//------------------------------//
// Subterranean Threat 
// Story: Innocence Once Lost 
// by Scorched Earth 
//------------------------------//

	Proof reader/Editor:  xoid

“Gear up and get ready. Melee dogs up front, rest of you, look out for any enemies from other tunnels.” The squad leader said. Barker just grunted and picked up his rifle. He and his squad, alongside two others, had been sent deep into tunnels to locate one of changeling hives. Plan was to locate one and, possibly, destroy it.

The Diamond Dog Protectorate had so far been a pretty low-key player on this whole conflict. On the other hand… perhaps it was better to say that the DDP was unseen. Humans were pretty open with their support of the DDP who were keeping the underground tunnel network clean of changelings. After The War, it had been realized exactly how much military value these tunnels had. Through them, one could reach any part of Equestria, in complete secrecy. That was without considering the amount of natural resources one could reach simply following the tunnels and locating unused ore veins.

Barker’s squad was pretty much a standard dog unit. Three melee specialists, armed with axes or clubs, depending upon their personal preferences, and one modified human pistol. They were slightly bigger than what humans used, but that was mainly due to difference in body structure. A dog’s hand was a lot bigger than a human’s.

There were also 3 gunners, who carried automatic weapons, a heavy gunner and a comm. officer. Anyone could be the squad leader, but quite often he was either a gunner or a melee fighter. Since the tunnels were pretty tight, melee combat was far more common than on the surface. Most human tactics failed since they could not bring enough firepower to bear in the tunnels.

To Barker, the DDP was a dream come true; for a long time, dogs had wanted to make a nation of their own, but had been unable thanks to their tribal society and diffuse nature. With humans bringing more and more tribes together for trade, more agreements could be made. Humanity had soon thereafter suggested an alliance, offering some of their tech, and the DDP had been formed. It had started a new age in diamond dog history. Finally, they could be more than a species of thugs.

Right now, the DDP was threatened and his duty was to protect it. His brother had fallen in the San Palomino Desert, roasted by a dragon if survivors were to be believed. Only a handful had managed to pull out. So this was not just a matter of protecting the DDP; it was a chance to avenge his brother.

Tunnels were largely in disarray. Someone who didn’t live underground could not tell, but to Barker it was clear as day. Until the DDP had set up new routes these tunnels had been one of the trade routes. Now, it was abandoned and left to erosion, “unmaintained”, so to speak. He could already see the fractures where the digging had been sloppy and where supports were already starting to crack. Furthermore, irregular use had left its mark. Trash had started to accumulated in “unseen” places as this passage’s few visitors dumped their unneeded equipment around.

They arrived at a crossroads. One tunnel lead to other parts of the former trade network, another one lead to depths that had never been fully explored. However, the latest scout reports indicated that changelings had a major movement there. So several more scouting parties had been sent; only one returned. They spoke of a massive amounts of changelings. This lead the DDP high command to believe that there was a hive down there. If they could confirm and locate it, it would allow them to strike back.

“Gronki, Gruff, check that tunnel. Barker and Dirk, that tunnel. Report here if you find anything. Do not engage the enemy. Understood?” They squad leader said. Everyone nodded and headed to their designated tunnels. Dirk was relatively young. He was not much younger than Barker was, but on the other hand, he had not been in real combat yet. Barker guessed that was why he had been paired with him. They needed someone with combat experience to keep the rookie in line.

The two of them moved down the tunnel. Slowly, they started to see the signs of their targets. Few spits of goop here and there. Small holes made to house young ones undergoing metamorphosis. A tunnel wall opened, to allow access to other tunnel. Other, much smaller, perhaps changeling or two sized tunnels branching off. It was a miner’s nightmare, to be honest. A single blast could cause the entire tunnel to collapse. Perhaps that was high command’s plan? To set off an explosion large enough to cause the entire tunnel network to collapse and crush the enemy?

