immortal," Vinyl laughed. "I've seen hundreds come and go. It's kinda odd seeing a guy get born, then how he lived his life, be it good or bad, and then how he dies. Yet nothing really changes with you."

"I'm just another story you guys are watching isn't it?" I gulped.

"Well, if ya keeping refusing to become a Survivor, yeah it is."

I didn't like it when she brought that up. By now it was nothing to me but irritating, annoying, and exhausting to listen to. So I did not reply to her and sat in silence while Scoots chopped my hair and styled it to a hairstyle that was the standard of Equestrian policewomen. This included shorter hair was knotted into a small bun. I had always been one for the ponytail or long hair look, so this style was pretty new to me.

The standard was to also have one's hair black. I never understood this rule, but my only guess it was because of all the natural hair colors colliding. I had mostly black in my hair, but I also had gray highlights that I was born with. So Vinyl and I both had our hair dyed. It was a little messy, but Scoots hummed and sang while she did it, so it was obvious she had done this many times before.

Vinyl was almost unrecognizable with the hair change. I never realized how dominating her spiky blue hair was until I saw her black short hair. If it was not for her red eyes, I would have mistaken her for someone else entirely. Once we were both done, we cleaned up and put on the uniforms Favor had gotten us. Surprisingly, it fit rather well. The dark blue shirt and pants were my length and width. Scoots helped me and Vinyl into our uniforms and we went out to see the guys.

"Lookin' spiffy," Neon remarked upon seeing us. "Never thought me girl Vinyl could clean up like that."

"Don't get used to it," Vinyl chuckled.

"I'll get everything ready," Favor said. "It's time to give them a licking."

I was not expecting him to say that so soon. My only guess was that Vinyl did not want to waste any time at all, so we were already going to start on our daring "rescue" of Starlight Glimmer. To be honest, I was pretty dang nervous about it all. Freeing a prisoner from a top prison like Baltimare Bay? Yeah right.  As we armed ourselves and prepared to leave, I could only pray that this was worth it. We grabbed our guns, our blades, and our hacking tools. All to prepare to kill any poor sod that stepped in our way. 


*.*

> Chapter VIII: Baltimare Bay
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The prison was much bigger than I had expected. I mean, I had never been to a prison before, so who could blame me? It was just like in the pictures I had seen. It was just much, much larger. As we drove up to it, I could not help but feel that our plan would go horribly awry. We were about to break into a prison to get one cracker! I didn't care how valuable she was, my life was on the line here. I very much deserved to be in that prison, but that didn't mean I wanted to end up in there.

Vinyl bobbed her head as we went down a hill towards it. We were not in the stupid van, but a patrol car. One again, I was ignorant about how the two Erebus guys stole it, but it was probably the same way they acquired the uniforms she and I wore. Whoever "Patty Rosebud" was that was on my ID, well, rest in peace you magnificent nobody.

"Are you sure we'll get close?" I asked Vinyl. "I mean, they'll know that we're impostors."

"Of course they will," Vinyl rolled her eyes. "Neon and the Erebus guys are by the generator that's way over there. Once we get somewhat close, it'll be an abuse. All we need to do is hack into gate after killing the guards and close it before anyone really notices."

"They have cameras..."

"I'll take care of them. You hack the guards and their communications."

I took up one of the silenced rifles that was behind us in the backseat. I put the magazine in and put one in the chamber. Yeah, this was about to be turned into a cop-slayer. This made me gulp. It wasn't the gun's fault in the slightest. All blame belonged to who pulled the trigger. That made me gulp again.

"Do...Do I have to kill the guards?"

"I can't have all the fun," she laughed. "If ya don't fire, they'll kill ya. If ya fire, they'll be too dead to kill ya. We'll try to kill only the ones in our way. If any surrender, we'll let them surrender. We aren't coldblooded murderers."

"You make no sense..."

"And that's exactly why I'm great at what I do."

With a roll of my eyes, I placed a wireless headset on my head and adjusted it so that it would fit comfortably. The mic part was also adjustable and I messed with it until it was at a good angle to the right of my lips. 

"Testing?" I said.

"We hear ya," Neon said from somewhere else. "You about there?"

"Yes," I answered. "Give us maybe two minutes.

"Aye."

"Lock and load my gun too, will ya?" Vinyl asked. 

