"Eenie, meenie, miney..." the stetson-wearing earth stallion moved nonchalantly down the line, holding out in his hoof an electrified baton, pointing at each one of us until coming to a halt in front of the second to last down the line and made direct eye contact. A baleful leer took form across his muzzle. "...You."
At his word, the pony selected began thrashing and squirming, pitifully begging the opposite. I tugged weakly at the zip ties in the feeble hope of straining the plastic to the point of escaping to try and save him, as well as the others, but that simply wasn't possible. Two sentries snatched him up and carried him through a doorway to our right, all while he continuously pleaded to be freed. Based on the last victim, whom now lay lifeless and without much of his color on the floor across the room, it was safe to say there was a general idea of just what they were going to do to every pony they could get their hooves on—and that was to steal their magic.
One particular detail I hadn't initially noticed was that every one of the other captives were unicorns. It didn't make much sense as to why I was the only pegasus there, though it only added to the fear compressed like a can of air in my chest, pushing with hundreds of pounds of weight. What are they going to do to me? I don't have magic to spare. I'm not a unicorn. What did I do to deserve this end? My own feelings surely would kill me before they get the chance to.
Bloodcurdling screams emanating from the adjacent torture room sent cold chills collectively racing up countless spines. Each despairing wail struck as more harrowing as the seconds ticked on by as slow as one could imagine, only to be later drowned out by what sounded like magic being cast. A couple of the other captives sat statue still, zoning out or silently crying as they too awaited the inevitable, yet neither of our captors, as cold and bent on ill-wishes to us as they were, seemed moved in the slightest. I doubt it could legitimately be expected of them.
My mind raced, processing hundreds of thoughts a second it seemed like. Through the chaos, I wasn't at all sure what to focus on, other than the fact that I knew I wouldn't make it out of here alive. There was no way. Not once did they untie us for anything, not even for what little food and water they provided. It was them who fed us, and even then it was gruesome for a couple of the others who weakly gave a go at headbutting their way out, only to be dragged off and beaten relentlessly by multiple shock batons.
Despite barely maintaining a cool composure externally thanks to a rather short training process after basic, deep down, a kind of passive panic had long set in. My mind began to think back; particularly to past recollections and little events in between. I thought about boot camp and how nervous I was there, how I believed one wrong move would send me packing with no second chance at redemption. I went on to reminisce over simply how much hatred I locked inside with a rusty chain for that place and myself for putting me through that situation, but only now I realize I will never think of it the same again. I'd already grown to love it as the memories flashed through my mind, positive or negative. If the choice was my own, I would take it in a heartbeat over this gloomy place a million times over.
It had been a few days since I first woke up at the least. With too much of a clutter sending my mind into overdrive, my track of time abruptly suspended subsequently. All of it seemed to move along so slowly. It couldn't have been over a week, yet no less than. For all I know, I might have only been here a few hours. It felt like an absolute eternity sitting in one place all hours of the day, unable to so much as shuffle my hooves or wings around, except to try and shift into a less miserable position to prevent my limbs from ultimately falling asleep.
The ties binding my hooves left marks in my coat and were beginning to rub the skin raw after just a couple of days, though the resulting pain wasn't nearly my primary concern, nor the highest amounts of aching I have ever felt throughout my body from staying particularly still for this long. Not even on evenings after a nine hour statue-still, no-muscle-movement-allowed post in the frigid, pouring rain do I find myself this sore. If I ever do have the freedom of moving around some time soon, in the near future at all, standing up again will certainly come to be a challenge.
On top of that, to say we were being starved would be exaggerating a little, though it didn't take a genius like Starswirl to discern a faint loss of weight over time. Our captors had been feeding us once, sometimes twice a day depending on how quiet the less healthy were—mostly with old, stale ingredients. But hey, food is food. If it keeps me alive a little bit longer, until the becoming-unlikely rescue comes, I'll take it.
It was to my understanding that stored body fat helps in temporary situations where a lack of food is prevalent, and I cursed mentally once more for joining the Marines knowing all of that is essentially washed away at basic. Now it had me wishing I'd joined the Navy, or even the Air Force for their low standards. Then again, things would have been so much different, and I would have never come to know any of the ponies I have since called my best friends, or even my brothers.
Alas, these thoughts don't sustain much significance right now. Despite maintaining a sense of hope that help might come soon, it gradually dwindled with the notion that they might not have a clue where to search, or that they might be too late, and anypony in their right mind knew yelling wouldn't do us any justice. We so much as speak, even if it's a whisper between one another, we get beaten; either by hooves or their batons, with or without the electrical current. Large swelling bruises plagued along my shoulders and chest, though admittedly, not quite as many as I assumed the others bore.
After long, the stallion's crying ceased entirely, as did the noises resulting in the victim's magical energy—and possibly also his life—being practically and gruesomely torn from his essence. The situation in all wasn't too dissimilar to Tirek's rampage last year that affected most if not all unicorns, but also pegasi and earth ponies, albeit on a significantly smaller scale.
No matter how you look at it, they are still killing innocents for their magic, whatever their intended use may be. These were once foals of proud parents, prouder when they grew up to become what they are today, now held against their will and tormented over something so petty as their spirit so that somepony else, whoever it may be, is undeserving of such power. I hadn't put much thought into it out of fear for my own life and my fellow Marines, though it was evident that these ponies had something bigger in mind if this is what they were collecting and why they needed us so desperately.
I closed my eyes in hopes of passing the time. Although it might not do much in my favor, if anything, hopefully it would bring the total closure of the situation sooner. It can't have been more than ten minutes after the screams stopped when the oil trench coat-donning, stetson-wearing stallion entered. The noise of his metal hoof clicking gently along as he walked up to a table made me open my eyes and watch him in utter silence.
