//------------------------------// // The Fifth Day // Story: The Conversion Bureau: Ten Days // by Windchaser //------------------------------// Jay rolled over underneath his covers. He had another restless night; the dreams were back, but they only replayed what he had already seen during his conversion, complete with the agony when his father tried to poison him in the hospital. The very idea that ones father would commit such an act left Jay speechless whenever he thought about it. If his father was guilty of wishing to take his life, where had his mother stood? Did she try to protect him?   Jay smacked his lips as he sat up in his bed. The sun was well over the horizon, the time likely somewhere around nine. "Crap!" Jay cursed.   "Hmm?" Sunshine groaned from his bed.   "We missed breakfast," Jay moaned as he fell  back onto his pillow.   "Mmm you think Peach won't give us a little something to tide us over until lunch?" Sunshine said, lifting his head off the pillow. "Come on. Let's get cleaned up and see who got converted."   "I suppose."   Jay  followed Sunshine to the washroom and into the showers. It was the first time they both used the gang shower at the same time, a fact that was a little strange to Jay at first. He realized that they were practically naked in front of each other all the time, but showering together was a bit harder to get used to. And Sunshine wasn't making it easy either.   "You got a pretty shapely rump there, Jay," Sunshine cooed jokingly while Jay was trying to wash his mane.   "D-Dude! Not cool!" Jay stammered in a panic.   "Take it easy, Jay. I was only teasing. No offense, but you're not really my type." Sunshine went back to his shower and hummed a quiet tune. Jay merely snorted in response. He rinsed the last of the shampoo from his mane and tail and turned his shower head off.   He went over to dry off as Sunshine finished rinsing his feathers and joined him. Jay levitated the towel over his body, soaking up the unneeded water with ease, while Sunshine had some trouble figuring it out without magic.   The towel floated out of his teeth as Jay scrubbed his friends head dry. Sunshine began chuckling as he snatched it back from Jay. "I can finish this on my own, thank you very much."   Jay tossed his towel into the hamper and waited for Sunshine outside of the washroom. When Sunshine joined him, the pair  walked off toward the cafeteria. When they got there, they saw everypony huddled in a big group around somepony. Instead of investigating right away, Jay and Sunshine walked over to the counter to Peach Cobbler and Cocoa Malt stood, cleaning the counter of the concluded breakfast.   "Oh! Good morning you two! Sorry, but breakfast is over," Peach said mournfully. Her ears perked up and she darted to one of the cabinets in the kitchen. She  levitated out two plastic covered bars and floated them to Jay and Sunshine. "It's all we have, but it's better than nothing, right?"   Jay recognized  the meal bars. They were bland, tasteless bars  of processed nutrients that met the most basic of nutritional needs for a meal. He had to have many of them when he still lived at home when there were no groceries or premade meals around for him to eat. The very idea of tasting one of those disgusting foods turned his stomach after getting so used to Peach's cooking.   He took both of the bars in his own magic field. "Thanks, Peach. By the way, who  got converted this morning?" Jay asked.   "Oh, it was Primrose's friend Leah. She's the light green one with the white mane over there," Peach said as she pointed to the large group with her hoof.   Jay sighed and placed his hoof over his face. "Thanks for the food, Peach," Jay said as he trotted off to the far table he and Sunshine frequently used. Jay sat his rump down lone of the chairs facing away from the group. He tore open the tops of the wrappers for the bars and  handed one to Sunshine and began on munching on his own. His new sense of taste protested, but eventually gave in.   Sunshine, on the other hand, was not as easy of a sell. He spat out the mouthful of the bar he had. "Disgusting!" he said, looking back at his half eaten bar. Jay shrugged and continued eating his own. He'd rather not be starving while waiting for lunch.   Something began bugging Jay's nose. It was a strange smell he didn't recognize, and it made his nostrils tingle. He began to snort to get the smell out of his nose, and after a few snorts and odd looks from Sunshine, he managed to get it out of his nose. Sunshine began making some strange faces too, likely from the same smell.   "Eugh. Wanna move to another table?" Sunshine asked. Jay nodded and wandered over to another table that was still a fair distance from the group. He was in no rush to see Leah's new body.  Sunshine seemed to catch onto this.   "Okay, dude, what's up between you and Leah? She hates you for some reason or another, but what is it? Did you do something to her?" Sunshine asked as he sat down, looking at the group.   "I honestly have no idea what I did to the girl. All I know is  that she's hated me since that... accident. If it was something I did in the past, maybe I'll remember it sooner or later, but as of now, I got nothing." Jay looked over to the group  rut as some o fthem moved out of the way. Leah was standing right in the middle with a great big smile; her coat was indeed a pale green and her mane was white, just like Peach said. As far as Jay could tell, he saw no horn or wings. So she must be an earth pony.   The group began to taper off as everypony went back to their own business. That's when he saw Primrose. She was smiling. The sight of her smile and her joy filled Jay with warmth and happiness, but it was immediately sapped away when he remembered that she likely hated him and resented him for his stunts with Peach.   Jay sighed and looked around the cafeteria and saw a new face. A hulking earth pony with a coat of dark grey and a mane that was almost black. He say by himself and with a frown. That must be Hank, the one that  was converted the night before. And with Leah converted, that left three more people to take the potion: Rob and two of his classmates he couldn't remember the names of. One was a larger guy who always seemed to have weight problems, and the other was a dark skinned girl who never really talked with anyone. Jay was interested in getting to know them as the rest of their stay at the bureau transpired.   ---   No matter where Firecracker went in the bureau, Jasmine always seemed to be nipping at his hooves, lurking right behind him and never letting him out of her sight. Last night was another night she subdued him to her will, and it was getting tiresome for the stallion.   He still was bothered by his actions against Jay the day before in the library. He was upset when he heard that Peach decided to have dinner with Jay, feeling that he stole her from him. But he never had her in the first place. While Firecracker may have been in the process of wooing the graceful mare, he never secured the bond he had been building with her.   