//------------------------------// // 189. Near Clean Sweep. // Story: Baa-Ram-Ewe! // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// 189. Near Clean Sweep. -Alternative Equus, Shanty’s Place, Oleander- “Only Ocellus and Smolder be making it back, a lot of people be dying. I be stuck in an Equestria that is not being my own, but the event that led to me… it not be happening yet. Pom be pushing to the very end, even beyond the point she should have died and she only be lasting so long after when death could finally be getting a hold of her to make her even stop.” The Shanty we were meeting was a future version of her, one that had seen the horrors of what Pom was willing to do to herself to at least get everyone home or at least make sure that Shanty lived. A badly scarred and downtrodden Dalmatian walked into the room and nuzzled the baby Pom resting against Shanty’s lap, the baby lambkin sleepily hugged her nose only waking for a few seconds and then gently went back to sleep. The Dalmatian sighed and then looked at me with a clear sign of having been one of Pom’s familiars, she also must have known what it was like to feel death considering the haunted look in her eyes. I wonder what her Pom’s last gift to her was? “We be fine here. It already happened to us, but you can still save them. Time be twisty like that from what Time Turner be telling me. ” “I swear, I’ll do something. This means I’ll have to do the absolute opposite in my choices of directions of places to look now.” Apparently Ocellus and Smolder will make it back to Equestria regardless of what happens to any of the others that join them in their adventures, that one of my friends and several others don’t riles me up. I’m so very capable, but I can’t save one of my friends? I turned to the highly depressing gothic Pom as she stood there looking at the baby Pom with a faint look of wonder, alongside a small frown. “Do you… do you think you’ll be able to live here?” “I will try… to adapt that is. This world is not the empty husk that mine is and it will not become as such if I have anything to say about it.” Said the all black wearing Pom with her wool currently dyed midnight black. The funeral attire looked nice on her at least, a very niche look. “There is too much light in this world to be lost.” “Misery be loving company.” Shanty said with a grim grin. “You are being welcome here Dim, the company here is sweet and I be needing all the help I can be getting with keeping them that way. Our little Oleander be a lost cause though.” “Hey, I’m right here you know!” Little Oleander and Children’s Book Fred glared at the goat acting as their nanny. “Sanwi… abba gewes.” Sighing at the adorable little Arizona slowly toddling up to her on the floor, Shanty carefully passed the sleeping baby Pom to the waiting Dalmatian that had moved when I hadn’t been looking. -Earth, Ten minutes after meeting Fawn Deer, Saint Canard Municipal Hospital, near the entrance, Dolly- “You were the Tartarus Raiser of your family right Dolly?” Pom asked me after having gotten acquainted with the local authorities in charge of the defense, I was a little bit confused by her question. “Let me rephrase that, you told me you were their primary trouble maker right?” “Yeah, so, haven’t had much reason to make trouble when I’m too busy trying to keep you alive and help you with whatever we’re getting up to.” Mostly because Pom was so good at taking care of me, that and she’s taught me a lot. I was happy to be her partner in anything, even if it’s separating me from the larger portion of my ‘fam’. “Besides, I never had any reason to give you too much trouble.” I guess it has been a while since I’ve done something silly or crazy, aside from that thing in Sobaka. Pom has never really stopped me from being myself, she also never really asked too much of me and she really does understand me. Another bright side of all of this is that she doesn’t constantly nag me to practice doing things. “Well you do now… still can’t believe the hospital has a one way entrance in that only works once on odd days of a particular month, but not single way out unless it’s on even, rainy days.” Muttered Pom as she looked away as some people passed by with a nasty looking chemical burned bird, her feathers had seen better days. Pom then focused her attention back on me. “Anyway, think you can cause some mischief? You know, use the wild cunning that your brother say you used to annoy them in a destructive manner.” “What do you need me to do?” I was ready for anything, not sure if I would succeed at it though, but my record of helping Pom out has been pretty good I’d think. I’m having some doubts about how good this situation will go. We managed Quackerjack well enough thanks to Sneeze Master and if Fall-apart hadn’t been there… I shivered at the realization. We would be shish kabobs, not the fun fried banana kind either provided the bomb didn’t wipe out a large portion of the park like it was said would have happened. Dude, that rabbit was more amazing than I gave him credit for. I mean the guy literally falls apart as an ability and he still makes the best of it. “Well take off the helmet and skateboard for one, you’re going to do us a favor by sneaking out and making sure that vehicle can’t fire it’s cannon. Basically I want you to do anything you can to sabotage it.” Okay, sounds like I’m going