//------------------------------//
// Chapter 40 
// Story: Hegira: Option Gamma 
// by Guardian_Gryphon 
//------------------------------//

Morning came early for Fyrenn and his companions.  Kephic suggested that the Gryphons eat on the wing, a proposal that met with universal agreement.  It would be faster and simpler than breakfast in the castle, and they would be free to hunt live prey.  The group waited to depart only long enough to secure food for Carradan, and bid the Royal Sisters farewell.

Carradan was now the only member of the group with a pack and armor;  Given that his gear had suffered minimal abrasions it hadn't been sent for repairs.  Stanley had offered to discard it, since it was essentially a Royal Guard issue uniform, but Celestia insisted he keep it as a token of appreciation for his service.

Once a suitable stash of grain had been fetched for Carradan's saddlebags, the group assembled on a large balcony and made ready to leave.  Celestia and Luna were present to say farewell.  

The Princess of the sun was in a surprisingly good mood given the trials of the previous day, but Fyrenn could see tell tale signs of stress.  Interestingly, she seemed more avid, and awake as a result of that stress.  

"Farewell my friends.  You have done the Equestrian Nation a great service by bringing news of the Wisps, and revealing traitors in our midst.  We will not soon forget these actions."

Luna nodded her assent, "We hope that this is a sign of things to come.  A deeper co-operation between us.  We bid thee return again soon to our halls."

Fyrenn smiled, "I hope we can take you up on that offer."

Kephic inclined his head, "I second that.  You have a wonderful city here.  Shame we didn't have much time to get to know the people in it."

Varan smiled slightly, "I expect we'll find a time to remedy that."

Carradan needled him in the side with his hoof, "You had better! I'm not making the flight alone, and I'm not letting you drag me all over creation for too long without bringing me back here.  I spend too long with you guys, and I'll start smelling like you.  Then no one here will have me within a thousand yards of em."

Neyla glared, and hissed quietly, "We do not smell."

Fyrenn shook his head and rolled his eyes dismissively before offering the Royal Sisters a respectful inclination of his head, "Thank you, for aiding us in the search for our enemies.  I hope we didn't cause too much of a stir."

Luna smiled, the first time she had displayed the expression so completely, "You did not stir anything beyond what was already in need of stirring."

Kephic chuckled, "Well when you put it like *that...* "

After a few more short farewells were exchanged, and the group set off by the light of the newly risen sun.

Their departure brought about mixed emotions for Fyrenn.  He wanted to see the PER threat ended, but at the same time it was going to be a harsh transition, returning to a dying world with a dead sky.





The drab gray van was the identical sibling of many other service vehicles on Manhattan's bustling roadways.  It dodged and weaved its way through traffic like any number of other vehicles, both piloted and automated.

This particular van was being driven by a live operator, unlike most of the shipping, waste removal, and logistical vehicles on the world's roadways, which were mostly AI controlled.

While the gray van was carrying cargo, it was also carrying a large passenger complement.  Another irregularity given that most public transportation was train based within large cities.
The gray van's passengers were anything *but* civilians looking for public transit, however.  A fact evidenced by the high power assault pistols they carried just out of sight in shoulder holsters.

The van ended its journey on the curb in front of the New York Hilton.  The back and side doors flew open, and the Van's occupants, with a single exception, began unloading large unmarked black crates from the vehicle's rear compartment.

The front seat passenger, a man with graying hair and an expensive suit, made his way up the front steps and into the upscale hotel.  At the reception desk, he calmly and deliberately bypassed the small line of guests waiting to check in, and placed a small black credslate on the counter.

Most people paid for goods and services using thumbprint biometric identification, or rarely using cash withdrawn from a bank when travelling to a less urbanized area.  Even the barter system was once again seeing use in poorer countryside communities.

A credslate was an even rarer form of payment.  Its only real purpose was to be able to make a payment with the same convenience of thumbprint, but the equivalent anonymity of cash.  Due to the extreme expense of backing the relatively exploitable card with security and insurance, while maintaining the customer's anonymity in the face of financial regulations, a credslate was an expensive and inefficient venture employed only by the powerfully wealthy.

The credslate was, in its own way, a soft bribe.  It was the promise of a guest with deep pockets and a desire to expend a great deal of currency.  The hotel clerk didn't even offer the guests the suited man had cut off so much as a sympathetic glance.

