//------------------------------//
// Calm Before 
// Story: The Olden World 
// by Czar_Yoshi 
//------------------------------//

"I gotta admit... I'm actually kind of ticked."

"Only kind of?" Maple shot a worried glance at Valey. "And you're more angry than worried?"

"Well, in hindsight, it does seem a rather obvious move, given how you disrespected him and foiled his revenge at that terminal earlier," Gerardo conceded. "Although, I did assume you had a contingency plan for this sort of thing..."

"A plan? Oh, I've got a plan." Valey stretched, arched her back and worked her forehooves. "Get up there, knock some blocks off, and tell Selma to sit on a lemon and rotate. With extra insults."

The group of six was gathered around the final elevator to the Flame District. Its carriage was open and waiting, the door facing them, with a message clearly scrawled on the floor: We want the bat. Surrender quietly, or you're all dead meat.

Howe rubbed his chin, thinking smugly. "I suspect an ambush..."

Gerardo shrugged. "No offense, but you do have a lot of enemies. However, this is the time to form a plan, not stand around lamenting our luck. Does anyone have any ideas besides charging headfirst into what may well be a batch of cannons pointed at our faces? For all I know, they intend to pour magma down this shaft as we ascend."

"Easy." Valey smirked up at the small gap between the elevator roof and the cave ceiling - nobody had installed proper bottom to the shaft, so they were hardly flush. Coiling her legs, she sprang, hooking her forelimbs atop the carriage and wriggling her way atop it through the narrow space. "I'll just head up there and do a scouting mission!"

"I thought your wings were hurt!" Maple protested, a strained caution in her voice.

"Yeah, yeah, they're busted." Valey rolled her eyes. "But this elevator shaft is super dark until the window opens up, and I can shadow sneak up the walls. I'll be right back!"





Valey slithered up the side of the shaft in darkness, her protruding green eyes reflecting the distant light from above. She moved along in strokes as if treading water, nose barely above the wall and ready to submerge at a moment's notice. Slowly, steadily, the windowed portion of the shaft that looked out into the Flame District approached, and she spent the climb planning what she would do from there.

When the moment of truth came, she hit a wall of light, casting around for a further direction to swim that just wasn't there. The light entered the shaft at an angle, and immediately above was a small rocky shelf where the tunnel ended and the tall glass window began. Tensing, Valey targeted it, then pushed herself out of the wall and kicked off it in the same motion. Her leap carried her to the ledge, and she landed safely.

Fortunately, the shadow of a pipe from inside the core fell across the ledge, forming a narrow path through the glass. Normally, Valey's shadow sneaking was a two-dimensional ability, limited to surfaces and unable to pass through even the thinnest solid object so long as it lacked holes for her to wrap through, but translucent materials were a different story: if they were up against something opaque, and a shadow ran through them, she could cross it just like air. A simple duck of her head and she was through the glass.

One machine level above, directly overhead, was an elevator terminal connected by a broad walkway to the drill column. Valey frowned up at it; from the number of shadows present, there were a good ten ponies and possibly a piece of heavy artillery stationed waiting for the elevator to climb past. That couldn't be right. Selma would send far more than that to catch her; there had to be more laying in ambush. She needed a better look.

The red rock edges of the core were rough and blasted, the product of having been mined away with industrial explosives and brute force, and as a result provided plenty of ledges for a nimble pony to leap to. Paying careful attention to her cutie mark, Valey coiled her legs and leapt, moving to the side.

Success. Then, she targeted a ledge further up; she needed to get close enough to see the ponies for real and assess their threat level. Another jump, and she felt no tingle, but the following one left her feeling sharp stabs of danger every time she thought about the next platform. Either someone would see her, or it wasn't stable.

That would have to be close enough. She stood on two legs so as to better press against the illuminated wall, staring up at the ponies on the bridge, and saw one flex their wings... Yep, definitely pegasi. All stallions, from the looks of them as well. Valey licked her lips; if the Defense Force really wanted one last go...

Within hopping distance was a slanted pipe running upwards from the wall to the drill column. Not sensing that it was scalding, Valey leapt, purposefully aiming low and hitting the shadowed bottom or the thing. She sank most of the way in, shadow sneaking's bizarre physics preventing her from falling out as if she were right-side up while inside the pipe. Slithering along, she eventually came to a junction, flipped on top of the pipe, and crouched low beneath the catwalk affixed to the top of the other pipe hers intersected with. If she followed it, one more leap would put her up behind the mess of stallions ready to assault the elevator. It was time for a stupid plan.

Valey reached her good wing out, hooking a tiny bundle of cables from the catwalk's underbelly that supplied mana to its feeble array of safety lighting. Slipping the dirty thing into her mouth, she gnawed and gnawed, getting an unpleasant spark for her efforts but successfully stripping away a hole in the shielding. She pulled her sound stone out from under her hat, pressed the gem against the exposed energy conduit, and watched it light up, tucking it beneath a folded wing to muffle it and hoping Maple would pick up.

"Valey? Is that you?" Maple was whispering. Good.

"Yeah. Listen, there are like ten dirtbags and a giant cannon pointed right at the elevator at the very first stop, and we kinda want to go to the top. I bet there's more in hiding. Quick question: do you know how to get to the Sky District without me?"

Gerardo's voice chimed in. "I do believe I've familiarized myself enough with the terrain to be a guide, should we find ourselves outdoors. Getting there, on the other talon, may prove a problem."

"I think I remember," Maple tensely replied. "If we can find that lift to the Water District, I know how to find the Flame District entrance from there. Or maybe we should take the lift? Do you think they'd expect us to go that way?"

"Listen, I don't care which way you go," Valey hissed into the stone, holding it close in front of her muzzle. "Remember, Starlight reeks; I can find her from miles away. Go anywhere and I'll catch up. Right now, here's the plan: start going up. You want the very highest this elevator can go. It's not destination restricted from your floor. The moment these bozos see the cable moving, they'll get all excited and distracted and I'll take them out or distract them or whatever so you guys can get to safety. It's me they want, so I should be good at that. Got it?"

"Valey, you can't fly and they're Defense Force! And you're in the Flame District! They'll have a huge advantage!"

Valey stuck out her tongue, fully aware Maple couldn't see it. "Yeah, maybe if they had, like... ten of those it would even the playing field. Remember, I'm awesome, and the Defense Force is deliberately trained to be incompetent by both me and Selma. I don't want them causing trouble and he doesn't want them usurping him, y'know? Anyway, this'll be easy beans. You ready?"

"Whatever you do, stay safe."

"Nyaa. You worry too much, Ironflanks. Look at it this way: if I kick the bucket, you'll be able to laugh at me for the rest of my life."

The voice on the other end of the sound stone whimpered.

"Right! Coolio..." Valey readied the sound stone to tuck back into her hat, turning to stare just as eagerly at the elevator shaft as the crowd of ambushers watching it. "It's on you to kick it off, Ironflanks. Here comes my goodbye present to the Defense Force."