//------------------------------// // The Delivery // Story: The Winds of Change: Fog of War // by AgentSnail //------------------------------// The Delivery Dash stumbled as she was walking, bumping into Jason as he trotted beside her. She turned and blushed, adding to the alcohol induced heat that was already in her cheeks. "Sorry, *Belch* I guess I shoulda' stopped with that lassst one." "You silly little lightweight." He shifted into his Alternis form before throwing a wing over and pulling her into his side. "And you told me not to get drunk." "Hey." She paused. "Listen you...hot...stallion, I'm not drunk." "Oh? So what's Eravel's codename again?" "It... uh, isn't important." She stumbled again, and Jason stuck an arm under her to make sure she didn't fall. She blushed harder. "I don't need your help, Jason." "Yes you do." "Nuh uh." "Just humor me." He said. She snorted in annoyance, looking at the ground. "You know, I had a dream last night about flying..." She paused, taking a breath. "Which isn't anything new for me, but you were there, and we were flying together, and I did a Sonic Rainboom. Best...Best dream ever." Jason's smile turned to a frown. "Let's just get you to bed for a while." Dash nodded her agreement. He'd already kinda planned on getting her back to the tent, and they were already most of the way there. But that dream... Maybe it didn't mean anything, but those were the same, exact events. Why? It could be coincidental, or there could be some magic affecting it here. Nah, that seemed a little too obscure, even for magic. Then what? His slightly alcohol muddled brain tried to come up with a reason. Dash doesn't have magic, so it couldn't be her. He was the only other one involved, unless there was an outside force. So it must've been him. What had he done differently last night? There was the soundproofing spell, but he'd used that before. What then? He sighed and pushed through the flaps of the tent, moving over to the mattresses before laying her out. He sighed again, laying down next to her. It's not like he had much to do anyway, besides question the griffin, but that could wait. Shining had said that he was still unconscious. He could see if the officer was awake in an hour or so. Dash laid her head and a foreleg across his chest, passing out nearly immediately as soon as she found a semi comfortable position. Jason started to stroke a hoof through her mane, repeating the motion as he started to think again. If their dreams were going to be connected and it had something to do with him, what had happened just before he got to sleep? He hadn't had a dream at all just before the attack, so when was the last time he hadn't had an interconnected dream? The night before, he'd been sliding around on a really un-slippery looking floor. And Dash wasn't there. So assuming she wasn't involved, something happened after that. Fighting, fighting, more fighting, training... Fuck, it had to be that thing with what he assumed was the hive mind. But why the dreams? The hive mind was only supposed to be between changelings... He'd just have to find out if it was coincidence and their dreams had just been similar. In hindsight, Dash hadn't said anything specific. He sighed, reaching over to set the alarm clock before closing his eyes. Well this would be interesting... _____________________________________________________________ Jason woke up with a start, his chest heaving as he tried to recover from the vivid dream. It wasn't as peaceful as the last, he'd been fighting in a battle, and had woken up when he got stabbed. He shuddered. Whoever said that vivid dreams were great was a fucking idiot. He looked over at the alarm clock, and turned it off before it could ring. So he'd slept about an hour then. He poked Dash's face, pushing her cheek into a rather humorous position. She stirred more quickly than he would have expected, given how stoned she had been an hour earlier, and looked up at him with wavering eyes. "Block the light Jason." He chuckled and moved between her and the exit. Then he remembered what was going on, and his smile turned to a frown. "Dash, did you have a dream when you were sleeping?" "Why?" "Because the dream I had last night was exactly the same as the one you had, and I couldn't figure out if it was a coincidence or if it meant something." "Well unless you got stabbed..." Jason put his hooves to his forehead. "Fuck..." "That actually happened?" "Yeah, and now that I know there's a pattern, I can't figure out what's causing it." "Why is this such a big deal? Sharing dreams sounds pretty cool to me." She sounded a little drunk still, much more in shape than he would have expected after only an hour. But she hadn't really had much alcohol, in terms of content. "But what if this is a premonition of something terrible? What if it has something to do with the hive mind?" "Jason, calm down, we'll figure it out. We can send a letter to Celestia, maybe she'll know." "But what if she thinks this makes me a threat?" Dash was silent for a moment. "Jason, why would there be any kind of hive mind link between us, I'm not a changeling." "You see why I'm worried?!?!" "Yeah." She stroked her chin with her hoof. "If you aren't in the main hive mind, is it possible you