//------------------------------// // Chapter 41 // Story: The Parliament of Dreams // by Wheller //------------------------------// Chapter 41 Kelso took a seat in the briefing room closest to the window. She looked out at the Ponyville sky line towards the mountain plateau that Canton was situated on. She had missed this view during her time as a private investigator. The fifth floor of the PPS headquarters had one of the best views in all of the Equestrian Republic. With maybe the exception of any of the buildings in Canton in general, after all, Canton was five hundred metres above sea level, while Ponyville was only three hundred. Her eyes however, were not able to stay focused on Canton; instead, they gravitated downwards towards the FutureTec Whitetail Industrial Complex. Thoughts of Mister Happy shooting up the place with that combat drone entered back into her mind. Even if he had used rubber bullets and tear gas, the images were not pleasant. Kelso turned back around, the other detectives had gathered in the room, and Viola had taken to a podium in front of them. 'You know what this is about?' the person to Kelso's left, a pegasus Detective Constable named Armand asked to the person on his left, a unicorn Detective Constable named Brightglow. 'Not a clue', DC Brightglow said shaking her head. 'Hey, Kelso', DC Armand asked turning towards her. 'Do you know what this is about? Guv's been talking to you a lot'. 'Honestly?' Kelso said, 'DCI Auditore has been keeping me in the dark too', she added with a shrug. Both DC Armand and DC Brightglow looked at Kelso with suspicion. They didn’t believe a word of that. 'All right you lot!' Viola called out to them. 'Best pay attention now, because I'm only going to go over this once!' The room fell silent as everyone turned to look at her. 'While she was away from the PPS, DS Kelso was investigating a case on her own, without support. Yesterday evening, DS Kelso brought this case to my attention. There is a supposed conspiracy involving the Equestrian Future Technologies Corporation, around the Discovery One incident. While Kelso has no evidence to show for it, I have reason to believe that the rumours were true. Last night, there was an attempt on the Detective Sergeants life. Someone wants to keep this buried, which means it is something we should be looking into. This case is our top priority, I want everyone working on it. We go over financials, press releases, everything pertaining to the Discovery One. We look for something that doesn't add up, and we use that as our point of entry. Detective Inspector Sapphire will give you your assignments. I want your findings on my desk at the end of the day! Dismissed!' Viola said as she stepped away from the podium. Everyone murmured to themselves as they rose from their seats and headed over to DI Sapphire at the head of the room. 'Kelso! With me', Viola called out to her, waving her over. Kelso nodded and trotted over. 'I can't help but feel like there's more to this than you're letting on', she said. 'Oh too right', Viola said giving her a wink. 'Follow me, and I'll show you'. Kelso and Viola trotted out of the briefing room and took the lift back to the first floor. As they stepped out, they took notice of a commotion at the front door. Five uniformed constables struggled to haul a restrained schäferhund through the door. Viola couldn't help but smirk. 'You certainly know how to make an entrance, don't you Otto?' she asked. The schäferhund looked up in surprise, until he discovered who was speaking to him, then he wasn't surprised at all. 'What can I say? Getting arrested was cheaper than hiring a taxi', he said with a huff. 'Let him go, I'll take him from here', Viola said to the uniformed sergeant leading the constables. 'I'll take full responsibility'. 'He insulted my mother!' the sergeant complained, clearly unwilling to go along with it. 'Your mother was a fat, loud, and obnoxious mule, now let the dog go!' Viola said firmly. The sergeant frowned and grumbled to himself as he ordered his constables to let the schäferhund go. They backed off and trotted away, grumbling with annoyance. Kelso took the moment to look over the schäferhund. Otto Büchsenmacher was the first schäferhund she had ever met. Viola had called him a dog, but that was pure understatement. Otto was a massive creature, standing far taller than she at almost two hundred centimetres, he couldn't weigh any less than a hundred and twenty kilograms. His eyes were beady and cold, stuck in the middle of thick grey fur. The schäferhund offered her a coy smile, exposing two rows of very sharp looking teeth. 'You're staring miss', Otto said plainly. Kelso snapped out of her trance and looked at him apolitically. 'Relax Kelso, Otto here might look nasty and intimidating, but he's a complete wimp', Viola said with a chuckle. To demonstrate, she gave Otto a light kick in his flank, causing the schäferhund to yelp out in surprise. 'See? Told you, complete wimp', Viola said. Otto gave her a cold look, but said nothing further. 'So how did you get arrested?' Viola asked. 'Racist security agent threw a fit over my gun... despite the fact that I had all the necessary paperwork filled out to carry it on the flight', Otto said with a grumble. This was something that Kelso did know about schäferhund. Their citizen-soldier mentality had caused them to view firearms as a status symbol. It was said that there was nothing more dangerous, and stupid, then trying to take a schäferhund's weapon away. 'I'll see what I can do to get it back for you', Viola said. 'The ammunition is probably lost to customs, though'. Otto cocked his head to the side, looking at Viola oddly. 'Who are you and where is the Detective Chief Inspector?' he asked. 'I'm right here Otto', Viola said rolling her eyes. 'Or I could do nothing, and you can go back to Bundesrepublik Schäferhund without your pistol'. Otto's eyes widened, clearly mortified at the idea. 'I... would appreciate anything you could do', he said. 