//------------------------------// // Payday 2: Part 1: Bank Heist // Story: The Elements of Gaming // by HellRyden //------------------------------// The Elements of Gaming 11 Payday 2 Part 1: Bank Heist By Ryden --- “Where are they? We’ve already been waiting for them for almost half an hour!” “Calm your bits, Pinkie,” Twilight groaned as she didn’t even look up from the strategy guide for Halo 4 she was reading to the pink pony who was bouncing around impatiently next to her. “Rainbow Dash is always late for our weekend LAN sessions. It really shouldn’t be any surprise by now! Right, Applejack?” The farmpony standing next to her snorted as she leaned against the wall next to the entrance to Ponyville’s LAN shop/arcade, the Big ‘O’ cafe, and she nodded in agreement. “Darn tootin’, that pony could never keep to an appointment even if she was the one who set it up! Ah’m kinda surprised Rares and Fluttershy are late too, though.” “They probably got a little too caught up with their spa appointment and ended up staying a bit longer than they planned on,” Twilight said dismissively as she turned the page on the strategy guide. “Just wait a little longer, they’ll be here eventually.” “Oooooh, but I can’t take the waiting any longer!!!” Pinkie whined, tap dancing around on her hind legs. “I need my gaming fix!” “Pinkie, stop making it sound like you’re some kind of drug addict or something.” Applejack groaned as she tuned out the pink mare’s inane ramblings. “They should be here any minute now…” “Urrrgghhh, CAN’T TAKE IT!” The partygoer shrieked before Applejack had even finished her sentence, and she disappeared inside the shop before either Twilight or Applejack could even get a word in edgewise. “I’m gonna go ahead first and start without you girls, let Dashie know that I’ve already started a lobby when she gets here!” Applejack stared after the departing mare and let out a sigh, and no sooner than she did, a prismatic blur screeched to a halt in front of her, and Rainbow Dash stood before her, panting madly as she readjusted her saddlebags with her wings. “Sorry, you guys! I’m not late again, am I?” The chromatic-maned pegasus wheezed as she leaned down, trying to catch her breath. “Stupid Thunderlane messed up the amount of rainclouds we were supposed to have covering the eastern fields today, so I had to put in an extra hour to correct that little cock-up of his. Did I miss anything?” “Well, well, now this is a surprise!” Applejack chuckled as she gave Rainbow Dash an impressed glance. “You’re actually not the last one to arrive today!” “Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, Applesnack,” Rainbow Dash snorted as she straightened herself back up. “Who isn’t here yet?” “That’d be us!” The three gathered mares heard a familiar voice call out to them from across the street, and the three mares turned their gazes to see Rarity and Fluttershy trotting towards them, the latter looking thoroughly abashed at her tardiness, though Rarity didn’t seem affected by it even in the slightest. “Terribly sorry about being so late, dears, but Fluttershy crossed paths with a litter of stray kittens on our way here and she insisted on bringing them back to her cottage first!” “I really couldn’t have just left them out there like that…” The timid pegasus in question murmured softly beneath her breath as she hid behind her mane. “I’m really sorry if I held you girls up…” “Oh, don’t worry about it, Fluttershy.” Twilight beamed as she shut the guidebook and finally tucked it back inside her saddlebags. “If anything, I just got an extra half an hour to read this strategy guide! I think I’ll finally be ready to tackle Halo 4 on Legendary after this-” “Yeah, yeah, that sounds great, Twilight,” Applejack deadpanned, and she quickly gestured inside the LAN shop while looking at the others. “While Twi’ here was readin’ that guidebook of hers, ah’ve been standin’ here doin’ all nothin’ fer that time - let’s just get in and get started already. Pinkie’s already in there.” “What? She started without me?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed, and before anypony else could reply, she dashed inside the LAN shop. “Oh no, she’s not getting a rank-up before me on Battlefilly 4!” Shaking their heads at the pegasus’ antics, the remaining four mares decided to simply walk inside, dropping their share of bits on the counter for their usual full-day rates before heading off to their usual computers. Poindexter, the reedy, bespectacled stallion who was manning the counter, didn’t even bat an eyelid as four of the elements of Harmony walked right past him - they had been frequenting the establishment often enough that they practically had their own ‘reserved’ section that was unofficially set aside for them every Saturday, and it was no uncommon sight to be seeing all six of them walking in at the same time every weekend. As they walked down the aisles of computers looking for their usual places, Twilight glanced around and saw that the place was packed with the weekend crowd, as usual. A few familiar faces were scattered around the place, she could see; huddled in a single row in the aisle opposite her were five stallions thoroughly engaged in