still have a hive mind that's just not connected? Like a separate one?" "Sure, but why you?" "We don't even know how the real hive mind works, this could be normal." "UUGH!! Why is this so hard to figure out?!" "Let's just go find something to do, a thought you might not have had could come to you." "Fine. The griffin?" "Yeah, any word from Scoots?" Jason shrugged, grabbing the pad of paper. He held it up, not finding any new messages. The clock read two thirty, she should be out of school right now. Scoots, you okay? I'm worried that I haven't heard from you in a while. He stared at the paper, watching as a response formed. Ha, I knew this thing went through to you. The fuck? Guess you won't be able to talk to your daughter anymore... Dash gasped from behind Jason's shoulder. Diamond Tiara, he assumed. The little bitch. So this is revenge? He wrote back. A little pathetic, if you ask me. You're bluffing. Am I? You're the one accumulating revenge points. And I'm not good at controlling my temper. He paused. I'd love to talk, but I have to go torture a griffin. Jason stared at the pad for a moment, before turning and throwing it on the ground. "SHIT!! That little bitch!!" He yelled, before sobering slightly. "And it's all my fault." "No it's not." Dash replied, looking over the messages. "It's better off things turned out the way they did, Scoots wouldn't have had a home without you. And she isn't in any danger from Tiara anyway. I taught her some fighting stuff, just in case." "Wow." He let out a sigh. "I'm much less nervous all of a sudden. Good call on teaching her to fight." "Well she doesn't know much, mostly defensive stuff. Like jabbing and dodging. That's pretty much all we do that doesn't involve knives." "Thanks for thinking ahead." He leaned over and kissed her. "You eliminate so much stress from my life..." "That's actually pretty debatable." She smirked, stumbling slightly as she walked over and poked him. "How drunk are you right now?" "Um, not very. I need some water though, my tongue feels like a rug." "It's dry?" "Something...like that. And I'm still pretty tired." She swayed a little more, putting a hoof to her forehead. "I'll wake up soon enough." "Okay good, cuz we need to go do stuff." She nodded and walked out of the tent, grabbing a pair of sunglasses he hadn't known she'd packed. She left him to grab his saddlebag and shove the computer and pad of paper inside before throwing it over his back. He walked out to meet her, handing over an apple for her to eat, and they started the short trek over to Shining's tent. Shining was unsurprisingly inside once again, he'd briefly been at the party before leaving. He didn't really seem like the party type. But Jason really wasn't either, to that end. Jason looked around, noticing that two other ponies were also inside the tent, and after a few moments of staring he remembered them as the two alternate ponies. "So which reason are you here for? Permission to question the griffin or bringing these ponies onto the team?" Shining asked. "Both, I guess. But there's not really much to say to you two." He turned to the stallions, a pegasus and unicorn. "You can choose which of the sub teams you're on, but try to bring something new to whichever one. And get to know the members of, well, all of us. I'm glad to see you're still willing to be on the team." He walked over and shook the hoof of both of the ponies. "Most of the team's still at the mess hall, I would go meet them now if I were you. But don't piss of Hunter if he's drunk. He's a little weird around alcohol." The ponies saluted and left without another word. "So about that griffin..." Dash started. "Yeah, go ahead." Shining started. "And Jason, I got a bunch more of the stuff that comes from your country over here." He stepped behind his desk, floating over a rather large box of junk and setting it at Jason's feet. "I wasn't really that interested to go through it, but hopefully you'll find some useful stuff." He paused. "And apparently some stuff is here for you two from Ponyville, but that's not time intensive." Jason nodded, pulling the box over to one of the bunks before taking out the first item. "Well this is household cleaner..." He pulled out another item, looking it over. "Maybe a wheel from a swivel chair?" He started sorting the items into useful and useless piles. "SAT book, Xbox games, combat knife..." He shifted his hoof around, flinching as he pulled it back out. "Thumbtacks..." "What are these ex-box things?" Dash asked, holding up a copy of Call of Duty 2. "They're like the video games on a computer, but it's a game console instead. It's only for gaming, pretty much." "This is a game? It looks a lot like one of those movies." "They're both stored on disks, or information donuts, and a case shaped like that is just a good way to store them." He tipped the box over, spilling it's contents. "I was wondering if there was anything past all these sharp things..." He pulled out a few more items. "Another knife, a multi-blade this time, a gun holster, some rope, a box with..." He opened the box, trying to keep a straight face. "Nothing in it." He slid it into his saddlebag, subtly checking if Dash had noticed. "And... a lightbulb, and ooh! Some shotgun shells." He