To a bit of my surprise, the coat he donned previously went absent, only sporting the stetson atop his crown. Doing so exposed his physique; orange-brass fur, the average build of an earth stallion, especially of his presumed origin from somewhere down south, and fully revealing the true scope of his disability. In this case, it might have been an advantage for him. Below his shoulder sat an embroidered insignia-like symbol in center of one of the outer steel plates of his prosthetic hoof, one that almost immediately rang a bell in my mind.
"That emblem..." I panted out softly. Little utilizable energy as a result of malnutrition and a severe lack of proper sleep was taking its toll on my ability to speak without slurring out incoherent words. "Equestrian Army. 8th Pararescue Division." I don't know how I recognized it as quickly as I did in my present state of mind. "You served?"
The stallion glanced up from the table, setting his sights upon me and blinking a couple of times before nodding curtly, seemingly taken aback by my discernment, and also moderately annoyed by the fact a part of his identity was picked out. "Ah did. Many years ago. Until one day my hoof met its timely fate to a rusty ol' hacksaw in a cold ass shed."
For some odd reason, this story came off as familiar, but I couldn't quite set my hoof on it with so little information to go by. "Captured?" I poked further.
The question brought a low, disapproving grunt out of him, but another nod thereafter and a curt response. "Yes."
Now curiosity had fully taken over, exceeding much of the persisting lethargy for once. "So... w-why?"
"Why, what?" he blinked slowly.
"Why betray your own country like this? There definitely isn't any going back at this point."
The stallion shifted to face me directly but didn't approach. "Ah didn't betray my country, my country betrayed me."
My head cocked left slightly, puzzled. "How? How did it betray you?"
"Ya wouldn't understand," he answered coldly, turning his attention back to the table.
"I don't understand right this second. How vague you are being doesn't help me figure it out, either. I'm simply curious as to why a former soldier is holding what he should proudly consider fellow serviceponies hostage and torturing them in a dry-ass basement, then killing them for Celestia knows what for!"
The stallion clenched his teeth in frustration, tossing a brief glare of sharpened daggers my way. "Just shut the fuck up, already. Ah have had enough of ya speakin'."
"Don't leave us in the dark like this! If you're going to fucking kill us at some point, give us a damn reason why you are doing this!" I yelled, sitting forward as much as I could. My throat burned immediately after as a result of the room's dryness and lack of flowing air. Despite my demands, he kept quiet and proceeded to tune me out. "Motherfucker, I asked you a fucking question! Answer it, asshole!"
At that, it set him off at last. "They done did me dirty! This blasted country and its ass-backwards coordination has done nothin' but do me dirty!" he snapped, thrusting his steel hoof through the cement, cracking and indenting the floor an inch beyond the edges of the limb. He swiped it forward, snatching me by the throat and drawing me mere inches from his muzzle, glaring his furious, fiery orange irides down upon my form intimidatingly. The worst part about him was definitely his breath that complimented his southern drawl.
"Ah was screwed over, right from the moment they put me under for emergency surgery to the day ah was discharged for being 'unfit for service'!" he shouted into my face, only easing off his hold just slightly when he calmed himself. "Ya wouldn't understand, youngin'. Ya might the day ya suffer a similar fate and they suddenly no longer have a use for ya, take that with a grain of salt."
His blinks were long and slow, stare unwavering upon me. My crimson irides widened with alarm when he made direct eye contact. Like the gunnery sergeant at basic, it was as if his stabbing gaze sought out my essence, the blaze of vengeance in his fiery cores and pitch-black scowl eating away at it like a hungry leech.
"Ah've seen ponies like ya in my day." He removed his face from my own, but refused to let go of my throat. "Young, naive, thirst for adventure, think ya own the world. But to put it short, y'all are flat out stupid. Oblivious to reality. All yer fancy-schmancy computers, yer phones, portable music players, all that other shit ya use in yer everyday life is fuckin' with ya understandin' of the real world.
"Ya know how much it sickens me, knowin' all these foals are bein' raised by fools? Seein' ponies left, right, and center bein' told the world is perfect when it ain't? They're all sheep! You are all sheep!" He threw his hoof down, tossing me to the floor on my rump, where I fell over with a pained grunt. The force was enough to where it felt as though my tailbone had been broken as a result.
He walked a few paces away, only to stop in his tracks and turn his head back at me indirectly, left alone in the middle of the floor and still writhing in pain with the breath taken out of me. "Y'all ain't aware of it, but each and every one of ya is the reason shit's fallin' apart nowadays. Too busy stuffin' yer noses in celebrity affairs in Applewood while sippin' on yer twenty-bit mocha lattes to open yer eyes up to what's really happenin'."
Setting his other hoof on the table, he gazed down upon it. Both ears faltered, one pinning back slightly. "When ah finally got the benefits check ah rightfully deserved a year later, ah cut myself off from the world. No one cared enough to stop me. Every so often ah'd come back to society for provisions—just once in a while—see if anypony'd acknowledge mah presence. Of course ah should've known better."
Upon finishing, the stallion lifted his head, the tip of his old stetson no longer masking his fire-orange irides. "The way ah see it now, if ah can't be who ah became all these years ago and ah'm goin' down this way or another, ah ain't doin' it alone. Maybe then will the princesses open up their oblivious eyes."
My sights scanned upwards, grazing along the side of this stallion's exposed stainless steel limb while simultaneously going over the details in my head; former soldier, lost his hoof to the enemy, abandoned society altogether for a life off the grid.