And with Jasmine constantly having him the way she wanted, it was going to be impossible for him to assure Peach that he was ready for something serious.   He rounded the corner into the staff offices and noticed something was off. Everypony present was scrambling about and Garnet was ordering ponies around as if they were at war.   "Garnet, what's going on?" Firecracker asked. The mare was reading over some paper, but still payed him heed.   "Our phones and Internet are out, including satellite communications. Something's going on, and I'm not taking any risks. Sea Foam!" she yelled.   "Y-Yes ma'am?" the timid filly asked, staining in front of the pair.   "I want you to keep an eye on the lobby. Send somepony if you see anything suspicious going on either inside the building or outside." the green and blue pony ran off in a hurry. "Firecracker, I need you to stay here in case I need you for anything. I have a bad feeling about today," Garnet said.   "Are you okay, Garnet? You're not looking too good," Firecracker said. It was true. Her eyes were sunken in, her body was shaking slightly, and it was clear as day she was panicked.   "Can I talk to you? In my office?" The stallion nodded and followed her to her private office. When he entered, Garnet locked the door behind him and ran over to him, bawling.   Firecracker was utterly shocked. He had never seen Garnet like this before; she was always organized, clear headed, and the voice of reason in any situation. And now she was crying on his shoulder. He put his foreleg around her neck and held her close. "it's okay, it's okay," he cooed.   "I'm s-sorry," she said through her weeping. After a few long minutes of comforting, Garnet finally pulled away and fell onto her rump on the floor. Firecracker sat with her, concerned.   "What's wrong?" he asked.   "It's... It's too much for me. I'm in over my head. I thought I could handle running a bureau, and for a while I even believed that lie I told myself. How pathetic is that? Falling for your own lie?" another fresh tear fell down her cheek.   "Garnet, you're doing a wonderful job here! Look at how much the kids are loving it!"   "Are they?" Garnet quipped back. "And it's not just making the bureau a bearable place for the kids... All the regulations, all the security updates, all the paperwork, it's just so much work! I never thought that it would be so hectic as the overseer."   "There's something more, isn't there?" Firecracker asked, careful about what he was getting into. Garnet looked up at him woefully.   "The HLF are coming today. To our bureau."   Firecracker's jaw dropped. "How do you know?"   "The United States government keeps a careful eye on the people in this world, and they picked up some not so subtle clues about another protest similar in scale to the one in Newark earlier this week."   "But this is private property, right? Property of the Kingdom of Equestria! Their government gave us the land for the bureaus, so any steps they take on out property would be against our law! Right?"   The red mare looked up once more, this time even more downcast. "We have no way of contacting the police force of this country with no communications short of going there ourselves," Garnet said quietly. "Nopony else knows about the HLF. Please keep it a secret. From what information I got, they're supposed to gather outside our doors around lunchtime. We have only a few hours, and I don't want this place in a state of pandemonium."   Garnet unlocked the door and the two left. She went back to organizing the effort to keep the bureau in order with the imminent threat of the HLF only a few hours out while Firecracker left the offices to find some peace and quiet. Unfortunately, his shadow wouldn't let him have any of it.   "Oh, Cracker," Jasmine cooed from behind his ear. "I heard that a certain three letter organization is going to be paying this little bureau a visit soon." Firecracker cursed the mare; she was listening in from outside the office. "Now, as you know, my mouth is liable to say anything that's on my mind. That is, of course, you were to fill it with something else to keep it busy..."   She was threatening to tell the entire bureau about the HLF if he didn't sate her lust? Frustration and rage began building up inside his body until he was about to burst. She was the most vile, manipulative, greedy piece of trash this side of the world. But if he was to keep Garnet from having a psychotic breakdown, he had no other choice.   He hung his head as Jasmine gave a sly smile. "Mmm I do so love brunch," she said, giggling to herself. Firecracker already felt his loins writhing with the help of the scent that was practically flooding his nostrils.   ---   Leah and Primrose trotted down the hall to the common room together, one supporting the rickety legs of the other. Leah was upset she wasn’t a pegasus or a unicorn, but Primrose had assured her that earth ponies were just as gifted as the others were.   “I’m sure you’re right, Prim, but… I don’t know. I don’t see the appeal in farming,” Leah sighed as they found a pair of couches to lounge on. “I like my colors… lime green was always a favorite of mine-“   “Until you found a new favorite,” Primrose giggled. Leah smiled and chuckled along with her. “And you don’t need to go into farming, either. You can be a cook, a sculptor, really anything you want! But anyway, we should come up with a name for you, right?”   “I suppose,” Leah said, passively.   Primrose brought her hoof to her chin as she regarded her friend. Her mane was a beautiful white, and paired with her faded green coat, it was a very pleasing color combination to look at. “How about… Key Lime?”   “Eww,” Leah spat. “I don’t want to be named after a fruit! Think of something else.”   Primrose shook off the reaction Leah had for her idea and tried to think of another name that she felt would suit her friend. “How about… Evergreen?”   “A tree?” Leah gasped. “Why would I want to be named after a tree?”   “Okay, I’ll think of something else,” Primrose said, dejectedly. “Forest Mint?”   “Too tacky.”   The two sat in silence for a while as Primrose tried to think of other names. Every time she would come up with one, Leah would shoot it down immediately. “Well, you may find a name for yourself later on when you figure out what you’re good at.”   “But that’s all off in the future. I care about the present, and I intend on living it to the-” Leah was interrupted by a burning in her nostrils. She began coughing and doubled over. Primrose reached over to see what was wrong when she smelled it as well.   “Come on; let’s just hang out in our room. It smells like shit in here,” Leah said, swishing her tail as she walked off before Primrose could catch up.   ---   Sunshine flew through the air on his breeze, much to Autumn Gale and Skysong’s joy. When they found out that he found out the secret to flight, they were ecstatic; they were both eager to teach him what they knew as well. Fleet Feather watched over the pegasi from a low hanging cloud above the bureau.   Most clouds outside of Equestria were too high in the atmosphere to use for living space for pegasi, but some of the lower hanging ones were more practical for temporary use. The air was thick and heavy with pollutants to Fleet’s keen sense of the air around him, but he was used to it. He watched as Sunshine chased Autumn around the field beside the bureau, Skysong following behind the pair.   Something he saw bothered him, though. In the parking lot outside the bureau, a group of cars pulled in. Not a bus or a single car with a lone soul looking for conversion, but a small group of maybe six cars consisting of a few pickup trucks and vans. They parked in the very back of the lot, and sat there for a short while. Fleet Feather snuck to the edge of the cloud to watch the gathering closer. A group of middle aged to older men exited the vehicles along with various signs and other objects.   The younger pegasi saw the commotion as well, and looked to Fleet Feather for any idea of what to do. They spotted him on the cloud and all flew up to find him looking over the edge; he gestured for them to be quiet and to watch from the edge as well. None of them had personally walked on clouds before, but Fleet Feather seemed to be secure enough on the cottony blob.   Their hooves sunk in maybe half an inch to the surprisingly sturdy material; after the short surprise of their cloud-walking ability, they looked over the edge at the group of men.   “Fleet, what’s going on?” Autumn asked.   “Nothing good, I can assure you that.”   More cars began filling the back of the parking lot, and the group of men grew to be a mob of people yelling things and waving signs as they stood in the parking lot of the bureau. Fleet Feather’s face contorted into a frown as he gritted his teeth. As the minutes passed, the mob grew piece by piece until the roar of voices could easily reach the group thousands of feet up.   “That’s enough of that. If you all are going to follow me, stay on the roof of the bureau, and don’t come down. No matter what.” And with that, Fleet Feather dove down from the cloud to the asphalt below.   Fleet Feather landed hard in front of the group between them and the bureau. The chants fell silent and were replaced with gazes of hate. “Jus’ what in the hell do you think you’re doing there, vermin?” the man in the front yelled out. He had a thick moustache and wore a plain tee shirt with dirty jeans.   “You are trespassing on private property belonging to the Kingdom of Equestria and its two benevolent rulers, Princess Cele-”   “Yeah, yeah, Princess Bubblegum Raindrops, right?” the man chortled. “You can’t have us leave public property, and that is precisely what this parking lot is!”   “Be that as it may, as a High Knight of the Royal Canterlot Guard, I will not allow you to harass this facility or any of the humans or ponies within.”   The man looked surprised. “Military man, eh? Got a wife?”   “I have somepony,” Fleet Feather replied, reluctantly.   “What’s ‘er name?”   Fleet Feather sighed. “HIS name is Daily Dose. He works as a nurse at the Canterlot Medical Clinic, and I care for him very deeply. Why do you want to know?”   The front members of the mob stood silent as the man and a few others with him began to seethe with anger. “I don’t know where you think you are, rodent. We don’t take too kindly to you cock-suckers down here.”   “Y’all ain’t natural!”   “Gut the fag!”   “Kill them pony scum! Kill ‘em all!”   The calls for violence from the crowd didn’t budge Fleet Feather from his spot. “If you think a few hollow threats are going to move this old stallion, by all means test my patience.” Sunshine, Autumn, and Skysong had never seen or heard Fleet Feather act like this before; they had known he was a bit blunt and hard with his teaching methods, but a knight of the guards?   “Any man who tries to pass me will lose more than just their consciousness.” Fleet Feather planted his hooves into the hard ground and stared down the mustached man. "This property belongs to Equestria and her citizens, and any trespassing or attack on residents therein will result in the immediate incarceration of all guilty parties."   The man with the mustache let out a hearty laugh. "Yeah? Where's your support, huh? You can't expect us to believe that one stinking horse can overpower the whole lot of us, do you?"   Fleet Feather gulped. He knew about the communications blackout when he spoke to Garnet earlier in the morning, and any attempt to call for support wouldn't be possible without it. "We have platoons of guards ready to 'port in at a moments notice. You would be outnumbered within a minute." Fleet prayed to Celestia that they bought his bluff. He knew full well they weren't getting any reinforcements unless they got their communications up again.   Most of the mob seemed to buy his threat. They backed off and lowered their signs, but the man with the mustache stood his ground. He reached behind his back and slowly pulled out a gun that gleamed in the bright sunlight. He pointed it directly at Fleet Feather and scowled.   "It ain't polite to lie, is it, mister knight of the guard?"   Motherbucker! Fleet cursed to himself. He knew. It was set up by the HLF this whole time. But this was too involved for it to be a simple protest. Fleet tried to piece together the revelations made to him, but before he could, his instincts took over before he could realize it.   A deafening sound pained the  ears of everyone around as the man with the mustache fired the gun right at Fleet Feather. He had taken the opportunity to leap into the air and behind the barrier on the roof, where the panicked faces of the three other pegasi waited for him.   "To the inner garden!" he shouted as he flew over the group. They all obeyed the order and dropped to the center of the garden where Fleet waited. His mane was a mess of black, and his eyes were vacant with horror.   "Fleet, what's wrong? What's going on?" Sunshine asked.   "Get to your rooms. Only the ones on the inner side of the hallway inside. Do NOT leave them or go near any windows that look outside. We're going into a lockdown." Fleet Feather galloped toward the offices to warn Garnet. They needed to activate the security gates immediately before anypony got hurt.   ---   Jay relaxed in the library. He was looking for Firecracker to explain what was going on between him and Peach Cobbler, but he had been missing for some time now. He practiced a bit more of his levitation with the books on the table he was sitting at; manipulating two books at the same time was gradually becoming easier for him, but the weight itself was proving taxing. He placed the pair of books back down on the table, and sighed.   