I did it without saying anything. She was still driving, but she was preparing just like I had been. I wasn't comfortable with that as she was already a bad driver when she was entirely focused. I didn't say anything and let her do it. I actually wouldn't have mind if we crashed right then and there.

However, we didn't. As much as I hoped and prayed, we kept getting closer to the prison. In a way, I felt like I was heading straight to where I belonged. Of course I didn't want to go there in the slightest. However, if I stayed there, I felt like I'd probably accept it as what I deserved. Where was my innocence in all this? Yeah, just as dead as the Brotherhood alright.

We crossed the field and were entering the danger zone. Everyone knew where we were now. We were so close that I could see the faces on the guards that watched us from their towers. They didn't seem suspicious of us yet, but they would soon. Some, if not most of these faces I saw were not going to see their families again. 

Vinyl began to whistle to the tune that played on that damn radio. She was so calm and collected. It made me disgusted. She'd been doing stuff like this for hundreds of years. I doubt she cared anymore. Just fight the Templar and please Discord. Yup, what a sad life, I must say.

The patrol car slowed down as we stopped at the first checkpoint. If everything was going to plan, Neon and the Erebus duo would be at a power station ready to cut all energy off from the prison. This was it. There was no conceivable way we could get beyond this point without being straight up caught or being shrouded in substantial amounts of suspicion. 

"We can't make a move until Neon shuts the power off," Vinyl whispered to me. 

"They are not going to let us through," I told her.

"Not willingly," she chuckled. "How good are ya drive by shooting skills?"

"You're only asking me that now?" I growled.

"Well, look at the place. It's got wide spaces with those sniper towers. We picked a patrol car for a reason."

"Oh no..."

"Oh yes," she grinned.

"Please show IDs!"

I expected a guard to be there with his hand up, but instead it was a speaker at the left of the closed gate. The voice sounded a bit computerized and it made me think there wasn't a guy actually speaking to us. I was pulling out my badge, but stopped when I say Vinyl just sitting there. Her lips were moving, but nothing was leaving them. I could read her lips and she was counting down. 

"Please show-" the speaker was shut off.

Vinyl nudged me. "We're ready."

"Wait, that's it?" I panicked. We aren't even inside!" I gestured at the closed gate before us.

"Not yet. The entire prison is probably going crazy at the moment. It'll take a little bit and then this gate will swing right open for us."

"I thought we were just shutting off the power?"

"Naw, we need more advantage than that. I mean, did ya really think we were gonna march right in here and blast 200-something guards up by ourselves? That's be fun and all, but tedious. We're hackers, we don't turn things off for good, just turn them to our side."

When she finished this, the gate slowly started to move to the side. The inside of the walls was in disarray. Teams were being mobilized to certain parts of the prison. It was at this moment I realized why we were in police uniforms. All this Chaos was happening. No one cared about Vinyl and me strutting our stuff through the prison! 

"Let them have it, baby," Neon's voice sounded through the speaker.

Vinyl calmly drove into the prison and we sort of just watched the guards go about. I trusted Vinyl to lead me to a possible route to Starlight's cell. Vinyl suddenly stopped the car and looked at my rifle, I presumed making sure it was ready for immediate combat.

"Get out, I'm leaving this here for quick access," she explained.

We both exited the patrol car with our rifles in hand. Now, if one took time to notice us, they'd probably be wondering about the silencers on our rifles. From what I saw, the guards were using riot shields or shotguns. 

"Why are they panicking like that?" I asked.

"Neon was supposed to release the male inmates," Vinyl said. "The prison is one side female and one side male. We need the men to take all the attention."

That had to be some party. Vinyl and I made our way to the women's side of the prison, entering through a small exit door that was unlocked by Neon. I raised my rifle and swiftly moved through the prison. Every security door was being opened right before we reached it and soon we were deep enough to start seeing cells. 

"Any clue where Starlight is?" I asked in my headset's microphone.

"In Cell Block C apparently," was the answer from Double Diamond. 

"Woo, that's helpful since I don't even know where I am!" I barked.

"If ya paid attention ya jackass, you would know!" Vinyl scolded me.

"If you didn't have the most boring plan meetings, I wouldn't have dozed off!" I shot back.

"Get ya ass moving before I put a round in it!"

"Fine!"

We somehow found the control room for this particular cell block we were in. From the signs, I gathered this was Cell Block A. In the control room were three men who were desperately trying to regain power. Well, one was actually trying to do something, the other two were simply yelling at each other.