ran his hoof through the pile again, checking for things he may have missed. "That's it?" "Yeah." "So why'd you put that box away?" She asked, crossing her arms. Shit. "If I told you it'd ruin the surprise." "It better be damn good. I think you're just trying to keep me from seeing cool things..." She raised the flap on his saddlebag before he swatted her hoof away. "Hey. Surprise." He couldn't exactly have her butting into this... That made it sound like he had some sort of dastardly plan going on, though, and it was the opposite of that. "What could possibly in that box that you can't tell me?" "Ingredients for the surprise. Which you will receive later, at a good time." Cryptic, good. "Sometimes, Jason, sometimes you really annoy me." "You'll be anything but annoyed later..." He paused. "Now come on, we have stuff to do." He waved to Shining and turned to leave, pushing through the flaps of the tent. "Come on, just a hint." Dash said from behind him. He rolled his eyes. "One hint. I can't put it together myself." Jason said with a smirk. "What kind of a hint was that?" "One that's far too vague to allow you to come up with what I'm doing." Dash bumped into his side, giving him a sultry look. "Maybe if I provide a service in return?" Jason stopped to stroke his chin, acting like he was considering the offer. "No, it's more of a big deal than that." "You're turning down that?" She paused, looking over her face. "The surprise is that good?" "Well it will be, if you like it. And I think you will." "Fine, I won't push for it anymore...As long as you tell me around when I'll be receiving it." "But that's like another hint..." She glared at him. "Fine, it should hopefully be soon, like in a couple weeks. But that depends on how the war's going and how fast shipping is. By the way, what do you think arrived from Ponyville?" "Maybe more junk from your world, if somepony decided to send it out here, or something." "Yeah, okay. Shining said this was the place he had moved the griffin to, right?" He gestured to a tent, one that seemed a little more sturdy than the others. He walked inside, finding a few guardsponies and ten or so metal cages. The griffin was inside one of them, tied to a chair. He looked up and sneered at the duo before looking back down. His foot had a bloody bandage around it, and the guy looked pretty tired. Dash ushered the guards out, and Jason put up the soundproofing spell. Man, this spell was coming in handy. "So listen, griffin." He paused. "God dammit, that didn't rhyme in my head. Anyway, we need information, and evidently we've come to get it from you." The griffin didn't respond. "And I'm assuming that you aren't going to just tell us." "How did you turn a griffin against the empire?" He asked after some more silence. "He hated living there, and he gave us a shitload of information, so we let him stick around." "Another traitor to the motherland..." The griffin shook his head. Jason furrowed his brow, deciding to question the more important of the words. "Another?" The griffin's eyes widened at the realization that he'd let something slip before returning to usual. There were another few moments of silence. "So how's the foot?" Dash asked, pointing with a hoof. "You know," the griffin started, "that noise weapon of yours shattered my foot, your field doctor said I'd probably never walk again. Not without a giant limp. So using your language, fuck you." "Well then, how about we organize a deal." Jason began. "What kind of deal?" The griffin asked, raising a furry eyebrow. "You tell us the information, and in return I get you nicer quarters, and fix your foot." The griffin went wide eyed before throwing his head back in laughter. "Oh, heal my foot, that's a good one, boy! The doctors couldn't, what makes you think you can?" Jason sighed and focused some energy through his horn, healing a cut on the griffin's face. The officer put a claw to his cheek, trying to find the cut. "How did you do that?" He asked. Jason shrugged. "Magic." The griffin turned away, mumbling a few things to himself. "You're saying I won't be crippled? Completely healed?" He asked. Jason nodded. "Get someone to write things down. I'm not spending my life as a invalid." Dash pulled in a guard from outside, thrusting a pad of paper and a pencil into his hands. "Take notes." She said, pointing to the griffin. The guard had an expression that implied he was doubtful they had gotten the griffin to talk. "So here's how this deal will work." Jason started. "You'll give the information, I'll relay it to Shining to make sure it passes the test of at least being possible. Then I'll come back here and fix your foot." "But if it turns out you're wrong, I'll personally shoot it again." Dash said. "Nice bad cop role." He whispered. She nodded, shooting him a grin. "You're not off the hook, just remember, Jason could be anypony, anywhere. And I know neither of us would hesitate to kill you." The griffin nodded solemnly, and they left the tent as he started to talk and the guard wrote down notes. "Good threats." Jason complimented. "Maybe you should be the one threatening Tiara." She giggled. "Yeah. You still got that paper?" "Yup, hold on..." He reached around and opened the saddlebag, grabbing the paper