The flight was long and uneventful. It didn't help that Enright was as talkative as a sponge. Unlike the Chinook, which had its interior partially soundproofed, the CH-53 was not so kind to the ponies’ more acute hearing thanks to their large ears. Luckily, the aircraft did have several helmets designed for a pony’s physiology and was more than adequate to drown out the engine noise.
Tune found it odd that there was already so much equipment designed with a pony’s shape in mind, but any inquiries into why were met with silence. It didn’t help that none of the helmets were equipped with microphones.
Conrad’s internal compass told him they were going south with a moderate lean to the east. His wings itched at the sensation of being in flight powered by something other than his own power.
Loki felt the interior of the craft was far too dull, and had a rough time staying still as the need to stretch her legs was becoming exasperating. The green mare was sorely tempted to toy with Enright by activating her bracelet’s invisibly, but decided to save that prank for later.
Eventually the helicopter set down in a clearing several miles north of Caney Creek Lake State Park, Louisiana. Spring was well underway and the grass had a fresh and healthy green luster along with the trees on the edge of the clearing growing in this year’s canopy of leaves. The surrounding area had three brick buildings that looked at home in a park reception center. There was no sign that the place was anything resembling a covert organization. Alexia mused that would defeat the purpose.
There was no one to greet them at the helipad, which was little more than a clearing of grass. Enright gestured for the trio to leave the confines of the aircraft and head towards the drab grey and red structure on the left side.
“So when are you start giving us some answers?” Loki yelled at Enright.
“You’ll get some soon enough.” He replied with no emotion.
“Stupid black suited robot.” The earth pony grumbled to herself. “I bet you couldn’t smile if your life depended on it.”
The interior of the two story brick building revealed itself to be a dilapidated storehouse that had been commandeered by the paramilitary group that had recruited them. Said group did not seem to be very big as there were only three people manning a small control center. The forth was standing behind the operator in the center of the room who looked to the door when Enright opened it and led the ponies inside.
By his demeanor and presence, it was obvious he was the one in charge. He stood just shy of six feet and had a surprisingly pleasant expression on his face. “Well now, the guests of honor have arrived. You may call me Director Thompson.”
He offered his had in greeting to which Alexia hesitantly accepted and shook before he repeated the gesture to Loki and Conrad. “Alexia Tune. You’re not quite what I expected Director.”
“I could say the same for you, Miss Tune. Your list of abilities is impressive to say the least. As such, I felt drafting you would enact a more efficient resolution to a problem of both mine and yours.”
“Like what?” Conrad asked flatly, not trusting Thompson’s approachable nature as genuine.
“I will get to that in a minute, but first I need a demonstration of your unique abilities so I can get a measure of them.”
Loki’s ears perked up at that and hissed at her friends to grab their attention before waving her bracelet at them. “On three guys. Ready?” Alexia felt better at the warmer reception from the Director and was willing to entertain Loki’s suggestion. Conrad needed some prodding from the unicorn before agreeing as well. At Tune’s nod, Loki started counting. “One, two, three!”
With an azure, green, and off-white transparent film spreading from Alexia, Loki, and Conrad’s bracelets respectively; the ponies faded from view entirely. The Director maintained his composure, but it was evident he was greatly pleased. “Active camouflage, most impressive. Glad your file was on the money. But I was under the impression only you had these abilities, Miss Tune.”
“I enchanted my friends’ bracelets so they can use the cloak too.” Alexia cantered a lap around the room with her voice being the only indication of where she was. “Our hoofsteps are dampened as well, so we don’t have to worry about hard surfaces.” She returned to her original spot and decloaked. Conrad followed suite, while Loki revealed herself to be standing on the table next to one of the operators. Her muzzle was inches from the man’s ear.
A crazed grin crept over her face as the man finally looked away from the satellite images to the green muzzle. “Hi there.”
Much to his chagrin and future teasing, the man jump out of his seat at the sudden appearance of the green pony. Alexia and Conrad cringed at the backlash Thompson was going to level on them thanks to Loki, but all he did was snicker at her antics. “I hope you didn’t piss your pants Moore.”
Moore tsked at the giggling mare and his bemused commander. “I’m fine Director.” His fellows kept their composure, but Moore knew he wasn't going to hear the end of it for weeks.
“Good to hear it.” He tilted his head to beckon Loki to rejoin her companions. “That will certainly cut down on training time if all three of you can already move silently and invisibly.”
Conrad was baffled by Thompson’s behavior. “You don’t act like any government agency I’ve ever heard of.”
“That’s because we’re trying a different, if highly unpopular approach with you.” The Director’s inflection grew sour. “What you see is the entirety of my department, if it can really be called that. The three men here and I wish to try a more candid and positive approach towards handling equine agents such as yourselves.”
“You can’t be serious.” The pegasus replied incredulously.
“Why do you think this is all I could requisition from the head office?” Thompson replied waving at the room with three desk agents and their modest equipment. “I told you my approach is unpopular, but I made enough noise to get a chance, and you’re it.”
“What about iceberg over there?” Loki jabbed a hoof at Enright.
“He’s part of the probation.” Thompson stated matter-of-factly. “To report the higher ups how effective my style of agent handling with your kind is. Although I know they only really care about results.” Enright made no reaction to the explanation, nor to the three ponies’ prolonged stares. The Director didn’t expect a reaction so he continued. “Suffice it to say, the DoD will make use of your talents, be it through me or someone else. I would like to think my hunch was right and that you would prefer a friendlier atmosphere to work with. If not…”
Alexia jumped at the chance. “We would. Totally would.” She jabbed a hoof into Conrad and Loki’s sides. “Right guys?”
“Yeah…sure.” He responded.
“Only if I can go online again when I go back home.” Loki demanded.
“That would be up to Colonel Bowler, I have no authority over him.” Thompson replied sympathetically. “But if you sign a nondisclosure agreement about our work here or about anything related to being a pony, I can accommodate you while you’re working with me. Provided you’re not on assignment and only if this operation is successful.”