After waiting for Firecracker for a bit longer, Jay gave up. He was sure to show up at some point, and Jay was in no rush to talk to him after their last interaction, but it was not something he could just let go unsaid.   "Attention everypony. This is an emergency announcement. Please move to your rooms and lock your doors. We are now in a lockdown. If your room has a window facing outside the bureau ring, please move to a room across the hall. This is for your own safety. I repeat..."   Jay listened with disbelief. A lockdown? Why? He timidly walked out from the library and began to drift down the hall towards his own room. He walked into the cafeteria ,but the smell from before assaulted his nose. He immediately closed the door, blocking off the foul stench.   It was the same smell from breakfast, but it was nowhere near this bad before. Jay took a deep breath and burst through the doors and rushed through the expansive room. The scent still reached his nose, but he tried his best to ignore the burning pain it caused him. He finally made it through the doors to the residential wings of the bureau. He let out his breath and took a few quaffs of fresh air.   He slowly walked down the silent hall to his own room, past the common room. He could hear some noise growing in volume the further down the hallway he walked. It  felt like a deep rumble at first, but the closer he got to the common room, he began to hear more distinct voices and yells.   Jay pushed the door to the common room open with his hoof to be greeted with the same smell as what he experienced in the cafeteria. Taking another deep breath, he stormed through the room to the doors opposite of him; the burning in his nose wasn't as bad this time, but his eyes were beginning to water by the time he reached the hallway.   He quickly rushed to his and Sunshine's room and tried to push the door open, but it didn't budge. "Who's there?" a voice asked from the other side of the door.   "Dude! It's me! Jay!" A click sounded from inside the door as the lock slid out. Jay pushed the door in and closed it behind him. Sunshine locked the door and sighed. "Sunshine? What's going on? Why are we in a lockdown?"   "It's the HLF. They're rioting outside the bureau. Last we saw, the group was half the size of the parking lot out front, and still growing. They pulled a bucking gun on Fleet Feather!"   "What?!" Jay didn't know what to think. He trotted over to his bed and sat down on it. He looked down at his hooves. "Why do they hate us so much? Why do they want to have a riot here of all places? We're in the middle of bucking nowhere!"   "I don't know, Jay. We're just going to have to sit and wait this one out."   Jay looked out through their window to the garden in the middle of the bureau, and his thoughts immediately drifted to Primrose. He hoped she was okay.   ---   Leah and Primrose were huddled inside of Peppermint and Skysong's room. Their original room faced out towards the mob, and had to relocate. Skysong had filled the three in about the mob outside and the confrontation with Fleet Feather.   "Of course they had to choose today of all days to riot!" Leah groaned. "The very day I get converted, we have to spend it huddled up in the dark. This. Sucks!"  The filly snorted and huffed.   "Why haven't the police come yet? Shouldn't they be here to keep us safe?" Peppermint asked.   "I don't know... The one guy said that Fleet was lying when he said that we would have guards from Canterlot coming to help us... I didn't like the sound of it..."   “We’ll just have to wait until it’s safe to leave, I guess,” Primrose mumbled.   She stared out the window to the garden as a few clouds sluggishly drifted overhead.   ---   “Peach, you sure it’s okay to be in here?” Berry Blue asked from the sink. He was cleaning off some platters and plates left over from breakfast, his hooves soaked from the water.   Peach Cobbler packed another sandwich into a paper bag along with a juice bottles. “I don’t see why not! The mean folks are out front, right?” she said, smiling. She tried to put on a good show for Berry Blue and Cocoa Malt; in fact, she was terrified. The HLF were well known throughout Equestria and the ponies there, especially those who volunteered for service at the bureaus.   “Well we need to get everyone their lunches. Berry, you take care of the girls, I’ll head to the guys’ rooms.” Cocoa loaded the paper bags into his own saddlebags and trotted out the door into the cafeteria. The smell was still present, but with the vents in the kitchen cycling the air, they didn’t have to smell it in there. He snorted and left the cafeteria to the guys rooms.   Berry Blue packed the girls lunches in his own bags and followed Cocoa Malt out, leaving Peach all by herself in the kitchen. She looked out the window to the garden in the center of the bureau from the counter. The day was far too beautiful for them to be in a lockdown.   ---   Garnet peeked through the window of the door leading to the lobby. Outside the front wall of glass windows stood the angry mob, yelling and waving signs. The metal security gate had come down at the beginning of the lockdown in front of the glass, keeping the mob a safe distance away.   “This is getting pretty bad,” Garnet said as she dropped her head. It was well past lunchtime, and the newfoals were still sequestered to their rooms. “Perhaps we should send someone out to get in touch with the police,” Garnet suggested.   “That would be helpful, but that wouldn’t solve our problem. Our communications are down, and according to Fleet, the mob outside knows something about it. But since they’re staying a fair distance away from the building, the police won’t be able to do anything but watch.” Firecracker snorted.   Garnet leaned in for another look, but recoiled from the door with a look of disgust on her face. “What is it?” Firecracker asked.   “That smell,” Garnet spat. “It’s not that bad in here, but outside that door it’s nauseating.”   “What smell?” Firecracker asked.   “You can’t smell it?” Garnet responded.   “I can’t smell at all. Accident when I got my cutie mark when I was a colt. What did you mean by this smell?” Firecracker focused entirely on Garnet now; it was as if the mob outside didn’t exist anymore.   “Well, we’ve been getting complaints from the newfoals about this awful smell in the cafeteria and common room, as well in the lobby here. It’s been there all morning and it’s been getting worse since. Why? What’s wrong?”   “What does it smell like?”   “It kind of smells like rotten eggs, or something like that.”   Firecracker’s eyes grew wide as his mouth went slack. He shook his head to bring himself back as he looked back out through the window to the lobby and mob outside. There it was.   A few of the humans in the mob held objects in their hands; some held red bricks, while others held bottles with strips of burning cloth coming from the mouth. The first group hurled the bricks through the gaps in the security gate, shattering some of the panes of glass in the lobby.   “Go go go!” Firecracker screamed, pulling Garnet with him. The mare was thoroughly confused as she was being dragged, but eventually pulled herself free and ran behind Firecracker. He quickly rounded a corner and threw open a door to an unoccupied office. He ran in, tossed the desk down and yanked Garnet in with his magic. He slammed the door shut and pushed the desk up against it.   “Firecracker! What’s going on?!” Garnet asked as he scurried to the far corner of the room.   “Just get over here! Stay away from that door at all costs!” he muttered. Garnet had never seen the stallion so nervous in her time knowing him. “I just hope everypony else is somewhere safe…”   ---   Peach looked up from the sink and out the window from the cafeteria. There were a few humans standing out there, close up next to the security gate. One of them hurled a brick at one of the windows, shattering it. Peach yelped in surprise as Berry Blue looked up at the noise.   “What’s that?” Peach asked, seeing the bottle in one of their hands. It had a rag attached to it that was crackling with a flame. The human holding it drew their arm back and threw it at the metal gate, shattering the bottle and causing a bright flash.   Peach gasped as the flash grew and grew, until a large brown pony tackled her to the ground and covered her with his body.   Peach Cobbler screamed as the wave of exploding gas washed over the cafeteria, knocking down the doors to the halls on both sides, and igniting the gas there.   ---   Jay and Sunshine scrambled around the room, trying to get their senses back. The door to their room burst inward, followed by a scalding wave of heat. Jay looked over at Sunshine, who’s right wing was heavily scorched, most of the feathers burned down to the root. He felt a strong stinging on the left side of his face and body. He looked down and saw some scorch marks, but no substantial burns.   “What the buck was that?” Sunshine yelled. He coughed as he drew in breaths of superheated air and smoke.   “I have no idea!” Jay yelled back. The lights had gone out, and the light from the window was now obscured by a towering wall of smoke coming from the other side of the bureau. “Was the bureau attacked?”   “I don’t know! We should find out if anypony else is okay or hurt!” Sunshine called back. The pair stuck their heads out into the charred remains of the hallway; the ceiling tiles were all on the ground in pieces, leaving the internal wiring above exposed. Fire still burned on most of the walls, creating a hellish pathway that lay before them.   “Rob's right next door. I’m going to check on him,” Jay said before going out into the blazing heat. His coat mitigated some of the burning, but it stung his left side considerably. He saw the door after a few short steps and slowly moved it aside.   Inside, it looked as if Rob was thrown against the back wall by the blast. Even in the flickering light and smog, he could see that Rob did not look well. He was pale, his skin glistened with sweat, and some blisters had formed on his face from the fire.   Jay walked over to him and nudged him. “Rob? Can you stand?”   Rob opened his eyes and grunted. He used Jay’s body to help himself up, but needed the support to stay upright. His legs were trembling, and his head seemed to roll from side to side as he walked. “We need to get out of here!” Jay yelled. Rob nodded and followed him out and into the hallway.   ---   Primrose finally came to her senses. The heat was almost unbearable. The door was laying on the ground, and a seething orange glow came from the hallway. Smoke was thick in the air, but she could still see the three other ponies in the room. They all were moving slowly, but they were alive at least.   “What was that?” Peppermint asked, shaking soot and burned hairs from her mane and tail.   Prim opened her mouth to answer, but she paused. She could hear something coming from the hallway; a faint screaming. She knew she needed to help whoever it was. Primrose ran out from the room, and down the hallway towards the screaming voice. The heat was considerably worse than inside the shelter of the room, but somepony needed help.   Primrose found a door the screaming was coming from and pushed it open, slowly. Inside was the wreckage of the kitchen. Pans, dishes, utensils, and food were scattered all over the floor, while some of the plastic cabinets had melted off their hinges. The screaming continued from further in.   Against her better judgment, Primrose went farther in to help whoever was in trouble. She rounded a corner in the kitchen and saw the wreckage of the cafeteria. The ceiling was covered by a several foot thick layer of smoke with flames climbing the walls. The screaming was fading to feeble cries as Primrose found her. She was covered by a black, charred shape, but heaving that aside, she saw her. Peach Cobbler, sobbing.   Primrose finally got a look at the other side of the black object. It was the back of Cocoa Malt, one of the newer cooks. He had thrown himself over Peach Cobbler to shield her from the blast so she could survive. Primrose froze in terror. Cocoa’s eyes were still wide open, but didn’t hold the glow of life that they usually had.   Prim felt something tugging on one of her front legs; it was Peach curling up around it, holding onto her as she wept. Primrose pulled Peach in closer and tried to comfort her, despite her previous reservations about the mare and Jay, but this was bigger than fighting over colts.   “Can you stand?” Primrose asked. Peach sniffed and nodded. Primrose took a moment to look around the kitchen and saw another charred figure by the other end of the counter; the other cook, Berry Blue.   “Let’s get out of here, okay?” The pair made their way through the smoke and back into the hallway.   ---   Firecracker coughed as he rose to his hooves. Garnet slowly rose to her own hooves behind him. The door had held firm behind the desk, but the smoke was still seeping in through the edges.   “What was that?” Garnet asked as Firecracker began moving the desk out from in front of the door.   “Fuel-air explosion. Whoever did this snuck in last night and set dispensers to release an explosive and flammable gas throughout the bureau to be lit by the mob. That smell everyone was complaining about? That was the gas.” Firecracker cracked the door open, letting only a small sliver of the outside hallway be exposed to the relatively unharmed office.   “Was it the HLF?” Garnet asked before a gust of sweltering air slammed into the unicorns.   “No,” Firecracker croaked through a cough. “It’s too well thought out to be just them. Probably someone acting through them to make it look like some accident. Come on, let’s see who else is okay. We need to evacuate.”   “Out there?” Garnet said. “Those HLF humans won’t let us leave! We could try and escape into the forest, but my gut is telling me they have the place surrounded. I think… I think we need to teleport out of the building.”   