Then it hit me, the shock twice as hard as the realization.
"I-I... you... y-you were the soldier that Ray menti—" My lips slammed shut just a moment too late. At that, my pupils shrunk to pinpricks.
He stopped in his tracks and glanced back at me slowly, eyes narrowing. "Ray? Ray, who?" he said with a small grimacing look on his face. I chose to keep quiet right then and there. He approached slowly, studying my expression. He then began to smirk sinisterly when he came to a conclusion.
"Ah, of course. Yes. Ray Blitz, ah know him. Who are ya to him?" Again, I remained silent as a mouse. "Not a talkative one when you say the wrong shit, are ya?" His hoof raised and swiftly caught me in the cheek, throwing my head sideways. I took it with a small grunt, breathing heavily as my heart now pounded away at my chest. He chuckled darkly. "That's okay, ah already know what yer thinkin'. Ah'll save a few bullets for yer little friend the next time he and I cross paths."
That absolutely left me infuriated with the blood boiling throughout my body. But I knew I couldn't do anything right then, not yet. I would save my internal rage for the prime moment, when I finally can kick his ass... granted that opportunity comes while I am still breathing.
"Lucky for you, we have arrangements set so ya don't have to see that day come," he added, turning to a pair of his goons behind him and whistling. Trotting up, they turned to him for orders. "Ah told y'all we needed unicorns only. No pegasi, no earth ponies. We don't have a use for 'im."
One of his sentries cocked his head, puzzled. "But the boss specifically ordered his capture—"
The stallion whipped around, getting up in the smaller pony's face and looming over him and his companion menacingly. "Ah don't give two shits what the boss said, ah'm tellin' ya the truth, and the truth is we need unicorns, so kill him!"
My blood ran cold at his words. Harder than ever did I tug at the zip ties, hoping luck might briefly be in my favor with what little adrenaline-induced strength I had available. Small whimpers could be heard just above my grunts of effort, which took me longer than necessary to realize were my own and purely out of fear for my life.
It was strange, I shouldn't be afraid. I shouldn't be scared to die anymore, yet I was. Something about it even felt different from the previous times where my life has been in danger or I have come close to biting the bullet, and it was all real. It was legitimate fear taking a firm grasp on my essence.
"No, no!" cried a couple of the other captives, begging I be spared.
"Take me instead!" shouted one in vain, thrashing against his bindings with all of his might mustered from refined anger and desperation.
Yet no one's demands went answered but the leader's. At his command, they dragged me away into the torture chamber and promptly began strapping me to a metal chair bolted into the floor near what appeared to be an operating table, scorched black on the surface by presumably the high amounts of energy being ripped from previous victims to be tied to it and slowly killed. Beside the chair stood a lone IV stand, hanging from it a plastic bag filled to the brim with a clear fluid, one unable to easily be discerned based on appearance. It looked like water at first glance, though instinct said otherwise.
By the influence of a strong field of magic, they held me perfectly still while one inserted a tubed syringe attached to the IV bag and removed a band tied around it to prevent the contents from flowing through prematurely.
Mere moments after the needle punctured the crease of my arm, a steady stream of cold, refined alcohol began spilling into my bloodstream through the connected tube. Like any other IV in the past—which could not have been more than two or three—the deadly fluid's sensation as it injected sent a freezing chill up my spine that ultimately immobilized me further. Needless to say, such feelings compel me to tense up to the point of essentially becoming a statue.
Only twenty or so seconds in and I felt myself on the verge of falling unconscious. What little movements I made in an attempt to slip free slowed and eventually ceased. My eyelids drooped, blinking slowly yet heavily as my vision steadily blurred when the alcohol quickly took effect.
Easing back into the chair, I began to breathe deeply. I couldn't tell whether it was because of fear taking over, or a side effect of the IV's contents making my mind gradually turn loopy when a crushing weight started to squeeze the air out of my lungs. Any inhale I took within a ten second window met with an invisible wall somewhere between my lips and throat that prevented me from breathing properly, and that is when the panic-induced adrenaline really kicked into high gear.
Even my hearing gradually subsided, though not quite nearly as intensely as the rest of my remaining senses. The process lasted an eternity, even though it was likely only a couple of minutes in all reality. I didn't have a grip on what was real anymore as the alcohol had reached the mind-numbing stage sooner than anticipated.
With what I had left in me, I fought to keep my head up and my eyes wide open. The pressure on my chest alleviated only slightly, but not substantial enough to allow me to breathe normally. Simultaneously it seemed to be worsening, yet gradually did my panicked state subside to the point where I was calm at the makeshift-poison's will.
In that instance, all hope was erased. I knew now no one could prevent it. I was going to die today, locked up in some abandoned foundry Celestia knows where. Nopony would so much as notice more than likely, either. I would perish down here and nopony would bat an eye to my disappearance. It's not like I was important to anypony anyways. I was just a measly corporal in the Lunar Marine Corps, one of hundreds sharing the rank, one of thousands, possibly tens of thousands serving. Me vanishing off the face of the earth wouldn't affect any of that. Everypony would simply move on with their lives whether or not they were aware.
And yet it hurt even more remembering the few who probably did still care about me. I never knew the last time I parted ways wouldn't be until another day; no, it was permanent. They didn't know either. They probably still don't. Silver Edge, Anchorage, Ashfall, Nightpath, Hardstaff, Shadow, my mother, Ray... No one. I tried to think of them, of the time I've spent with each and every one of them mutually, but nothing was there. It was all gone, wiped clean by the alcohol purging my form of all that I remember and the mechanisms in place that kept me alive for twenty years. Until today.