Tune wrapped a foreleg around Loki and pulled her in to a side long hug to whisper. “Come on Green Bean, this is the best chance we got. Be glad he isn’t yelling at us to do push-ups or something.”
Loki glowered at her new nickname for a few seconds before cracking a smile. “Fine, fine.” She turned to the Director. “So what do you want us to do?”
“Jackson!” The Director yelled so that the operator would grab his laptop and place it on the table in front of the ponies. The computer revealed a zoomed in photo of a large open walled dining area near a marina along the western end of the park to the south. A second image taken via satellite showed several armed men and women patrolling the area while some dragged a hostage off camera. It was too grainy to see any fine details of the militants. “About seventeen hours ago, a group of cultists proclaiming themselves to be the Arm of the Koridost started kidnapping everyone in the state park just south of here and rounding the hostages up and bringing them to this location.”
“Originally I was going to have you go through an extensive training regimen, as that is what I planned to have you do once Bowler finally released you into my custody. But when this situation occurred, I knew with your skill set that you could accomplish this mission without it.”
“Wait just one damn minute.” Conrad exclaimed. “You want us, a bunch of civilians, to go against a damn small army with no training?”
“All three of you just demonstrated invisibility, and your file said Alexia here possesses teleportation and can summon a concussive blast which would be excellent for both lethal and nonlethal alike. You possess flight, and Loki has demonstrated strength in excess. Prove to me, and my superiors alike, that you are ready and willing to defend your country, and I promise you that given enough time I can pressure the brass to give you more liberties at The Ranch. Maybe, but no promises.” He added. “You could persuade them through your actions to disband the camp entirely.”
Conrad still believed it was a ploy, but Alexia’s prodding made him relent. “I still don’t like being sent in with no training.”
“We’ll do that later. Of that I can guarantee, if this op goes well.” Thompson promised. “I am not proud to say that I begged the brass to give me this op, and as you can imagine they are not very patient with hostage situations on American soil.”
He had Tune at the promises of more freedoms. “We’ll do it!” She glanced at her brethren for support and they gave it.
“Great. The brass doesn’t care how you do it, as they don’t really know what to expect of you.”
He leaned against the table to get more comfortable. “The situation is this. Seventeen hours ago, a group of militant fanatics attacked the homes of everyone living in the park to the south while five families there were hosting reunions. They’ve issued no demands, and if their actions are anything to go by, they didn’t even want to be discovered. Police were called in shortly after the shooting started and thirteen officers were killed by the numerically superior hostiles before the rest backed off. After that, the cult gave their ultimatum to the police to stay away or they would kill every hostage.”
“As I said, there were no demands and no willingness to negotiate. Whatever these people are doing, they need to be stopped. With none of you having any sort of training, I was originally I was going to send Tune in there by herself because invisibility coupled with muffled footsteps more than makes up for it. However since all of you have this ability, I think sending all three of you will work better.” The mares were apprehensive, but Conrad was more or less unaffected by the prospect of taking life. “Your goal is simple. Secure the hostages and notify me when they're safe so I can call in the strike force and evac.”
The brown pegasus showed interest. “As for the cultists. Would you rather them dead or alive?”
“Either or.”
“Dead it is.” Conrad liked it simple.
Alexia wasn’t quite so ready to deal out blood and death. “What do we know about this cult?”
“Very little, other than that they seem to be able to convert anyone who will listen to them, and they have a penchant for ritually scaring their faces and painting their skin red. A real nasty bunch.”
Loki kicked the air behind her, and was not letting the reality of it all sink in. “Well I’m all for bucking some extremists. Just give me some lunch, a direction, and watch the zealots fly.”
“The National Guard is crawling up my ass wanting to go in themselves, so I need you to go in now.”
“We’ll do our best.” Alexia declared.
“Excellent.” Thompson pulled a padded grey briefcase out from under the table. Within were ten headsets and he pulled three of them out. “These will keep you in contact with us so we can keep you appraised on up-to-date intel.” The three ponies took the sets and found they were anchored around the ears and had a long mic boom. They were moderately uncomfortable because their ears constantly swiveled to errant noise and were fully integrated into their facial expressions. The Director noticed their discomfort. “It's all I could get on short notice. If things go well, I can get the funding for equipment better suited to your physiology.”
“We appreciate it.” Tune replied. “So are we being airlifted again?”
“Afraid not.” Jackson butted in. “This is as close as we dare without the risk of getting shot down. Two choppers were nearly taken down by stingers. If we were going to bring in more aircraft, it would not be for small insertion team.”
“So you want us to hoof it from here?” Loki inquired.
“That’s the idea.”
The idea of running appealed to the hacker. “Then what are we waiting for?”
“One more thing before you go.” Thompson said with a voice of command. “Keep the headsets with you at all times. They’ll let us track your movements and we can direct you to the target location.” He checked the map on screen. “If your invisibility holds up at running speed and can fully muffle your footfalls, go along the main road for about five miles, after that we can help you zero in on the location.”
I don’t like the idea of going up against people who managed to procure stingers of all things, but Alexia is determined to help our brethren. Plus this invisibility really does give us an edge. Conrad brooded before turning to Alexia. “Should we get moving then?”
“Yes, lets. We can eat along the way Green Bean.” Loki’s unvoiced objection halted in her throat. She gave a grunt of approval before chasing after her friends.
Conrad took to the air to point out where the main road was before dropping back down again to save his wings for later. Almost unconsciously, both he and Loki let Alexia take point and followed along in a chevron as they thundered after her as the three of them found the main road and galloped south. A brief flicker of color saw the three ponies disappear from sight.
Almost immediately the two mares felt a strange sense of loss with the absent clip clop of their hooves on the asphalt. Both had grown to enjoy the noise whereas the stallion felt relief at not hearing it for once.
Alexia was not very fit by pony standards, but her equine form was easily able to handle the mile and a half before she slowed down at sighting the first road block set up by the cultists. That didn’t mean she was not breathing heavily as she led the gang to the shoulder of the road to observe the roadblock outside of earshot. One quick look at Loki’s headset told her what button to press on her own to speak.