to be having some fun real soon. “Feel like you can use your magic a little bit? I need you to sneak out by running along the ceiling and then up outside, then do a jump and glide over to the top of that vehicle. Once there figure out how to disable the cannon. On our end Shanty will deflect all the chemicals it’ll fire next, I’ll personally protect Sneeze Master as she’s important to our plan and Fawn Deer will be busy watching Dormarch for us while dealing with the chemical burn patients. We’ll continue to hold the main entrance, when you’re done disabling the cannon get to safety send me a World Wide Woof and if you can manage it safely, have some ideas for distractions if things go south. That’s when we’ll take it out with Sneeze Masters strongest sneeze she can muster, if we’re lucky we can take out the whole group. I doubt it’ll be that easy though.” I was going to ask why I couldn’t use my skateboard or helmet, but I think I get it. Too attention drawing, I could move faster without the weight and the skateboard would dangle below me as I’m running along the ceiling. I just had to avoid getting seen and shot at. If I stopped for a second I would lose my momentum and fall. “Say… how are the other entrances blocked off anyway?” My question was fairly important so that this won’t be all for nothing if someone was working on a way in through some other route, I already took my skateboard from my back and sat my helmet down on it. “Jitters only said that no one could get in that way.” “Blast doors that weld themselves shut upon closing in emergencies, the hospital is made to take explosives and the buildings walls are chemical resistant… except around the main entrance according to Miss Deer. That goes for all the windows of the hospital… I think it also doubles as a plague seal in case an outbreak happens in the hospital. It’s kind of scary that it makes sense for the hospital to be built like a bunker in this city.” Shaking her head sadly, Pom then coughed into her hoof while turning her attention to Shanty. “So Shanty can you handle deflecting the chemical spray, after the Sneeze Master feints a big sneeze?” “It be easy, I can be manipulating any liquid close to me… but I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to be doing that before I be needing to scram.” Shanty had that whole water power thing which was useful for that oversized water bottle sprayer. “I think I be better when making waves, not splitting them.” “Just give us five second to get out the way and then start backing away yourself.” Feeling Pom’s misgivings, I decided to try and be the cheerleader here. One of us had to be the optimist and it certainly wasn’t the drinking goat or my anxiety riddled partner. “Hey, she’s got this Pom! She can do it and I can do my part too, easily.” There was an uneasy glance towards my bright smiling face and wagging tail, but Pom nodded and felt a little less concerned. What did it take to keep her in a good mood? My talent was keeping others entertained and generally cheerful, Pom was a constant challenge. “Come on, we’ll take down this Pine Smell person and then we’ll continue on helping this city with whatever trouble we’ll find, we’ve got this!” “I wish I had your enthusiasm sometimes Dolly. This is going to be a long day and it’s only just turning nine.” Taking a deep inhale through her nose and her eyes flew open and she looked very alert, I took a long sniff too. We looked to each other. Oh… no way… Tobias Rieper had been here or was he still here?! Both our minds began doing that passing stuff back and forth at a rapid pace. The slightly breeze through the entrance had carried the underlying scent of the guy hiding behind so many other smells. Unfortunately for him, both Pom and I had good noses for these things. “I’ll try to be careful, it’s me he’s after.” Yeah, but he’s not exactly against collateral damage Pom, considering he almost fried Shanty back at the park! “Yes, I know he almost fried Shanty back, but he was going to wait until she was out of the puddle. I only noticed the trap too early.” Didn’t stop him from trying to fry Shanty, I thought again. “Yes, I know that… wait… you didn’t say anything.” Okay now that Pom pointed it out, it was a bit freaky that we could… “Read each other’s minds? A normal familiar bond isn’t supposed to do this Dolly, only images and thoughts, not outright communication.” “Neither of us actually knows about familiar bonds of my world Pom, maybe the rules of both are being applied?” Goodness know that could be a bad thing, we’ve been ignoring it pretty well so far. “Well we can’t keep being ignorant Dolly, even you know that can lead to problems… Do you always think about how attractive Hansel is to get your mind off things?” The implications of what Pom just asked made my face go burning hot. “Yes… let’s get back on track, what are we going to do about that Rieper guy?!” And you being his target, I didn’t add afterwards. “What we already planned to do anyway.” Pom said simply with a smile. “I think he’s among the Egghead troopers… let’s make his day horrible. Hey, Jitters come over here for a second, there’s something I need you to do while we’re busy turning the situation around here.” “What?” I suddenly received the slightest change in the plan and a slow grin began building on my face. All hospitals had a cafeteria, not that my step mom