I jolted only when gunshots erupted outside the room, startling the sentries stood guard in my room. They rushed out to see just what was going on, but in my blurred line of vision when I reopened my eyes, I witnessed one of them go down in a spray of blood. Efforted grunts escaped my muzzle, tiredly blinking as I tried to piece together what was happening. It lasted no longer than a few seconds, and still yet I had no clue in my present state. That was until a familiar face barged in over the bodies at the doorway.
"In here!" yelled a muffled voice, the stallion whom it belonged to rushing up at my side and quickly cutting the leather clamps holding me to the chair. A pair of dark red eyes snapped up to the IV stand, then to the tube leading to my arm, where the uniformed figure practically snatched the needle out of its hole, where a red ring had formed around the puncture site.
With a hoof around my back, he helped ease me upright, where I fell forward quickly, only to be caught by him and another pony galloping into the room.
"Easy, Star," he assured, lifting me slowly and turning my head to meet his eyes. "It's Lieutenant Snow Storm, we came to rescue you."
I couldn't grab a hold of my senses with the amount of alcohol now flowing through my veins. "S-Snow?" I huffed out just barely. Now I was vaguely starting to remember him, thankful for him to have come at long last. Even though a sliver of hope had returned, I continued to spurt gibberish. "T-tell my mother... a-and Ray... I love them both..."
"Ray? Who's Ray?" It took a moment or two, but the realization struck me like an oncoming train and I shut my mouth up tight. Snow proceeded not to question and asserted instead, "You tell them yourself, Marine. We're taking you home."
A weakened and frankly drunkened, stupid smile of pure relief took form on my muzzle as he carried me with my hoof around his neck and vice versa. "I-I couldn't be happier to see you, Lieutenant," I panted, on the brink of fainting, both out of relief and the dangerous level of alcohol now flowing in my bloodstream. It was in that moment where a new question suddenly came to mind. "H-how on earth did you f-find us?"
Before the snow-white pegasus had the opportunity to answer, a somewhat low voice off to my right interrupted. "It was me."
I blinked, turning towards and studying a scrawny stallion for a minute at least while my mind sluggishly calculated things. He was breathing heavily with a bullet wound in his shoulder, in the process of being patched up by one of Snow's medics. Despite his injury, he seemed to disregard it for the most part. Snow Storm set me down on the edge of a table and reached a hoof into my pocket and produced my astonishingly-unscathed smartphone, holding it before me. Again, a few seconds passed before I recognized the device.
"Easily enough, we tracked a ping in your phone used to find it should it be stolen. Sounds to me like they did a piss-poor job of searching your person and didn't bother destroying the evidence."
"But... w-wait a minute, it was in my hoof. I dropped it when they knocked me out. H-how...?"
He grunted when pressure was applied to his wound to clean up some of the blood. "I... uh... well, they told me to get rid of it, I didn't know what to do, so I just put it in your jacket and left it be."
With that, I stared at both of them, dumbfounded. I began to chuckle, which soon turned into a stupid laughter that showed off my exhaustion and relief in the moment. "You... dumbass! Hahaha!" I couldn't control myself any longer. Somepony, anypony, please, end my misery before I hurt myself.
Snow rolled his eyes and turned around. "All right, Star, I'll leave you to settle down. Cluster!" he called. The moment he did, a unicorn lance corporal helping tend to the small pony's wounds quickly stood and clicked his hooves at attention as the lieutenant strode by, on his way to have a word with a wine-red unicorn fumbling with a computer on the far side of the room. "Get that alcohol out of his system at once, we need him sobered up for the trip back."
The greyish-blue unicorn with a patch of stone grey down his forehead and the top of his muzzle nodded acknowledgingly. "Yes, Lieutenant," he affirmed, throwing up a quick salute, then came over to me.
"Sorry for shooting you," apologized Snow sheepishly as he passed by the wounded insurgent.
The short stallion chuckled weakly. "You know what? I deserved it."
Despite blurry eyesight, I narrowly managed to hone in on the two tone-faced unicorn pulling up before me. He knelt to dig through his heavily-stuffed yet surprisingly organized backpack. The first thing he brought out was a small pack of cotton swabs and what looked to be a breathalyzer of some sort. He rose up to eye level, producing a single swab from its plastic container in his gloved hoof.
"First thing's first, open wide, I need to collect some saliva samples. If you don't mind, of course," he joked. With how slow my mind had become subsequently, complying took a good ten or so seconds, and another two or three for him to rub the tip of the swab around my abnormally dry maw.
Upon finishing, he took the small device in his other hoof and inserted the sample, tapping a few buttons while it worked to calculate just how much pure alcohol had been injected. The results brought a frown to his muzzle, and he turned to Snow across the room. "Point-three precisely, Lieutenant."
The lance corporal's announcement made the pegasus whip around suddenly out of shock, responding immediately. "Don't give him water yet. Bergenson Maneuver, on the double!"
Some standing around stopped what they were doing immediately and turned their eyes toward Snow, then to the young medic. Cluster himself looked moderately shaken, only to then nod once. I stared at him as he looked back, querying out of genuine curiosity and mild concern. "W-what's the Bergen-huh-Maneuver?" I slurred.
The unicorn sifted through his heavy sack once more, drawing a tiny glass bottle and a needle, saying as he did so, "I need to administer a sedative that will force the alcohol out of your bloodstream and finish it off with an extraction spell to withdraw it without breaking your blood vessels."
He then lifted his gaze, unwrapping the little syringe and jabbing it through the vial's lid to suck in a tiny portion of its contents. "This might be a little painful, and you will feel extremely woozy for a few minutes at the most while it wipes from your system. Just keep your mouth open until it's all out, okay?"
