//------------------------------// // Fire in the Clouds // Story: Danger Close // by CoyoteXray //------------------------------// The morning sun had risen several hours before, and the work of the day was well underway. But it was only going to be a short one today, as the whole family had planned to take a trip in to nearby San Ferneighdo for the local version of the Friendship Festival. There was even talk of actual yaks showing up, Greybolt remembered, and he wouldn't miss that for the world. By now he was almost through. Just a couple more of turns of the wrench left, and they could turn the water back on. 'Not bad', he thought as he examined his handiwork. It may not be up to most plumber's standards, but given the low pressure on this irrigation line, he figured it was good enough. Time to pack up and head for the barn. "Greybolt!" He heard his name and quickly glanced up and spotted his sister Bluebelle galloping up to meet him. "What are you doing out here?" she called out as she got close enough, "I've been looking for you everywhere!" "Well sis," he said with a grin, "Congratulations, you found me!" "Yeah right," she answered as she arrived, "Don't be a smartass. Are you done yet?" "Yeah, I'm done," Greybolt answered, We getting ready to go yet?" "Uh huh, but mom's all in a dither," Bluebelle replied, "We'd better get going." The pair trotted off, with Grey's tool bag bouncing on his left flank. They made their way down the well worn path, past the irrigation pumps, and around the barn, and up the path, rounding the corner, and immediately bumping into a large furry creature. The collision knocked Greybolt back onto his haunches, and he was stunned for a second. But the loud roar of the creature brought him quickly back to reality as the creature lunged toward him. He immediately tumbled backwards to evade him. Only when he could regain his hoofs did he spot another creature lunging at him from his left. He ducked his head and twisted his body around and kicked the animal in the knees, then combat rolled away as the animal fell to the ground. "Grey!" he heard his sister call out as a third beast tried to carry her off. He immediately took off after the pair, and when he got close enough, launched himself into the air and hit the beast dead center in the back. He immediately dropped Bluebelle, who promptly regained her hooves. "Come on!" he called out, and Belle quickly joined him as they galloped off towards the house. She had to admit that her brother's reaction to the unexpected attack was amazing. Though he was born an earth pony on a watermelon farm, her brother's interests had always been elsewhere. It seemed he was forever studying books on military strategy and technology, and he had learned how to fight years ago. Why he didn't just enlist in the guard was a puzzle to her. But right now, she was glad he was home. They paused just short of the front porch, and Greybolt signaled for quiet as he gingerly stepped up and moved towards the front door. He crept up slowly, the only sound being the rattle of his tool bag. He paused. 'How in Tartarus did I manage to hang onto them?" he thought. and slowly reached his right arm back till he hooked the loop of fabric that supported the twin bags on his hind end and slowly lowered it to the floor. He then continued forward. He was just about to take hold of the door handle with his teeth when the door was suddenly thrown straight into his face... The sudden impact threw him backward onto his haunches, but he had no time to think about it as he opened his eyes and suddenly found himself looking straight into the crosshairs of his father's hunting crossbow. "Dammit Pa..." he said in a loud whisper, "It's me and Belle." "Young stallion," his father growled, "Don't be scolding me. You're just lucky I didn't shoot." The older chocolate brown stallion paused, and then gestured to the two siblings, who followed him back into the house. He led them back through the kitchen and then gestured towards the back window. Greybolt came closer and peered outside, instantly spotting the small airship parked behind the barn. It was partly concealed, but he could see enough to understand the situation. He turned towards his family, and said, "That ship belongs to the Storm KIng. If he's got forces this far inland, we've got to get out of here." "What if he's here for the festival Grey?" his mother chimed in as she joined her family. "Not a chance," Greybolt answered, "He overthrows kingdoms. He does not do friendly visits." Greybolt pulled back, and then gestured to his family to circle up. When they had, he said "We need to get going, hopefully to someplace with a Guard garrison." "Son, that's going to be one hell of a trick," his father replied, "I mean, who knows how many of those nasty things are out there." "It's not that many," Greybolt replied, "That airship of theirs is just a scout. Can't be more than four or five on that thing. Trouble is that the group they're scouting for can't be too far away. If we're going to go, we need to go now." Grey's father glanced around to his family, judging their response. His wife nodded to him, as did his daughter. A sound caught everyone's ear and they all looked towards the window as two of the large creatures shuffled back towards the airship, waving their arms