a match of DotA 2 (or was it League of Legends? She could never tell the difference), and to her surprise, Big Macintosh was one of the stallions present. She also recognized Thunderlane’s distinctive mohawk as the pegasus let out a loud, triumphant whoop to echo the announcer’s ‘M-M-M-M-MONSTER KILL-kill-kill!!!’, and it seemed that his opponents weren’t taking it too well, because Caramel’s head was visibly hung while Pokey Pierce was letting out a string of curse-words that would have put a sailor to shame. “Took you guys long enough,” Pinkie piped up from her usual spot at the back of the shop as they approached. “Dashie’s still waiting on you before we can start our game, AJ! Time to get this show on the road!” “You won’t find any argument from me there.” Twilight replied as she sat down on her seat, already searching for the icons that she knew and recognized so well after months of gaming here at the Big ‘O’ every week. “Rarity, up for our usual few rounds on Company of Heroes?” “Most certainly, darling! I say, I think I feel ready to take on a Hard AI this time, don’t you think?” “Pffft, please!” Twilight snorted as she prodded her friend good-naturedly. “I’m too used to playing against Hard CPU opponents now - how about we kick it up a notch? Expert difficulty!” While Rarity spluttered and tried in vain to convince Twilight not to bite off more than she could chew, Fluttershy gave them a good-natured smile and took her seat to the side of everypony else. “Enjoy yourselves, everypony!” She called out softly as she opened up the one game that she hadn’t found objectionable so far. “I’ll just be by the side playing Audition by myself for a while - let me know when you’re finished!” It didn’t need to be said that her calls went unheard by the others, but it was fine by her - Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Pinkie Pie were all currently too caught up in their game of Battlefilly 4 that they were practically deaf to the world around them, what with Applejack calling out targets and barking out instructions as Rainbow Dash enthusiastically followed them with rambunctious gusto - whatever helped her team win, she would do it without hesitation. What Pinkie was doing, not even Twilight would have been able to figure out even if she had been watching the pink partygoer play - somehow, her character avatar was able to dodge bullets and explosions flawlessly while sprinting across an open field. It didn’t take long for each of them to finish their first few customary rounds of the games they favored. About an hour for themselves was what they had come to an unspoken agreement on, but once everypony was done, with Rarity’s mane completely frazzled from the stress of having been utterly trashed by the Expert AI Twilight had foolhardily set them up against, they would all then gather for the one game that they knew they could all agree on playing together - Team Fortress 2. At least, until today. “Guys, I don’t know about you, but I’m getting a little bored of this!” Rainbow Dash piped up as her scout mowed down Rumbledown for the fifth time with her scattergun, eliciting a cry of frustration from somewhere else in the LAN cafe as she grabbed the opposing team’s flag and began making the run back to her own base. “It’s always been the same routine for the past few months - I’m aching for something new for us to play!” “Well… Rainbow has a point.” Twilight mused as her sniper picked off the opposing team’s Heavy, leaving Brad_2.0’s avatar stumbling around like a headless chicken for several seconds before it finally collapsed as she cycled the bolt on her rifle. “These matches have kind of gotten a little repetitive after a while...” “Are you kidding me!?” Pinkie exclaimed while her pyro decapitated yet another hapless victim with her fire axe as the opposing team’s medic’s head was sent flying. “It’s because when the six of us play together, we’re almost unstoppable! The last time we got a run for our money was only when both Princess Luna and Princess Celestia were on the opposing team!” “Do tell, that is rather true.” Rarity’s spy deftly backstabbed Wubzorous, an enemy engineer, before expertly tossing a sapper at his sentry gun, immediately shorting it out as the unicorn continued playing with an almost bored expression on her face. “It does get rather boring when you just know what the outcome will be like - I can’t remember the last time there was a team that could challenge ours!” “Ummm, maybe it’s because the only ones smart enough to play against us know they’ll probably lose, so they just don’t play against us? I mean, I wouldn’t want to make them feel bad by winning against them so easily…” Fluttershy murmured as her medic tailed Applejack’s Heavy around, keeping the farmpony’s avatar charged up and standing by with her uber ready at the click of a button. “Ah dunno about you girls, but ah’m fine with anythin’ either way,” Applejack shrugged as she rounded around the corner, just in time to face an oncoming rush of enemy soldiers and demoponies. In a flash, Fluttershy’s ubercharge hit her Heavy, and the massive Prussian stallion weathered the oncoming storm handily as rockets and grenades exploded against him