“I don’t like this, they’ve been in there too long.” Sheet Rock said for the fifth time in an hour. “Why wont they pick up?”
“Can you stop fidgeting, you’re making me feel motion sick.” Scarlet barked. “It’s only been a few hours, calm down.”
“Something’s bothering me about this job too.”
“You mean how convoluted everything is, or the fact that your mentor appeared out the woodwork for the first time since you met them?” Scarlet grunted. “Can’t see why that’d be suspicious.”
“Didn’t you see how weird Phantom was acting before she left ahead of us?” Sheet Rock said, turning to face Scarlet. “She couldn’t keep her eyes off Matterhorn, like she wanted to know where he was at every possible moment.”
“Maybe she just wanted an experienced solo to cover her ass.” Scarlet shrugged. “I can’t imagine Star has much combat experience.”
“That’s just it too, why would Phantom bring Star with her?” Sheet Rock pointed out. “She’s useful when it comes to talking to ponies, that’s what she does best, she can barely hit the broad side of a garage at the best of times.”
“I see your point, but I don’t think it’d do us any good to speculate right now.”
The two mares had spent the better part of the last few hours sitting in the humid interior of the van, fan on full for all the good it was going right now. They jumped at every sound that passed overhead or on the nearby road, until one small passenger AV broke off from a small, low-flying group and headed toward them.
“I think we’ve got company.” Scarlet remarked, peering through a detached rifle scope. “That group of AVs there, the jet black ones, you see them?”
She passed the scope to Sheet Rock so she could take a look for herself. Her heart was already in her stomach at this point, and it dropped that much further when she caught a glimpse of the logo on the AV’s nose.
A golden crown.
It closed the distance between itself and where they were parked with frightening speed and hovered directly above them, projecting its landing warning holograms around the van.
“Did it see us?”
“Sure hope not.” Scarlet answered.
“Do not move, stay inside your vehicle or we will open fire!” a voice bellowed above them. “Do as you are told, and you’ll leave in one piece.”
Sheet Rock grimaced as six heavily armed ponies dropped from the AV. They landed heavily in the wet dirt and spend no time surrounding them, weapons gripped in hoof, magic and wing alike.
“Step out and kneel in the dirt.” commanded the voice again. “Toss your iron on the ground.”
Sheet Rock looked at Scarlet for a moment, then unloaded her smart SMG’s magazine into the hoofwell and tossed the firearm at the hooves of one of the armored figures. Once they got out of the vehicle and laid down in the damp and frankly rather disgusting swamp mud, a seventh figure jumped out of the AV, which then quickly flew off into the distance.
“Hm, I figured it was you.”
“I don’t believe we’ve met.” Sheet Rock grumbled. “One hell of a welcome party though.”
“This is anything but a welcome party.” the stallion said. “The director sends her regards, but regrets to inform you that your usefulness is at an end.”
“We stopped working for you a while ago now.”
“Did you?” the stallion chuckled darkly. “No, I do believe there was one more thing the Director wanted you to do, but couldn’t ask you directly.”
“Ah, Matterhorn.”
“Quite, but she doesn’t want him retrieved, she wants him liquidated.” the stallion said with surgical coldness. “Allow me to demonstrate why.”
The stallion twisted his helmet slightly to break the airtight environment seal and removed it to reveal his face. He was the spitting image of Matterhorn, an almost perfect copy from the color of his coat right down to the tone of his voice, although it was far colder and matter-of-fact.
“Matterhorn?”
“Hm, who?” the copy said quizzically. “Oh, you mean the Prototype, right?”
“Figures they’d have more of him laying around.”
“Not quite, close though.” the copy hummed, sauntering over to the two prone mares. “Put simply, his usefulness ended when he failed three times in a row, so the responsibility to uphold the Director’s wishes now falls to me.”
“Sounds pretty arrogant to be honest.”
The copy stamped on Sheet Rock’s left forehoof roughly and ground it into the dirt with a cruel grin on his face.
“Don’t compare me to that traitor.” the copy growled. “He was mere months from being replaced by a superior model anyway, but no, his handler had to go and lose him so his replacement was brought out of the labs early.”
“Why did the Director replace him?” Sheet Rock hissed through the pain. “She treated him like a son, so I have trouble believing that she’d throw him away like that.”
The copy stepped off of Sheet Rock’s hoof as the crazed look on his face faded.
“I do not question, I do not argue, I do as I am told. This is something that Matterhorn often struggled to accept, so she treated him with foal gloves to get him to comply.” the copy remarked coldly. “In short, she never really cared about him that much.”
