“Clear!” Sparky yelled.
Neon and Silver then filled into the room, pneumatic crossbows leveled. They both crossed to the next doorway across the room. They took a moment to gather themselves before Silver opened the next door.
His crossbow swept across the room, and he found nothing. “Clear!” he yelled.
“Contact! Contact!” They heard Sparky yell into his radio.
Silver turned, leaving the room immediately as the team began to file in the hallway back for Sparky.
The sound of thunder roared as flintlock’s fired, and Sparky yelled in pain.
The lights went up, and Spike shook his head. “Sparky, stop running ahead.”
The pegasus growled, sporting a nice red welt covered in fluorescent purple paint. “I’m the scout! I’m supposed to run ahead!”
“You’re supposed to lead,” Spike said from his observation post above the mock building they were raiding, watching along with the other teams. “That means the others should be able to follow you.”
Sparky sent up a long string of curses.
Spike stared down, unimpressed. “Keep whining, but we’re going to keep running this until you can clear a room without getting shot. Gamma, you’re next.”
Silver sighed, before he led the team back up the steps to the observation deck.
Sparky muttered behind him. “It’s not fair. That target wasn’t there the last time.”
“That’s the point,” Silk told him, saving Silver the need to point out the very same thing.
“Yeah, yeah,” he grunted.
Mandible shook his head, obviously not impressed with his teammate.
Gamma got into position below them, and the lights dimmed as the exercise began.
For the past three weeks since the attack, Spike had been drilling them on urban exercises. “This isn’t the good ol’ days,” the Commander had told them, “where vampires took titles like count, and cultists hid in haunted castles. We’re going to find them in warehouses and office buildings. So you need to know how clear a room before they can get a spell off, because you won’t make it if you can’t.”
And so it had begun.
“Ivory! Watch those corners!” Spike ordered as Gamma’s scout dropped to the ground, narrowly avoiding the paintballs that flew over his head.
Chrome Shift, the demo and leader of Gamma team, answered with a timed grenade, bouncing it off the wall and exploding on the target.
“Good move, Chrome,” Spike called.
A shot took down their support in a burst of green paint.
“Thunderwing! Make sure the room is clear. Just yelling clear isn’t going to help anypony!”
The lights went up, and Spike ordered them back up. “You’re not leaving until I get a perfect run, ponies.”
Omega prepared themselves for their next run, as the ponyquin targets and they’re paintball turrets ran on rails to randomize their locations in the building as doors and walls switched up.
Sparky quickly lost interest. He turned from the team down below, and let his gaze wander over to Silk. “So, Silk...you doing anything later?”
She turned and glared at him. “Excuse me?”
“Yeah, tonight. Are you doing anything tonight?”
“Not with you,” she answered.
Neon suppressed a snort.
“Hey, c’mon, don’t be like that babe.”
“Babe?” she repeated.
“Look, I’m sure we can do just fine,” Sparky said, sliding up next to her.
She moved away. “Look, I’m busy...I have...a ton of...training to do. I just can’t.”
“Look, babe,” Sparky continued, “let’s face face, I’m the best looking stallion here, and you’re quite the looker yourself—”
The whine of a TS long rifle sounded, and its barrel pressed against his chest. Whatever Sparky was saying died in his throat, as Silk made her feelings about this perfectly clear.
“Don’t call me a ‘Looker,’” she warned.
“Alright! Alright!” he said, “I get it! You’re busy! I’ll ask another time.”
Silver thought that perhaps the best time was never, but he kept quiet about it. Even if the idea did annoy him in an oddly specific way.
He wasn’t even sure why it annoyed him, but he did have a suspicion that was very quickly growing.
He...well...he might have a crush on Silk.
The thought wasn’t terribly surprising, especially with this sudden burst of annoyance and or jealousy, but still, he wasn’t really sure why.
She was a good mare, he would admit. She was nice, sure. She had a strange obsession with horror movies that he kind of understood. She had saved his life more than a few times during their missions…
And...apparently she was a quote-on-quote “looker.”
Honestly, he was not best judge on looks. He very rarely thought of ponies as “beautiful,” “handsome,” or even “ugly.” He had only the faintest awareness of the spectrum, when it came to his fellow pony. The only ones that really hit any obvious milestones were the Princesses, and well...they were the Princesses.
It was usually a strength of his. As a guard, he was expected to just stand still, regardless of what passed by him. It could have been the royal sisters themselves, and he’d have to stare straight ahead, ever vigilant.
However, if she was beautiful, it would certainly explain this subconscious draw toward her. It would also explain that weird moment in the theater...
Honestly, it made him feel better about this instant flare in his anger towards Sparky. It meant he wasn’t totally irrational, and subject to forces he didn’t truly understand.
He was also very happy to hear that Silver did not want to give Sparky the time of day.
She gave a final snort before she turned back to the exercise going on below them, standing next to Silver as they both stared over the catwalks.
“You don’t like being called a looker?” Silver asked, trying to keep things casual.
“Too many years in too many bars,” she answered.
Silver nodded. “Got it.”