ineffectually, laughing madly while Sasha mowed them down without hesitation. “This match is in the bag - t’ain’t no challenge at all!” “Hmmm…” Twilight pondered upon it even as she continued racking up the kills from her sniper’s perch as Rainbow Dash ran back and forth capturing the flag over and over again while Applejack held the line and Pinkie and Rarity kept sowing chaos amongst the enemy’s ranks. By the end of the match, the evidence spoke for itself - they had seriously gotten too good at this game. Ten captures for their team while their opponents had managed only a measly two? Yeah, perhaps it was time to move on to something else. “Yeah, you girls are probably right,” Twilight admitted as she left the lobby and quit to the desktop, her friends following suit moments later. “I think we really should try something new, at least for the sake of variety - I am kind of curious as to what other new titles just came out too. But still, what could we play…” “Ah, that’s easy!” Pinkie chirped, and she hopped up on top of her seat, waving towards the counter. “Hey, Poindexter! What’s the latest games you’ve got on here!?” The bespectacled stallion in question looked up from the gaming magazine he had been reading, and when he saw who was calling out his name you could practically see the sigh on his face that screamed I don’t get paid enough to deal with this. To his credit, Poindexter still got off his seat anyway and trotted over to the waving mare. “All right, we got one that we just recently installed on all the computers - it’s over here.” His hoof pointed to an icon on the screen that Twilight realized hadn’t been there last week, and when she squinted closer, she realized that she didn’t recognize the symbol: “What’s that?” She asked. “I don’t remember seeing that before last week.” “That’s because Overkill studios released it only a couple of days ago,” Poindexter explained. “It’s called Payday 2, and-” “Whoa, whoa, Overkill released a sequel to the first Payday?” Rainbow Dash cut in as she wheeled around in her chair to face Poindexter. “How am I hearing about this only now? I loved the first one!” “Wait - wasn’t that the game about them no good two-bit crooks makin’ a dishonest buck by robbin’ banks and such?” Applejack raised an eyebrow, but Rainbow Dash was quick to correct. “They’re not just ‘two-bit crooks’, AJ - the Payday crew are professional heisters!” The cyan pegasus cried out. “Don’t tell you you’ve never watched the latest Batmane movie, The Dark Night? It’s just like the professional bank heists that you saw them doing in the movie, except that this time, we’re the ones doing the heisting! Can you just imagine the class, the awesomeness, the sheer badassery of doing that stuff on your own?” “I still think it sounds completely uncouth and totally distasteful!” Rarity huffed as the full meaning of Rainbow Dash’s words sunk in. “It’s one thing to play as a soldier fighting to defend ponykind from invading aliens, but to play as a common criminal, breaking laws and killing guardsponies? Unheard of!” “Oh, come on, Rarity, you make it sound like as though you’ve never heard of the Grand Theft Auto series before!” Pinkie piped up, and the fashionista ground her teeth together. “And that is exactly why I have never touched that series, and never will!” Rarity hissed. However, it seemed that Twilight didn’t share her opinion of it. “Hmmm…” The unicorn peered closer, the gears evidently grinding in her head. “Lawbreaking as it is, it’s still only virtual - it isn’t like we’re pulling off real life heists, are we? But what’s the gameplay like?” “It handles a lot like Left 4 Dead, meaning it’s a team-based first-person shooter.” The bespectacled pony elaborated. “From there, you’ve got a team of four heisters playing out different kinds of missions: you’ve got bank heists, you have watchdog missions, you got jewellery store knockovers-” “Jewellery stores knockovers!?” Rarity shrieked in outrage. “Oh, for the love of all that is- That’s it, I am not touching this game, no matter what you might offer me!” “Pffft, suits me!” Rainbow Dash snorted. “The team’s only got room for four, and I know I’m down with this! Ain’t that right, Pinks?” “You got it, Dashie!” The pink party mare whooped, high-hoofing her fellow prankster. “I’m always down with springing surprises, and nothing’s a bigger surprise than a surprise bank robbery!” Twilight gave her overenthusiastic friend a concerned look, but she shrugged anyway. “Well, it does sound like it would need a lot of teamwork - it could certainly be good practice for us at working together!” “Don’t we already get enough of that in Team Fortress 2?” Applejack raised a questioning eyebrow, but she clicked on the game’s icon as well. “Well, if anythin’ else, ah figure this’ll be a learnin’ experience, at least. Fluttershy, you in?” “Umm… It’s really all right…” The timid pegasus shrank back in her seat as she realized that the attention was all on her. “I-I don’t think this is my kind of game either way… The characters really don’t sound very… nice.” “Well, it’s settled then!” Twilight called as she double-clicked on the Payday 2 icon on the desktop. “Payday 2 it is!” The screen abruptly