“Hey ah, Boss?”
Thompson responded quickly. “What is it Alpha one, have you made contact?”
Tune had seen enough action movies to know what he meant. “Yea, a bunch of them are manning a roadblock. What do you want us to do?”
“Can you sneak by them or is your invisibly malfunctioning?”
“They didn’t see us coming, and we didn’t exactly try concealing ourselves outside of the cloak.”
“Did they react to you moving up the road?”
She surveyed the militants standing vigil over the roadblock. None of them acted as if they had seen anything. “No.”
“Then leave them to the strike teams later, your priority is to secure the hostages. Make your way there further down the road and give us a better picture to work with.”
“Right.” She turned to her compatriots. “We leave these guys alone, come on.”
One of the cultists felt something strange along the ground. He put a palm to the road and felt faint vibrations. “Hey Barley. You see anything coming up on us?”
The man grabbed a pair of binoculars and looked down the road. “Not a thing.”
The vibrations were getting stronger. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, brother. There’s nothing. Why?” He turned around to double check that there might be something coming from within the park, but nothing was visible.
Before the first could respond, he felt the vibrations were right on top of them and then a buffet of air before the vibrations started fading away. He grabbed his assault rifle and pointed in the general direction of the park, but had nothing to shoot at. “There was something there.”
Barley knew his brother wasn’t one for flights of fancy. “Should we inform the Herald?”
“Tell him what? That there was wind and a minor earthquake maybe?” He slung his rifle to face back away from the park. “It was nothing.”
With Loki bringing up the rear, she sighed in relief when the roadblock didn’t start shooting randomly at their passing. What the hell am I doing? She thought after the heat of the moment with Thompson died down. I’m a hacker, not a damn super spy. She looked to Alexia and saw the silver mare had a worried, but set determination in her visage.
It was all she needed to see. And she’s a mail carrier turned mage. She glanced at Conrad who was only concerned about the weaponry they were up against and not so much the bloody business in of itself. Loki knew from his history that the stallion was no stranger to firefights or taking a life. The earth pony didn’t see much inspiration from him, but felt waves of it from Alexia. If this is really what Alex thinks is best for our people then I’ll follow her lead no matter where it takes me.
Beneath her notice, some of Alexia’s fatigue faded away, allowing her breathing to return to a steadier pace.
The group was guided by Thompson to the last two buildings where the team found a small nook between some trees on the far side of the road to let Loki drop her cloak so her magic could recharge a bit while Alexia talked to the Director. The unicorn was short of breath and had to wait a minute to catch it. The green mare wasn’t anywhere close to her three hour limit on invisibility, but they all agreed that it was best not to take chances.
Tune clicked her headset. “Boss, we’re at the place.”
“Good work. Tell me what you see.”
“Two buildings across the street. There are about twenty or so hostages under the covered picnic area like you said. All of them look scared, but they seem unharmed.”
“I was under the impression there were more than sixty down there.” Thompson responded with grave concern. “How many cultists can you see?”
“Two by each door I can see from my angle. Ten around the hostages, and I guess another ten patrolling the area, but I can’t really tell with them moving about so much. I counted fifty on the way in along the street, but we were going so far I can’t say that number is accurate.”
“So few…I’ll make sure the Guard are informed that their numbers must be concentrated along the water fronts.”
“Hold on. Something’s happening.” Tune sent back and angled her ears forward to listen, her companions followed suite. Two cultists exited the door of the house and walked briskly towards the huddled group of prisoners and barked for one of the young men to follow them. The ponies’ large ears could barely make out what they were saying. “No way in hell am I going in there. No one’s come out of there since you started.”
The lead red tinted skinned cultist backhanded him harshly. “Did I stutter? I said you’re coming with us.”
The other hostages cowered from their sitting positions at the man being thrown to the ground. The defiant hostage spat blood at his aggressor. “You’ll have to kill me.”
The other cultists trained their weapons on the remaining hostages to keep anyone from playing hero. The cultist who had been struck wiped his cheek, chuckling darkly. “You will make a fine addition to the faithful.” He punched the man in the gut, making him bowl over. Both gunmen roughly grabbed the hostage’s arms and pulled him back on his feet to be hauled inside. “Come, your future awaits. Brother.”
Conrad grimaced and turned to Alexia. “Whatever they're doing in there we can’t let them harm that guy any further.”
“I know.” Tune said as she clicked the transmitter. “Boss, I think they're brainwashing the hostages in the house and they're bringing one inside now.”
“I’ll leave it to you on how to proceed. Don’t endanger the rest of the survivors if you can’t free that one without raising the alarm.”
Alexia motioned for Loki to reactivate her cloak. “I’m not going to leave someone to be tortured if I can help it.” She closed the transmitter to speak to her friends. “Okay, that guy is our top priority. Conny, there’s a balcony on the second floor of the house, we need to run over to get under it. Then you’re going to airlift me up to it while I levitate Loki up to join us. I use my magic to undo the lock then we rescue the guy. We can worry about the rest of the extremists after that.”
“Got it.” They whispered back. The trio raced across the road and made sure to stay on the pavement so they wouldn’t step on any dried twigs or rustle the bushes. Conrad sped up to get ahead of Alexia and unfurled his wings. She jumped to land on his back and he heaved them both up into the air.
Tune couldn’t resist scoffing at the reversal and whispered in his ear. “I’d prefer it if you were the one doing the mounting.”
He suspected the joke was her trying to cope with the situation and gave her an amused chuckle once they were on the ledge. Once on solid ground, Tune looked down to lock onto Loki with her magic and hefted her up and over the railing. Her telekinetic strength having no difficultly bringing the densely built mare up to their level.
“Thanks.” Loki mouthed. Alexia nodded at her gratitude and turned around to see Conrad staring at the interior of the house with abject horror. It was a feeling both mares quickly mirrored.
Hoisted up on what appeared to be meat hooks, were over a dozen hostages wrapped in bed sheets. Loki was the first to break the short silence. “What in the Sam Hell is going on here?”