He stood next to her in silence, letting her cool, before speaking again. “The rifle, though? I mean, he deserves a lot, but pulling a gun on him?”
“There is no such thing as overkill,” she answered.
“Well,” Silver began. “I can't really argue with the results.”
She smiled at that. “It’s a good policy,” she told him.
“At times,” Silver agreed. “At times.”
===ᐁ===
It was evening by the time Spike was satisfied with his teams. He let them go, off to enjoy an hour or so before he lights out.
A construction team had come by earlier, having been blindfolded for safety's sake, and began reconstruction on the floors in both A and C, and already things were looking expensive. Once they finished with the first layer of concrete, they’d have to add a layer of silver, which would have been bad enough, but the holes were too deep for a quick job.
He pushed these thoughts aside,and focused on his latest correspondence.
The letter on his desk had come from the Crystal Empire branch of the Department. The Crystal Empire’s branch had always been the experts on cults and other underground gatherings, and Spike quickly turned to them for any information. He was pleased to hear they have been keeping their ear to the ground and they offered all they knew concerning the various Old One cults, vampire worshipers, and necromancer covens that might have had the power to attack the Department.
He had already received information from Griffonstone’s D.S.P.I. equivalent, but they had to offer was that they were dealing with some sort of necromancer.
Spike was very tempted to answer with a letter that simply read, “No, duh.”
At least they told him that he wasn’t dealing with any of their problems. It was unique to their shore.
Between the two, and his own informants, he had narrowed it down to a handful of possibilities. At the top of the list was the Ashen Heart Organization. The Ashen Heart had been around for almost as long as the Department. They had originally tried to take over the world, but they slowly turned to a proper business, selling the...harder-to-get alchemical ingredients only available from the pits of alternate worlds. They had the power, certainly, and it was possible they had the motive, but they has also come to an agreement, and Spike wasn’t sure they were willing to risk that.
Still, it might do well to have a small conversation with the current CEO.
Next on the list was some no-name cult named the Crimson Covenant. It was possible, in terms of motive, but there was no way they could have pulled this off without backing. However, they were the new kids on the block, and that meant they weren’t to be taken lightly.
The Brotherhood of the Astral Skull was another possibility. The Brotherhood have been a problem for a long time. Originally founded by a vampire, the Brotherhood has tried numerous times to gain power for their founder/lord, including, but not limited to, blotting out the sun, trying to assassinate a minor lord and taking his title, and staging a thousand minor crimes across the country to fund an organized crime family.
Of course, Spike made sure to leave them with nothing, but it’s entirely possible that little miss Lily La Croix may have shifted her attention.
That’s how vampires work, after all. Obsession. They shift their focus, and everything becomes about the object of their attention. Even Fluttershy’s personalities suffered from it, and Spike had enough experience in the matter to know well enough. Whether is causing pain, gaining power, an unending unlife of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, vampires obsess.
If Lily decided to obsess about the Department, then she could easily gain the means and motive to attack.
Finally, there was the Followers of Shadow. The Followers were another Necromantic Cult, serving a now dead vampire. They could be responsible, if only because said vampire died by Spike’s own claw. On the other hand, the last time Spike met them, they were little more than a book club, only focusing on bringing the dead back to life, as opposed to reading through the latest romance book.
He didn’t want to rule it out though. It only takes one crazy, charismatic cult leader to redefine the objective, and revenge was always a fire-starter.
He sighed, before running through the list again. The Ashen Heart, the Covenant, the Brotherhood, and the Followers. Anyone of them could be responsible. Or it could be another organization, one that Spike and his informants hadn’t heard of.
And that scared him more.
If they could keep them out of the ears and eyes of his network, then they were a much bigger problem than the others.
He shifted his attention again to the other programs. Now these were the heavy stuff. The research that had been put into any one of these projects made the concrete and the silver lining look like a paltry sum. These were billions of bits, spent over decades of magical research.
Of these programs, the softer one took a longer time to repair, and the other…
Well, it would be a while, it seemed, before either of them really took off. Though, honestly, it was probably for the best.
The Princess had voiced her concern over these projects several times already, but every time she said anything, Spike returned with the very maxim that was responsible for the Department’s creation. “Better safe than sorry.”
Now that they were about to use them, to bring use their full force to bear, he felt uneasy. He had heard enough discussions about the line that separates the civilized from the monsters, and Spike was sure this began to blur the line.
He sighed, before he muttered his hope. “If we do this quick enough, we won’t have to resort to this.”
That was his only hope now.
===ᐁ===
“One more time, soldiers,” Spike said.
Silver nodded, holding up his pneumatic crossbow, his team at the ready. It was the seventeenth run on the fifth day of their urban breaching training.
“You may begin,” Spike said.
Sparky kicked the door open, pointing left while Silver took the right side. The hiss of firing paintballs sounded from the left, and Silver ducked as a handful of green balls flew over his head, returning a crossbow bolt in answer.
The bolt struck true, and turret went silent.
“Move in!” Silver ordered, and they quickly flooded the room.
Splitting up, they moved to the two other doors in the room, and quickly began to rinse and repeat their way through the compound. Up next to the door, use the wall as cover, scan corner to corner, shoot anything that moves, move on.