went black, as it always did when it was starting up a game, and when it came back on, the unicorn was greeted with a low, ominous-sounding guitar riff, along with images of Canterlot castle and a statue of Celestia, before switching to a view of an armored chariot in motion. Inside, four masked stallions sat with their weapons, locking and loading for what was no doubt the heist ahead. As she watched, the van pulled up outside what she recognized was the typical structure of the large, multi-conglomerate banks that had branches scattered all over Equestria, with the larger branches situated in Canterlot, and in morbid fascination, she continued watching as the masked stallions exited their chariot, charged inside the bank, and started a stick-up. The moment they stepped inside, the foremost stallion smacked the nearest guard across the face with the butt of his rifle, sending him tumbling to the floor. At the same time, the music kicked up to an intense, rocking beat that Rainbow Dash would have certainly gotten into as the remaining stallions charged inside. Waving their guns around and forcing everypony else inside the bank down on the ground, the stallions didn’t waste any time clambering over the counter and towards the vault in the back. Once inside, they started drilling through, bagging stacks and stacks of bits by the truckload once they were in, but by that time, the police had arrived - and that was when Twilight got really impressed. Rainbow Dash was right - these stallions weren’t just some small-time, two-bit crooks. They were professionals. The level of teamwork and co-operation, and the sheer amount of planning ahead that the crew of four displayed when the police arrived and the shootout began simply astounded her. One stallion would lay down covering fire while the other inside the vault threw the bags of money out to the third one who was waiting to move them out, while the fourth one was already securing their ready-made escape route. Once the vault had been cleaned out, the heisters pulled out as one, laying down covering fire as they went in a well-coordinated retreat down their escape route, through a network of underground tunnels, and arrived at the escape chariot which they had planted there beforehoof, astounding Twilight even further with the amount of forethought and preparation that had gone into the heist. There was no denying it: these guys were good at what they did. “That… was so… AWESOME!!!” Rainbow Dash squealed from right next to her as the intro video came to an end. “Did you see how Dallas and Wolf got out of there like nothing was gonna stop them!? Hoxton and Chains were such badasses keeping those cops at bay!” “Rainbow, ya do realize that yer cheerin’ on a couple’a criminals, right?” Applejack remarked skeptically as she raised an eyebrow. “Psshhh, it’s not like they’re real criminals, right?” Rainbow Dash waved a hoof in dismissal. “Lighten up, AJ! It’s just a game! Now c’mon, let’s have some fun with this - I wanna see what Overkill decided to pack in the sequel!” Nodding in agreement, Twilight clicked the mouse button to begin, and the first thing that struck her was the heavily armored stallion standing next to the menu buttons on the screen, wearing a menacing-looking mask, a heavy, armored breastplate, and… was that two assault rifles he was toting? Was that supposed to be her avatar? “Hoho, I like this one!” Rainbow Dash laughed next to her as she checked out her own profile. “Whoever’s been playing Payday 2 on this computer, he’s got good taste in weaponry! An assault rifle and a shotgun? This is gonna be awesome!” “Well, I have to admit, those suits of theirs do look rather classy…” Rarity muttered as she peered closer at the screens. “But those masks of theirs are just so… so tacky!” "Hee hee, but I think they look kinda funny!" Pinkie giggled as she pointed at her own avatar. "Look! He's got the Anon mask on!" "Anon what now?" Twilight blinked, nonplussed, but she shook her head and quickly refocused her attention. "All right, never mind. I guess it's time to pick a heist now. Thanks for your help, Poindexter! I think we've got it from here." "Not a problem, Miss Twilight." Poindexter tipped an imaginary hat in her direction, walking back to the LAN shop's counter, and Twilight turned back to the screen, examining it closely. Though Poindexter had described the game as handling rather similarly to Left 4 Dead, it seemed that there was more depth to it than she had expected - there was actually an option to check out her skills, as well as her inventory. From what she could see, the profile she had been saddled with, a level 34 one, had put most of its skills into “Mastermind”, with a smattering of “Enforcer” and “Ghost” points, though “Technician” read a big, fat zero. To her left, Rainbow Dash was still gushing about the weapons in her inventory to Applejack and Pinkie, so Twilight decided to take a bit of a closer look into the skill trees - according to the descriptions, the Mastermind was the team medic and leader, and was highly focused on situational control, while the Enforcer on the other hoof seemed to be purely focused on combat, its skills enhancing both the damage