to signal someone onboard. Another creature suddenly appeared and the trio began chattering back and forth in an unrecognizable language. "We've got to go...now," Greybolt said in a loud whisper, and the quartet slowly made their way to the door and onto the porch, Greybolt leading the way with his father bringing up the rear, pausing occasionally to check their rear, sweeping back across his line of sight with the large crossbow. The group immediately made a beeline for the pear grove, going to ground immediately as they cleared one of the rises. They paused and watched for pursuit for a moment, and then kept going down the tree line until they reached the road, and proceeded off to safety, wherever that was. They had been running the checks for nearly an hour now, and it looked as though the situation was becoming clearer. "This should be the last one ma'am," the sergeant said as he placed the small red pyramid on the table, glad to have the nasty tasting object out of his mouth. The light blue unicorn he worked for gave him a nod and levitated it out onto the map. "O.k. sergeant," she said when she had it placed properly, "Let's see what we're dealing with." She then turned and walked back up to the observation platform to get the bigger picture. She brought her arms up onto the rail, and carefully studied what was in front of her. The size of it all left her speechless. She quickly ran the numbers through her head, based on the mileage scale on the side of the map, and the varying distances. She noticed that her assistant had joined her. "This is all confirmed, right?" she asked him. "Yes ma'am," was his reply. 'Sweet Celestia…' she said to herself, 'That's a gap of over a twelve hundred square miles! You could fly the entire population of Griffonstone through that!" She quickly levitated her clipboard up from the map and scanned down the checklist. She had been scanning the blasted thing repeatedly all morning. There was no way to deny the result. It ran twenty five miles north and south of Las Pegasus, and as far east as Coltlumbus; the whole area in a communications dead zone, save for a patchwork of wireless operators, and a few barely networked telephone systems. "Damn!" she cursed to herself, and then turned around and called out, "Sergeant, where's the general? " she queried, the stress clearly showing. "In his office, I believe," was his reply. "Get him over here sergeant...he needs to see this!" she commanded. "Yes ma'am," he answered, and immediately did as he was told. "Can't breath....can't breath..." It was the only thought that she had as the weight bore down on her. She was going to suffocate. She was going to die. That was all there was. Her feeble attempt at heroism was for nothing. Would her parents ever know what happened to her? Would her friends know of her fate? "H-h-h-how...w-w-why?" she choked out with great difficulty. "Shoot up little creature!" came the voice of the massive hairy monster whose great weight pinned her to the deck. "Joost shoot up!" She couldn't move, so she just tried to concentrate on getting enough air. She could feel the pressure on her chest. She knew her wings couldn't move. The only bright spot was that there wasn't much pain, meaning hopefully they were only pinned by the feathers. But that was enough. She didn't dare close her eyes. All that accomplished was to let her see again the poor earth pony she failed to save. She felt a tear escape her as he saw the horror on his face as they tossed him over the side. 'Why? she thought, 'Why did it have to be me that had to try and save him? I'm not strong. I'm not brave. Why couldn't it have been anypony else...somepony who could actually fight?' She turned her head and looked over towards the dirigible's squat pilothouse. She could see what appeared to be the captain in the large windows. "What is he doing?" she thought. Two other ponies, who she recognized as the owners, were also there, talking it appeared, to the large unicorn who had led the boarding party. She turned her head back. 'What kind of an idiot,' she thought, 'would on an otherwise clear day fly straight into a cloudbank.' She certainly had never flown anything bigger than herself, but even she knew how dangerous that was. And what in Tartarus were they talking about? She heard a distinct rattling sound, and looked over and spotted another creature approaching. The creature stopped just short of her, and from the sound she heard, apparently handed something off to her captor. As soon as this happened, her enemy changed his hold, taking his hands off her neck. She immediately raised her head, only to have a thick leather strap appear out of nowhere and come in tightly around her neck. Before she could even begin to react, she felt the creatures arms around her, pinning her wings to her side as he strapped them tightly down. "Too...too...tight," she croaked out as the straps bore down on her chest. "Zilince schtupid creature!" her attacker hissed. The poor mare looked up ay her tormentor, and their eyes met. She cringed a bit at the harsh glare her captor gave her, but after a moment he seemed to soften a bit, and he loosen the strap ever so slightly. It wasn't much, but at least now she could breath. He quickly shifted his position and began securing her arms and legs with metal