Firecracker stopped in his tracks. “Are you being completely serious, Garnet? Who here can teleport so many ponies? I know I can’t, so does that mean…” Garnet slowly nodded. “Blimey. I had no idea you were that good. Okay then, that means we’ll need to get everyone gathered up in one place, so…”   “There’s a safe room in the basement under the residential common room, across the bureau,” Garnet said. “It should keep the flames out and everypony safe while I get the spell ready and charged up.”   “You need to charge it?” Firecracker asked as he passed a scorched office. The inside was completely charred black, and a few figures were present. Who they were, he couldn’t say. He gave a short prayer to Celestia for them and anypony else who had lost their lives.   “Ten minutes. That’s all I need. Go and get everypony else and meet me over there. There should be a door to the basement with a path to the safe room near the conversion room. I’ll make an announcement if the intercom still works. If not, we’ll have to get the colts and fillies ourselves.”   “Right.”   ---   Jay managed to guide Rob back to their room without either of them collapsing; Jay was supporting the majority of Rob’s weight on his back. Was it the infection in his arm that was doing this to him?   The fire was still going strong, the heat in the air making it harder to breathe with each passing minute. Sunshine helped the two back into their room, and set Rob down against his bed to rest. It was only a short distance, but Rob was wheezing and shaking.   “Is he going to be okay?” Sunshine asked. Jay bit his lip; Rob was counting on getting converted before whatever is ailing him got to this point.   “He won’t be for much longer. I don’t think he’s been able to leave his room since yesterday,” Jay said.   A faint crackling sounded through the room over the sound of the fire. “…lo? Can anypony hear me?”   Jay and Sunshine looked at each other in surprise.   “I don’t… work, but ev… needs to get to… basement! We’re going to… here!” The speaker crackled once more and died. The fact that it was able to broadcast anything during the fire was a miracle.   Jay walked over to the door and braced himself against the waves of heat coming from the flames outside. “Get Rob up and leaned against me!”   Sunshine poked Rob with one of his hooves. Rob mumbled and rolled his head to the side. He used Sunshine’s body to lift himself up, and trudged over to Jay. Jay’s head reached just above Rob’s waist, but he didn’t need to lean down far to find Jay’s back to rest on.   “Do you know where the basement is?” Jay asked Sunshine. They pushed against the heat into the burning corridor right as the ceiling collapsed on their left, blocking off the way to the lobby. “I guess we go towards the common room then.”   After only a few yards of progress, the two ponies were panting and exhausted. The smoke was burning their throats, and the heat was messing with their thoughts. Jay thought he heard voices coming from further down the hallway, but a silhouette appeared through the smoke and fire.   “Jay! Sunshine!” It was Autumn Gale, with Quake and Sugarberry behind him. “We were just going to go find you two! Whoa…” Autumn gawked at Rob in his feeble condition.   “Quake!” Jay grunted. “A little help? Can you take him?” The blue earth pony nodded and trotted over. Rob saw what was happening and switched leaning posts. Quake was better built for carrying heavy loads than Jay’s feeble frame as a unicorn.   “We need to find the basement! What was back there?” Quake asked as he guided Rob forward with the group.   “Dead end. The building is coming down in places already.” Jay grunted as another wave of heat washed over him and his burned side. “We need to check the hallway on the other side of the common room for the fillies and see if there’s a door over there.”   “Primrose?” Autumn Gale asked, knowing full well why Jay wanted to go through the burning hell the common room was bound to be. Jay looked up at the brown pegasus and nodded. “I need to make sure Skysong is safe too. I’m right in there with you, buddy.”   They reached the doors to the common room after a few minutes of slow progression. Sugarberry was surprisingly brave against the fire, not even breaking down once. Quake had commended her on the face and promised to get her a treat after they got out of the building.   “You know what that means, right Berry?”   “Huh?” the filly wondered, looking up at her brother.   “That means we will get out of here. Without a doubt.” The blue earth pony smiled. “I never break promises.”   Tears began forming in Sugarberry’s eyes, but not from fear. She knew her older brother would refuse letting anything hurt them.   The doors were slightly ajar already from the blast. Jay pushed them open with his magic, unleashing another searing wave of burning air to wash over the group. The entirety of the carpet was gone, leaving only charred concrete for the group to tread across. The furniture throughout the large room was all ablaze, creating a hellish atmosphere for the group to cross into.   Their hooves clopped against the hard concrete as they walked through. When they found the other end past the dark smoke creeping down from the ceiling, the doors were blocked off by a wall of fire several feet thick. The doors were closed, and if they functioned like the ones they passed on the other side of the room, they open inward.   “How are we going to get through?” Sunshine asked before breaking down into a fit of coughs.   Jay lit his horn up and tugged on one of the doors, past the fire. The door swung open towards the group, revealing the hallway beyond. There was no fire that they could see past the door.   “Everyone needs to just run through! If you’re fast enough, you won’t get burned!” Quake yelled. "Rob, hop on my back and hold on tight. You too, Berry. Jay, can you get that second door open?”   Jay looked up and nodded. He expanded the field of his magic to the second door and opened that one as well. It was straining his mind, but it was holding. “Everypony needs to go through quickly! I’ll come through last! Go!”   Quake galloped into a jump with Rob and Sugarberry holding onto his mane from his back. It was surprising to see him carry himself so well with a human and a filly riding him, but Jay was glad to see them go through. Autumn Gale followed the trio, with Sunshine in tow.   Jay began cantering towards the door; if he wasn’t too careful, the spell would collapse and the doors would close. Almost as if on cue, he felt the connection to the doors sever from his wavering concentration; they began to drift closed as he desperately tried to pick up speed to push through the barrier. He leaped through the wall of fire and fell through the other side right as the doors closed.   “Bucking hell, Jay. Don’t pull a stunt like that again!” Sunshine yelled. He ran over and helped Jay up onto his hooves, then gave him a quick hug. It was a small gesture, but Jay appreciated it greatly.   