and tossing it to her with a pencil. "Jason." "What?" "What is this here?" She pointed to a couple of red splotches on the paper. "Is that blood?!?!" He moved closer, touching it with a hoof even though he figured it was only the color that had come through. "That's what I thought it was." He heard her gulp audibly, and she started to walk again, looking down at the paper every so often. "You wanna go over to the LZ, grab whatever's been delivered?" Dash simply shrugged. Jason walked over, shifting into Alternis and wrapping a wing around her. "It'll be okay, Dash." He cooed, turning her head to force her to look at him. "She's not an innocent little filly, she's way out of Tiara's league." "But what if Scoots is hurt, what if it's not a fair fight?" "Do you think that Scoots would seriously get into a situation like that? She'd bring her friends, or at least ambush Tiara. She did a couple things on the map that I just re-used. I think it's her cutie mark, to be honest. I've just got to figure out some way for her to accidentally get a plan approved by Celestia or something." "Do you think she knows?" Dash asked. Jason gave her a look. "No, this is Scoots we're talking about here. She's going to take forever to get her cutie mark, so I'm just going to give her a little push, and by that I mean make sure the plan she 'accidentally' sends isn't used in case there's a mistake." They crested the hill, and walked over to a small group of ponies that were unloading boxes and bins. The piles were labeled with signs based on their owners, but try as he might, Jason couldn't find one labeled with his or Dash's name. "You're rainbow Dash?" One of the pegasi asked. "Yeah, Shining said we had a delivery." The pony pointed to an unhitched chariot. "Right there, miss." She nodded and led the way, fiddling with the chariot door before she pulled it open. "Wow, Jason, look!" She pointed inside, waiting for him to join her at the door. "Octavia sent us out instruments!" She jumped inside, tilting the chariot slightly as a clatter of drums and symbols came from inside. "You alright Dash?" He heard a belated clang. "Yeah, it's just dark." Came her response. "And you call me the clumsy one." He chuckled, walking inside and lighting up his horn. Dash had literally knocked over everything, and was buried somewhere in the wreckage. Jason sighed and started floating the instruments away, leaving them in a pile outside. He found Dash after a few had been removed, face redder than he had ever seen before. "In my defense, I'm still buzzed." "Whatever, I drank the same amount as you." He floated the last of the drums out of the door, setting them back up. He walked over and grabbed a box pulling a note off the side of it and handing it to Dash as he carefully moved it outside. "I found some human stuff, it says. And then Octavia signed her name. When'd she find out?" "Lyra let it slip in front of her at the going away party." "She's not very good with secrets, is she?" "I think she's just overly excited that humans exist." Dash stroked her chin for a moment. "You're probably right. You wanna get this stuff back then?" "Might as well. How'd she get all this stuff to the chariot?" "I don't really know. Oh wait, she probably just asked Applejack to get another chariot over to her farm. She's been sending a lot of apples out here lately." "Yeah, I'll bet she's really pulling in the profits right now." He took a deep breath and levitated the box and all of the instruments off the ground. "Let's just get these back before my brain explodes." "Why do you have so much trouble with levitating that many things?" "I dunno, I guess I'm just not good at it. Rarity definitely is, and I think Twilight probably is too. All I can do is lift really heavy stuff." "Is that really a bad thing?" Jason didn't answer, he just sped up his trot in an attempt to get back to the tent faster. After a couple minutes he got there and quickly shoved the instruments through the flaps, setting them in a pile in the corner. He visibly relaxed before setting down the box, tipping it over to go through it. "Find anything yet?" Dash asked, looking over his shoulder. "Just some magazines and a few pairs of scissors. And an extension cord." He sifted through the pile, throwing several more magazines into the junk pile. He pulled out a computer mouse, setting it in the keep pile. "Yes!" He reached in and pulled out a vaguely L-shaped object, and turned it over in his hooves. He pressed a button and a metal thing slid out, carrying... Wait were those bullets? "Is that another gun?!?!" Dash asked. Jason turned and nodded, smiling widely. "Here, I've got something to do with this." He grabbed a belt, something he'd found a while ago and figured he'd find a use for, and pulled the holster out of his saddlebag. He walked behind Dash, and immediately went about attaching the holster to her upper hind leg. "Enjoying yourself back there?" Dash asked, the hint of a smirk on her face. She raised her tail flirtatiously. "Be serious for a second, then you can flirt with me." She suppressed a laugh, putting on a more serious expression. Jason put the safety on the pistol before putting it into the holster. He went back to the box, returning with two more clips, which