"Are we really gonna have to use the land lines?" one shouted angrily.

"If you didn't spill your coffee, it would still work!" another yelled.

"My coffee didn't break the computers, you moron! That's just a joke in the movies!" the third one snarled.

"Put 'em down," Vinyl whispered to me.

I took a deep breath and kicked open the control room's door. They did not even have a time to react before I pulled the trigger three times. Tink! Tink! Tink! Their bodies fell across the control panel before falling to the carpeted floor. Vinyl lowered her weapon and jogged over to the large computer. 

"Neon, let us in," she said in the coms.

The computer then turned on, revealing everything about the cell block. With a few clicks of the keyboard, she brought up the security cameras in the men's side of the penitentiary. Needless to say, all Tartarus was let lose. full riot teams were blocking the hallways and inmates were being beaten down in every way possible. 

"How long will that last?" I asked.

"Twenty minutes I bet," Neon said. "Ya better hurry."

"Let's go, Akay," Vinyl moved past me. 

I followed her tightly. While my hand was placed on her shoulder, I trailed her through the prison. She most definitely knew where to go, so I kept silent and just did my duty. 

"I'm not sure which exact cell holds her yet,"Party Favor said. "It looks like you two will come across some resistance."

"Six guards on bottom level. You two are on second floor. You'll have a nice view of 'em," Neon informed us.

We opened a door and entered Cell Block B. Vinyl signaled for me to go to the left while she went straight ahead. Inmates in their still closed cells watched us with confusion. One woman was leaning on her cell door with an eyebrow raised at me.

"What's goin' on?" she asked me.

"None of your business," I snapped back and aimed my rifle at the guards below us. 

"Wait a second, you don't work here, do you?" she pestered.

"How observant of ya," I sarcastically replied. 

I looked over and saw Vinyl give me the signal to fire. I aimed and fired at the unsuspecting guards below. My first shot knocked one guard straight to the ground. Vinyl took two out before I could even take my next shot. I would say we shot about ten rounds in total in less than a few seconds. In that tiny amount of time, they were all downed.

"It's a break-in!" the women gasped and they leaned on their doors to look at us.

"We're only here for one," I said. "Don't get ya hopes up."

"Sorry to tell ya this, lasses, but I think they know they've been hacked into," I heard Neon's voice in my ear. "They've deployed two helicopters from the nearby airbase." 

"Are you serious?" I asked him.

"Oh yeah. DD and Favor are packing up. We can't get caught in the open like this. This power station has no hidin' places. I'm unlocking all doors. Ya going on blind, lass."

"Damn!" I heard Vinyl yell and gestured at me. "Let's move!"

Together, we rushed onward. The prisoners continued to watch us and yell questions at us, but we ignored them entirely. No more sneaking, no more acting, just run and gun. Since we knew Starlight was in Cell Block C, we made no stops until we ran all the way there.

Upon entering Cell Block C, we found a couple more guards to gun down. I was having mixed emotions still even though my adrenaline was spiking. So far, there had not been as many cop killing as I had expected, but my number was reaching ten guards slain. One was too much and I had bypassed that number ten freakin' times.

"Wait, if Neon unlocked all the doors-?"

Vinyl cut off my questions with a violent hush. "Don't let them hear you."

Vinyl made a sudden stop. She looked at the prisoners and then moved on. It was obvious she was checking every cell individually for our special little cracker. I tried to help, but I was not sure how Starlight looked. I knew she had purple hair, but then again, so did a lot of the inmates.

"Starlight!" Starlight?" Vinyl started to yell. "Where are ya?"

"Starlight Glimmer, it's the Sons!" I shouted in the attempt to help.

"Shut ya pipe!" Vinyl snapped at me. 

"Hello, girls!" I heard a confident voice utter from a level above us.

"That's her," Vinyl told me. "Let's get up there."

Since most normal people would take the stairs, we instead stood on the railing of the cell level and jumped to the level above us. I was a bit rusty in my climbing skills, so it was harder for me then it should have been. However, we both made it cleanly and were now standing in front of the cracker's cell.

"Wow, see you got fresh meat," the inmate smiled at me.

Starlight was a few inches shorter than me and much, much skinnier. Her purple hair with a few green highlights were tied back in one long ponytail. Her orange outfit's sleeves were rolled up, revealing a tattoo sleeve for each arm. The sleeves did not end until they reached her knuckles. She had an angled face like a fox and conniving eyes. Another with common sense would avoid this person out of safety concerns alone. Of course, the Sons had no common sense or any sense, so she was worth rescuing in our idiotic eyes.