If I weren't so drunk, I might have freaked out. But I didn't, I was simply that numbed by it. Giving an affirming nod, I leaned my head back and closed my eyes, holding my hoof out while he gently and borderline painlessly inserted the syringe, injecting an ice-cold fluid into my veins.
Snow walked up, planting his hoof on my shoulder and softly smiling. "Star, you're a tough motherfucker. Never would have occurred to me that you drink often?" he said, though it took the form of a partial question. I looked at him slowly, shaking my head in silence, my response only further adding to his surprise. "Point-three percent blood alcohol concentration. Anywhere between point-three-five and point-four is considered fatal. Most heavy drinkers can barely tolerate past point three-two. Are you sure?"
Without speaking, I nodded slowly. A tingle spread throughout my body as the lance corporal's magic went to work. It sent a shiver that forced my wings open partially, and soon the feeling encased my whole form. The tingle steadily transformed into a slight burning as the alcohol seemingly phased out of my blood and into other orifices. I gagged once, then twice as it surged up my throat.
"Don't throw up, don't throw up..." I thought to myself, trying my hardest to maintain my composure and not eject whatever was still in my stomach all over these two stallions. I think they had the same thought going through their head.
Finally, it was out. I opened my maw wide, and in the bluish hold of Cluster's magical aura emerged a string-like glob of red-tinted goopy liquid. Snow recoiled, a look of disgust on his face. "Eugh," he shuddered, lifting his forehoof.
The lance corporal let off a sigh of relief, producing a plastic container from his backpack and carefully storing the fluid inside before sealing it tightly. To our surprise, it filled a third of the container.
I held up a hoof to my forehead as a migraine quickly sprouted in my head, just as he had warned about how I would feel afterwards. "W-why's it red?" I groaned.
The greyish-blue unicorn tucked the secured canister into a sleeve in his backpack, glancing up at me. "Leftover blood cells mixed in with the alcohol. You should be all right now, but medical attention is still necessary as soon as possible. Especially for that," he prodded a hoof at the hole in my arm and the red swelling encompassing it.
"You hear that, Star?" Snow smiled warmly. "You get to live to see another day."
Despite the joy of the moment, I was still very much miserable, holding my head with both hooves now and groaning as sickness worked its way up. "Lovely." I think at this point that dying would have been a much more preferable alternative to my present condition.
"Hey, Lieutenant!" called one of Snow's squad mates from my left. Glancing up slowly, my eyes shot wide open, and there was absolutely no way my gasp went unnoticed when the stocky pegasus hauled in the stetson-donning earth pony, hooves securely shackled and bound by a short chain, though long enough to allot movement. "Found this little asshole hiding in a storage closet."
Snow turned slowly to face either stallions. He cocked his head a little at the sight of the earth pony's metal hoof before lifting his sights to make direct eye contact. "Funny. So big and intimidating to your victims, but once the cavalry shows, you piss yourself and scamper off to your safe space? Never would have guessed from an old Army grunt."
The brass-orange earth pony let off a snort. "A Marine whose got jokes, that's definitely a first. But ah'm not laughin'."
"Neither am I. If it were up to me, I'd cut your ass up like you did to one of your captives and dump salt in each of the wounds, then feed you to the lions of Zebrica." Snow Storm strode up to the cuffed stallion, flicking the stetson off his head with a single, gentle movement of his hoof and catching it an inch above the floor, uncovering the stallion's stone grey mane. His crimson irides lowered to the old hat, stroking the brim gently along the curled lip.
"Looks like you won't be needing this anymore. Might keep it for myself if command lets me, or auction it on base for a pretty bit if somepony wants it, 'cause it sure as hell ain't going in a museum in your honor, pal."
Cores like a blazing wildfire softly glared at the pegasus lieutenant resentfully and in utter defeat. "Ah ain't goin' down easy. You'll catch up one day."
"So be it," said Snow, handing off the stetson to one of his squad mates and looking the stallion dead in the eye. "Now, who are you working for?"
The earth pony of southern origin blinked slowly. "Ya really are clueless, aren't ya?" he tittered beguilingly. "Should've seen it comin' from a mile away."
A hoof from the squad leader snatched the stallion by the chest fur, yanking him to where their muzzles came within inches of one another. Despite his appearance, Snow had a good three or four inches on him. "I didn't haul me and my ponies' asses all the way out here to play games with you. Perhaps I should leave it for the colts in Intelligence to beat it out of you, but you look like the kind of stallion who'd enjoy that."
Unmoved by Snow's threats, the stallion chuckled in evident amusement and put on a big, deceptive grin. "Ah, shucks. You jarheads, too busy chewin' brass and gunpowder to grow a brain cell or two."
I looked over at him and rushed over. Two of Snow's squad mates tried to grab me before I could deal a blow. "Yeah? Well, this jarhead's about to kicking your bladder through your fucking skull!" Glancing around me, I shook the two Marines off gently, stepping back. "But I'll leave that to your future cellmates."
"Oh, of course. Ya know what? Ah'll give ya a hint. My boss ain't willin' to negotiate with you terrorists, nor will he before or after the job is done," he declared, lifting his cuffed hooves to remove Snow's from his chest, backing against another Marine holding him there in case he attempted something.
"I think the joke's on you now. Whatever you were concocting out here is shut down, courtesy of the Lunar Marine Core and Princess Luna's stern orders."
"Ah wasn't talkin' about that, ya dimwit," he grunted, dropping the witty smile immediately. "For what it's worth, ah ain't about to spoil the surprise."