“I don’t know.” Conrad admitted in hushed tones. “But we have to try and stop this.”
He gently shoved Tune to snap her out of her bewilderment. She shook her head to clear her thoughts. You’ve seen worse in movies and video games, just try not to think about it for now and get the job done. “I’m fine, and you're right.”
After a quick inspection, the unicorn found the lock and flipped it so they could enter the blood chilling room. On the bed and floor, were more victims wrapped in linin to keep their arms and legs from moving, but their faces were kept unobstructed. The ponies noticed there was very little blood, only a small amount just below each person’s diaphragm in a thin red line. Loki observed that the hooks were anchored into the linin, rather than each person’s flesh. It didn’t make the ponies want to stay any longer than they had to.
Chanting filled the air and allowed the group to find the door from behind the hanging victims. They crept towards the door knowing that even though their steps were muffled, that would not stop their weight from possibly creaking the floor and drawing attention to them. A slicing sound and a yelp of pain caught her ears as the chanting reached a fevered pitch. As she was about to open the door, inhuman screeching carved through the air with such intensity it made their ears press flat against their heads.
The screeching peaked again and the chanting dissolved into sounds of anger and surprise. Tune pulled the door open, allowing the group to filter into the main room and found themselves on the second level of the foyer.
Below, the floor was painted in purple and orange colors with wicked looking foreign letters forming three rings around the hostage they had seen be dragged inside and what looked like the cultist leader standing over the man on his knees. The five other cultists were garbed like their leader, in unassuming civilian clothes. The only difference was the vicious looking halberd the leader had firmly planted into the cracked marble floor. The halberd was very real, and not some costume knockoff. It was six and a half feet of solid steel with the foot long axe head that was stained a dirty rusty color from lethal use and lack of cleaning. The four inch spike on the end was just as dirty.
The other, and more grotesque, identifying feature was the five inch screeching parasite writhing out of his right arm that was alarmingly discolored. His fingers were elongated and his nails were thickened and sharp. Almost to the point of talons. Every time the worm was moved towards the hostage’s wound, the parasite recoiled and hissed at the hostage. “I don’t understand.” The leader announced. “Why does the lightbringer reject you?”
“Maybe I just taste sour.” The hostage spat and was rewarded with a fist to the face. He took the hit, but remained on his knees. “Keep that tapeworm away from me you freaks.”
A follower kicked him in the kidney. “You will not insult the messenger of the gods!”
The ponies watched, completely dumbstruck by the sight of the worm. The leader cooed at the parasite and it calmed considerably. He reverently kissed it on top of its eyeless head and whispered to it. After a few moments it slid back inside his arm. “It seems this one is tainted by something that would kill the lightbringer if it tried to enlighten him.”
“Aww, I’m so disappointed.”
The man’s mockery was so thick it brought a snicker out of Loki. I like him already.
The leader gestured to his minions to hold the man down and he pulled the halberd out of the indentation in the floor with a bit of muscle. “For this crime, I sentence you to death.”
As the axe head reached its highest point, it became encased in an azure aura and was yanked out of his hands. Everyone looked up at the possessed weapon as it spun around and slammed the flat of its blade into the leader’s head. He went flying into the cultist next to him, sending both into the far wall.
Before anyone could react to the traitorous weapon, two voices from the banister above roared in fury. Still invisible, Loki leapt over the guard rails and planted all four hooves into a cultist’s skull, caving it with all one hundred and twenty pounds of her as his head met the hard marble floor.
Conrad crashed hooves first into one of the two cultists still holding the man down and started pummeling him until he stopped struggling against his invisible attacker.
Alexia was not idle with her stolen weapon and smacked anyone who tried to escape. She was not willing to use lethal force as Conrad or Loki were, but that didn’t stop her from using the flat of the blade to try and be less lethal. She wouldn’t lie to herself and say it was strictly nonlethal, but that thought only resided in the back of her mind as she thwacked a second target.
Fully in the moment, Loki’s mind was set on taking revenge on the people responsible for trapping people in the cocoons and swept the legs out from under a female cultist and bucked her chest as hard as possible on the human’s way down.
Conrad stayed in the air and unleashed merciless strikes on anyone trying to flee. None of the zealots thought to try and strike at their invisible assailants and were only able to evade the halberd because it was visible. Seeing all of his brethren be struck down, the last cultist was in a panic and tried to run out the front door. Alexia was faster and slammed the flat of the axe head across the man’s face and Conrad stomped him for good measure.
All the shouting and commotion brought the two guards from outside the front door to investigate. They quickly found themselves pulled inside by an invisible force only to have Loki and Conrad either buck them from below or from above and they too joined the pile of broken bodies.
The hostage in the center was freaking out, but held his tongue in a vain hope that the ghosts wouldn’t kill him too. A soothing feminine voice spoke after a moment of silence. “Hey calm down, we’re here to rescue you.”
“Rescue me? Where are you?” He knew the voice sounded as if it was right next to him, but he couldn’t see any movement.
“Oh sorry, let me turn it off.” His eye’s widened as a dim film of light appeared before falling away to reveal a miniature silver horse with an azure mane and enormous eyes. “I’m Alexia Tune. We’re here from the government.”
Loki and Conrad uncloaked beside her with the stallion grunting in amusement. “Never thought I’d see the day.”
“Amen to that.” The green mare concurred.
“Who or what the hell are you?” The man asked with confusion. He looked as if leaning back was incredibly uncomfortable.
Thompson interrupted Alexia’s answer. “Tune, report.”
She turned away from the hostage so as to not be distracted. “That guy we saw be dragged in the house is safe, and I think the cultists still don’t know we’re here. Aside from the ones we knocked unconscious anyway.”
“Did you send your team to cover the doors to make sure no one else is inside?”
“No.” She took the hint. “Loki, Conny. Cloak up and watch the exits. Take down anyone who comes in.”
“Got it boss.” Loki replied.
“As you wish.” Conrad answered.
“Tell the civilian to find a place to lay low.” Thompson said in her ear.
She pressed the mic with her magic, but spoke to the hostage in a friendly manner. “Can I get your name?”