Delilah ever stole food without properly asking for it… unless we’ve had a tight week in the house because of my hijinks. Oh right, Dr. Dave saved our butts that day… he was one of the friendliest bipeds I know, like my dad’s coworkers at the fire station. -Five minutes later- “Get ready to fire the suds cannon, they are weakening, it won’t be long before we can take the hospital and eliminate all opposition!” Yeah, that Alpine lady was still putting the pressure on the police near the entrance and we were near the entrance and ready to move, just had to keep momentum and get out of sight quickly. “We’ll cleanse it of the police officers protecting those gross infirmed piles of bacteria!” “Well you won’t be doing that while I’m here Ammonia!” There was Pom, Shanty and Sneeze Master… Pom was wearing my helmet and was silently readying her hoof at her back for the fun part of all this. Tobias Rieper was going to be focused on her hopefully, this was going to be awesome. “Leap Lamb, how did you get in there?! No matter, you’re bounty is worth millions in cleaning supplies!” The mop holding large chicken waved it around. “Don’t know what you think you can do here, but you’ve just made my day by bringing me your bounty!” “Oh try us, Sneeze Master go!” Pom took position in front of Sneeze Master and she started to sniffle and inhale with her beak scrunched up several times for a sneeze she looked to be holding back. “Fire the suds cannon before she can get that sneeze off!” The suds cannon, as tree for the forest said, fired a second later. That’s when Shanty jumped in front of Pom and started to rapidly slash her hooves left and right downwards in front of her to split the stream of soap, chemicals and liquids. That’s when Pom and Sneeze Master broke the charade, Pom brought the skateboard around and blocked a dart that tried to hit her in the chest over her heart. I had to go, now! I ran up the pillar and then continued to charge across the ceiling as a stream of suds passed underneath me. I grabbed the corner and shifted my momentum around it and up the outer wall and half way up to the roof I kicked off and spread my paws out. As I glided overhead for the vehicle, I kept an eye out for that assassin guy among the eggheads and then visually tagged the one I thought was him. He had a poison dart gun and there was a frown on his beak. Then I landed on the base of the dangerous sud spewing cannon as softly as I could and looked around to see if anyone noticed me, they were all too busy staring dumbfounded as Shanty back away while cutting the spray in half from what amounted to a firehose going full blast in half. I started to slowly and carefully climb up and around towards the back of the vehicle’s weapon, as Shanty flipped backwards over the reception desk and used it as cover. The hole riddled wood of the shot up desk was quickly eroding by whatever the cannon was firing, the cannon eventually stopped firing and the desk was barely covering Shanty now. I better take care of this thing quickly before it can fire again. “Give yourself up Leap Lamb and I might leave the hospital alone just for the payday your worth!” Pneumonia said while stabbing the wooden tip of her mop at the ground. I heard a loud grunt of pain and saw someone with a fake beak in disarray stumble away from the other eggheads readjusting the fake facial feature, which was now covered in bits of splattered tomato. He also had a dart was in his leg and he was busy quickly pulling out a syringe and sticking himself with it, nice aim Pom! Not only did he just shoot himself in the leg, he also likely had a nasty bruise by how hard Pom threw the tomato. Afterwards he quickly ran off when he noticed me on the tank looking at him with a grin, he mostly only saw me due to being distracted with injecting himself with what was likely the antidote to the poison he tried to hit Pom with. He had no reason to warn the eggheads of what I was about to do, though he could have sold me out before leaving and simply didn’t. Sending Pom that mental image, I received the image of a smiling face in return as I clambered quietly around to the back of the machine. “Hey where is that guy going?!” One of the eggheads called out. “He’s going to clean himself off and get a fresh suit obviously. I should give that guy a raise, anyone that works under me knows that ‘cleanliness and crime’ is my motto!” That swine flu chick had issues. “If he knows that I hate dirt and messiness that much, then you could learn something from him!” She doesn’t like getting dirty huh? Heh, heh, heh, I had a few ideas for distracting her personally. Nobody can make better mess than or get out of one than a Caper Canine! I rubbed my paws together with an evil grin. I silently clambered up onto the back of the vehicle and looked up at the complicated set up I couldn’t make heads or tails of. I barely understood the kibble pump or half the stuff that Dawkins makes. Eh… er… maybe that thing? Ah dog, just winging it! I started using my claws to carefully unscrew one of the pipes… -Shanty- Dolly be making it, now we just had to hold on. “You okay there Cut-Lass?” The bat officer with burns on her body asked as she kept her weapon readied. “I be fine, it didn’t be touching me!” I also be wondering why the Eggheads not be shooting at me while I was doing that. “Well don’t take any big risks with these