After several more turns, the rookie in front of him raised his paw. Universal “stop” sign. Then he gestured him to move forward. Barker moved up and saw their target. The hive. There was still plenty of tunnel to traverse before reaching the main chambers, but for all intent and purpose, it was a hive. Nursing chambers were something that was not build unless changelings had decided that the place was good enough for a queen.

“Good work kid. Let’s head back.”

“We’re not fighting?”

“No. Orders were clear. Do not engage, only scout. We got what we wanted, time to pull back. Plus, you think you got enough ammo to take down an entire hive?” Barker as as he turned around. “However… it’s strange there aren’t any sentries here. It’s like the hive is too weak to guard itself.”

“Can’t argue with you. I don’t have any experience with dealing these things, they are pretty rare up north.”

Two of them headed back to the rendezvous location. The others were waiting for them, having found alternate routes into the hive. The mission had been a success.





“This data is correct?” Saral said to her diamond dog counterpart.

“Yes. We know where they are are. Just give us the explosives and we can make the whole hive disappear.”

“Hmm…” 

This could give them time they needed to reinforce their positions. There were options before her. Either take one of the Final Argument weapons and use those or use something else. They could just pour tons of explosives into a single bomb and then have that one go off. She wasn’t a fan of using WMDs, not yet.

Even more, she had no intention of revealing existence of Project Final Argument. Suddenly revealing that they’ve got weapons of mass destruction pointed at the planet capable of destroying any target they wanted in less than 5 minutes would no doubt make every nation on the face of the planet distrust them. 

Worse yet, it might bring so far seemingly uninterested and isolated nations from the other side of the world into the table. Humanity could not afford enemies. They had too few allies to fight a global war, not in the scale humans could afford it. They needed the planet. They could not just bombard it back to stone age, not while the magic was there. That was the main problem of human politics. Everything had to be planned so that it didn’t cause threat to humans. A relatively simple thing, losing The Zone, would be enough to cause humanity as a nation to collapse in on itself.

But her job was to fight and lead, not to think. Right now, she needed to make sure that the enemy would be stopped. The DDP’s plan to destroy a hive could be what she needed to buy some time.

“Very well. I will contact my troops and prepare the weapons. In the meanwhile, I want you and me to go through this plan. We can’t do this alone, we will need the others. Those, what were they, ‘elements of whatever’ could be use to us.”





“Queen Chrysalis?” Saral asked the changeling queen sitting in her cell. Even if she wasn’t considered a prisoner and her cell door was unlocked, she was still a security risk. So she had agreed to remain in the dungeon for the time being, guarded by several elite Royal Guard ponies.

“Not much of a queen these days. You’re a human? Funny that one of your kind would want to talk to me.” The changeling queen answered, raising her head from her meal. Magical crystals, fused with emotions, and some normal pony food.

“It is because we wish to confirm several things.”

“Like what?”

“What it takes to completely destroy a hive.”

“What!?” Chrysalis shouted and rose. She walked to the door, where Saral was leaning against the wall. “What do you mean by that?”

“Just answer my question.”

“No. Not before you tell me which hive it is!” She was worried. If this was her hive, which was closest to current battlelines, she would need to find a way to save it.

“How about we make a deal. You tell me what how to do it and I tell you which hive it is?” Saral asked. She knew that the changeling queen would not contact the enemy forces. Reports she had gotten from SOG-9 had spoken of her being very bitter towards them, not to mention their covert attempts to kill her.

“…Fine.”

“Well?”

“To completely destroy a hive… you need to kill its ruling queen and kill over two thirds of it’s population. It would cause a large enough backlash to cause remaining drones and soldiers to die from it… It will also ensure that the hive won’t be able to spawn a new queen.”

“Hmm? I thought that queens were only ones who gave birth?”