it could receive and dish out. The technician, it seemed, favored precision and the usage of tech and explosives, as she could see from its skills related to drill enhancement, sentry gun usage and the deployment of trip mines, as well as shaped charges at higher levels, while the ghost was focused on speed, agility, and simply not being detected, or even being hit to begin with. Situational control seemed like an excellent choice to her - the Enforcer and Technician skill trees sounded like something that was a lot more up Applejack's or Rainbow Dash's alleys than hers, and she knew for sure that Pinkie would definitely go for the Ghost tree. The ghost's propensity for popping out of seemingly nowhere and getting into places they weren't supposed to be able to get into sounded just like what her magenta-furred friend was capable of, after all. That left the Mastermind tree open to her, and Twilight felt rather fortunate to have gotten a profile that was already suited to her play style. Still, it seemed like her build could use a little bit of tweaking, she realized as her cursor hovered over the respec button. Maybe if she- "Hey, Twilight! Hurry it up! We're waitin' on ya!" Rainbow Dash suddenly called out from next to her, and Twilight jolted in her seat as she remembered that she wasn't on her own and she was still playing with her friends. "Oh, right! Sorry!" The unicorn apologized as she grinned sheepishly, exiting back to the main menu. "I'm still a little new to all this, Rainbow. How do you start up a game here?" "Click on Crime.net, you can get started from there." The cyan pegasus pointed at the icon at the top of the menu screen. "Come on, pick a heist and let's go already!" Twilight didn't really see what the rush was, but Rainbow Dash was always impatient anyway. Deciding to humor her pegasus friend, she clicked on the Crime.net option and saw the screen switch to what looked like a bird's-eye view of Canterlot from above, the capital city divided into its several distinctive districts on the map. On the map, several icons were popping up one by one, all of them bearing different names and a number of stars, some of them white while others ended with up to three yellow stars - no doubt the different kinds of missions and heist contracts she could choose from. Twilight didn't know what the stars were supposed to represent, but she didn't have time to figure it out either way - Rainbow Dash was raring to get her game on, and Twilight didn't want to keep her waiting. Clicking on the first icon that caught her eye, she accepted the mission without taking the time to look at the details, and found herself faced with a rather typical game lobby, her avatar standing o display on the screen with his forelegs folded, the name “UnLock_Mode(34)” plastered across his chest in red text. On the lower right of the screen she saw the following words: A few seconds later, three other stallions appeared next to hers, each of them wearing a different set of armor and sporting different masks. As familiar as Twilight was with her friends though, she realized that she absolutely could not recognize the names of the accounts that they had been saddled with; between Mr.TotoSwensen(31), Jorcoolguy(51), and YourPunyTool(42), she had absolutely no idea who was who. “Wow, real mature of whoever was usin’ this computer before me.” Applejack deadpanned as she stared unamusedly at her screen. “Gimme a sec, ah’mma change this thing up - darned CoD colts keep thinking puttin’ up filth like this makes ‘em cool…” “Yeah, I think we’d better do it - we still need to be able to tell our avatars apart once we’re in-game either way.” Twilight agreed, hitting shift-enter to bring up the steam dashboard to edit her settings. Once they were done, CiderJack(42), Taste_the_Rainbow(51), Twilightlicious(34) and The_Pinkienator(31) all stood ready in a single row, waiting for the heist to begin. “All right, are we all ready, girls?” Twilight asked, and Rainbow Dash pumped a hoof into the air. “Born ready, Twilight - now let’s hurry up and get it over with!” The rambunctious speedster didn’t seem content to wait any longer, and Twilight quickly clicked on the button that said “START THE HEIST”. “Well, as distasteful as the concept sounds, I suppose it would be interesting enough to see how this match turns out…” Rarity muttered thoughtfully as she and Fluttershy perched themselves behind Twilight’s chair, watching the action from over the unicorn’s shoulder. “Do put on a good show, girls!” The loading screen didn’t take long to disappear - after a couple of seconds, the ready screen came up with a short clip of the masked stallions she had seen in the intro video looping itself every few seconds, a voice marred by slight static speaking to her; probably the mysterious Bain who had given them the job. “All right, now we’re getting into the bank vault.” The stallion’s voice wasn’t as deep or imposing as she had expected it to be, but it carried with it an air of confidence and authority that marked him as probably mission control. “This job is about deposit boxes. Case the bank first - they’re wired out the flank with security cameras and trigger happy guards. Get the