The group wandered down the hall for another few yards. Rob was unconscious on Quake’s back; Sugarberry trotted on beside her brother. Only now did Jay notice that Quake was sweating and his legs were starting to tremble as he lifted them from the ground.   Autumn Gale suddenly paused, then shot off a few feet down the hall to a door on the right wall. “Here it is!” he yelled back. The group met up with him and saw it: the downward stairs sign on the door. It had to be the basement.   “Who’s there? Hello?” a voice called from further down the hall.   Autumn’s ears perked up. “Sky? Skysong, is that you?” he yelled.   “Autumn!” the filly yelled, running through the smoke into the colt’s brown hooves. Her cream mane flew over the colt’s shoulder as she embraced him. When she leaned back to get a good look at him, they shared a smile and both leaned in for a deep, passionate kiss.   “Skysong! Where’d you go?” another voice called out. Jay recognized it. Primrose.   “We’re over here!’ Sunshine yelled. Another group emerged through the smoke. Jay saw Peppermint gallop through, followed by Primrose and Peach Cobbler. Peach immediately ran over to Jay, throwing her hooves around his neck, greatly surprising him. She was openly crying, her tears dampening his coat.   “Peach! What’s wrong?” Jay asked, waiting for the mare to come to her senses.   “C-Cocoa Malt saved me… he and Berry…” she managed to say before weeping once more.   “Somepony help me open this door! It’s jammed!” Autumn yelled as he tried pushing on the door. It cracked open a slight bit, revealing what was blocking it: a collapsed beam on the other side was keeping it shut. Autumn ignored it and kept pushing, struggling against the heat in the air, and the rapidly thickening of the smoke.   A sharp crash came from the doors to the common room; a dark grey earth pony barreled through the doors, sending them tumbling to the ground a few feet away. Behind him was a tall woman in a lab coat.   “Who are you?” Sunshine asked the grey pony. He scowled as his black mane covered part of his face.   “Anvil. I’m Anvil now.” Jay was surprised for somepony to be so hostile to another pony at a time like this.   “Oh hush, Hank. He’s just a little upset is all. Something blocking the door?” Samantha asked.   “Doctor Samantha?” Jay asked.   “The one and only! I was checking up on Hank here-” Anvil shot Samantha a glare. “Fine! Anvil here, to make sure he was okay after last night’s conversion. Sometimes folks get a little… confused after conversion. I was helping him through it when the lockdown started.”   Anvil pushed Autumn out of his way. He gave the earth pony a glare as he backed up next to Skysong. Anvil turned around, reared up on his front legs, and delivered a kick with both hooves to the door that sent it and the beam tumbling down the staircase.   Jay and Sunshine watched in stunned silence as Anvil wordlessly began his descent to the basement where Garnet was supposed to be waiting. The group was spurred into action when another part of the ceiling by the common room collapsed in, raining burning embers throughout the hallway. They all dashed down the staircase and into the darkness.   ---   Jay rushed into the closed off room through the choking smoke. While the actual fire had yet to reach down into the basement, the lockdown had closed in all of the smoke, flooding the facility with the toxic gas. There were already a lot of ponies inside the room; Garnet was standing in the middle with her horn lit with her ruby glow, Firecracker right next to her with his own orange glow.   There were a few of the bureau staff ponies present; but a few faces Jay remembered weren’t there. Garnet, Firecracker, Fleet Feather, and Jasmine were all present. Jay was thankful for the first three, but how Jasmine managed to survive was unknown. The two unicorns stood in the middle of the room, Garnet’s horn lit up already.   Fleet Feather stood to the side, watching over everypony present. Peach Cobbler sat on the ground in a stupor, her eyes distant and faded. Clementine walked over and sat with the yellow mare, nuzzling her and trying to get some sort of reaction out of her.   Sunshine crashed in behind Jay followed by Rob on Quake’s back. The blue pony rolled his unconscious body off his back in the center of the room; he was pale and his breathing was very slight, almost non-existent. Firecrakcer levitated a cup from a cooler beside him and poured what looked like a purple fluid down his throat.   “Somepony take his clothes off! Hurry! And get him on his side! Are there any humans left?” Garnet yelled out over the small crowd.   “I don’t think so!” Sunshine called out. “Samantha was right behind us, I think she’s the last one.”   “Someone call my name?”   The red-haired doctor appeared in the doorway with a smirk. Her white lab coat was stained grey in places and the corners were singed, but aside from that and a few other stains, she looked no worse for wear.   A loud clap deafened everyone’s ears that instant. The sound reverberated off the closed space, echoing for a few moments afterward. Everypony looked around for the source, but Jay saw it. Samantha stood in the doorframe with a stunned expression as a blossom of red bloomed on her abdomen. She stumbled forward onto her knees until she was kicked forward by the one who caused the shot.   “A… Andrew?” Primrose whispered.   Jay stood there, his mouth agape. It was Andrew; he was dressed in a heavy coat and bore a heavy handgun with a sinister grin on his face. “All these new faces! I’ve been gone far too long. How’s everybody doing?” he asked as he strode in. Everyone present stared at him with terrified eyes, but none so petrified with horror as Primrose. And Andrew could see it. “Chloe? Is that you in there?”   Primrose backed away as Andrew trudged forward towards her. She backed up into a wall and squealed as he knelt down to her eye level. He brushed a tuft of her mane out from her face as she tried to stay still; but as hard as she tried, she trembled in fear, helpless.   “Chloe! It is you!” Andrew cheered as he smiled. “Come with me! We’ll get you cured and back into your real body and-”   “No…”   “Hm?”   “I don’t want to go with you.” Andrew backed away from Primrose. “And I’m not Chloe anymore… My name is Primrose.”   Andrew furrowed his brow in disgust. “You’re one of them now, huh?” he said, pointing to Garnet and Firecracker. Primrose dropped her gaze and nodded her head. In a flash of motion, Andrew slammed the butt of his gun down on the top of her head, drawing a scream from the filly. She collapsed in a heap on the ground, blood seeping into her blue coat from the wound.   Jay felt something light inside his body right then. An uncontrollable rage, something he never felt before. Seeing Andrew laughing over the stunned body of the mare he was infatuated with… Without a single thought to object to his action, he charged forward and slammed his body into Andrew, sending the human tumbling to the floor a few feet away from Primrose.   