//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: H3L10 // Story: Freezing Dawn // by Necro Atom //------------------------------// Interspace's Peterbilt idled nicely. The smoke stacks beside the cab vibrating. The truck is sitting on the side of the road, Waiting. The windows tinted to almost pitch black, from the outside. With a bit of unicorn magic they are still clear on the inside. Interspace is sitting behind the steering wheel. On the wind-shield is a hollow-gram map of the city. There is a single dot on the map. Blinking as it moves along the highway. Getting closer to our position. I take some gloves and slide them onto my talons. Leather driving gloves. I pull my .67 CC out of it's holster under my jacket. Looking it over then starting to screw on a silencer. Hopefully I won't need to use it but anything is possible. I put it in the belt of my pants by my tail. When it gets about a mile away from our position Interspace reaches to the gear-shift. Pushing in the clutch and putting it in first. Pulling off from where we were waiting. She gets onto the road then onto the entrance of the highway, speeding up and shifting gears and starting to head down to the Highway. "Alright." Zap comments over our ear pieces. "You should see the van with the Experimental Heliodryl coming up on your left. Should be an uh... Chocolate brown G2000." There was an air of uncertainty in his voice. Though intel on this sort of thing is sketchy since the main reason it's in a civilian van is to not call attention to it. Interspace focused her mind to driving. Glancing in the mirror and speeding up a bit. She slowly starts to pull her Rig over to the left, in the lane in front of the van. Sitting on the back of the of Interspace's Truck, which she's taken to calling Nyx, is a black 48' trailer. Spread-axle and drop deck. The main purpose of this trailer is to hold vehicles in them. In the front bit of the trailer is a little tech office for Zap. Which is wear he is now. Between him and the vehicle bay is a 2 inch thick wall of magically sealed Plexiglas. There is a door in the Plexiglas too and when it is shut magic seals it closed. Most of our magic stuff is done by Zap's old college roommate. A unicorn mare by the name of Solar Flare. Ironic name eh? The highway is about to go through a tunnel. A not very long tunnel, but long enough. "Killing the lights." The lights in the tunnel all get turned off. The door on the trailer starts to open, scraping along the ground a bit. The door opened to a ramp right in front of the van. Zap makes it so all the windshields and windows on the cars dim so no-pony can see this. He hastily hacks into the van, turning off the tracker and taking control of the wheel and acceleration. He makes the van accelerate and drive into the trailer. He shuts down power to the van and keeps the doors locked. The trailer door closes just before they exit the tunnel. The windshields and windows return to normal on all the cars. Interspace drives like nothing happened. She smirks a bit to me. I return the smile. Interspace starts to pull off of the highway after getting on an exit. She stops at the stop light and starts moving when it turns green. I lean back. Sighing in happiness. "Alright, the two guys never saw my face. I knocked them both out. I got Solar waiting at a location for us." An address pops up in the middle of the split windshield, a hologram hovering over the dashboard. Interspace starts driving to it. "She still expects payment for doing this for us by the way." Interspace sighs a bit and gets on the comms. "I understand fully and she's getting payed in full. This is the deepest I want to drag her into this. A relieved sigh comes from Zap. Interspace does her miraculous thing and drives through the streets with ease. She pulls onto a road that goes past a park and starts to drive along it. She carefully comes to a stop. Though she leaves the truck running. I glance in the mirror. A door on the side of the trailer opens. Nothing too big just a pony-sized door. It's above the rear tires on Nyx. A stairway extends down to a unicorn mare standing on the side walk. The mare herself is yellow, her legs and ears fade gradually to a bright orange. Her mane is red with streaks of white in it. She is pretty young but has had a very stressful life. She looks up at Zap and walks up the stairs. Said stairs retract into the trailer and the door closes. Interspace pulling off of the curb. We have Solar Flare here to do one thing. Mind Magic. She is taking the memories from the two driver's encounter with us. Everything up to them getting in the van. She is putting them in memory orbs of which we will be shattering. Solar wants to be as innocent as possible but she is amazingly skilled in the magical field. Mainly stuff with neuroscience. She is also researching stuff like Suntech, trying to get the neurological connections more certain. Better use. Solar doesn't even know why she helps us. She told Interspace and I she thinks it's because Zap is the one who took her virginity and vice-versa. She gets the feeling that has something to do with it but Interspace quickly shut her down. Said something like 'Trust me darling, if a stallion takes your virginity and you still talk to him you'd be married by now.' By the way she said it she makes it sound like she isn't a virgin. I mean she is 34 but still. I personally want to find out who her first was. Solar still seems to think that she has some sort of connection with Zap. "She's done, pull over some where." Well speak of the devil. At Zap's cue Interspace pulls over. I open the door and slide out of the rig. The stairs descending at the same