vault open with the thermal drill, then get the safe deposit boxes open. You might want a saw. After that, get your loot to the escape van.” A saw? Well, that must’ve been one of the pieces of equipment they’d be providing them with for the mission - they’d said something about a thermal drill, right? No time to ponder it - she could already see the rest of her friends had clicked the ‘Ready’ button to start the match. She was now the only one left. This totally went against the grain for her. They were going in with absolutely no idea of what to expect, completely unprepared for the heist ahead - yet, that was always part of the risk of picking up on a new game, wasn’t it? Twilight hit the ‘Ready’ icon, and there was a deep chiming sound before the screen went black, and a few seconds later up came a single, yellow skull, with the word ‘HARD’ plastered ominously below it. “All right, we’re in for deposit boxes.” Bain’s voice sounded from their speakers again as the screen faded from black to show her the view of a street, her character looking towards a single-storey building on a Canterlot street - the Harvest & Trustee bank, according to the sign that she saw. The words “PICK UP THE THERMAL DRILL” appeared in the centre of her screen before relocating themselves to the upper right, while a small briefcase icon plastered itself somewhere else, probably indicating where the thermal drill was. All right, Bain had told them to case the bank first - that meant they had to to do some reconnaissance and planning ahead. Maybe if they scouted ahead first, kept a low profile so that they didn’t raise the alarm… “All right, Applejack, Pinkie, I need you two to-” Twilight never got any further than that. Before she could even finish her sentence, there was a loud, familiar whoop, and abruptly there was a series of loud, harsh beeps and a number of orange exclamation marks appearing on her screen as Taste_the_Rainbow charged inside the bank while wearing an improved combined tactical vest, Chains brandishing his Locomotive 12G shotgun before screaming “EVERYPONY DOWN!!!” The unicorn’s hoof smacked itself across her forehead as the klaxon screeching of the bank’s alarm went off just a few scant seconds later, along with the words ‘ALARM TRIPPED: CAMERA DETECTED SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY’. “Darn it, Rainbow! That was totally unnecessary!” "There's only one way to case a bank, Twilight, and that's with a grand entrance!" Rainbow Dash laughed as she blew away the two guards inside the bank with her shotgun. “C’mon, it’s just a game! Now lighten up and let’s wreck this joint!” Twilight nearly snorted, but decided to ignore that - she immediately began sprinting for the thermal drill, hammering down on the ‘G’ key to pull her character's mask on. Dallas immediately shoved his mask over his face, grabbing the thermal drill and hauling flank to the vault, where Twilight threw it down and started setting it up. Around her, Applejack was already barricading the windows with wooden boards, while Pinkie ran around cable-tying the civilians, and Rainbow Dash was just… standing outside in the street, firing her gun into the air. “All right, you lousy cops, come at me! Chains isn’t afraid of anything!” “That girl’s gonna get herself killed, ah’m gonna bet on that.” Applejack muttered from Twilight’s right as she came up next to her at the thermal drill. “All right, 340 seconds - that’s about five or six minutes, right? Guess we just gotta hold the cops off for that long.” “If we can even last that long,” Twilight muttered as she started cable-tying civilians of her own - a part of her rankled at the fact that her avatar was taking hostages, but deciding to see it as nothing more than a game mechanic that allowed her to gain an advantage and help the team complete the mission, she went ahead with it anyway. Once the entire first floor of the bank had been secured, she fell back next to the thermal drill, holding position at the teller’s counter and readying herself for the oncoming assault that was doubtlessly on its way. Next to her, Pinkie Pie and Applejack’s avatars did the same, bracing themselves for the attack, and pretty much the only one who hadn’t joined them was Rainbow Dash, who was still outside wasting ammo and yelling for the cops to attack her already. By the time the first couple of police cruisers rolled up and the uniformed stallions clambered out with their pistols at the ready, Rainbow Dash had wasted nearly half her shotgun shells, but that didn’t stop her from blowing them away either. “You girls just sit back and relax - I got this!” Twilight really wanted to reprimand Rainbow Dash right there and then - her recklessness could easily cost them the mission, but before she could say anything, a hail of bullets slammed into her character from the right, and she jerked the mouse to the side to see a quartet of police officers clad in riot armor advancing on her, their guns blazing. Twilight returned fire with expert accuracy - she might not have been as great at first-person shooters as Fluttershy, but she’d played more than enough to be at least decently good at them. The police officers fell beneath her