The clerk merely snatched up the small, obsidian-like black rectangle, and pressed it to a sensor pad, "Will you be rooming alone sir?"

The suited man shook his head, willfully ignoring the glares of the guests he had displaced, "I need three adjoining suites."

"Luggage?" Even as the clerk posed the question, the other passengers from the van burst through the front doors, lugging the black crates between them.

The suited man shook his head, "We will handle our own bags.  Suite keys."

It was not phrased as a question, or a request.  The clerk was not about to argue or ask questions.  The rate for three interconnected suites, housing so many guests, booked last-minute, would equate out to a second a Christmas bonus for every employee on the register.

What did it matter to him if the men looked less than savory?  Or if their behavior was at all suspicious?

The clerk pressed several buttons on his touchscreen terminal and finalized the arrangements.
He selected three suite keycards, and bumped them against a magnetizer, "Here are your keys sir.  Rooms 2903, 04, and 05.  Enjoy your stay. Ah and sir?"

The Clerk appended a final warning as the suited man withdrew a small box from his suit, "No smoking please. It tends to upset other guests."

The suited man grimaced, withdrew a cigarette, and ignited it with a touch from a pocket lighter, "Tell them to buy an air freshener."





Approaching the Barrier from the Equestrian side, Fyrenn noticed a peculiar phenomena.  From the Earth side the bubble had seemed to be just that;  A massive bubble with a slight but perceptible curve.

From the Equestrian side however, it appeared more as a massive wall extending in a straight line both horizontally and vertically.  Furthermore, the view of Earth through it was distorted in a subtle but strange fashion.  If one was to fly along the Equestrian side of the barrier the view on the Earth side would seem to pass unusually slowly, in defiance of normal parallax effect.

The unique effects were a mind bending result of the fact that Equestria's space-time was physically magnitudes of order larger than the size of the bubble it was creating and propagating in Earth's space-time.

The view was mesmerizing for all, but Neyla was especially entranced, having never even been near the phenomenon before.  She angled her trajectory to pass closer to Fyrenn, "Do you have any understanding of how it works?"

Fyrenn shook his head, "Not especially.  That's a problem for the physics majors."

Neyla whistled softly, "It is beautiful.  And terrible."

Kephic nodded, "And a sign that we still have a long way to go.  We should indulge in a meal now, there are no native fish in Earth waters, and the risk of carrying ingested food from here to there is considerably less than from there to here."

Neyla shook her head, "How does Humanity survive in an environment that offers nothing to them?"

Carradan snorted, "You ever see a construction crew throw up a hydroponic cylinder?  They can turn three acres of nothing into a giant steel container for synth plants inside a week.  One of those will produce enough food for thousands of people per week using nothing but water hookups, solar power, and automated chemical deliveries."

"Astonishing" Neyla marveled.

"And Disgusting," Fyrenn added, "I can stomach synth-meat, and synth bread, but the rest of that plant matter is despicable.  Tastes like kelp."

Carradan chuckled, "It *is* kelp.  Every last lick of it.  Unless you believe all those silly stories about ground-up old people."

Carradan and Fyrenn received quizzical glances from the other three Gryphons.
Fyrenn shrugged, "Human fiction gets...  Strange. Sometimes.  And dark."

The Gryphons caught a large fish each, and ate their fill before proceeding to the barrier.
Neyla hovered in-front of the shimmering quantum membrane, and reached out a talon hesitantly, "What does it feel like?"

Varan shook his head, "Little more than passing through a soap bubble."

Kephic jerked his head at the barrier, "Just be sure to exhale before you cross."

"Why?"

Carradan smiled knowingly, "Hiccups."  With that, he, Kephic, and Varan made their crossing.

Fyrenn smirked, "From what I can tell they're not kidding.  I'm right behind you."
He cast a glance at the gray storm-tossed sea on the other side, "I'd brace for bad weather if I was you.  It looks like monsoon season finally arrived."

Neyla paused after placing a claw through the membrane, "How long does monsoon season last in that part of the world?"

Fyrenn shrugged, "I've been told it used to only be a few months.  Now it lasts about nine."

Neyla exhaled and plunged through into the driving rain, Fyrenn followed suit.