“Do I look like someone who could give birth to hundreds of thousands of changelings? No, there is different caste for that, breeders. Sometimes a drone can become a breeder, but breeders can’t control drones or get nourishment themselves. That is what we queens are for. We direct the hive and serve as a ‘link’ between all that energy and the hive. Kill the queen and breeders and cause large enough backlash, and the hive will collapse.” Chrysalis explained. 

She didn’t like talking about the matter, but she had few choices. She needed to know. Besides, even if she wouldn’t talk, humans would very likely just resort to “kill them all” tactics they had used against one of her outposts. She had originally build that one to expand her hive, in preparation to raid another hive, but that plan had been abandoned after humans burned during their March to the Sea.

“I see… Thank you.” Saral said and turned to leave.

“Wait! What about your end of the bargain!”

“It’s a hive near current battlegrounds. That is all I will say.” Saral said as she walked away. There were secrets to be kept.

However, Chrysalis knew that there was only one hive in that direction. Hers. She turned to one of the guards.

“I want to speak to the Princesses. Now.”





“It’s surprising you wanted to see me. You have been rather… quiet ever since we found you.” Celestia said as she entered Chrysalis room. Chrysalis simply gave her a cold look.

“I would have preferred to keep my silence, but the situation has changed.” She said. “One of the humans visited me recently.”

“Oh?” Celestia said, raising her eyebrow. Humans didn’t think much of changelings, preferring to just burn their hives where they found them. Their hive-minded society and insectoid nature made then, for a lack of better word, “scary” to humans. It was surprising that a human would talk to one on his own.

“Yes. They are planning something. She asked me how to destroy a hive.” Chrysalis said. “And she spoke of a hive near current battlegrounds.”

That caught Celestia's attention. First, the human was female. Only human who would know about Chrysalis would be either the ambassador, who had not appeared in public for sometime, or General Saral. Since she had asked about destruction, it would most likely be Saral.

“I think they plan to destroy the hive.” Chrysalis continued.

“Most likely. Not something I would like. I need to find a way to prevent it. Genocide is never an answer.” Celestia said. But how? Unless she got a good alternative, she would not really be able to oppose humans, not without breaking the unity of the coalition.

“I have a personal interest regarding the hive.” Chrysalis said, earning a puzzled look from Celestia. “That hive, it used to be mine.”

“I see…” Celestia said. She had a guess what Chrysalis would propose.

“I have a proposition. Help me regain my hive. With your and the Elements help, I could drive the usurper away. I would pledge myself and my hive to you.”

“You sound… desperate.” Celestia tried to keep her voice even. The idea of having an entire changeling hive join the coalition was tempting. The amount of soldiers they could get. She hated herself for thinking it like that, but it was undeniable fact. They were outnumbered. Human tech would only get them so far, before they would run out of ammo. She herself had seen it happen. They had almost taken Las Pegasus by wearing humans down. Only the sudden arrival of human reinforcements had saved them.

“I may be a changeling, even a queen. I might not have spawned them myself, but they are still MY subjects. MY hive. Imagine yourself losing Canterlot. They are not your children directly. Yet you would mourn them, would you not?” Chrysalis said in anger. She was not heartless. The hive was hers, no matter what. Each one of those changelings had once looked up to her for guidance. This… usurper had turned them into mere cannon fodder.

Celestia knew well what Chrysalis meant. She had once lost Canterlot. Not the city itself, perhaps, but humans and dogs had still raided the castle itself, even destroyed it. Not to mention hundreds of thousands of ponies that had died. Their deaths weighted heavily on her. Canterlot cemetery had grown tenfold during the war.

“Very well. What do you need?” Celestia asked.





“Careful… careful…” Head engineer said as the other engineer tried to maneuver the new, experimental vehicle into the transport. The blueprints called it an “Armored Personnel Carrier,” though the teams called them “Bulldozers.” It was armed with two heavy machine guns and had enough armor plating to survive a hit from an ACES suit’s cannon.

It used six wheels and would able to carry 12 soldiers inside it. It would, no doubt, be of great use in combat. Its armor and weapons would make it perfect support for the troops. With the upgrades from other systems, its AA-System could provide much needed air cover. 