he attached to the designated places on the holster. He took a step back to observe his work, smiling when it was up to par. "So is that an AUG too?" "No, that was the specific gun. This one's a colt 1911, a pistol. I'll have to get some sort of system rigged up so that you can pull the trigger, but try pulling it out. Dash reached back and grabbed the gun in a fluid motion, pointing it in front of her. "Bend your elbow." He said. "And generally you hold those things with two hands, or hooves in this case, so see if you can rear up and do that. Aim at the bunk over there, but don't try to shoot." Dash followed his directions, shoving off the ground with her free hoof and taking aim before tottering and coming back down. "Was that good?" "Probably, you'll do better without alcohol, but there'll be kick when you shoot it. Smaller than this gun, but it'll be there nonetheless." "So how does this gun compare to yours?" "Well, that's semi-automatic, so one trigger pull equals one bullet. Eight bullets in the clip, I think, but there may be more." He walked over, pointing out parts of the gun with his hoof. "Magazine release, safety. Oh yeah, you have to pull the top back to chamber the first bullet." He pulled it back partway to show her what he was talking about. "Don't chamber one now though, I don't want to think it's empty and then be wrong." "Yeah, okay. This is so cool!" She made an adorable 'squee' sound, putting the gun back in the holster. "You wanna go see what happened to the griffin?" "Might as well. Actually, Shining probably knows by now." He walked outside, admiring the setting sun for a moment before Dash caught up and they set off. Shining was in the process of entering the tent with a pad of paper at the time, presumably having picked it up from the guard. He turned to see them and ushered them inside. "So," he started, "This seems like it's in order, I was looking it over for a while, and I haven't found anything that doesn't fit with what the griffins could do. This definitely sheds some light on troop movements though." "Near us?" "Yeah, they're massing in the hills a little ways from here, he said. I checked, and that's the opportune place for an ambush, or defense, or whatever." "So I gotta go heal him then?" "It would appear so. That's another gun there Dash?" He asked. "Yeah, Jason just found it from the stuff in the delivery." "Hey, Jason, I call dibs on one of the next ones you find." Shining said as Jason turned to leave. "Yeah, you look like a revolver kinda guy. I'll keep you posted." He sent a wave back and left, taking off and flying across the camp. It'd been a while since he'd flown, come to think of it. Dash had already gone past him, dipping to do quick circle around a tent before joining him again. Jason laughed slightly at her antics before landing in front of the jail tent and walking inside. The griffin looked up, trying and failing to contain his eagerness at being healed. Jason walked over, staring at the griffin for a few moments before opening his mouth to speak. "Why do you care so much about being crippled, why did that sway your fancy so much?" The griffin shrugged. "You might think I just didn't like it there, and that this is a rather blatant disguise for that. But really, living in a militaristic society where the weak and terminally ill just disappear, it gets to be one of your deepest fears that you'll end up like I am now. And even if you are going to stick me in jail indefinitely, I just don't want to be that limited. And I don't want pity for my injuries, nor do I want a reminder of the day I was bested by a pony." "Well, okay then. I'm not a pony by the way, I'm a changeling. Just keep your foot still, and it should be healed in a minute or so." He waited until the griffin had stopped moving before resentfully channeling some power through his horn. He'd never felt his way through a bullet wound before, but it was completely different from a stab wound. Luckily the bullet had gone through, leaving only shattered bones and torn flesh to fix. It took a bit more energy than it usually did, but after a few moments, the foot looked the same as he assumed it had, minus the large scar in the middle. "I hate to say this, but thanks." The griffin said. "Yeah, whatever. Nice of you to come around." Jason said sarcastically, turning to leave. "I'll see about getting you your 'cozy' cell." Jason pushed through the flaps, making a bee line towards the tent. He wasn't sure why, but he was damn tired. A bump in the side let him know that Dash had caught up. He took off with her, flying low over a few tents before arriving back at theirs once again. Jason followed Dash inside, immediately collapsing on the mattress. He took his saddlebag off, pulling out the pad of paper to see what had happened. He took a deep sigh as he saw the message reading prominently at the top of the page. I got it back, and I'm totally fine. I got a little help from a new friend. New friend? Who's that? He asked, figuring that he wouldn't get a response soon anyway. He tossed the pad to Dash and floated the saddlebag away. Dash let out an audible sigh, setting the pad down and joining Jason on the bed. Jason hardly had the energy to say goodnight before sleep took him.