"All right, I've had enough. Get him out of my sight before I gut him," snarled Snow, waving his hoof around and lifting a hoof to the headset attached to his helmet. "We've got the package, requesting airevac to NLM Los Pegasus."
It took a moment to process due to the dizziness, but when it clicked, my eyes widened. "Los Pegasus...? That's where we are?"
"About one hundred miles due east, yes," answered Snow, removing his gloved hoof off of his helmet's earpiece and looking over with concern plastered across his mien. "They really kept you in the dark, didn't they?"
I nodded slowly, still trembling all over. I hoped perhaps one of them had something to give to temporarily wave off the post-extraction procedure sickness. "Y-you wouldn't happen to have a cola on you, would you?" I asked, sheepishly smiling with a weak laugh following, only to frown in disappointment when met with a shake of Snow's head. "Damn," I muttered, glancing over at my former captor.
They dragged him off along with the others under his supervision accompanied by one Marine each, but not before speaking one last time, stopping in his tracks in the doorway to block. "Mark my words, boys. The future is now!"
"Move it!" the pegasus ordered, shoving the stallion's rear with a rough bump of his chest, forcing him through.
In that moment, I froze up, mildly stupefied by his words.
The lieutenant peeked over his shoulder when he noticed me tense up. "What is it?"
"Those... were the words said the night I was kidnapped, right before I was struck down..." I looked at my hooves and the floor in contemplation. "The pony we found in the alley, the captain of the Alder... he phrased it in those exact words." I glanced up at Snow. "That's the GenTech slogan."
Snow Storm blinked in puzzlement as he tried to follow. "Why would that be something they go by?"
I gave a small shrug of my shoulders. "Beats me. His prosthetic looked like something they would produce. My question is the same as yours."
Right as I finished, my gaze settled upon a collective pile of closed booklets and pieces of paper on a separate table near the computer Javelin was busy tinkering with. Nopony had yet drawn their attention to any of it. Out of curiosity, I walked over to it with a tremble in my step.
I pulled up to the table and studied the contents messily strewn about. Moving some of the clutter about in an attempt to organize some of it, doing so unveiled a previously hidden blue piece of paper taped to the tabletop. Blinking, I shoved more of the mess aside and wiped my hoof over the blueprint, which had a topographical map attached by a paperclip to the corner.
"What... is this?" I muttered under my breath, studying the blueprints carefully. It wasn't more than a few seconds after when I knew none of what was in front of me made any sense—why would it? I study weather and earthquakes. Construction and engineering far surpassed my line of expertise.
My attention shifted to some of the disheveled work I had moved over. Snatching whatever papers I could grab in one go, I filed through them. Turning a couple of pages over revealed rather detailed overhead images of the United World of Countries and the surrounding blocks, as well as hastily-drawn figures in yellow and red markings scattered about randomly. After a few moments of staring, a breath sharply drew into my maw and my eyes went wide as saucepans. Each of the markings weren't random after all, but were key locations of security forces the day of the summit meeting, including some of the times written for their rotations throughout the day and the week leading up to the event.
A hoof set upon my shoulder gently, startling me. I whipped around to face the pony it belonged to, coming face to face with Javelin Charm, a once-rival of mine. My immediate response took him aback a step, having evidently spooked him in return, before he proceeded to ask, "What did you find, Shooter?"
I stared for a good few seconds in silence, shrugging my shoulders when I could think of a viable response. "Beats me. I'm still a little out of it," I replied, turning back to the table. Javelin moved up along my side, examining the assortment scattered about and sharing my bewilderment for a moment. He then let off a low gasp that alarmed me. "What is it?"
"I recognize the blueprint formatting, just look!" Javelin snatched up the plans in his magic, holding it between us and setting the map attached aside. "They're GenTech, and only GenTech. Who else chips their blueprints?" he remarked, carefully splitting the thick paperlike material in half and pulling out a thin piece of hardware no bigger than a pinhead. I had to squint just to see it in his aura.
My brow raised. I focused on the unicorn before me, perplexed as ever. It only caused my migraine to intensify. My eyes drifted down to the drawings on the blueprint. "Why would—." It hit me again, this time like an oncoming train. I felt the muscles throughout my body crunch together as they locked up, as well as my blood grow increasingly warm. Snatching the plans from his magical hold, I examined it closely, then took the map and noisily unfolded it to full size across the table.
This was it right here, the answer to countless questions asked since the start of this year. Of course, I could have just been going insane, but Javelin Charm was here to vouch for what I was seeing. One glance at him told me he and I were on the exact same page.
"Grab everything, leave no evidence behind!" he barked at the top of his lungs to snatch everypony's attention. Initially staring in question, Snow's team quickly went to work, snatching up pieces of paper and ripping open computers for their hard drives. To the wine-red unicorn's dismay, he began following suit, albeit much more carefully to preserve the hardware.
I turned to the lieutenant before he could speak up to question and went, "It's all right here, Snow. The missing pieces of the puzzle we've all overlooked!"
***
I paced around in circles. Give or take two more hours and I might have worn a ring through the cement floor. This was all while being hooked up to a rather painfully-inserted IV to restore much needed hydration to my body. Meanwhile, Snow furiously bounced back and forth between comms channels in feeble attempts to muster quick transport cross-country.
"We need a C-17 ready to go at Los Pegasus International, stat!" he ordered. Glancing over at me while I trotted in an endless loop, he asked quietly so as to not accidentally direct the question to the pony on the other end, "Can't this wait until we get to Manehattan?"