“Ah…Michael Anderson.”
“Glad to meet you Michael. You should move somewhere safe.”
She offered him a hoof and he looked at it wearily before taking it. She helped him to his feet and he couldn’t stop staring at her tail. “Yeah, sure.”
She followed his gaze to her rear appendage. “I am completely real, just so you know.”
“No it's not that. It's just your tail.”
Her face scrunched from the awkwardness. “What about it?”
“Well, I hope you can tell me why I have this then.” She stepped back as he pulled the back of his pants off his waist and pulled out a two toned crimson pony tail.
Tune gasped at the sight of it. “Oh for the love of… I didn’t think that was still happening!”
“Is what still happening?” He demanded.
Alexia forgot she still had the mic depressed and Thompson barked a question. “What does he have?”
She tsked at her mistake and addressed the Director. “Never mind that, we need to help the rest of the people first.”
The Director conceded the point to his field operative and temporarily forgot about Anderson. “The satellite feed shows the militants are acting erratic. Whatever you did down there, must have thrown them for a loop.”
“All we did was take out a bunch of cultists and some leader guy with a freaking spear of all things!”
“Well something’s making them act extremely erratic. The higher ups are wanting to move in and I don’t think its wise to try and stop them.”
Alexia’s eyes searched the room trying to think of something she could do. “I can still try to bring the hostages into the house, there’s a ton of them already in some kind of linen cocoons in here.”
“Cocoons? Did I hear you correctly?”
“Yes. Tell the cavalry or whatever not to shoot the house.”
“Copy that. You have two minutes to get those people in the house before the rain falls.”
“Only two?!” She forgot the mic. “Michael find a basement if there is one, the feds are going to light the whole place up in two minutes, I have to get the rest of the people in here.”
He fixed his pants and tucked his tail in as she spoke. “Yeah okay.”
As he ran off Conrad came running. “Alex, we got a problem, the freaks are going crazy out there and some are threatening to shoot the prisoners.
“Then we need to hurry, cloak up and move!”
The couple bolted to the side entrance where Loki was waiting. The mare had seen some of the bloodiest games the industry could produce, but to kill someone in real life unnerved her greatly. She didn’t have much time to contemplate it with chaos erupting outside. The originally calm and disciplined cultists were a crazed mess of their former selves. Some were weeping openly, calling out to the air begging for something the ponies couldn’t understand. Other were furiously bashing anything nearby, be it a car, table, or wall. A few were still in control of their faculties and were trying to get their brethren under control.
Alexia had no time to think of a real plan so she slammed the door open and grabbed every cultist one by one, and threw them towards the street. “All of you stupid nuts get off my lawn!”
Loki and Conrad took advantage of the distraction and raced over to the huddled and terrified hostages. Conrad yelled without dropping his cloak. “Government agents! Everyone in the house! Now now now!”
Between people getting pulled to their feet by invisible hooves and the cultists in even greater disarray, the remaining hostages needed no further prompting and sprinted for the house. One of the rambling militants saw fleeing civilians as traitors and leveled his rifle to open fire. Conrad saw it and yelled a warning. “Everybody on the ground!”
Most of the civilians didn’t comply, but were lucky that the crazed man’s aim was so terrible he didn’t compensate for the recoil and the weapon dragged its barrel into the air. An azure bolt of energy struck him in the midsection and he fell heavily on his back.
Loki saw more zealots coming from the far side of the hostage area in response to the gunfire. The wiggling worm of doubt was eating away at her. Oh damn, what the hell am I doing? She finished pulling a civilian to his feet and galloped straight at the three gunmen who managed to retain most of their sanity. They never saw her coming as she closed in on the first one and spun on her forelegs to add her momentum into a buck that launched the running man backwards. Conrad flew in a moment later and smashed a back hoof into the man’s neck, crushing his windpipe. Loki was too caught up in the moment to worry about the man she hit didn’t move. Conrad leveraged every bit of his tribe’s agility and bounced off his target to tackle the one who had been in the center from behind.
As soon as the pegasus dropped him to the ground he pumped his wings hard to get off and then fall back down on the man’s neck, breaking it under his hooves. He looked up from his bloody work to a frozen Loki. “Good job on stopping them long enough for me to get here.” His ears swiveled at the sound of multiple thumping sounds in the air. “The choppers are here.” He started to make a running start to take off when he noticed Loki standing there with a vacant stare. “Damn it mare come on we have to go!”
The green mare couldn’t peel her eyes away from the blood. He growled at her. “We can’t stay here, move it!” A part of him wanted to leave her there, all the trouble she causes him would have justified it in his eyes. Yet the majority of him felt repulsed by the idea. “Damn it all to hell.”
The first rockets hit the ground on the far side of the house. Cries of pain and angry roared back and two stingers flew off to meet the national guard aircraft. The attack helicopters deployed flares and continued their assault on the cultists. Cursing his luck, Conrad flew on top of Loki and grabbed onto the comatose mare and tried to lift her off the ground.
He was used to carrying the seventy one pound unicorn, not an earth mare and the additional fifty pounds of dense muscle and bone Loki possessed. He groaned from the strained effort that nearly pulled a tendon in his left wing as he strained to get a few inches off the ground. “Shit you’re heavy.”
He saw Alexia at the door scanning the warzone for her friends. As soon as the unicorn locked onto them, both the earth pony and pegasus found themselves wrapped in her magic and forcibly pulled into the house. He nearly collided with the kitchen counter before Tune was able to halt his momentum with the help of him quickly flipping in the air to give two powerful wing flaps against his direction. Loki slid on her side along the floor. Her greater mass made it impossible for the unicorn to fully arrest her momentum and she collided with the counter. The hit did no real damage other than to ruffle her fur and snap her out of her stunned state.
Alexia dropped her cloak so the noises caused by invisible beings wouldn’t scare the three hostages in the room any more than they already were. Loki reflexively dropped the cloak when she hit the counter. Tune slammed the door shut to run over to check on them.
“Are you guys alright?”
