Eastern Siberia
12:03 pm
One Month Later...
The sound of helicopter blades thudding echoed over the frozen tundras of Siberia, crews of Russian military joined by United States and German soldiers working in unison to deal with one of the problems the 'aliens' known as ponies and changelings had caused.
The group was traveling to the last known location of King Sombra, a shadowy monstrosity that had devoured an entire Russian base in the middle of Eastern Sibera and began raising large black and purple crystal pillars throughout the area.
New technologies had been invented, and today was to be their field test. Armoring and weapons developed from the hive material that Queen Blue Sun provided combined with other metallic alloys in order to support weapon and armor designs that would have been impossible for the average soldier to wield before the invasions on China and India. The official name of their weapon was roughly translated from Scientist to Soldier as 'Chemical Sprayers', but the soldiers had taken to calling them 'love sprayers', 'portable flirtation devices' and 'third base'.
A soldier tapped Captain Olive on the shoulder, his hand wrapped in cold weather gear like the rest of his body. "Hey, you think these things are actually going to work against the shadow-guy?"
Others seemed interested in Olive's answer, as the former lieutenant had been the only one of them to not only spend time with changelings on a regular basis but also ponies. "Well, judging from what the Princess said, these things should do the trick. King Sombra doesn't care about conventional ammunition, but these things?" He pointed to his Chemical Sprayer with a smirk, "These should do the trick just fine..." His smirk wavered for a second, "Well, in theory."
"And if theory is wrong?" One of the Russian soldiers asked, leaning from his seat towards Olive and his conversing comrade, "What we do then; use harsh language?"
A few Russian and German soldiers chuckled darkly before Olive could reply. "If these weapons don't work, then we'll have to evacuate and try something else." Everyone present knew that their chances of escape were practically zero, judging from the camera footage of the base being overrun by a large malevolent cloud of black fog.
An hour later the leading Russian pilot came on over the soldiers' headsets. "We land in one minute. Be ready for opening doors; pull up scarf and don't lose feet in snow."
"That's a cheery thought," An American commented, "You think this new armor will protect us from windchill?"
Olive tapped his torso plate with his knuckles, a sharp knock sounding out from it like plastic. "Only one way to find out, right?"
The helicopter eventually landed on a frozen lakebed, the rest of the surrounding countryside being trees and mountains that stretched towards the sky covered in snow. The facility was on a hilltop just a few hundred meters away from the squads that assembled outside of their transports, and it wasn't long until the pilots flew off. The once serene landscape had been transformed into an alien visage of black and purple crystals jutting from the frozen ground, the snow melting on contact as dark energies crackled and arched with neon green magics.
Olive was already unsettled. He felt like the ground was watching him, waiting to see what he would do. Pointing a hand towards the waiting facility that was encased in crystal the newly promoted Captain announced, "Spread out, stay in the sight lines of your fellow squads, shout if you hear anything and spray first. There aren't any allies out here and our weapons don't harm humans."
"Da, komandir!" The leader of the Russian solders replied, organizing his own troops with bellowed Russian words.
Olive's own soldiers seemed a bit apprehensive. "You're sure they don't hurt humans? I don't want to melt anyone's face off on accident, especially when we're working with Russians."
The captain nodded and sprayed his own foot. A bright pink liquid coated the outer layer before evaporating a few seconds later. There wasn't even enough liquid left to make his boot wet. "I'm pretty sure they don't hurt humans, Lieutenant."
"The hell is this stuff, really? We can't be shooting love out of this, can we?"
"Explaining it would take longer than we have time for this mission, and I don't want to be caught out in the open talking about purified love if I get killed." Olive gestured once more towards the abandoned base and his soldiers followed suit, now confident that their weapons might actually do something.
Marching through the snow with strange equipment and an unfamiliar environment took a while; the American group being the last to arrive to the now crystallized base. Windows had been covered in a transparent black and the walls were encased in purple. Catwalks had collapsed from the weight of crystals growing on them and a dark cloud loomed over the horizon. After quick searching, no bodies were found. Piles of ash with deformed weapons were scattered around, the only sign that people had been stationed here any time recently.
The arching magical energy had taken a toll on the base as sections of pipe or heating vents had been welded shut from the intense heat the magic gave off. Computers had frozen over only to be covered in black and purple crystals and the wind itself seemed to avoid the area. A silence that a graveyard would be jealous to possess marinated the atmosphere with palpable dread.
"We find anything?" Olive shouted out to the searching groups.
"Nyet." A grumbling Russian soldier replied. He tossed a crushed Kalashnikov rifle to the crystalline floor in disgust, "Nothing here but ash and dust."