Mandible, along with Silver and his team moved into what basically amounted to a living room, when there was the sudden hiss of a paintball gun. “Get down!”
Silver slammed into the changeling, tackling to the ground as the wall to their left exploded into color.
“Did you forget you’re supposed to clear a room?”Silver growled.
“We did clear it!” he answered, before he rolled off the floor into cover. “You were there when we did!”
“And apparently, I can’t trust you!”
“Newsflash! I’m a changeling!” Mandible answered.
Both fired into the target, turning it into a pincushion.
“So I noticed,” Silver sighed. “We’re clear!”
“Clear!” Chestnut answered.
“Clear!” Lemon Bubble sounded.
“All clear!” Silk told them.
And the lights went up. “Good job, Alpha. Good job,” Spike said as he clapped from the observation deck. “Silver, that was good save.”
Silver shrugged.
“Mandible, you should know better, and because of that, you and your team are going to keep running this training all day tomorrow.”
Alpha Team groaned.
“For now, get some rest. Alpha Team, you are dismissed,” the dragon told them, before turning to Omega Team.
Alpha team, meanwhile, was eager to leave. Together, they wandered out of training room 5, moving back towards the mess hall. A few moaned, and groaned as sore joints and limbs complained against the near-constant training they had been facing for almost a full week now.
Yet...Silver stayed silent, his mind elsewhere. It were on the mare in front of him, armed with a very powerful magical heat rifle that could vaporize him given a good hit.
Coincidentally, his eyes were also on the mare in front of him, watching her walk and sway. Yeah...thinking back on it, she does look good, and...well, asking her out wasn’t technically possible, but...he could watch a movie with her...but...well…
He heard a grunt beside him, and turned to see Mandible walking beside him. “What?” Silver asked.
“Look,” Mandible said, “I’m a changeling. I do that whole eating love thing, and let me tell you, I can smell that pre-asking-someone-out nervousness, and yours reeks.”
“Thanks,” Silver grunted.
“Look, look,” Mandible said, shaking his head. “Take me it from me, just ask her, it’ll turn out alright.”
“Says the guy who, moments ago, said I shouldn’t trust him.”
Mandible smirked. “Yeah, well, this statement is false and all that.”
“You’re citing a paradox for your defense?”
“Reductio ad absurdum is a perfectly reasonable logical argument,” Mandible argued. “But seriously, go talk to her. You’re making me nauseous.”
“Yeah, yeah, shut up…” Silver muttered before he sped up, pulling up alongside their sniper. “Hey, Silk.”
“Yes?” she asked.
“You wouldn’t…” he began, “you wouldn’t happen to have any more movies you’d like to watch?”
She blinked, and smiled. “Yeah, yeah. There are a few favorites of mine.”
“Well, would you like me to join you?” Silver asked.
“I wouldn’t mind,” she told him.
“Tonight then?”
“Absolutely.”
And Mandible smiled as he watched.
But Sparky did not.
===ᐁ===
Another few days came and went, and Spike felt that they had recovered enough to begin the offense again.
A knock sounded on his door.
“Come in,” he called.
“Guten Tag, Kommandant,” Butter Streusel said, entering the room. “I am here vis zee report you vanted.”
“Good, good,” Spike said, motioning to a seat. “What did the Organization had to say for themselves?”
“Zey deny eferythink, of course,” she told them. “Zey shpeak of zeir ingredients and zeir perfectly legal operations.”
“And do you believe them?” Spike asked.
Butter shrugged, “It’s possible. I am unsure sough…”
“Any evidence?”
“Nein…” she grumbled.
“Then they’re an innocent business for now.”
She offered nothing else.
“Alright, has Diamond found anything?”
“Perhaps,” Butter began, “I do not know.”
Spike sighed. “Fine, send her in.”
“Hello, Commander,” the vampiric pegasus greeted, accent gone, and a sultry smile on her lips. “It’s been a while.”
“Yes…” Spike agreed. “What have you found?”
“What? No ‘How are you?’ No ‘what have you been doing?’ It’s always business with you, Commander.”
“Diamond…” Spike began.
“I just want to know why I'm getting the cold shoulder, Commander,” she said, fluttering her eyelashes.
“You know why,” he said.
“Oh, come now, Spike, she’s been gone a long time and—”
“Another word about it, Diamond,” he growled, flame flashing from his nostrils, “and you will be in more trouble that you could even begin to imagine.”
Diamond decided not to push her luck. “The Brotherhood isn’t behind the attack. Miss La Croix is too busy running around to get her money back to attack us. She has neither means, nor time.”
“So that leaves the Covenant, and the Followers,” Spike muttered.
“So it does,” Diamond replied.
“Now, which one, is the question,” Spike said, before taking a drag on his cigarette.
“Well, if there was ever a time to find out, it would be now,” the vampire replied.
“What now?”
“The Followers have been moving lately, they’ve found Ceasar De Vile’s tomb.”
Spike raised an eyebrow, before pushing a button on his intercom. “Velvet?”
“Yes, Commander?”
“Send Alpha team to my office.”