His visual estimation had been spot on.  It was indeed monsoon season.
The rain was pouring in driving sheets, and the wind was whipping along at what Fyrenn guessed was around thirty knots.

Neither the rain nor wind could put up any kind of fight versus the powerful wings and piercing eyes of a Gryphon, but some of the relentless moisture was going to eventually work its way past the water-resistant coating of their feathers and fur, making the flight miserable.

Kephic had to shout to make himself heard, "This will be *fun!*"

Varan grimaced, "These winds are going to add another hour to the trip!"

Fyrenn caught sight of something in the bank of clouds to the group's left, and shook his head, "Nope.  Someone called us a cab."

Like a monster rising from the deep, a gray and tan form burst through a layer of cloud and rose to meet the group, producing the distinctive whine of a jet turbine that could be heard even over the wind.

The red and green flashing navigation lights on the craft's wingtips produced an eerie pulsing glow against the rain and clouds.  Together with the twin beams of the VTOL's forward high power arc-lights, it produced the mental image of a strange creature come to devour its enemies.

Fyrenn waved, and squeezed off several hand signals with his right claw.  The VTOL pilot responded in kind with standard signal gestures, and swung the craft around, opening the side door for the group to enter.

The wind was causing the craft to pitch and sway as the pilot attempted to keep it in a level hover, but the Gryphons were easily able to compensate.

Fyrenn was last in, and extended a foreleg to snag Carradan, who was having slightly more trouble given that he had no experience with weather manipulation, and was not nearly as strong a flier in such a magic deprived environment.

When they were all in, Fyrenn yanked the side door shut, and banged his fisted claw twice on the cockpit door to signal all clear.  The VTOL switched from hover to lateral flight configuration, and took off like a round from a gun, its speed allowing it to cut through the turbulence and gain a modicum of stability.

Fyrenn smiled, and shook the layer of rainwater from his feathers, "Someone definitely called ahead.  How else would they have known to send a *heavy* VTOL to accommodate all of us?"

Varan nodded, "It would not surprise me if Celestia had something relayed by yesterday's messenger."

Neyla was gazing around the rear cabin in open-beaked awe, "You were not exaggerating when you described these all-metal airships.  How fast are we going?"

Fyrenn shrugged, "About three quarters the speed of sound.  Point seven five Mach is relatively slow for a Human aircraft, but in exchange this one can land and take off vertically."

Neyla looked breathless, "Extraordinary! How much does it weigh?"

"I'm not entirely sure what the analogous Gryphic measurement is, but it weighs a very very *very* great deal by your standards, and not much at all by turbine driven aircraft standards."

He paused and thought for a moment, "I'll show you how it works."

Fyrenn deftly twisted the handle on the cockpit door.  He reached in to the relatively small space, and tapped the co-pilot on the shoulder.  The man rose, and moved into the rear cabin, watching the Gryphons with a mixture of awe and concern.

Fyrenn set the co-pilot seat to its lowest and widest settings, and gestured for Neyla to move into the vacated space.  It was a squeeze, but she could just manage to fit, if somewhat uncomfortably, eliciting a nervous glance from the pilot as she did so.

Fyrenn stood behind her, limited to all-fours by the low ceiling.  He gestured to the controls with a talon in turn, briefly explaining each, "Stick, for basic control.  Pull up to raise the nose, push to lower, left and right for roll, twist for computer-controlled collective.  Rudder pedals for yaw.  There you've got a hat switch for swapping the engine modes and directions, throttle for power, spoilers for braking, landing skid and wheel up/down controls..."

Neyla shook her head trying to take it all in.  Fyrenn gestured to the instrument panels in front of her, to each side, and above her head embedded in the canopy's support beams, "LADAR system, Identify friend-foe tagging, radio and sat comms, terrain sensors, weapon master arm, HUD controls..." he reached out and flicked the final switch, bringing up a holographic display before Neyla, and eliciting a gasp of surprise.

"Incredible! How is the illusion generated?"

"Light tricks.  I understand the basics, but I'd be a poor explainer compared to what you can find online."

She glanced back at him, "How do you know all this?"

Fyrenn hung his head slightly, "It was a stupid pipe dream...  But I hoped they'd find a way to adapt genetic therapy to treat my eye injuries in my lifetime." 