One of the Americans snickered, "Breathing in the chemicals, Chekov?"
'Chekov' gave the American a sideways glare, though it was hard to fully judge his expression from the cold weather gear that concealed his face. "I know of your songs. We are not Soviet Union, Urod."
The American held up a hand in mock surrender, the other holding the middle of his sprayer against his chest. "Hey man, chill! No need to get frosty with me."
"Captain!" One of the Germans shouted, "I found something!"
It had taken a bit of muscle power but between the roughly thirty soldiers present it didn't take long. A large stone door had barred passage to a hidden section of the base and had been coated with the same crystal as everything else, leading the Germans to investigate. With everyone now gathered, the group advanced inside with their weapons readied and flashlights on.
The groups swept through abandoned rooms filled with cold-war era technologies and computers, the hallways lined with steel reinforcement beams through the concrete and paths of purple crystal along the floor. Some doors were smashed open; the metal having caved inward like a great fist punched them to pieces. Shelves were ripped apart, books and documents lay shredded and scattered through the halls of the dark base and Olive was now even more on edge.
"Fan out; check the area here before we move on. I don't want the fog king to come from behind and get us," Olive quietly ordered. He stood in the main hallway with the squad leaders of the German and Russian groups.
"You think he has moved on?" The Russian nicknamed as 'Chekov' asked. "No sign of him."
"Or he is waiting for us up ahead," The German countered. "He is an alien unlike the others we have seen in China and India, and we have only video evidence of him existing. There is no way to tell what he might do."
"Actually," Olive butted in, "Princess Twilight gave me a few pointers about him."
Chekov shook his head and snickered, "Oh, Princess tells him things!" He replied mockingly, "Tells him to save from big fortress, tells of evil wizard in mountains."
The German smacked Chekov's shoulder, "Listen up and keep quiet. Your laughing could get us killed, dummkopf."
"Alright," Olive interrupted, placing himself between Chekov and the German. "This 'King Sombra' guy likes crystals, magic and mind controlling stuff. You see one of our guys acting strange, then Sombra is probably nearby." He lifted his sprayer, pointing the nozzle towards the floor. "One of the reasons we have these things is that friendly fire won't get us killed with it. Sombra doesn't know what these weapons do, but he has seen what the normal ones are capable of."
The German nodded with understanding, "So any of us attempting to shoot an ally would be rendered pointless."
Captain Olive smirked, "That's the idea. All of this was in the briefing, you know that, right?"
Chekov patted Olive on the shoulder. "Yes, but now we go find 'Sombra'. Enough of this waiting around for him to appear."
He was already taking his squad away from the main group, and Olive could see the many ways this operation could go wrong. "Move up!" Olive announced to the other squads. If the Russian was going to be stubborn then he would have to keep the groups together. Splitting up would be a terrible idea...
Ten minutes later, the group was given a reason to split up. The crystals throughout the base had begun to pulsate with green energies and the temperature of the halls quickly rose. Their armor protected the soldiers from the magic, but they would have to find Sombra quickly to stop whatever it was that he was doing.
"Chekov, take your group west. Heinrich, go East. Everyone else with me, we're heading north!"
The soldiers filed out, each with their weapons ready and nerves slightly fraying. There had been mock runs of the base of course, but Twilight Sparkle and Queen Blue Sun had no way to mimic Sombra's dark magic and crystals. The layout was roughly the same though detours had to be made on account of passageways being sealed over with ominously glowing crystal that promised doom to those that looked at them.
"Anyone missing?" Olive whispered behind him. The same call went out through his squad and returned a few seconds later.
"All present, Sir."
Captain Olive's group advanced through the northern section of the abandoned base. They eventually encountered a large, open room that appeared to behave like an observatory. Judging that the facility was from the Cold-war, it was most likely a front for something less than benign.
The squad spread out and secured the room, giving Olive enough time to understand just what he was looking at. Four separate pillars of crystal dominated the center of the room, each of them sending out steady bolts of neon green magic like Tesla coils. A design was scratched out in the crystalline floor, the base of it purple with black lines in...
"Is that a freakin' heart on the floor?" One of Olive's soldiers questioned, his guard lowering from the sheer unexpectedness of the symbol. "You mean to tell me that we came out here to kill a guy that draws hearts on the floor?"
"Keep quiet," Olive ordered, "We don't know where Sombra is and he could be lurking around."
As if waiting for the right dramatic moment, fields of green and purple energy closed the exits from the room. Crystals grew over the doors in the blink of an eye, and a dark chuckle sounded from the very walls around them.