Stopping after a good fifteen or twenty minutes, I don't even know how long anymore, I looked up at him directly. "I can assure you, Lieutenant, what we've put together can't wait any longer than it has to."
He blinked a few times, staring questionably, only to then nod comprehensively. His gaze darted elsewhere as he listened in to a voice through his earpiece, where a scowl swiftly took form on his countenance. "The fuck do you mean you can't arrange anything? We don't have time for this!"
With a grumble of frustration, he turned to me with a look of defeat. "I'm sorry, Corporal, the soonest we can get you home is tomorrow afternoon."
"Damn it!" I stomped my hoof, only to then grimace as a shock of pain shot up my arm. Soreness caused by the swelling where they had attempted to kill me sprung up, making it difficult to properly move the limb freely to my annoyance.
It seemed as though the Lunar Marine Corps base just south of Los Pegasus stood in for a place to sleep for the night. However, I knew I wouldn't get much, if any. Thankfully, as soon as the helo landed, Snow Storm went right to work arranging impromptu communications to Joint Base Manehattan per my demands to get in touch with the higher ups ultimately unaware of what was coming based on what we now knew from recovered intel at the foundry. It was his version of a plan B.
The Marines here worked hastily at the lieutenant's request to set up a computer monitor with a high definition camera so that those on the other end could see precisely what I wanted to show them. It was in my best interest that the ponies in charge back home are aware of the looming situation at hoof.
Alas, it can't go without saying that I still had the shakes, albeit no longer primarily caused by malnutrition and countless other issues mustered as a result of spending a week in captivity under poor conditions. Now it had to do with anxiety for presenting myself before the Commandant of the Marine Corps, the Lunar Fleet Admiral, and including but not limited to Shadow and the other captains willing to attend the emergency meeting.
I took one last sip of water, right as the camera turned on and the monitor began broadcasting the briefing hall at Joint Base Manehattan. It caught me off guard, causing me to quite nearly spit the contents. I quickly swallowed and set the plastic cup down to the side before clearing my throat.
"Uh, thank you... all for coming. I apologize in advance that I can't be there physically, but… this simply could not wait another day. You should know who I am by now, so no introduction is necessary." I drew in a deep breath to clear up my conscience. "Let's get straight to the point, shall we?"
I inhaled deeply before beginning to explain, stood beside a geological map of Equestria hung up on a rolling whiteboard. "Okay, so... plate tectonics! I'm sure all of you are at least somewhat familiar with how they work, that's basic middle or high school knowledge. If not, allow me to give you all a refresher, just so we're all on the same page.
"Heat from the planet's core rises like steam from a boiling pot of water, and this melted rock churns under the surface in the mantle," I moved my hooves in circular motions. "That's called convection, and this causes the sediment we live on, known as the crust, to shift about around two inches a year. The crust all broken up into chunks of differentiating size and mass called tectonic plates, and this movement, albeit slower than a snail's pace, is substantial enough to affect seismic zones as much as they do; namely volcanoes and, of course, earthquakes. Shakers of varying magnitude consistently plague the western coastal region of the country, say Los Pegasus, San Prancisco, Vanhoover for example."
In an almost straight, neat line following the oceanic boundaries, I moved the red-inked marker in my hoof along the left coast of the country, south to north, up to the northernmost point on the map, before turning back to the camera. "The same process occurs around our neck of the woods, but on a much smaller, indiscernible scale. This is because the ridge that splits the middle of the ocean is constantly spreading outward, allowing magma to the ocean floor, where the water instantly cools and continues on and on, creating more areas of the crust. But! Somewhere, around here," I stopped, circling the marker just west of the ridge line. "There is a crack somewhere in this region that is showing rather abnormal signs of activity."
Taking one brief glance at the map, I took a couple of steps back, pausing as my mind began working again. "Wait a minute..." my eyes narrowed on the red circle. In that instance, my brain fired up with countless questions all leading back to one in particular. I glanced back at the camera, turning my body around to face it. "Captain, on our last deployment, do you recall us positioning ourselves somewhere within this vicinity?" I queried, tapping my hoof beside the marked area in question and stepping aside.
There was a short silence as Shadow studied the map. "Vaguely, yes. That was somewhere near one of the energy signatures we were out searching for. Why, do you think the two correlate?"
"It's merely a theory I thought of just now, but..." I paced slowly around a bit in front of the board, looking down at my hooves in thought. When a conclusion came to mind, I mumbled under my breath. "Of course... it's a diversion."
"Pardon?" questioned the fleet admiral, who happened to pick up on my quiet voice.
I looked up at the camera, eyes widened some. "Those signals Command has been detecting for the last few months, it's like a mirror, always leading us to the wrong place. They're meant to drive us from what is really under the ocean! They're... a diversion. Which can only mean..." Again, I stopped in my tracks, this time eyeballing the screen and the pack of perplexed high-ranking officers tuning in on the other end.
"Theoretically... a pulse device, like in the blueprints recovered from the old foundry, can manipulate the fault line by either pounding into the ground repeatedly or emitting invisible but powerful energetic waves that can essentially speed up the process of the two tectonic plates shifting beside one another, which causes friction, which in turn, causes earthquakes," I described, added to by the gestures of my hooves.
Shadow's brow furrowed as he stared questionably at me through the monitor. "Corporal, what are you saying? You think there's something beneath the sea, at the bottom to be precise, that is behind all of this?"
"The quakes we have been having are far from natural, and they are a warning. Someone has something at the ocean floor that is manipulating the faults and triggering miniature temblors, sending out electromagnetic pulses, and screwing with our communications, it's what is causing these tremors." I stopped, looking him dead in the eye through the computer. "It's why our reactor shut down, Captain, and you know what? I bet whoever is behind it also sent out the false signal to engage with the Ajerstanians. It was probably to distract the both of us from our mission so they could sneak under the radar again."