time. Zap lets me into the trailer and then we go to the vehicle bay part of it. It isn't the first time Solar and I have talked or anything but I still feel a aura of intimidation or hatred come off of her when i'm near her. I don't think she likes me very much. Zap and I open the doors to the van. I pull out the guy on the left and Zap the one on the right. We carry them out and bring them out of the trailer. Putting them behind some dumpsters in an alley way. Zap climbs back into the trailer and I walk over to Solar. "This is a pretty nice neighborhood so you shouldn't have anything to worry about. Their's a gas station a few blocks that way." I point down the road in the direction of a visible gas station. "Just head there and call a cab or your friend or something." "Alright.. Thank you." She says nodding. "No, thank you." I give her a friendly smile and climb back into Nyx. Interspace starts to pull away from the curb once more. She starts to drive along the city streets once more. I lift up my prosthetic, opening the hologram menu and starting to swipe through it. I send out a call to Sader and wait for her to answer. Leaning back. I can hear the ringing in my ear piece. Suddenly the sweet and adorable voice of Sader Sweet dances it's way into my ear drum. "Hello?" I smile a bit. We tend to use our real names when talking on the phone in case anyone is listening. But we refer to Sader as well.. Sader. So I like to get a bit creative. "Hey there Sweet-cheeks. How's the shopping?" The bat-pony groans through the phone. She doesn't like it when I call her Sweet-cheeks. "It's goin' alright Hilt. I am still annoyed that i'm doing this instead of you. But.. At least i'm able to get something for myself." "Well I got called to work. So it isn't my fault really." "Please, don't make me laugh Hilt. The main reason i'm here is because you and Zzzz.. Geskenk drink through the Destiny™ supply so quickly." "Sweetie i've seen you grab some Destiny™. Don't try blaming us. We conserve our drinks." "You drink a can a day!" "There are ponies who drink more than that daily." "Yeah and they probably lost a limb for it." "The Fourth Wall is a cruel mistress..." "What was that Hilt?" "Nothing!" I quickly hang up the phone and realize that we're on the highway, probably heading for the docks. I look over at Interspace and I see her giving me an odd look. "What?" I ask, a bit defensively. She shakes her head and looks back forward to the road. "So, how's Sader?" "Oh, she's alright. Still annoyed that she's the one doing all the shopping and not me. That, kinda feels like laziness doesn't it?" I ask. Looking over at Interspace, she glances at me as she drives. Quickly turning her gaze back to the road. "Yeah, you do most of the work but Sader is good at scouting stuff out. She doesn't tend to have many uses in the execution of the heist but she's damn useful in the planning." The buildings we're driving past steadily starts to get more and more industrial like as we get closer to the Sky-Docks. The Sky-Docks is basically like normal nautical docks, just for air-ships. Most of the Air-ships have been shut down since it's dangerous to run them in the cold because the propellers might freeze up. Most vehicles that are used to travel between cities are specially designed and use Magical Nuclear power. Many just using the Nuclear Heat to keep the vehicle warm. These are the same companies that created the marvel that is SunTech™. The vehicles used to travel between cities tend to be large 4 axle'd behemoths that run on a MN Generator, they're too large for city streets so it's rare to see one if you aren't travelling beyond the City Line. We use a kinda medium sized warehouse in the Sky-Docks as our base of operations because there is a large bay area where we can park our various not stolen vehicles and it's rare that any one'd go over there. Most of the area is shut down but there are some small-ish private companies that run out of that area, just using the warehouses to store their stuff. We like to make most ponies think that's what we are. Nyx's blinker broke me out of my mental ramblings as Interspace turned into the small compound that is the entrance to our Warehouse. Interspace swings Nyx around and starts to back the trailer up to the garage door where Nyx is normally parked. I hop out of the truck and run over to the garage, opening said garage door. I wave my talon, giving the signal to Interspace to keep backing up. She keeps coming till a few feet of the trailer, about 3, are inside. Then of which I raise my talon up flat like a wall, telling her to stop. Zap starts to open the trailer's rear ramp from his little office inside. I head up the ramp of the trailer and get in the van, turning it on with manual control and backing it out of the trailer carefully. Really we don't want the van we just want it's cargo. I park it next to where Nyx is normally parked. The trailer's door closes once more and Interspace pulls out of the garage to go park said trailer. Zap trotting in under the closing garage door just as I was getting out of the van. "So, now that we have another G2000... My van has been making some weird noises when I back up..." He gives me a smile. Heading around to the back of the van. I roll my eyes a bit. "So where you telling the truth or just yanking my chain?" I ask, looking through the van and out the back window. He looks up and winks at me then opens the back door. He pulls out a lead-lined brief case. The case has the SunTech™ logo on it and the locking mechanism is juvenile. He shuts the rear door on the van and heads into the main area of the warehouse. Taking it up to the little living room