“I’m fine.” Conrad announced with concern directed at Loki. “Green Bean went into shock.”
Loki swatted at him with a hoof, missing by several inches. “Okay mister crime prince, not everyone here’s killed anyone before.”
“I won’t lose any sleep over snuffing out a bunch of fanatics. I can’t stand people that use religion as an excuse to commit crazy shit like this.” He waved at one of the cocoons for emphasis.
Alexia barely heard him as she was on the verge as well. Work now, freak later. She repeated the mantra four times, trying to ignore the memory of the bodies in the foyer and the hanging cocoons all over the house.
The impact and subsequent explosion of four rockets nearby rattled the house. The hanging cocoons in the kitchen swayed on their hooks and the free civilians gave muted cries of alarm and fright. One helicopter took up station over the roof and fired its nose mounted gun at more targets. The noise of combat outside made it much harder for Tune to keep herself from blanking out like Loki did.
Conrad ignored the bedlam outside and focused on keeping his mate from losing it. “Hey Alexia. Stay with us.” He shook the mare as he noticed she was locking up. “Sorry about this.” He hit her moderately hard across the cheek; cutting through the quaking mare’s cognitive seizure.
The unicorn yelped and held a hoof to her sore cheek. “Thanks Conny. You should drop the cloak so we can help the hostages remain calm.”
“That’ll be hard seeing as we’re barely capable of that ourselves.” Loki commented as Conrad obeyed.
“Not to mention they're terrified and I don’t think they’ll react to us well at all.” Conrad pointed out.
“We saved them.” Tune insisted as she tried her best to ignore the battle outside. “This is the sort of thing we need to get our kind good publicity.”
The sounds of combat were starting to drift away from the house, but one helicopter remained on station above the house. Conrad had to agree with Alexia’s statement. “Then we should go tell them.”
Tune nodded and headed to the massive and open living room where half of the civilians were either huddled at the interior wall, or were shouting and cheering out of the large windows to the helicopters as they continued to pour firepower in the distance. “Take that you commie bastards!”
“Gotta love the Marines!”
“Bout time they showed up!”
One of the less gung-ho civilians pointed and yelled at the arriving ponies. “What the hell are those?”
All eyes turned to the equines. Loki thought fast and jump onto a table while activating her cloak. “We’re the awesome possums who saved you guys!” She raised and lowered her cloak a few seconds after to prove they have been the invisible agents.
As the ponies tried to explain themselves, a heavy scraping noise went unheard due to the thumping aircraft above. One of the women screamed and pointed behind the ponies. The cult leader was dripping blood from the right side of his face, but looked as if he didn’t notice or care. He hefted his halberd to cleave Alexia who was in the center of the group. The horrifying visage of the leader’s twisted face under his ornate hat froze her legs in terror. “In the name of the Koridost above, I must purge the unclean!”
The only thing that came to Alexia’s rapidly narrowing tunnel vision was the need to be anywhere but there. Conrad saw the buildup of magic in her horn. He knew what it meant and dove away. Loki was rooted in place as she saw the axe head descend towards Tune in slow motion. The earth mare could only look on in terror as the weapon was about to cleave her friend in two before the light on her horn reached its peak and she blinked out of existence. The halberd cracked the wooden floor, but found no new blood to spill.
Loki found her legs willing to move again and scrambled away from the cultist. Alexia reappeared in midair above the cowering civilians and fell on top of them. Conrad used the opportunity to charge the cultist. The leader ripped the halberd out ground and tried to swing at the pegasus, but he held his wings against his barrel and fell below the weapon and used the ground to spin for a buck.
The leader only laughed and used the weapon as a counterbalance to deliver a strong kick to Conrad’s exposed belly. He was sent flying across the room only to be caught by Michael Anderson who had heard Loki’s voice from the basement. His catch of the pegasus was more of a collision that ended up with his arms wrapped around the brown stallion and they both fell to the ground, the impact sent a lance of pain from his concealed tail.
By then, Alexia had been shoved off the humans and managed to get her hooves under her. With both Conrad and Tune on the far side of the room, the zealot turned to Loki for a new target. Switching his stance to use the halberd like a spear, the leader charged the green mare. Loki scrambled around the furniture to escape, not thinking to reactivate her cloak.
Alexia was able to push her reservations aside at seeing her friend being in mortal danger and fired off a quick concussive blast to unbalance the raving cultist. His strength was more than enough to shrug off the hit. Loki turned a hard corner around a love seat, the civilians around there backed away to the far wall to stay clear of the bladed weapon as it cleaved the air, a few stands of pink hair fell away from Loki’s tail.
“Can someone get this freak off my back!?” Loki cried out in a mix of fear and exasperation that none of the humans tried to help.
Alexia waited until the leader started charging after Loki. The moment he dropped his halberd low to the ground, she grabbed the tip in her kinesis and dug the point of it into the rug. The sudden stop of his weapon made the shaft jab him in the gut. He staggered and dropped the weapon, but remained standing.
Conrad had recovered and charged through the air to shove a hoof in the man’s head. The cultist was quick and ducked under the attack causing the pegasus to only knock his large hat off. The man used his other hand to rake his thickened nails along the pegasus’s left flank. The gashes were enough to falter the stallion’s flight with the lances of pain and he collided with the floor in the adjacent room.
The cultist let off an inhuman chuckle that grated the ears of everyone present. He revealed his face to everyone present in the room, causing a lapse in the fighting. His face was the color of dried blood. His toothy smile revealed teeth that had been filed into points. His face was ritually scarred and pitted with elaborate markings and tattoos.
One of the more gung-ho civilians sneered at him. “Damn freak, you’re not so tough without your spear.” The man ran at the cultist, ready to pummel him for all the trouble he caused. He was joined in by his brother.
The leader only laughed and closed his fist. The cocky civilian landed a solid hit on his target’s face, but it did little more than turn his head away. In a feral roar, the red man punched the civilian in the gut, knocking the wind out of him. “You’re time for enlightenment will come.” The second civilian ran at him with his fist reared back. The zealot crouched and swept the legs out from under him. As the brother lost his balance, the cultist slammed the heel of his boot in the man’s ribs. Not enough to kill, as he wanted to enlighten man, not kill them.