The Marine Corps commandant wore his usual expression of mild disgust, yet also one of question. "Who on earth even has the technology readily available to—"
"GenTech," Shadow cut him off, looking up from the table at each of them. I simply bobbed my head in agreement. "Same bastards installing new systems in all of our ships," he grunted. "If I recall correctly, GenTech launched a new satellite into orbit early last year. The GX-04 rocket," he continued, glancing at the screen. "It suffered catastrophic failure mere hours later, which threatened adjacent satellites and had to be brought back down to Earth."
"But I thought that one burned up in the upper atmosphere?" I remarked, tapping my chin. "I heard it was too far damaged to be recovered and they were forced to 'control it to destruction'."
"Not necessarily. The satellite design itself was kept under wraps, but the rocket it went up in was seen and approved by aeronautical engineers and officials. I had the honor of visiting the launch pad a week before launch," said Shadow. "Frankly, it would not surprise me in the slightest if it wasn't a satellite at all. Not after all that you say, not after all that's happened in the last few months."
I blinked a few times, catching almost immediately on to his thoughts before he finished them. "You think the satellite was the pulse device?"
"Just a theory," Shadow winked, turning to one of the enlisted sailors accompanying him. "Petty Officer, would you mind loading up a projection of the satellites predicted crash site had it not burned up?"
"Aye, Captain," the sailor responded, tapping away on a tablet. Within a minute, the simulated map pinpointed the region of uncertainty—placing it smack dab in the middle of the red marked circle on my map.
"Son of a bitch..." I mumbled, taken slightly aback by the model. "Bastards faked a satellite launch to cover up their machine diving to the ocean floor."
Standing, the commandant of the Marines slammed his hoof demandingly on the table's edge. Somehow, the force of it smacking the glass didn't so much as crack under its weight. "Well, we need to find this device at once and shut it down before it causes any more damage!"
"That won't be entirely possible until we disable whatever it is causing those signals so pinpointing the true source can be simpler," said Fair Winds, the commanding officer of the L.R.S. Gibbous.
"Just how do you propose we do that?" Shadow questioned, shifting in his seat.
I looked to the floor as my lips curved downward. Then, as if a light bulb lit up in my head, "I have an idea. How soon can we sail out to the ridge?"
"Star, I'm afraid the Eclipse cannot be prepared in time. Plus, if what you say is in fact accurate, the new systems may not be reliable in our favor. We would have to deploy the Gibbous and the Aphelion by themselves," Shadow said, the others in the room slightly taken aback by his way of addressing me that time.
My countenance turned stern as I stared back through the camera. "What ever it takes."
Nodding firmly, Fair Winds addressed, "If we leave port at 0400 sharp, at full steam we should be able to make the ridge zone by tomorrow afternoon, tomorrow evening by the latest."
"Perfect. The sooner, the better. Whatever the intended use of that thing, it can't simply be for research purposes."
Shadow nodded in agreement. "Thank you for coming back to inform us of this, Corporal."
I nodded once in return. "I couldn't abandon Manehattan."
"I expect you here in person to oversee the mission at the right moment and coordinate with local law enforcement to work out a plan to bring Armet Mace in for questioning. I will inform your platoon sergeant of your return as soon as possible."
For a second time, my head bobbed in a nod of acknowledgement. "Thank you, Captain."
The Lunar Fleet Admiral turned to Shadow from across the table with a stern look. "With your ship out of commission, Captain, I suppose you would not mind a temporary change of command for a portion of your crew between the Gibbous and Aphelion?"
The greenish-grey stallion gave a firm nod of his head in response. "Be my guest, Admiral."
"Excellent. We'll need all hooves on deck. In the meantime, I will get in touch with the Coast Guard to be on alert and inform them that the Lacus shall accompany them around the harbor. Shadow, Fair Winds, call for a briefing at 1930. I'm certain there will be a number of sailors asking about this deployment. We will assure them everything that needs to be understood," said the leading naval officer, standing from his chair, the others following suit a moment after. He glanced between them individually. "Let's get to work."
"Aye, Admiral," said Shadow. The group exchanged salutes with one another mere seconds before the video on either end ceased.
As soon as the transmission ended, I relaxed my shoulders and let off a heavy breath. Glancing over my shoulder, I looked up at the lieutenant, having stood the entire time out of the camera's view. "Think I got the point across well enough?"
Snow immediately replied with a firm nod. "Stupendously."
"Thank you," I returned him a single nod, then sighed softer than prior. "Let us hope this works."
"Let's hope. That was a lot you had to say in such a short period. How are you feeling?" he asked, sounding genuinely concerned for my well-being.
I looked at him in silence for a couple of seconds, blinking. "As good as somepony who could have died a few hours ago could feel," I responded as honestly as I could before gulping down more of the water in the cup.
"Good to hear. Let me know if you need anything." I nodded comprehensively. At that, Snow turned and walked away to find his squad mates.
While he did, I went over to a chair on the far side of the room and proceeded to claim it for the time being in ease myself as much as the time and my mind would allow in its chaotic state, bringing along more water to sip on carefully to wash out the lingering nauseousness in my stomach. I sat back, and that's when my mind went to work yet again. This time, it wasn't about the device, or GenTech, or the past week; it was Shadow. The look on his face, even part of his apprehension while speaking said more than he did verbally. I could tell he wanted to say something else. Perhaps it was something best saved for a one-on-one discussion, and I knew exactly why.