withering hail of fire, and she planted herself solidly behind cover as she braced herself for further assault, Bain’s message over the team channel loudly announcing the oncoming storm. “All right ramblers, let’s get rambling.” The next few minutes passed in a storm of gunfire and an endless stream of police officers that just kept on coming from nowhere - the assault was so unrelenting that numerous times, Twilight found herself getting perilously close to being downed, and only the timely intervention of the doctor bags she was carrying prevented that. Applejack gunned down another group of cops with her Reinfield shotgun, but when another batch just continued streaming through the door before she even had a chance to reload, even Pinkie was starting to wonder how the hell they were even doing it. “Land’s sakes, where the hay are all these yo-yo’s coming from!?” Applejack cried out as she ducked behind cover to avoid another hail of bullets. “Does the royal guard even have these many soldiers!?” “I think we just killed even more guards than there are in the whole of Canterlot!” Pinkie howled in laughter at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation. “Okay, this game definitely just got a lot more fun!” As sociopathic as Pinkie’s statement sounded, Twilight realized with growing mirth that her pink-furred friend was kind of right - in the face of the hammerspace police force that they were facing, it was starting to get increasingly hard to take the game seriously; not when the body count was so cartoonishly high. Spurred on by the realization, she decided to just let loose for once and just enjoy the game for what it was. At least, until Rainbow Dash got herself downed, that is. “Oh horseapples!” The hot-headed pegasus cried out right before Bain’s voice came over the speakers, yelling out, “Chains is down!” “Uh, a little help here, guys?” “Ah told ya she was gonna get herself killed out there,” Applejack gave a resigned sigh as Twilight tried really hard not to get annoyed with Rainbow Dash’s carelessness, and the apple farmer’s avatar began dashing outside. “You two hold the fort, ah got her!” The moment Wolf’s sprint brought him outside the bank’s main entrance and into the street beyond, fire slammed into him from nearly all directions, but the combined tactical vest that Applejack had him wearing protected him from the majority of the bullets as he threw a sentry gun down on his way out. The improvised turret immediately turned its fire upon the cops, sending them scurrying back behind cover, and Wolf slid to a stop behind a car near the downed Chains, already jabbing a needle into the prone stallion and shouting at him to get up. “C’mon Rainbow,” Applejack said. “Don’t go runnin’ off all gung-ho now, otherwise ah’m gonna need to pull yer flank outta the fire again. Hold yer ground with us inside the bank!” Grudgingly muttering her assent as Chains was pulled back up onto his hooves, Rainbow maintained a sullen, mollified silence as she dashed back inside with Applejack into the bank, where Dallas still stood watching the thermal drill’s countdown slow descent like a hawk. “Ten more seconds!” Twilight announced as she directed Dallas to look back up, just in time to catch another group of riot gear-clad police officers in a hail of gunfire from her JP36 rifle. “We’re almost in, girls!” Moments later, the thermal drill disappeared as its job was finished, and the door to the vault began to slowly slide open with several loud, deep creaks from its heavy, deep-set hinges. The four heisters didn’t waste a single moment - the second the vault door was open, all of them immediately rushed inside, only to find themselves confronted with a wall of locked deposit boxes. “Bain said we might have wanted to bring a saw - where is it!? Isn’t it mission equipment?” Twilight rambled frantically as she walked up to a deposit box, seeing only the option to pick the box’s lock, and when she tried to initiate it, boy was it abominably slow. “How are we supposed to crack all the deposit boxes in time when we’re under attack like this!?” “Ah don’t know, but them cops ain’t gonna stop comin’ anytime soon!” Applejack replied as she poked her head out of the vault. She sent out another burst of fire in the direction of a wall of advancing shield-toting guards from her Reinfield, but it bounced ineffectually off the almost-literal wall of protective steel. “Darn it! Pinkie, help Twi’ out with them deposit boxes! Dash, ah need you ta flank these varmints!” “On it!” Chains immediately dashed out of the vault and circled around the wall of shield cops, switching out to her UAR rifle just as they were about to reach the vault’s entrance, and their exposed backs came into view. “Eat lead, you lousy shields!” The cyan pegasus emptied her weapon’s magazine into the wall of exposed backs, and they all crumpled to the ground, but not before having done their damage. “Wolf is down!” “Horseapples - don’t worry AJ, I gotcha!” Dash rushed forward, Chains hauling Wolf to his feet. Turning to face the advancing assault once again, the two determined ponies held their ground doggedly to give their frantically working teammates behind them a chance to