//------------------------------// // Chapter 1: Stealth Is Not Enough // Story: Past In The Shadows // by Ratchet //------------------------------// Chapter 1: Stealth Is Not Enough “Stay vigilant 00 donut, and good luck.” –Nu      Staring down the long, steel gray hallway, I readjusted my posture and began walking.      Sneaking into the griffon occupied facility was easy enough. They might have keen vision, but their hearing is about as poor as anypony else. A knock-out spell to their spinal column was all that was needed to take the armed birds down. Considering their body mass, a spray ball full of sleeping gas wouldn’t have been as swift, and might have raised an alarm.      The layout of the facility was a labyrinth in of itself. I only had navigational blueprints of the facility contained in my hoof watch to guide me.      Only two more corridors...      Several offices lined the hallway with equipment panels strategically positioned for any maintenance pony to use. Security cameras hindered my advancement, having to wall hug dodging their field of view. Looking up, the ceiling was a massive network of cables and piping. Some brightly colored and labeled with warning tags such as: WARNING HAZARDOUS CHEMICALS and HIGHLY FOCUSED ARCANE ENERGY DANGER!      No wonder the griffon separatists were attracted to this place, it has enough resources to make a balefire bomb!      I knew from my mission briefing that the facility belonged to Arcano Security, a defense contractor to Celestia’s Royal Guard. They specialized in personnel armor and reconnaissance devices, nothing close to weapons development. Nonetheless, this building had high strategic value. Even with several units dispatched to tighten security, the Griffons had the advantage.      The griffon separatists arose from a recent trade agreement between governments. The separatists did not agree that a free trade agreement should exist between griffon and pony kind. Some could say that a bit of ethnocentrism played a role. Instead of causing a civil war, the separatists turned to terrorism. The capture of Arcano’s R&D facility was for a staging point against Canterlot.  Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough intel to determine their mode of attack. Coming back to reality, I heard a couple of griffons from an empty management room on my right. A younger, mellow voice came from one of them: “-Concentration of the toxin has been raised by 25%, we will have the final drones within the hour, Commander.” My interest was piqued and I carefully moved toward the office. A gruff, clearly older sounding griffon spoke: “Very good, this plan is already more lucrative than a nuclear winter…” The second voice sounded very familiar. Seeking confirmation, I poked a hoof at my watch, enabling the voice recognition spell and it began to record while the older griffon spoke. “Corporal, thank you for the update, you may return to your post.”      I clicked the spell off and let it upload the data for- ANALYSIS COMPLETE      I smirked at the marvel of Rho’s engineering. VOICE ID MATCH 2nd Cmdr. Baron Silverclaw      An image appeared on the watch’s holographic display. Baron was a middle aged, grey feathered griffon with several scars on his face and talons. My assumptions were correct, I had seen his face in the mission briefing.      He was also a dedicated war vet from another era, back during the griffon civil wars. His ideals were a relic and never once did he agree with the new trading treaty. Naturally, he would become the leader of the separatists. This, along with the fact that the corporal had mentioned something about a toxin being finished within the hour meant action was needed. Killing Baron wouldn’t entirely solve this.      Moving away from the doorway, I heard the corporal grab the doorknob. I reacted and stashed myself in the next available doorway.      He closed the door shut and began walking down the hallway from the direction I came. With haste, I emerged from the empty office and headed further into the depths of the facility. -----      Another turn brought me to a pair of heavy industrial doors labeled as “Chemical Research & Development Lab 02”. Several of the ceiling pipes that had followed me, terminated into this room. I stole a glance through the slit windows of the double doors to see four smock covered griffons with full beak respirators. One had a clipboard in his hands. All were standing around a glowing vertical viewing tank.      The tanks appeared to contain…Parasprites?      Come to think of it, Arcano had recently been developing cybernetic parasprites as recon drones. But the light coming off them would defeat their purpose of remaining hidden. What had they done to these drones?      I flashed back to the corporal mentioning toxins.      Could the cyber-sprites be a delivery system for a chemical/bioweapon?      The double doors were not airtight and lacked any warning sign requiring respiratory protection. Clearly, these separatists were jury rigging Arcano’s labs to create something they never envisioned.      Sliding through the doors, I noticed a pair of guards at the far end of the laboratory; another griffon was on my right at a counter typing away on a terminal. The guards were far enough away for me to remain undetected behind the snaking walls of equipment and pipes.      I moved with light steps behind the griffon at the counter. With a mellow glow of my horn and a tap to his back, he slipped into unconsciousness. I gently lowered him to the ground to minimize any sounds. Turning around, I made my way to the other griffon scientists at the tank of cybersprites.      Another step. Another step. While keeping my calm, I inched ever closer. I readied my horn and… Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt.      All four griffons fell to the ground with adjoining thuds.      One of the guards coughed.      Damn.      The guards mumbled but from my perspective, they remained stationary.      I neared one of the tanks and investigated the pipes meeting them. One was a hoof-wide, red pipe and an explosion warning tag with hazard lines down the length of the pipe. This pipe went straight to the ceiling and stemmed all around the lab, back out to the hallway.      Confirming with my watch, the blueprints revealed that this particular gas pipe spread throughout the facility. Supposedly it was the heating fuel for most of the facilities experiments.      Perfect.      Reaching into my suit pocket, I pulled out a small satchel charge disguised as a coin with the gleaming faces of Celestia and Luna on either side. I gave it a click and levitated it underneath the tank next to the red pipe.      Standing back up, I straightened my bowtie and made my way toward the door. I put a hoof on the knob when suddenly… “Ey! You! Identify!”      I looked over my shoulder to find one of the guards standing at the bodies of the griffon scientists. He began to draw his gun. I burst out the door and galloped down the corridor.      Security alarms roared as I flew down the corridor. I could hear the stomps of armed griffons coming down on my position. Nearing a junction in the hallway, I spotted a door labeled as “Stairwell: Roof Access”. I almost knocked the door down and I flew up the flight of stairs. Baron’s forces were not two flights below me when they began to fire up the stairwell. Sparks from the shots rang out behind me. Another level up and I was at the roof door. Only to find it locked with a spell matrix.      Not a problem. I gave my watch another tap and a green beam shot from the watch. A second later, the lock was overridden and the door swung open. I passed through and locked the door behind me. Running out onto the gravel cover roof top, the crisp mountain air breezed through my mane. It was almost dusk. DI-DANG. The door busted off its hinges, griffons erupted and lined up in firing position.  I turned around They cocked their guns and were about to let loose. They instead, split and Baron walked out between them: “Well, well, well, would our suited guest like to introduce himself before being blown to oblivion?” I responded with: “The name is Mane, Con Mane.” Another tap to my watch and…BEEP The whole building began to shake violently, several explosions cascaded throughout the levels. “Well Commander, I’d love to stay and chat but you seem to have a timely demise awaiting you”, I remarked. I threw off my suit’s jacket revealing Rho’s special toy, the arcane levitator pack. A quick focus of my magic into the device levitated me with great speed and precision. “FIRE!” A volley of gunfire rained in my direction, but I was already out of reach, hovering away from the facility. In the distance I heard, “DAMN YOU MANE!!!” Boom I cocked my head back to see nothing but a green fireball erupting from the facility, glowing all the nearby mountain ridges. I flew west toward the sunset, back to Canterlot. ----- “Some say that you can start anew. Unfortunately, that was never the case for me…” END OF CHAPTER 1