He shifted uncomfortably, "I kept up to date on the flight manuals for everything Earthgov Air Corps has.  Hoped I'd be able to get the post I really wanted as a pilot one day."

Neyla shook her head, "It's all so very complex.  How do Humans ever keep track without an eidetic memory?"

"Lots of practice.  It becomes instinctual after enough training.  To a Human, a vehicle becomes a partial extension of the body in the same way as a weapon or tool."

"Fascinating...  I can see the allure.  Especially if some of the other aircraft are even more graceful and swift."

Fyrenn nodded, "Gotta say though;  Having my own wings is better by far..." 
He cast a sidelong look at the pilot, "No offense."





Mr. Utah watched with relative apathy as his soldiers screamed.  The small squad he was personally overseeing had been divided into three groups.  The first group, the lucky ones, were technicians overseeing the second and third.  They had spread out the equipment from the black crates, covering the three posh suites in a bevy of wires, thick cables, movable terminal stands, miscellaneous equipment, and two small portable fusion generators.

Of the remaining men, half were immersed inside Sepulchers, writhing in a viscous mixture of gray goo as it forcefully rearranged their genetic and molecular structure.

The other half were strapped into Lovecraftian bed-like aparati that resembled some devil-spawn's re-conception of a dentist's chair, done up in chrome and white biophobic plastic finish.

Wires and hoses were plugged directly into their skin, forcing nanoprobes and synthetic materials into their bloodstream, while small robotic armatures welded metal and carbon fiber plating directly to their epidermal layers.

As with the operatives going through the HLF's butchered version of Ponification, the soldiers who would soon be Augments were not given sedatives during their operation.

The lack of painkilling medication sped the process, in both cases, and Mr. Utah was not in the mood to be patient.

The man's appreciation for the macabre scientific prowess on display was cut short by a knock on the door to the end suite.  Mr. Utah stepped to the aperture and peeked through the viewing hole to see a member of the hotel staff, "Go away.  We're not to be disturbed."

The bellhop, however, knocked again, "I'm sorry sir, but I need to speak with you.  Several guests are complaining about noise, and the smell of cigarettes."

"Get out while you still have a head."

"Sir I'm going to have to---"

Mr. Utah sighed in exasperation, and opened the door.

The disgruntled employee had less than a second to witness the unfolding biological horrors in-front of him before Mr. Utah casually put two shots from a Laser Pistol through the unlucky man's torso, spearing his heart dead center with the focused, searing light.

The weapon was an assassin's tool;  Its beam was extremely low focus,  and the mechanics were all insulated, producing no sound whatsoever, not even a trigger click.  The weapon had vastly limited range, very few shots per cell, and extremely limited power against any armor with energy diffusion, but it was accurate to within a nanometer at close range, untraceable, and utterly silent.

Like clockwork, two technicians sprang to their feet and caught the body, dragging the corpse into the suite and hurriedly closing the door, before returning to work.

There was no time for petty delays.

The PER would be ready to make their move soon.
Mr. Utah was determined to be ready.





Neyla had insisted on remaining in the co-pilot's seat.  She was eager to see Manhattan from a decent vantage point, rather than the fist sized flak resistant windows of the rear compartment.

As the city came into view through the rain, she gaped in wonderment, her beak hanging open.
"That..  Is a single *city*?!"

Fyrenn chuckled, "Yes.  Granted it's one of the biggest."

"It is vast...  And all those lights are powered by electricity?  How do they generate it all?!"

"Atomic fusion mostly.  There's still one or two fission generators kicking around, and some solar and wind farms leftover from when clean energy came from comparatively less efficient natural sources.  They thought about orbital solar once, but scalable fusion came along first."

The pilot held up a hand for silence, "Hamilton tower, Military India Golf eight five one, requesting instrument vectors to a pad."

The fact that they were headed to Fort Hamilton, instead of the Bureau, puzzled Fyrenn.  But he was sure there was a good reason.

"Roger India Golf eight five one.  Crosswinds of thirteen knots, proceed east to vector seven and down to pad five.  Spot-set guidebeams are on. Call it."

"Understood vector seven, for pad five.  Spot-set.  Guidebeams locked."