"Here, let me get ya out," Vinyl acted like she unlocked the cell door, but in reality simply slid it open. 

"Finally!" Starlight beamed. "I was starting to think this'll never happen."

"Well, we need ya," Vinyl chuckled.

Starlight frowned. "So this wasn't because you liked me?"

"Not really..." Vinyl gave a dry laugh.

"Hehe, thanks anyway!"

"Ya not out yet, cracker," Vinyl handed her a pistol. "In case the exit is harder than the entry."

"Oh! Perfect!" Starlight took the gun.

Starlight casually walked in front of the cell next to her and happily raised the pistol, pointing it right at a scared inmate. Then she simply fired the pistol two times, killing the inmate right then and there. No hesitation, no second thoughts. I felt my mouth hang open in shock and it hung there when she giggled at the sight of the now dead woman on the floor. Even Vinyl was a bit taken off guard.

"She was an awful neighbor," Starlight shrugged. "Had a bit of a snoring problem too."

"Whatever," Vinyl huffed, "let's just get the hell outta here."

"Helicopter heading your way," Scoots said. "Gonna see you two soon!"


"We have Starlight, Scoots," I told her. "I didn't know she was so trigger-happy."

"You gave that bitch a gun?" Scoots sighed. 

"Vinyl did it!" I defended myself.

"Well, good luck then. I doubt ya biggest worry is being killed by the guards now..."

"Enough talk! "We need to leave now!" Vinyl barked. 

"I think you two are forgetting to give me something," Starlight said as she ran with us.

"Akay, give Starlight your phone," Vinyl ordered.

"But it's mine!" I protested.

"She'll put it to better use than you can. Just do it!"

I rolled my eyes and tossed my phone to her. She caught it with absolute glee. The craziness in her smile was off the charts. As we made our back through the she had her eyes glued to the electronic screen.

"Who unlocked all the cell doors, yet forgot to open them?" she asked us with a cackle. "Such laziness!"

"Star! Don't ya dare open them up!" Vinyl told her.

"But that'll give every inmate the equal opportunity to escape this place!" Starlight argued. "It's unfair just to let me be free."

"Ya jus' gonna have to live with it," Vinyl looked back at her. "In fact, ya should just lock the doors before they find out!"

"Quiet, Vinyl!" I harshly whispered.

It was too late. The inmates heard us and now swung their doors wide open. They didn't immediately attack us as they knew we were in some way on their side. However, I kept my rifle up and ready as they poured out of their cells, creating congestion in the hallways and delaying us from escaping.

"Out of the way or ya will be shot!" I warned them harshly.

Suddenly, an inmate grabbed my gun and tried to pry it from my hands. I could not even see her face clearly before I shot her. I dug the barrel into her chest and fired. Blood sprayed out and onto my uniform. As the inmate plopped to the ground, the other inmates decidedly to give us more room. 

From one cell block to another we tried to go as fast as we could. I was leading us three with Vinyl right over my shoulder and the giggling Starlight a foot or two behind her. We kept pushing and shoving inmates out of our way, threatening the lot of them that we'll shoot them without hesitation. Without the rifles, we probably would never have been able to escape them.

The final hallway to the exit was not nearly as congested as inmates who saw freedom rushed out through the door at full speed. It sounded like a true battlefield outside. When I ran out of the door and into the bright daylight, I saw that it was, indeed, a battlefield. Inmates of both sexes were on the concrete crying about their new wounds. Some inmates didn't move, so I presumed them dead. Riot squads and snipers in the towers were pinning the escapees expertly. The three of us took cover behind a vehicle to gather our thoughts.

"Scoots, where ya at?" Vinyl asked the coms.

"Be right with you!" Scoots answered.

"Where's the damn helicopter?"

"If ya outside, you should be hearing it right about now."

And we did hear it. The loud engines of the helicopter could barely be heard of the gunfire around us. I had no idea what Scoots was doing, but from Vinyl's angry expression, something was going wrong. 

"How about we wait until they run out of ammunition?" I suggested to the other two.

"That may take too long," Vinyl remarked. "We need to leave before Scoots gets here. That helicopter will-"

"Don't worry, I got the helicopter," Starlight said confidently. "All I need is ten seconds to take it down for good."