"Great." Olive grumbled, readying his sprayer. "Keep a sight line open!"
The walls shifted in shadow and the building seemed to warp in on itself and contort impossibly. Floor became pits, ceilings became pools of dark fog and the centerpiece of crystalline pillars radiated even more green lightning between them. Glowing red eyes flashed from the ceiling's fog, studying the group with a curiosity.
"Why have you come here?" Sombra's smooth voice asked, "Why do you intrude on my sanctuary?"
The soldiers paused for a moment having not expected to actually speak with the fog monster.
Sombra was quickly becoming annoyed. "I have important tasks to get to, so I suggest you explain yourselves quickly."
The captain was the first to respond, "Well, you killed everyone in this base and we were sent to... uh... you know."
The dark ceiling snorted, "What, you're going to kill me with those?"
A soldier shrugged, "I guess we thought we'd try?"
"Why is it that you're really here? Over a month has passed on this frozen wasteland of a planet and only now do you think to come here. Was it Twilight Sparkle? Did she send you here?"
"Wait, so are you an evil wizard or not?" A soldier asked, lowering his weapon from the sheer confusion of the situation.
Sombra scoffed, "Evil? If you count controlling the minds of an empire for their own betterment, then possibly." The red glowing eyes flashed again, "You still haven't answered my question."
"We came here to kill you, honestly." Olive replied, "Now... I'm kind of having doubts about this whole thing."
The black fog sighed, drooping slightly from the ceiling. "Really? What is stopping you from leaving this place? There is no one else around for miles upon miles."
A soldier pointed his thumb at the crystalline wall. "You leave all this stuff around and we have no idea what it does other than look evil."
Sombra's red eyes flashed once again, "That 'stuff' is known as crystal. I need it for my ritual."
Olive raised an eyebrow, "Your ritual? Are you summoning demons or something?"
The cloud growled and the red eyes flashed, "I'm not anywhere near stupid enough to summon demons!"
"So what's with the heart in the middle of the room?" An American asked. The Squad of soldiers had gathered towards Captain Olive, all of them looking towards the ceiling and the red glowing eyes as if this was the perfect moment for a casual conversation.
"That is the beginnings of my latest work: A Heart of Darkness." Sombra proudly explained.
A few soldiers burst out with laughter. "Seriously! A heart of darkness!? What, you couldn't come up with anything unique and went for the cliche?"
The red eyes flashed far brighter this time, and half of Olive's squad straightened themselves out like puppets. "Silence!"
Olive raised his weapon along with the few unaffected by Sombra's mind controlling magic. He risked a glance to his possessed soldiers and saw a red glow coming from behind their winter goggles.
"I will give you one chance to leave this place," Sombra warned, his voice booming with annoyance. "Leave, or die."
The possessed soldiers pointed their sprayers towards Olive and the rest of the group. The Captain was glad he was wearing balaclava, because he smirked. "A-alright!" He voiced with false fear, backing away from the room. "Just give us a way out!"
Crystalline walls opened up behind Olive, his group taking the opportunity to open the doors and make a quick retreat. Sombra slammed the doors shut behind them, giving the captain a chance to speak.
"Alright, we found Sombra." Checking over his group he noticed that the mind controlled soldiers were still trapped with the king. Using his radio, Olive called the other groups. "Chekov, Heinrich, regroup at the split up point. We're leaving."
A soldier tapped him on the shoulder, "Wait, we're just abandoning them?"
He shook his head and pointed to the radio, "Sombra took our guys, and our guys have the same radios we do. We gather everyone here, and then I'll explain the plan without 'heart of darkness' overhearing us. Right now he assumes I'm keeping my word."
The group snickered at the nickname, and now assured with the knowledge they wouldn't be leaving anyone behind, King Sombra didn't seem as much of a threat as they once thought.
"So, what is plan?"
The German and Russian squads had returned to their original meeting point and Olive had explained they weren't actually leaving.
"A few of my men were possessed by Sombra in the main 'observatory' up ahead. The King still hasn't tried to kill us, but we know from the video footage that if he touches one of us, we're toast." Olive gestured to the sprayers everyone was holding, "If he gets close, spray him down. The guy latched himself onto the ceiling in a cloud of fog, so we'll be slightly out of range with these sprayers."
"I have idea," Chekov announced. A quick order given in Russian later, and the squad leader was reaching into his backpack. "We take canisters, we take explosives. Tape together, add detonator, explode 'King' in his tiny palace. Entire place caves in on him, crystals explode, we win."