“Bullshit.”
“He was only ever a tool to be used up and thrown away, and with the way he acted during any mission he was given, it’s surprising he didn’t get himself killed in the process.” the copy spat. “It is this that led to the decision to have him replaced, the Director approved it, and here I am.”
“You’ll be replaced too!” Scarlet bellowed. “Just like he was, you aren’t safe.”
“Don’t think you can sway me with your empty words, I know what I am and what I am not. I don’t intend to make the same mistakes as my predecessor.”
“Raptor, sir!” one of the armored ponies said. “The Support Team has just informed me that the Anti-Air emplacements have been disabled, external communications have been cut as well.”
“Excellent, tell the Demolitions Team that they can begin their approach.” Raptor said with barely restrained glee. “As for these two, tie them up and toss them in the back of their vehicle.”
“Sir?”
“As long as they don’t try anything stupid they can keep on breathing just a little bit longer, though it would be smarter to bury them right now.” Raptor lamented. “Director’s orders, sentimental old circbrain.”
While the rest watched, one of the troopers zip tied Sheet Rock and Scarlet’s limbs together in such a manner that would make moving around or even getting their bindings off quite difficult without making a lot of noise. They were then unceremoniously thrown into the back of the van with little regard to their comfort or safety, but at least they weren’t injured.
“Fuckin’ hazed us.” Sheet Rock said quietly. “We listened to her story and we bought it, hook, line and sinker.”
“Too right.” Scarlet answered. “What do we do now, grab a weapon and fight back?”
“We could probably drop one or two of them before we get our brains boiled inside our skulls, that’s assuming I could grab the magazine I dropped in time as well.”
“We can’t just sit here!”
“I don’t think we have much choice, to be honest.” Sheet Rock answered. “Just sit tight and try to think of something.”
Snowy had memorized the locations they should search for their missing comrades and opted to search them one by one, as he dared not to split up knowing what was down there with them.
As the search began on they found flooded out storerooms, empty and barren break rooms missing their appliances, and even a few disused mechanical rooms filled with old utility pipes and broken pump systems.
After some time finding nothing but rust and decay, there was but one marked room left, some distance from where they’d entered.
“Watch my back.” Access remarked, his voice a whisper. “Gonna try the handle.”
Snowy nodded and rounded the corner, rifle unfolded into its firing position. Access crept past him, trying not to make a too much unnecessary noise.
His enhanced hearing picked up the low rumble of voices coming from the other side of the wall, but he couldn’t be completely sure without revealing his own presence to whoever was inside. If they were indeed voices, whoever they belonged to were keeping their voices low to avoid them leaking out into the hallway too much.
He went to investigate, and a misplaced step into a large puddle of water caused a loud splash to ring out down the hallway.
The voices stopped and Access found himself frozen to the spot, and the only sound he could hear was his own breathing and Snowy’s mechanical whirring.
Out of the darkness came a hoof aimed directly at his face, unable to respond in time Access was on the ground in mere moments, slammed in the very puddle that’d given him away. The next few moments were a blur of gunshots and ricochets exchanged between Snowy and Access’ assailant, only stopping once everyone’s magazines were empty.
“Don’t move an inch you big dumb- Access?”
“You’ve got quite the grapple there, if I were more meat than machine you might’ve broken my back.” Access joked, despite the pain. “Snowy, you can come out, it’s just Matterhorn.”
“Don’t scare us like that!” Star shrieked as she emerged from the room. “We thought you were one of those things!”
“We’ve met their acquaintance.” Snowy nodded. “We shot one dead on our way here, actually, kinda had to.”
“So that was you then?”
“If we’re all done with the reunion, we need to get out of here, fast.” Phantom said impatiently. “Our exit is back the way you two came, did you see a hatch by chance?”
“Thats how we got down here, but it’s one way.” Snowy remarked.
“Yeah, it was sheer drop after sheer drop.” Access added as Matterhorn pulled him up off the ground. “I don’t think the ducts will survive us climbing back up them, they were more rust than metal.”
“We found a service elevator though.”
“That’s going to have to do.” Phantom remarked, scratching at her neck nervously. “Are you sure it’ll drop us close to where the others are?”
“I have no idea!” Access declared. “At this point it might just be best to take what we can get.”
A dull rumble shook the walls and floor slightly, but only for a brief moment. Then came another, and another, and another.
“Explosions?” Access asked. “Here?”
“We need to go, now.” Phantom declared. “You remember where that elevator was, right?”
“Well yeah, but-”
“No time, start running.”