guys.” It be nice that there be good people in this city, despite currently being full of bad ones. -Tobias Rieper- I needed to be more careful, also the bruise that left me with was fairly nasty. This injury to my now bruised lungs was just from a tomato, fairly impressive throw Ms. Lambchop. You even blocked my poison dart with Caper Canine’s skateboard, then made me shoot myself with one. If Leap Lamb were to ever get angry, she could probably take me out by throwing a frozen banana like how I took out that one guy with a sharpened and flash frozen carrot. Lucky there was a canister of liquid nitrogen nearby, that guy in particular was creating a world ending virus and had been pointing a gun at me. I just thought he could use some beta carotene in his die-et. I wonder how you knew I was coming, were you that alert and not willing to drop your guard or did you find out in some other way? -Dolly- Twisting the screws back in place, I had no idea what this would do, but nobody was watching the back of the vehicles. Then again anyone who would approach this group of at least twenty to thirty armed eggshell helmet and yellow suit wearing guys without a plan was bound to be either an idiot or absurdly brave, possibly both. Now to start pulling few wires loose, cross these three at randomly, twist this screw halfway out and… then… done! I leapt off and glided to the nearby building and ran up it, narrowly avoiding one of the guys spotting me as I clambered up onto the nearby roof top. Putting my paws up to my mouth, I yelled my catchphrase. “Bow-whaka-wow!” I hollered the go message for Pom on the World Wide Woof and several dogs answered back with ‘what?’ immediately afterwards. -Pom- “Alright Caper Canine, has done her part. Get ready to sneeze for real this time Sneeze Master.” She looked a little nervous. “Follow me.” “How do you know she managed to disable it correctly?” She asked as I put her skateboard forward and moved out. “I don’t, I’m just trusting that she did something. She’s saved my backside several times over and has a habit of surprising you when you least expect it.” I moved out to the front and looked to Shanty. “Get ready to charge forward, knock out anyone that manages to stay standing. Ready Sneeze Master?” “Yeah, give me a second to start up a head cold, oh... I’m already feeling it already.” The nostrils in her beak started getting stuffy. “Hey, Ammonia Pine right?! I would like to ask you to surrender or else!” She didn’t seem to take the ‘or else’ part seriously. “Or else what? Fire the suds cannon!” The cannon jerked and rumbled. “What is it, why aren’t you firing it?!” “Something’s wrong ma’am.” Someone said from inside the vehicle. “The gun is acting a bit weird.” I could hear Sneeze Master already building up her sneeze power behind me, a glance to see Shanty bracing her. “Just do it!” Ammonia Pine probably should have ordered her men to fire, but I would have been prepared to block most of the shots heading for us. “If you’re sure!” The cannon rumbled and started to bulge outwards and shook violently. What did Dolly exactly do to it to make it do that? “Uh Ammonia, ma’am, is the suction hose supposed to be leading into the sewer drain?” The large chicken gained a look of horror as she turned from the egghead that spoke and the suds cannon was a second from exploding into a mass of filth. When it finally did explode, said filth went everywhere and coated all the surrounding eggheads in grime and sending a fountain of sewer water high into the air and said mass of filth was heading towards us in a wave. “Ah…. AH…” Ducking behind Sneeze Master I braced her like Shanty had and we held her in place. “CHOOOO!” The wave was blown right back into those poor souls that had been knocked over by the exploding cannon and if that wasn’t enough, the sneeze was powerful enough to flip the damaged vehicle onto its back and smashed half the eggheads against the walls of the nearby building. The rest that had stayed down avoided the sneeze, but still took a second dose of the filth wave. If that wasn’t demoralizing, I don’t know what was. “I seriously don’t think that could have gone any better.” I said with a bright cheerful smile, Sneeze Master smiled back at me as she started applying the Antihistamines to her beak to stop her sensational sinuses from going off again by accident. “Join us when you can, let’s go Cut-Lass.” “Do we be having to? They be covered in horrible filth and we’d be needing a shower if we have to fight them now.” Nodding solemnly to Shanty, we had to take down the ones that could still fight. “Unless you can somehow pop that nearby fire hydrant in their direction.” I probably shouldn't have said that or even suggested the idea, as Shanty ran for the fire hydrant. She slashed the end off of the rusted bit of metal on the side and then, using her hydrokinetic talents, aimed the sudden vicious spray into the already battered, beaten, bruiseed and beleaguered bad guys. “I be getting sick too much when I was younger!" Well this fight shouldn’t take long we already had them on the back foot, eventually the pressure from the hydrant died down to a trickle. "I’m not getting sick while fighting you because you be covered in grunge!” Only one person stayed standing through it all and was angry. “Filthy!” Ammonia screamed raising her mop to the sky. Yeah, she was going to be trouble.