Neyla raised an eyebrow, and Fyrenn quietly explained, "Landing systems are mostly run on infrared beams now.  They're called spot-set because you can acquire them directly 'on the spot' with a sufficiently advanced instrument setup.  He is expected to make verbal confirmation just to be sure we're receiving the beams.  They strike sensors embedded under the skin of the nose and wings, and that lets him have a point of fixed reference even in bad weather, or if other instruments have been damaged."

Varan poked his head into the cockpit over Fyrenn's shoulder, "Ingenious."

The group, Neyla included, pulled back to the rear compartment as the disgruntled co-pilot resumed his seat.  Fyrenn 'mouthed' a quick 'sorry' to him before realizing that beak-reading wasn't a viable means of communication, since the edges of the yellow material were not moving the way lips would be.  All he was doing was silently moving his beak open and closed in subtly different ways that weren't unique enough to evoke words.

Musing on the oddity of this occupied the rest of the short descent.  A tell tale bump told them all that the craft had come to a rest, accompanied by the crescendo of a whine as the VTOL's turbines spun down.

Fyrenn smacked the release lever for the side door.  It was still raining, so the group dashed towards the nearest door, with Varan holding out a wing over Carradan to offer him the benefit of his water resistance.

Central Military Command must have updated Fyrenn's biometric access credentials, because when he touched his fisted claw to the exterior door's denial pad, it chirruped an acceptance tone, and displayed the words "Welcome Lt. Cdr. Wrenn."

Fyrenn made a mental note to file his change of name with the military.  He saw no reason to bother with civilian records, or past military service documents, but it would make it easier for him to adjust if everyone knew him by his new name.

The door slid open, and the Gryphons filed inside, along with Carradan, who had still been lashed by a few wind driven sheets of rain despite Varan's best efforts.

The group barely had time to shake off the water, before a cadre of soldiers approached, flanking two very familiar figures.

Hutch and Sildinar stepped forward, and Fyrenn noted with no small amount of shock that both were wearing uniforms, or in Sildinar's case a sash, with the words JRSF.  More amazing still, Hutch's shoulder pins identified him as a Brigadier General.

The man smiled warmly, "Well! About time you sorry, tardy, bedraggled lunks showed up.  I was sure I'd miss my bedtime waiting up for you.  Good to see you Isaac! You too my feathered friends."

Kephic smiled, "It's Fyrenn now, actually."

Hutch coughed, "And you got yourself a lady too?  What'd I miss?"

Fyrenn chuckled, "She's just a friend."  He shifted the subject as quickly as he could, "Brigadier general? JRSF? What in the hell have I missed?"

Hutch shrugged, "Ah...  Not much.  We formed the Joint Reconnaissance and Strike Force, The PER were puppeting the Bureau's biggest biomedical provider, we put Manhattan on lockdown for a day...  And I feel like I'm leaving out something..."

Sildinar snorted grimly, "And the PER are planning to set off a Potion attack that will affect the entire greater New York area."

Varan shook his head, "Ah.  So we have not missed very much at all then."





No one paid any mind to the twelve identical white trash trucks.  Why would they?  Every Manhattanite knew the sight of the ubiquitous remotely AI driven sanitation vehicles all too well.

Since the vehicles had no windows and no doors, no one could have suspected that each of the twelve craft carried five men, and an industrial Atomizer in the compartment normally used for trash.  The vehicles had been programmed to bypass their regular instructions, and instead drive to twelve equidistant locations citywide.

Once at each location, the vehicles' RFID authorization chips would gain them, and by extension their illicit passengers, access to the maintenance areas of the twelve destination skyscrapers.

The five men in each truck had a simple task.  The atomizers were already pre-loaded with enough Potion for the job, in concentrations so high that it would be deadly if ingested in such an undispersed state.

All the sixty PER agents had to do was carry the covered and boxed machines to the roof of each building, and activate their interlinked timer release sequences.  All were equipped with the uniform of the maintenance, or janitorial staff of the specific buildings they were targeting.

No one paid any mind to the sixty maintenance men across twelve buildings, each carrying identical crated packages.  Even the few JRSF and Military Police troopers on duty didn't spare a second glance for the technicians.

Why would they?  After all, the men were simply the friendly neighborhood janitors.
The friendly neighborhood janitors laden down with enough Potion to re-write the DNA of every human living in greater New York.