"Ugh, we still have to get to the patrol car!" Vinyl grunted.

"Alright, I'll take out the snipers, you and Starlight try to head towards the car," I told them.

"How can we-"

Vinyl didn't answer as I took off down the row of parked vehicles. I set up on a hood and aimed at sniper. He was distracted by the other inmates, so he had no idea I was his biggest threat. With one shot, he was down. I then moved on to another sniper and neutralized him in the same way. 

The third sniper noticed me. I took cover as a large round went over my head and blew a small hole in the concrete. I kept low and walked to another vehicle, hoping he could not see my movements. I peeked over the side on one car and yes, he knew exactly where I was. Another round whizzed by me, striking a side mirror completely off. I sat down then and kept my head as safe as possible.

"There's got to something to help me..." I said as I searched through my gear.

I always tried to prepare like an Assassin. I had an extra magazine, some loose rounds, two throwing knives, and some smoke pellets. I sighed in relief as my preparation paid off. I took the smoke pellets out and threw them at the ground, creating a large cloud of black smoke. I then ran back the way I came and set up immediately, aiming right at him. The sniper was looking around where the smoke cloud was, completely oblivious to my current location. That was his last mistake when I shot him.

"C'mon, Akay! Let's go!" Vinyl yelled at me.

I ran over to her and we all sprinted across the open area. The inmates were severely losing the battle, so we were easily spotted by the riot squad. We were so close now. I was scared more than ever. I just wanted to be in that patrol that instant. Every step felt like a mean trick. I just knew weren't going to actually make it. That was false hope. We were going to get caught and maybe killed, or spend the rest of our lives in this prison.

Well, the riot squad did not react fast enough to us, so we did reach the patrol car. Since we were so well-armed, they did not come for us with the zeal they had for the unarmed inmates. However. they did press towards us. They shouted at us madly. When I reached for my door's handle, I saw the armed guards rush behind the riot shields. It was going to be another gunfight, but this time we were severely outnumbered.

Then I heard the helicopter's engines as the large flying vehicle flew over us. The heavy gunfire that came with the helicopter was not pointed at us, but another familiar individual. The fiery swords of Scoots came into view as she rushed wildly at the riot squad. Shotguns sounded off in pure panic as her flaming blades sliced through the hard plastic shields with ease. Heads, arms, and entire torsos soon flew into the air. The terrible smell of burnt flesh followed almost immediately.

"Scoots! Get in with us!" Vinyl shouted.

"Busy!" she shouted back.

I said something not even I knew and went into the car. Starlight did the same as me, her face glued to the phone screen. Vinyl cursed and got into the driver seat. She stomped on the acceleration, driving us straight into the mob of guards. Blood and smoke was still rising from the mob in startling and disgusting amounts. Shotguns were sliced in half, riot shields were diced up, and the guards were mutilated. 

When Vinyl reached Scoots, she stomped on the brakes, making it swerve crazily. Scoots reacted just in time and hopped on the side of the car, hanging for dear life. As soon as she was on, Vinyl sped up again and we headed out of the prison. Starlight rolled down the window for Scoots, allowing her to climb in after sheathing her swords. We had one main obstacle left. That was the helicopter.

"Couple more seconds," Starlight told us.

Dirt and concrete spat up around us as the helicopter brought its fire down. We were reaching speeds well over a 100. I wanted to lean out and take some shots at the helicopter myself, but the speed and aggression of my driver pinned me to my seat. 

"Star! Get 'em down!" Vinyl yelled.

"Bingo!" the cracker grinned.

It was almost instantaneous. The helicopter's back rotor stopped spinning, sending the whole thing out of control. I watched it fall from the car's side mirror. It spun out and fell so fast. When it met the ground, it began to violently tumble with its momentum. It probably rolled four or five times before stopping. 

"Woo! It's so good being back!" Starlight laughed.

Vinyl high-fived and the three of them celebrated with laughs and cheers as we left the prison in the dust and fire. I was surprised we got away with it. The guards were not even pursuing us. I think I knew the reason for this. I doubted that they had enough living guards to even send after us.

We were an unstoppable army, and we could all fit inside a dumb old van. We were quality over quantity in its finest form. Finest? Heh, I'll reword that. We were quality over quantity in its most terrifying form. If we could barge in a prison and escape with this amount of ease, what couldn't we do?


*.*