Heinrich, the German squad leader, seemed skeptical. "You expect it to be that simple?"
"Won't the explosion cause the love to vaporize?" Olive added.
Chekov waved their concerns away, "Plan will work. If not, then we take our soldiers and leave this place. Then we gather more of this pink... chemical... whatever-the-blyat it is, and drop it onto entire base like bomb."
An American soldier chuckled, "Nuke it from orbit, then?"
Chekov shrugged, "It will work. Shadow man cannot possess bomb."
Olive clasped his gloved hands together. "Alright, sounds like a plan. Everyone on board?"
The squads nodded and readied themselves, all of them packing up their equipment from a short rest.
Captain Olive was the first one through the door, and the first to be flashed by red glowing eyes from the ceiling. His vision went blurry and he stumbled as if he were intoxicated.
"Why did you return!?" Sombra shouted in anger, the walls vibrating from the volume.
The soldiers behind Olive wasted no time with a reply, Chekov hurling his hastily constructed love-bomb towards the center of the room. It landed roughly next to the heart-shaped design and slid into place, a blinking light on top of it. The German soldiers spread to the walls and immediately began spraying them down with chemical, the crystals turning from a dark purple or solid black to clear white or shimmering blue as liquid streamed down the sides.
"What are you doing!?"
The possessed soldiers turned to face the intruders, pulling the trigger of their sprayers and coating their allies in chemical 'love'. The feeling was unpleasant, but they were able to mostly ignore the rain of chemical.
Sombra was in a world of confusion. The soldiers' weapons were spraying some kind of fluid everywhere rather than the sharp metal they had before. What had they done? Why was his magic being washed away? He possessed a few more soldiers with another flash of his red eyes in the fog and used them to tackle the others.
Olive staggered to the floor holding his head between his hands. It was like he was wrestling with an immense headache that sought to order him around. The others continued with the plan, most of the room having been coated in chemical 'love' in the minute that had passed.
"Is ready!" Chekov shouted, his own Russian soldiers having focused on the four pillars in the center of the room.
"Everyone out! Grab your allies and let's move!" Heinrich added, ushering his own soldiers to retreat.
Another flash of red and more soldiers were rooted in place, their minds being taken over by King Sombra. There was a struggle in the middle of the room, the Russian soldiers wrestling with the Americans and a few token Germans.
Olive tried to steady himself with deep breaths, the pain of resisting Sombra forcing him to crawl along the ground away from the bomb in the center of the room. Heinrich reached down and dragged him by his backpack's handle and he slid out of the room on the crystalline floor.
"Move, schnell!" Heinrich shouted, pulling one possessed soldier after the other. Chekov was protecting the bomb in the center and shoving his own men towards the exit, where the more mentally resistant soldiers were assisting in the team's exit strategy.
When most of the soldiers had escaped or locked in a fist fight with their comrades outside of the room, the Germans kept Sombra from escaping by spraying into the room like flame-throwers, sweeping in every direction to hold back the dark fog that threatened to melt the flesh from their bones. The crystals that had been purified with love refused to answer Sombra's magical will, frustrating the apparition of the King to no end.
Chekov's bomb gave its own flashy signal as the Russian leader pushed the doors leading into Sombra's room shut. He held a detonator in his hand and shouted, "Move from door! Pull them all to safety!"
He was joined by a few of his own squadmates as they held the door down. Pools of pink chemical were under their feet, quickly evaporating or fusing with the crystalline floor. Chekov pressed his shoulder against the door and freed one of his hands, allowing him to depress the detonator for his explosive concoction.
A deep boom sounded and a wave of pressure knocked the entire team from their feet. A great wall of pink energy cascaded from the epicenter of the room outwards like a colossal dome of magic, transforming the building and the landscape from a dark and foreboding place of dread into one of serene peace. The distant scream of King Sombra echoed throughout the base as the energy crashed into him, the soldiers he had possessed collapsing to the floor.
Olive sat up and rubbed his eyes, feeling like he had the result of twelve hangovers compounded on top of one another. A solid smack on his shoulder forced him to open his eyes, and Chekov stood over him.
"See? I tell you my plan work! No more dark wizard in big fortress now."
The Captain looked around to those under his command and was astonished to find that no one had died. Had it really been that simple? Granted this would have been impossible a month ago, given the new technology they were using. Any other group that went in with bullets... well, they would be piles of ash right about now.
Chekov offered a hand to Olive, "Come, our mission is finished and is good time to celebrate living another day."
Olive smiled from behind his balaclava and accepted the offer. His first operation as a Captain had been a resounding success.