above the office where Zap normally keeps his rear. He places it on the coffee table and then goes to get some Destiny™ soda. I sit down on the couch, looking at the box. I lean my head back and wait. In about 3 minutes the garage door opens and Nyx backs into her little bay next to the stolen G2000. Interspace gets out and heads over to us, walking up the stairs and sitting down next to Zap and I. Zap of which is clearly enjoying his soda. "So are we waiting for Sader before we check out this Experimental Heliodryl?" Interspace asks, looking between the two of us. "That's the plan. When I was in the van dealing with the drivers I saw a letter on the dash board." Zap hands said letter over to Interspace, she opens it. "'Experimental Heliodryl, H3-4K. Codenamed "H3L10." This is a prototype product.' Interesting..." She glances up at the closed case. "What's so different about this Heliodryl?" "Well, we haven't actually opened the case yet. It might be obvious. I get the feeling it's supposed to be more efficient than current Heliodryl." "That might be true.." Zap said, a hoof on his chin. "Though it may also need to be distilled to tell the difference. I know there's a priest at the old Celestia church that distills this stuff." An imaginary army of heavenly flutes starts to play as Sader's voice suddenly cuts in. "Then we should get going." We all jumped at the bat-pony's voice. All 3 of us looking at her. "Well, go on and open it." I blink at her for a few more seconds then lean forward and pop the latches on the case, raising the lid. Inside is 5 vials of H3L10. Right off the bat the first difference I can see is that the actually Heliodryl is lighter than normal Heliodryl. Brighter more so. I quickly close the case. "Let's get this to the Father." The 4 of them nod. "Actually, Interspace, you and Sader stay here. Zap and i'll go." They both nod. "I need to clean this place up a bit anyways." Interspace commented. Sader doesn't seem quite as happy but she obliges. I motion Zap to stand up as I do so. Grabbing the case. "We should hopefully be back soon. Cya later." They both wave at us as Zap and I head down the stairs. We head over to our nice Caprice Retro. I grab the keys from the key ring and unlock the car, getting in and turning it on. Zap gets in next to me with a slightly perplexed look. "Why did you want me to go with you and not Interspace? Or Sader? I know you trust Interspace more and just prefer Sader." Oof, low blows much Zap? "I know you've been taking an interest in SunTech™ so I thought you'd like to come along." I carefully drive over to the garage, driving out once the door is open. "How do you know I have an interest in SunTech™?" He looks at me as I drive. The case is sitting between is. "Hah, please. You have like, 5 SunTech™ magazines sitting in your office. Plus i've woken up to you tinkering with my arm." He seems surprised at the second one. "Wait really? I thought you were always asleep..." He looks down, seeming to try and think of a point where I was awake. "Yeah, I woke up but didn't move. Peaked an eye open. Saw you working on it. Funny, after that I was thinking about how my arm was working. It seemed to be working smoother than it used to." I give him a small smile. "Well... It's quite the old model so I won't lie, I have been working on it a bit. Using techniques and that of newer models and adding some new bits of my own. I've been meaning to ask how it was holding up for you." He seems kinda happy i'm not mad at him. "It's been working really well. I feel like I have better control than I used to of it it seems slimmer. More stylish." "Well... There was one night that I didn't really want to work with little fiddly-bits like wires and things. So I spent most of the night working on design." He seems proud of it. I am not one to judge I think it looks nice, less bulky. "Well now that you know that I know. I'll let you work on it with out needing to hide during the night. It'll just have to be me doing something like watching TV. Otherwise I won't be able to sit still for that long." "I understand. Thank you, as well. I look forward to playing with it. I was thinking about adding sharp carbon tips to your talons to make them quite sharp and deadly. Or maybe running an electrical current through them so you can use them like taser claws. I think that'd be nifty." "Oh no we're here." He has a lot of plans... It's just one little arm! I shut the car off and grab the case. Getting out in sync with Zap. We both close the doors and I lock it. I hug the case with my wing and we start to walk into the church. Zap looking up at it in sub awe before picking up the pace a bit to rejoin me at my side. We head into the church and he leads me to a side door. He knocks on it. A voice coming from the door. "Yes? Who is it at this hour?" "My name is Zap, We have something you may be interested in Father." "Oh, do please come in." Zap opens the wooden door and walks in. I follow behind and close the door afterwards. I drop the case and Zap grabs it with his mouth. Putting it on the counter by The Father. An older pony, brown with a greying mane and yellow eyes. Large glasses on his face. "Sir, this is experimental heliodryl. We.. Procured it with the hope of it being useful to a cause. Though... We don't know how to distill it and we don't yet know what i'll do. It is still experimental." The Father looks over the case. Inspecting it then opening it and looking at the vials of H3L10. "I may know someone who might be willing to test a vial..." "Who is it?" I ask. Stepping forward a bit. "A reliable runner of mine.." He says, holding one of the vials up and looking at it. "Atom Smasher."