Still, it had problems. First one being no-one was used to these things. Most Grav-lev vehicles used were either computer controlled or moved in completely different way. They had first thought that taking a transport pilot would be a simple solution, but that had turned out to be a false premise. There was a clear difference between moving in 3D space where momentum remained and moving in near 2D space, where hitting the brakes actually made the damn thing stop.

Several prototypes had been lost because pilots had crashed them on the courses. Still, they needed to ramp up their equipment. This APC, as it was called, would be a valuable asset. They had grown too used to close quarters combat, not to mention to limited areas of the moon. Surface warfare was completely different from that, which had contributed to their slow advances.

They had cannibalized jigs and tooling from two entire grav-lev assembly lines to make a single production line for these things and the operation still had efficiency problems. The most glaring being that the armor plating had to be custom fitted. The hull might be based upon the chassis of mass transit grav-levs, but there was no ready-made armor plating. They had tested the systems on unarmored prototypes before adding armor plating on these three. There was no guarantee that they would work correctly. People higher in the military hierarchy had ignored him on that, deciding that even a minor advantage was better than nothing. He fully expected these things to break down during the first battle.

It was not only vehicles. Shoulder Mounted Rocket Systems were also being loaded into transports, to be delivered to the troops. He was even less sure about those. They had too many unknown parts in them and too little testing. He had designed several weapon systems, one being the rifle-helmet targeting interface he worked on before the invasion. He had spent four months merely testing that one and even then, after initial battles he had gone back to drawing board to redesign several elements that simply didn’t work. These rocket launchers? Barely three weeks of testing. Even so, most of the tests were performed without a real warhead.

These weapons were untested, as far as he was concerned. They could do anything. From exploding right next to user to causing even bigger damage than anticipated. Still… they would need all the equipment they could give to their troops. Even if it was a meager three armored vehicles and untested weapons.





“Thank you for coming to this emergency meeting.” Saral said to assembled leaders. She had called them to a meeting that was being held at the embassy. “Yesterday, DDP scouts located a hive near our current defensive line. This hive poses a significant risk to our troops.” A monitor flickered on behind her, showing the map of Equestria, with human territories outlined. It then zoomed to the area Saral had referred to.

“Thanks to scouting efforts made by the DDP and some research, we have come up with a plan to deal with this threat.” Saral continued. A screen changed to show a text. “Let me present you Operation Broken Demon.” Words flashed on the screen, before moving upper left corner. The screen showed a map of tunnel network.

“There are four different entrances, three of which can be accessed through here.” A large tunnel, that branched into three smaller tunnels was highlighted in green. “We will deploy our main force through here, which will engage the enemy.”

“Sounds risky. How do you suppose we can beat them there?” The Zebra Union representative, Legate Bacus interrupted . He was sceptical about the plan, attacking a hive directly would cost them a lot. Saral gave him a short glare, she was not used to getting interrupted during briefing. Then again, these people, or creatures, or whatever, weren’t humans.

“Simple. We don’t defeat the enemy there, we will simply tie up their defenders. Once our main objective is completed, they will fall back and collapse the tunnels behind them, allowing a safe retreat.” Saral continued. On-screen, a green arrow moved through the tunnels, before being countered by a red arrow, creating an icon where they met. Behind the first arrow, a bomb icon appeared.

“Meanwhile, after enemy has concentrated their main force against out diversion unit, the secondary unit will move through here.” Another tunnel, isolated from the first one, was highlighted in blue. “This team, consisting of the Elements of Harmony and the best soldiers we can offer, will move into the deepest parts of the hive while the hive is distracted.” A blue arrow moved through the tunnel into the hive.

“And do tell us, what is this supposed to accomplish?” The High King asked.

“Just wait and listen.” The diamond dog representative said and nodded to Saral.