With the future converts dealt with, the cackling maniac searched for one of the ponies, only to find himself incased in an azure aura and levitated in the air. Alexia snarled at him. “I don’t think anyone here wants your version of enlightenment.”
He flailed in the air, trying to grab ahold of anything that could be used as an anchor point, but the unicorn kept him from latching onto anything and this room was bereft of any cocoons. In a fit of rage, he screamed at the infuriating unicorn. “You can’t stop the illumination of mankind! Soon all will heed the song of the Koridost.” He stared maniac daggers into the unicorn. “But not you or your kind.” He raged venomously. “You are marked by the Herald and we will scour your unclean souls from the face of the planet!”
“I think I’ve heard enough of that.” Conrad bellowed before delivering a flying bicycle kick to the man’s jaw, knocking a few teeth out of his mouth, but he was only stunned by the hit.
Loki poked her head out from behind the large TV in the corner of the room. “Is it over?”
Tune shook her captive a couple of times for good measure. “I think so.”
Thompson spoke up in all three ponies’ radios. “Heads up, the Guard is about to crash the house. They know about you, but do as they say.”
Alexia only registered half of the warning before seven Guardsmen broke through the various windows and glass doors into the living room, rifles up and searching for targets. Loki ducked back behind the TV and Conrad ran over to put himself between the soldiers and Tune who was still holding the limp cultist in her magic. The squad leader barked orders to sweep the top floor and the basement. The men only took a prolonged glance at the ponies and the floating body before following orders to make way for a second squad to file in behind them.
The second squad leader secured the ground floor and rounded up the few cultists who were still alive around the ritual site. A third moved in to start ushering the civilians who were still standing outside to a waiting helicopter that was hovering by the dock. Lastly, a lieutenant came in and walked up to Alexia and shouted an order over the noise. “Status.”
She almost dropped her cargo, but restabilized him before he could hit the ground. She had to shout to be heard. “We saved the hostages and captured their leader.” She moved the cultist in her magic towards the officer.
He scowled at the disfigured zealot. “Ugly bastard.” He faced her again. “Head to the docks for extraction. There’s a Sea Stallion waiting for you. We’ll take it from here.”
“Okay, I mean yes sir.” She nudged Conrad with her nose towards the broken doors. “Let’s grab Loki and go.”
“You’ll get no argument from me.”
Both ponies saw the green mare was leaving the concealment of the TV and trotted over to join them. “Never thought I’d be glad to see the feds show up.”
Alexia felt her adrenaline fading and knew that might bring a crash to her mental stability. “We should leave.”
The trio stayed out of the soldiers’ way as they escorted the civilians to the awaiting transport helicopter when Anderson pulled out of the group to speak with the ponies. “You said you could tell me about my tail.”
A Guardsman tried to tactfully put him back in line. “Sir, I need you to get to the transport.”
Tune held a hoof up for him to wait. “Our boss needs to talk to him.”
The soldier didn’t know if that was true, but didn’t have any basis to question it. He only nodded curtly before resuming his duties.
The docks were short, but they were spaced apart enough to allow the two aircraft to not interfere with one another. The unicorn could see the CH-53 that had brought them in was hovering next to a similar dock with Thompson standing outside. Alexia faced the tensed man with a tail. “You should meet with the Director; he’ll know what to do.”
Michael followed her hoof to the Sea Stallion. “Okay.”
The ponies darted off, almost leaving the biped behind. Thompson saw the trio coming in, and was disconcerted to see a civilian following them. He had the modified helmets with him and handed them over to the grateful ponies. “You can make your report once we get back to HQ, but why is there a civvie with you?”
Alexia was immensely relieved to have the painfully loud chopping blades of the helicopter muffled by her helmet. “His name is Michael Anderson, and he has a pony’s tail.” She yelled over the noise.
Thompson’s hum was lost in the din, but his reaction was not. “I see.”
By now, Anderson finally reached the group and was badly out of breath from sprinting with his tail painfully rubbing against the waistband. “Damn you guys are fast.”
Thompson clicked his headset. “Command, one of the civilians is a code P dash one nineteen. I’m taking him with me. One Michael Anderson.” He received confirmation and then turned to the civilian. “Mister Anderson. I would like you to board to the transport now.”
“What about my family? I they’ll want to know I’m okay.”
“I’ll be sure they are informed of your wellbeing, but I need you to board the aircraft.”
Thompson’s authoritative inflection was not lost over the noise and Michael felt refusing was a very bad idea. “Yeah, sure.” He stepped onto the gangplank and was quickly followed by the Director who pulled the plank back into the aircraft and resealed the door. As soon the door closed, the CH-53 angled forward and started the flight to a distant airbase.
The Director found Anderson chose to remain standing, but had the wits to grab one of the handholds. The trio of ponies were huddled in their seats. Tune was in the center, stroking Loki’s mane as the green mare tried to keep her composure with her head leaning over to rest next to Alexia’s chest. Conrad had a wing covering Tune’s back and was trying to comfort her with his touch as nothing he said could get past the noise nor the muffling of the helmets.
While the herd mentality made a lone pony, both mares and stallions alike, emotionally vulnerable and prone to mental instability in stressful situations. The reverse was true in even in small numbers. Alexia’s group was able to draw strength and a sense of security from one other. It was slow, but their close proximity and supportiveness melted the trauma of the day’s events away. Over time, the social mending of the herd would reduce them to bad memories instead haunting ones.
Michael felt a compulsion to join them as the previous events were weighing heavily on him, but forced himself to ignore it as an awkward feeling towards strangers.
The flight between the two locations lasted over two hours as the helicopter brought them to Fort Smith, Arkansas. The helicopter set down and the Director led the group to a nearby building and into a briefing room. The existence of ponies was not very well known throughout the entirety of the military, but Fort Smith was one of the places in the know. The briefing room was filled with simplistic desks one might find in a high school, albeit larger to accommodate adults. Windows adorned one side of the room and gave a ground floor view of the airfield.