She cracked an eye open to see what was causing the commotion. Jay stood between her and Andrew, his chest heaving, his eyes blazing with adrenaline and absent of any sense. Andrew got to his feet and stormed over to the beige unicorn, sending a powerful kick into his side. Jay flew and crashed into one of the walls by the door; the impact loosened the already weakened supports behind the wall, causing an avalanche of burning debris from above to land on the unicorn. A massive flanged beam fell forward and landed on his front left foreleg, crushing it under its colossal weight, drawing a guttural scream from him.   Jay struggled to retain his consciousness through the pain. His vision was beginning to blur and fade, but he saw Andrew laughing. He turned back around from Jay and to Primrose once again.   “There’s no going back, Chloe. No going back.” Andrew lifted the gun and pointed it at the helpless filly on the ground.   Jay felt another surge of adrenaline course through his battered body. His eyes darted around the cramped room from his stationary position. Everypony else was huddled together away from Andrew and Primrose, none of them risking their lives to help her like Jay did; it would only end in more bodies on the ground.   Somepony had managed to drag Samantha over next to Rob and feed her the potion; she was in the middle of her conversion, while Rob layed next to her in his new equine form. The details of the new form escaped Jay’s perception, but he was still asleep but very much alive.   Jay finally saw it. A loose length of rebar jutting down from the ceiling right above Andrew’s  head. His impact into the wall loosened more of the ceiling tiles than he thought, but it was angled perfectly. Jay forced as much of his magic into his horn and subsequently into the piece of iron as he could. When he felt he packed in as much as he could, he let out a loud shout.   “STOP!!”   The iron rebar shot downward directly at the back of Andrew’s head in a blur of gold and grey. It drove through the base of his skull and out of his mouth and embedding itself into the wall, an inch from Primrose’s cheek. Andrew’s eyes grew wide as soon as he knew what happened. A trickle of blood began to drip down the length of the pole, dripping to the ground as it went.   Andrew screamed in agony, struggling to move his head, but only succeeding causing more pain. Jay smiled, knowing that he was able to save Primrose, even if it wasn’t before she got hurt.   Andrew pulled the gun up and traded the hand he was holding it in and blindly aimed it in Jay’s direction and pulled the trigger several times. He felt the impacts on the beam that was crushing his foreleg, but after several misses, a single bullet struck home. The intense sensations made the beam crushing his leg feel like nothing; it was as if his entire body was on fire, being frozen, electrocuted, and crushed at the same time while his mind was aflame with agony. He only felt it for a fraction of a second before everything went black.   ---  Prim looked in horror as Jay’s horn shattered from the gunshot. It was accompanied by a bright spark and a flash of light as Jay’s body went rigid; his eyes grew wide for a moment then closed as the rest of his body went slack. A trickle of blood dripped down his forehead from inside the messy tangle of his mane.   Primrose looked back up at Andrew, the metal beam coming from the blackness of his mouth. The lights in his eyes were all but gone, the pistol hanging loosely from his hand. She tried to squirm out from under him, but her head throbbed with each beat of her racing heart.   “Jay…” she said as she crawled over. “Jay! Jay, please be alive! Please!” Primrose could feel the tears coming down her cheeks. The selflessness he showed was unfathomable to her; she had constantly pushed him away and denied anything she may have felt for him until the very last minute. And yet… he still put his life on the line for her. He still cared so much for her that he risked his life for her… a life that he may have just lost.  “Jay, please open your eyes, please look at me,” she cried. “Jay… please wake up… please…” she whispered as she kissed him gently on his cheek. His eyes were only half open, but there was no life behind them. “I love you…” Primrose began sobbing into his mane, using it to muffle her crying.   “Prim! Prim, hold onto Jay! Garnet’s almost got the teleport spell ready!” Peppermint yelled. She had grabbed onto one of Primrose’s back legs, and another pony was connected to her. She wrapped her forelegs around Jay’s head and cradled it. Her tears were darkening his mane as she cried into it more.   “Garnet! Are you sure you can do this?” Firecracker yelled. The roar of the fire was getting louder over their heads and the room was rapidly getting hotter. The burning wreckage of the bureau was weighing down on the safe room, but it was never designed to support that much weight. If they didn’t go now, the ceiling was going to collapse in on them.   “I… I don’t know. But we don’t have any other choice! It’s either try to teleport to Equestria or die from the fire. Which do you prefer?” Garnet asked sarcastically. Firecracker dropped his ears back as he bit onto Garnet’s tail to secure his grip on her as she teleported. Everypony was connected to one another; Jasmine was biting his tail rather hard as she glared at him. He wasn’t in any mood to deal with her.   “Are the conversions done?” Garnet asked, sweat beading on her coat. Firecracker leaned down between the two unconscious ponies and listened by each of their mouths. He looked back up at Garnet and nodded.  “Okay everypony, hold on tight!” Firecracker resecured his mouth’s grip on the mare’s tail.   A blinding white light began to build up around each of the connected ponies, a strange tingling enveloping their bodies. Autumn Wind and Skysong both embraced each other, staring at the layer of smoke creeping ever closer from the ceiling. Sugar Berry huddled close to Quake, who looked down at his sister confidently and whispered something in her ear. She seemed to relax a bit, but didn’t budge from her spot next to him.   Rob was asleep on the ground, his new black mane and yellow coat indicative of his new body; a short horn protruded from the black mess of his mane. Samantha’s coat was a deep pink and her mane bright yellow. Her body showed no horn or wings.   The light of the spell reached the eyes of one other though. Andrew was still in unbearable agony, but he looked past it. His vision was only limited to the wall the bar was embedded in, but the shadows on it gave him enough of a direction. He lifted his arm up, aimed the pistol blindly towards the light and fired a single shot.   Firecracker watched in horror as Garnet’s eyes widened and a fountain of red burst from her throat, spraying him with a fine mist. With a final, bright flash, the ponies vanished, leaving Andrew as the last of his life left him.