'Good dog', Viola said with a smirk, she waved Kelso and Otto to follow her. She led the way down a hallway towards what looked to be a dead end, however appearances could be deceiving, as the actual end of the hallway was a doorway that was shut up tightly with a large steel door with a security scanner attached to it. Viola leaned forwards and held her eyes up to the scanner. It beeped, and the door slid open to reveal a large computer core in the centre of the room. Otto's jaw dropped wide open. 'This, fillies and dog...' Viola said as she trotted up to the core. 'Is the Crusader! The most powerful computer known to the Equestrian Republic outside of the military, designed by AppleTec specifically for the PPS', Viola said as she pulled up the holographic keyboard and began to type at it. A few seconds later, a holographic representation of a mare in her twenties, her mane tied back with a bow, materialised before them. The Computer's VI smiled at them and gave a polite wave. 'Howdy everyone! Welcome to the PPS Crusader Super Computer! For your convenience and comfort. Ya'll can call me Apple Bloom', the VI said warmly. Viola turned back to face towards Kelso and Otto, grinning brightly at them. 'In cyber warfare, the party with the superior hardware wins, and, fillies and dog, that would be us today'. … Sparky glanced over her shoulder, to her relief, Ice Wind was no longer following them. They could stop for a breather. She and Dizzy reached out and stopped themselves against the nearest bulkhead and took the moment to catch their breaths. 'Where's Ice Wind?' Dizzy asked with an exasperated huff. 'I don't know...' Sparky said taking a deep breath. 'I lost track of her'. The ship shuddered slightly, and they heard a loud hissing sound fill the air. Sparky swallowed nervously. They could hear the air, which meant that there actually was air aboard the ship. 'Sparkplug, Mission Commander Ice Wind is re-pressurising the ship', Hannibal said over the helmet radio. 'What?! Can you stop her?' Sparky cried out. 'Unfortunately not, she has bypassed my control completely and is tapped directly into the computer systems'. 'How can she do that?' Dizzy asked. Sparky looked over to her and frowned, there was genuine fear in her eyes, Sparky tried to think back to the last time she saw Dizzy afraid of something. There was only one other event, that day in Olde Towne, when DCI Auditore was seconds away from killing them. 'Unknown, I have a theory that wherever the tetrahedron took the Mission Commander, her body was heavily modified to suit its purposes, which may or may not include cybernetics... be advised, Sparkplug, her hypersonic scream is powerful enough to shatter the reinforced glass of your helmets'. 'Do you have any good news for us? Hannibal?' Sparky asked sarcastically. 'Not at this time', Hannibal said emotionlessly as his voice faded from the radio. Sparky frowned, the VI certainly did not sugar coat the situation. She grabbed a hold of Dizzy and pushed off against the bulkhead. They were so close to the airlock. A few twists and turns later, and they were just in sight of it. Sparky looked to Dizzy, and Dizzy looked back at her. The two of them knew they were so close, and still yet so far away from being free of this wretched place. They pushed off hard against the wall and glided towards the airlock. 'Hannibal! Start the clock for the reactor overload!' Sparky called out. 'Affirmative, time to detonation is T minus five minutes'. They were three metres from the airlock when a bright flash of light appeared before them. Ice Wind was in front of them before they could have a chance to react, and they crashed headlong into the pegasus mare, knocking her off balance and sending Sparky and Dizzy off in opposing directions. Sparky tumbled into the airlock and crashed against the door release. The airlock door flooded open and sucked Sparky out of it into space. Dizzy followed not too far behind before the emergency seal dropped the door shut behind them. Ice Wind pressed her face up against the window, staring intensely at them as they fell through space. Sparky turned around to discover that the Leninov was right behind her, airlock door open, with DC Hopely clad in a space suit standing in the doorway to help pull Sparky and Dizzy inside. 'Come on! We need to get out of here!' DC Hopely said as she pulled the two of them in. Sparky nodded and looked back out into space. That was when she saw it. Floating completely still behind to the Discovery One, against the backdrop of Tartarus, was the tetrahedron. Sparky was in awe, the tetrahedron couldn't be any smaller than two kilometres at its longest side, and she couldn't help but want to look at it. Like she was drawn to it. She shut her eyes tightly. She wasn't about to let the tetrahedron dominate her mind as it had with Ice Wind. DC Hopely, Dizzy, and Sparky, clamoured back into the ship and took seats up in the cockpit, fastening their restraints tightly. 'Punch it!' DC Hopely called out. 'Dah!' Korolev said with a nod as he hit the afterburners. Accelerating the Leninov away. … Ice Wind continued to watch as the Leninov sped away from the ship. Her own mind was thoughtless, and she was not concerned in the slightest. She could not be concerned, for there was nothing there but blank space and a set of instructions for her to carry out for the tetrahedron. 'Mission Commander Ice Wind?' a voice said from behind her. Ice Wind turned around to discover the holographic representation of Hannibal behind her. She let out a hiss at the VI in anger. 'Burn in hell', Hannibal said plainly as a bright light began to fill the room. … The exterior of the Discovery One was soon replaced with a silent flash of thermonuclear light as the ship's reactor went critical. The tetrahedron was too close to the blast and shattered as the force from the explosion hit it. The Leninov too, had insufficient time to get away, and was caught in the resulting Shockwave. Sparky held on for dear life as the ship shuddered as if it was going to fall completely to pieces around them. Korolev and Marusova struggled to regain control over the ship as the consoles began to spark around them. Sparky looked out the window in front of her, washes of colour were flowing over the windows, and suddenly, the Leninov disappeared in a flash of light, taking the passengers with it.