“Thank you. As I was saying, the second unit will move into the hive proper. They will move as deep as they can. Once they have gotten as far as they can, they will deploy a bomb. This bomb will be massive. It will be enough to cause the entire hive to collapse in on itself. Furthermore, it will fill the tunnels with flames and deadly gasses. In short, it will kill the hive.” A bomb icon appeared where the blue arrow had moved to.

“Once the bomb is set, the Elements of Harmony will use their powers to first evacuate the troops here.” The blue arrow disappeared and a blue cross appeared behind the green arrow. “Our troops will pull back, collapsing the tunnel as they go.” The green arrow moved backwards, behind a bomb icon, which promptly exploded, creating a boulder icon in its place. “Then, the Elements of Harmony will move as large a contingent as they can outside the caves.” Both the blue and green arrows disappeared. “If everything has gone correctly… at this point, the bomb will detonate.” The other bomb icon on the screen exploded and sent a shockwave around it, destroying the hive.

“A hive destroyed and enemy forces significantly weakened with minimal casualties compared to a traditional assault. Not to mention the morale boost we all could use after the San Palomino disaster.” Saral concluded as the screen switched back to the first slide, showing the name of the operation. “Any questions? Do we all agree that this is the best way?”

“No.” Celestia said and rose up. Saral raised her eyebrow, but gestured her to continue. “We have a changeling queen here, in Canterlot, who is ready to cooperate with us.” Celestia said. Saral cursed silently. She knew that talking to that damn thing would cause problems, but she needed to confirm her plan. “Thus, I propose an alternative outcome to this than genocide.” Celestia said, giving a glare at Saral. Celestia was slightly unnerved by the plans’ callous approach of killing hundreds of thousands of (almost) sentient creatures.

“Instead of using a bomb, we take Queen Chrysalis into the hive. With the help of the Elements of the Harmony, we can disturb the whatever connection the hive is sharing with it’s new queen by taking her out. This will allow Chrysalis to assume control of the hive and turning it from an enemy, into an ally.” Celestia said. 

It was a sound plan, one that the princesses had come up with during their talk with Chrysalis. Celestia had not known full details of the human plan, but her guess was very close. She was glad that her guards had sought her out quickly when Chrysalis had demanded an audience. Had she remained unaware of what was brewing she would have been unable to offer this alternative. Humans planning to use the Elements of Harmony had been a slight surprise, though.

“And if that plan fails? A lot of people will die.” The diamond dog representative said. “I say we go with the original plan. Kill them all. Let the Underdog sort them out.” He said, slamming his fist into the table.

“I say we go with Celestia’s plan. I’d rather have a new ally than a hole in the ground.” The High King said. Of course, that was a lie. The real reason was that he didn’t want barons back home thinking he would be ready to kill them too. If they got such idea into their heads, his reign would be cut suddenly. He had no sons, not yet, so that would lead to all kinds of problems.

“So… it falls down to you, then.” Saral said and looked at the zebra, who had remained silent. “I trust you see the need to destroy that hive.”

“Surely you don’t consider this sort of act appropriate?” Celestia asked.

“I see both sides of this argument and I am thinking benefits of both plans. There is no doubt that this plan would allow us strike against our enemy. Celestia, your plan is risky. There are too many ways it could fail.” He said. “On the other hand, it will give us a great boost in terms of combat abilities, not to mention intel we could learn.”

“However… the human plan is much more straightforward and simple. It is also more likely to succeed. I assume we can’t carry out both?”

“No. The queen is either leading the troops in front or hiding in her chambers. Dragging the bomb there is risky and detonating it there will give us suboptimal result.” Saral said, pressing few buttons. The screen showed the map again, this time with the queen’s chambers highlighted.

“I see… let me think this for today… I will give you my answer tomorrow.” Legate Bacus said. “I will see you all tomorrow.”

“Very well. Anyone else got anything?” Saral asked, receiving few shakes. “Then this meeting is adjourned. We will meet tomorrow.”