clamps and iron chains. He then installed a leather collar on her and what appeared to be a leash. When he had finally finished that, he got up off of her and yanked on the leash, commanding "Get up!" She tried to roll over onto her hooves, but the chains on her legs severely limited her range of motion. She tried as hard as she could, but just couldn't do it. Her enemy growled at the sight and roughly lifted her onto her hooves. She was unsteady at first, but slowly adjusted. It was only then that she looked around at the deck of the zeppelin that had carried her into this disaster. There were only a few ponies in sight, everypony else apparently locked up down below deck. She looked back to where she had lain and saw her bracelet lying on the deck, the chain obviously broken. It was painful to see it. She wore that everywhere. It had actual rubies in it. Her mom had given it to her when she had been named best flyer in the San Franciscolt Junior League competition. It meant so much... Then, from somewhere in the cloudy distance, she heard it. A loud blaring noise, distant...but distinct. Everyone left on deck looked in the same direction. There it was again. She heard it clearly. Someone was coming through the clouds. "Oh no," she thought, remembering the small ship she had seen before they had detoured through the cloudbank. It was obviously some sort of government craft judging by its plain grey hull, large black numbers on the side, and large royal standard flying from the halyard off the stern. She had even waved to the crew on deck. She heard a sound behind her head, and turned just in time to see another of the large creatures coming up beside her and shoving her over onto the deck. She landed hard, the straps digging into her sides as the stranger barked orders to her captor. "Stop wasting time with this runt!" he commanded, "Another one is coming! Get to the rails! You should be on the boarding party!" As she watched, she could see a flash of fear in the eyes of her attacker. He shrank back, and seemed for a moment to be shaking his head before the senior officer struck him across the face. "So you think you're special, huh?" the senior one growled, "You are nothing but cannon fodder! Now...GO!!" The smaller creature looked at the helpless pony just a few feet away, and then turned and did as he was told. The young mare looked on in horror as a dozen of the creatures lined the rail, waiting for their enemy to appear. She knew that there was nothing she could do. She could hear the fans of the approaching ship's engines as it approached, getting louder with each passing second. The clouds were so thick. Even if the ship was somehow armed...they would have no warning whatsoever. She tried to move, tried to do something. But her range of motion was so limited that she couldn't accomplish much. Finally it happened, as a shape loomed out of the mist. "NOW!!" came the order, and almost simultaneously all the attackers leapt at once into the gloom. She couldn't say for sure at first, but it appeared the some had gotten past the large ducted fans and had reached the strange vessel's deck, or at least caught hold of the hull. But others, including what she believed to be her personal attacker, had missed and had fallen to their deaths. "Oh sweet Celestia…" she said to no one in particular, "That's pure insanity!" She continued to watch as the disaster continued to unfold in front of her, still in disbelief at what she saw. The small craft rocked back and forth with the fight, and she thought she saw at least one pony tumble over the side. But all too soon it was over. It was then that she heard footsteps behind her, and she turned as best she could and saw a much smaller creature come up to the commander of the attackers, apparently carrying a....clipboard? "You know," the smaller creature said to the bigger one in a somewhat higher voice than the others, "If you keep using the troops like that, we're going to run out of them." "We'll manage," the other one replied. "Uh huh," the smaller answered skeptically, "I bet Tempest will disagree." "Humphh," said the bigger one, "I bet she wont." The smaller one tucked the clipboard under his arm, and slowly walked to the rail. He peered over to the alien craft in front of him and studied it for a second before turning back to his comrade and calling out, "Hey...I think this one's a warship!" The other creature snorted and answered, "No such thing in Ponyland." "Oh yeah," the smaller one replied, "Then what is that on the front, behind that shroud?" The other creature plodded forward and joined the smaller one at the rail. The young pegasus tried to reposition in order to hear the pair talk. She twisted herself around to face the pair, all the while straining to catch anything that was said. The larger creature just stood there and studied what was in front of him for what seemed like forever. Finally though, he leaned back from the rail, and said quite clearly, "It is...a gun." The young mare's mouth dropped. "Huh??" she managed to choke out before she felt someone grab hold of the straps that held her bound and begin dragging her towards an open hatch. She tried to pull away, but it was no use as she suddenly fell down into the ship's hold, and the blackness enveloping her as the hatch closed over her.