open up the vault’s deposit boxes. “I’ve only opened up two so far - this is taking way too long!” Twilight cried out in frustration as she opened up only her second deposit box, and lamented the fact that it was empty, again. “Pinkie, how’re you doing on your end?” “I’ve got about three! Just a little bit here and there, but it’s really not much…” The pink partygoer replied dejectedly just as the fourth deposit box Hoxton had been picking at swung open, but when she took a look inside, it was like a switch had been flipped inside her as her entire expression lit up. “Just a couple of rings and rolls of cash, but- oh, lookie here! A bunch of gold bars!” Before Twilight could respond, Pinkie had already grabbed a hold of the stack of loot, and Bain’s voice came over the team channel. “All right, that’s enough. We can leave now, or you can stay and get more if you want to.” “Ah say we git the hay outta dodge while we still can!” Applejack suggested as she emptied the rest of her Reinfield’s magazine at the assaulting guards, who at long last were finally beginning to retreat as the police assault ended, and the music, which had been a loud, pounding dubstep-techno beat so far, finally died down to something quieter as Dallas yelled out “The police are pulling back!” “And ah mean now, while the cops aren’t all up our flanks tryin’ ta tear us a new one! Ah don’t think we can last another wave.” “But we haven’t opened up even a quarter of the deposit boxes yet!” Rainbow Dash protested while Chains reloaded a new magazine into his assault rifle. “Think of all the loot-” “No time for that, let’s go!” Twilight cut her off as Dallas sprinted out of the vault with Wolf following closely. “Let’s not get too greedy here and end up failing the mission - cover Pinkie, she’s got the loot!” “And lemme tell ya, this thing is heavy!” Pinkie replied as Hoxton finally trudged out of the vault behind Chains, who had still managed to exit long after Hoxton did. “Sooooo sloooooow! What is this stuff made of, gold? Oh, wait - silly me, of course it is!” Twilight rolled her eyes even as the scatterbrained party mare bounced in her seat to the unheard rhythm of Hoxton’s steps, and she kept the streets outside covered alongside Applejack and Rainbow Dash as Pinkie’s avatar slowly trudged his way to the escape van. The police still sent piecemeal volleys of gunfire in their directions as they pulled back to lick their wounds, and Rainbow Dash was more than happy to respond in kind. By the time Hoxton was close enough to toss the loot bag into their escape van, Twilight heard the music begin to slowly kick up in intensity again, and she knew what that meant - another assault was on the way. “Pinkie, hurry up!” The unicorn hurried her friend as she clambered Dallas into the escape vehicle. “The police are about to attack again!” “Ah, don’t sweat it, Twilight! We’re in the clear!” Pinkie giggled as Hoxton clambered into the back of the van with Dallas, while Chains and Wolf ran around the front. “All right, we are done here!” “Woohoo!” Rainbow Dash cheered as she gave Applejack a high-hoof. “Awesome job, guys!” Twilight blew out a sigh of relief, holding a hoof to her chest as the screen turned blue, an upbeat techno rhythm pumping out from the speakers to replace the fast-paced battle music that had been playing just now. “Phew, that was a close one! Rainbow, please, next time, don’t jump the gun and rush in through the front door! I think we could have saved ourselves a whole lot of effort if you hadn’t!” “Ah, don’t sweat it, we still made it, didn’t we?” Rainbow Dash laughed it off as she waved a hoof at Twilight. “Ahhh, the loot we grabbed must be sweet! I wonder how much we got out of it!” “Umm, Rainbow?” Fluttershy murmured softly from over her friend’s shoulder. “You might want to look at the screen first…” “Probably wasn’t a lot - we just grabbed one bag of gold,” Applejack muttered as she shot a sidelong glare at the multispectral pegasus. “We might’a been able to grab more if somepony hadn’t been too eager to get the heist started!” “Hey, that bank was just begging to be hit!” Rainbow Dash defended herself vehemently. “Did ya think I was gonna sit around waiting for it to case itself?” “Ummm, girls? I really think you should-” Fluttershy tried to interject, but she was swiftly cut off by Twilight. “Okay, okay, enough!” The level-headed unicorn quickly defused the argument before it could escalate any further. “What’s done is done - we may have pulled through by the skin of our teeth, at least we got out of there alive with nopony left behind. We’ll do better on the next job, all right?” “Umm, Twilight?” Finally noticing the gentle taps on her shoulder that the timid pegasus was making, Twilight started and turned towards Fluttershy. “Oh, sorry! What was that you were saying, Fluttershy?” The cream-colored pony didn’t say anything - she just pointed at the screen, and when Twilight peered closer at it, her ensuing frustrated scream of denial could be heard from as far as the Everfree forest as she read the words displayed for her to see. “Oh, COME ON! As if we didn’t have enough to deal with ALREADY!” “No money has been awarded. You need to escape first.”