To the ponies’ surprise and annoyance, Agent Enright was waiting for them and was leaning against the white board at the head of the room. The Director acted as if he wasn’t there and took his place at the head table while the ponies crowded around the front row of desks. The equines found it more comfortable to sit in them if they kept their hind legs folded in close to their barrel rather than fully extended. Anderson remained standing at the second row of desks feeling rather out of place and nervous as to why he was present in a debriefing.
Thompson held onto his laptop from before the operation and activated it to transcribe Alexia’s report. “From what I heard from the ground teams, you three did an exactly as hoped. Just goes to show how a bit of magic can make up for a complete lack of training. Nevertheless I don’t want to press our luck and we’ll need to rectify that before the next op. Still, with any luck this success will have won us the support we need.” The computer finished booting and he brought up the empty report. “In the meantime, I’m going to need a timeline of everything you saw and did.”
The long flight coupled with the three ponies’ consoling each other did wonders for Alexia’s spirits and she was almost back to her old self. “Guess we should start at the roadblock.”
Her report was supplemented by Conrad and Loki at multiple points throughout the entire summary. Thompson found it odd when Tune informed him of the ritual they had disrupted. “The cultist had some kind of worm coming out of his arm?”
“That’s what it looked like.” She confirmed, chills ran down her spine at the memory of it. “Some creepy alien thing that slithered back in his arm when he said he couldn’t infect Anderson over there.”
The Director hummed. “Is that what you all saw?”
Loki nodded. “That thing was screeching like a banshee, it was kind of hard to miss with ears like this.” She swiveled her ears around for effect.
Conrad grimaced. “If Alexia said it was there, then it was there. But yes I saw it too.”
“The brass is going to want to verify that themselves.” Not exactly something they would lie about. “I’ll inform the Guard to take precautions when handling the prisoners. I have to say capturing the leader will definitely support your claim about the parasite.” He waited to get the rest of the report before addressing the issue with Anderson. “Now, I’ve been told you possess a tail.”
Michael had been standing the whole time, his new appendage made it impossible to sit down with it tucked in his pants. “Yes, I do.” He said at length, squirming under the sudden scrutiny.
Thompson sighed in apprehension to the unpleasant task. “May I see it? I need irrefutable proof.”
Anderson nodded his compliance and pulled his pants down a bit to reveal his two tone crimson tail. There was pale creamy yellow fur in a five inch radius around the base of the tail. Michael was not foolish enough to try and remain in denial at what was happening to him and saw the similarities between his and the ponies’ tails. “Am I turning into one of them?”
The Director checked Anderson’s head and saw his ears were still human. That won’t be pleasant. He wanted to be respectful to the trio and choose his words carefully. “That seems to be the case. By Executive Order twelve oh twelve I have to take you into custody to be resettled.”
“Wait, What? What about my life and family?” Michael’s already sullen expression sank further.
Thompson’s tone became inflectionless as if he was reciting a speech. “You may stay in contact with your relatives at our discretion. As for your life, it was irrevocably changed the moment you grew that tail.”
Michael raged as he tried to fix his pants. “You can’t do that! I have rights!”
Conrad scoffed. “Boy, none us have rights, only privileges.”
The future pony was starting to hyperventilate. “Can’t I just have it cut off?”
“That won’t stop the transformation.” Thompson replied. “People have tried and it’ll just grow right back.”
That had the three ponies baffled. Conrad voiced the shared question. “They do?”
“Only while you’re still changing. Once you’ve completed the transformation, it doesn’t anymore.”
Alexia wracked her brain trying to think of a way to calm Anderson down before he lost it completely. The disrupted ritual came to mind and she yelped in excitement. She walked over and placed a comforting hoof on his leg. “Hey. Hey!” She shouted to cut through to his racing thoughts. “Remember that guy with the worm in his arm?”
“W-what about him?” He stuttered.
“He was saying something about you being tainted by something that would kill the parasite. You remember that?”
“I. Yes, but what does that have to do-“
“Listen Mike, can I call you Mike?”
“Sure.”
“What if, turning into a pony like us is what stopped the guy from infecting you with the worm.”
“So? Couldn’t I just have the worm surgically removed later and still remain a human?”
Tune faced the Director who was contemplating her words. “Didn’t you say before we left that those guys convert anyone they can get their hands on?”
“Wait a minute.” Thompson said, holding a hand out. “Are you trying to suggest that the worm is some form of mind controlling parasite?” He didn’t buy it for a second without physical evidence and suspected she didn’t either. He interpreted her actions as trying to make the shock of changing species easier for the guy. “Yes, that would corroborate our previous information on the group.”
Alexia mentally thanked him for the support and addressed Anderson. “See? If you haven’t have been turning into a pony you’d end up just like those cultists. Its possible that the worm doesn’t even need to stay in you to brainwash you.”
Loki jumped in. “You’d have lost your mind like they did. I bet you a hundred clams most of them didn’t want to be in that cult to begin with.”
“So I traded my body for my mind?” Michael muttered, just loud enough to be heard.
“That seems to be the case.” The Director reaffirmed.
Loki propped herself up on Anderson’s other leg. “Sure we end up on all fours, but being a pony’s a lot better than it looks. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”
Conrad felt he should give his own thoughts on the matter and hovered a few feet off the ground to be eye level with Michael. “It does have some serious perks. You’re going to be one of us regardless of how you feel about it, so you might as well think positive.”
“You were all humans?”
“Yup.” Alexia replied, feeling his reservations easing up. “So we know exactly what you’re going through and can help you through it.”
The Director watched the ponies slowly drag Anderson out of the pit of despair he had dug himself into. I hate having to send them into combat. As good as their abilities make them at it, these people should be on the home front. I dare say they’d be even better there than fighting enemies of state, but the higher-ups won’t let go of them that easily. He glanced at Enright. Especially not after today. He turned back around to see Michael crowded by the ponies and watched him crack a weak smile. All I can do is make it easier for them, and try to keep them alive.