//------------------------------// // Chapter 21: Decisions, Decisions // Story: Marked // by Eisen //------------------------------// Twilight stepped out of the double doors and found herself in a fairly short hallway, with dull gray walls, a high ceiling, and the same black tiled floor. The hallway was unadorned, featuring only four other doors aside from the one to Reach's office. There was a door with a blue arrow, with the base curved to the right, a door with a straight red arrow, a door with a yellow arrow, base curved to the left, and a blank exit door. She had so many questions, so much she wanted to know, and yet... her mind was drawing blanks. Perhaps it was the sudden flip from a fight for good to a simple job proposal. Perhaps it was the enticement of so much hidden information that she could now uncover... or perhaps it was something subtle and unnerving. Only one way to find out, she thought as she began to scan the labels on the doors. She looked at the plain plaque above the yellow arrow door: "Research and Development Department". Twilight thought that this was a good place to start, and walked inside. Inside, she found a much longer hallway, with multiple doors, all of which had the yellow curved arrow emblazoned on their faces. The plaques on each door had clean letters, with the first letter of each word capitalized, like titles. She read a few as she slowly traveled down the length of the hall. Testing, Research Labs, Development Lab A, Development Lab B, Prototypes, Successful Projects, Documents, and Council Board Room. These were the names that she took note of, and she thought through the options before making her decision, and slowly opening a door. She had chosen the testing room, and immediately she was shocked and awed at what she saw. The first thing she noticed was a pair of mechanical wings being worn on a subject's back, actually moving and flapping on their own. They seemed very lightweight, and fully functional, with the wingtips themselved coated in what seemed to be some kind of strong plastic, and with a strong flap, he was raised off of the floor for a moment. She walked in and observed another booth, where some kind of electric tower was set up. She had studied electricity before, but this contrapton seemed to contain an almost unsafe amount of coils. When a flip was switched, a bulb that a mare in the back of the booth was holding lit up, without any wires. Yet another booth contained two scientists hooking up a device to a unicorn's horn. He stood perfectly still as the device glowed, and transferred energy from his horn into a cylindrical container. The scientists seemed to ignore her aside from a short glance now and then, which was just fine by her, as it meant her observation didn't disturb the events she was seeing. After she had been thoroughly fascinated, she exited that room and walked into the door labeled "Documents", hoping to learn more about this place. She looked around to see that she had entered a small library of sorts, with documents rather than books. One of the scientists was in the back, reading a plain folder labeled resources. "Ah, you must be Mr. Reach's guest," said a simple, pleased voice behind a desk. She looked over to see a cream colored mare, with a black mane, simple glasses, and wearing only a yellow sash. "Yes, hello! He told me I could take a look around, and I just wanted to try and get some information," Twilight prefaced, nodding to the librarian respectfully. She nodded in return. "Of course, I can help you find whatever you need, assuming we have it here," she offered, her tone somewhat flat, but content; more calm than bored. She glanced to her flank and noticed that it was bare. That brought to mind her whole point in getting here to begin with, and figured that, since she was here, she might as well ask. "I was wondering if you had any information on Cutie Marks," the princess asked, plain and simple. She had a small fluttering hope for a moment that by some miracle all would be revealed here. However, it was short-lived, given that the librarian frowned slightly at the question, and looked mildly embarrassed. "I'm sorry but... that information wouldn't be in this department. We deal in new technologies and techniques. I could show you to some of our more impressive techniques for unicorns if you would like," she suggested, walking out from behind the desk. Twilight wasn't too disapointed. To be honest, she felt it would have been a little underwhelming to just find the answer she had sought for so long just sitting on a shelf. So, when the offer was made, she gladly accepted, and took the file she handed her. Opening it, she saw all sorts of unicorn methods she had never thought of before. Direct mind reading, speaking to one other person silently, without talking... She even found the return blast that the black unicorn had used on her back in the Reach building, which sent any physical attack or blast directly back to the source. There was one technique, however, that caught her eye because she HAD seen it used before. It was a method to remove one's Cutie Mark, and hold it elsewhere. That's what Starlight Glimmer used to make her town of "equality." This is extremely complicated... Is it possible that she DIDN'T actually figure it out on her own? The librarian skimmed what Twilight was reading, and quite suddenly offered her a new folder. "Perhaps you would also be interested in our technology?" The princess was a little startled, but decided that she might as well take a look, and handed back her current folder in exchange. She quickly got lost in her reading, her eyes swelling with wonder as she read each line she could, fascinated by the contents. The librarian thinly smiled at her interest, and piped up once more. "I see you've taken quite a fancy there to our achievements. If you'd like, I'd be quite glad to show you our more successful technologies." Twilight didn't need a second to think about it, and after placing the folder back on the shelf, she followed the librarian out of the door and into the next room. Inside, she had to stop just to take it all in, and a gasp involuntarily left her lips at the sight. The room was organized something like a museum, with tech on pedestals, some even running quietly as a demo, each with plaques in front of them. "Some of these concepts were allowed into the private sector eventually, but I'll show you some of our more... secretive successes. Each plaque states what the invention is, and which of our partners covertly worked on it. If you'll look over here..." And so she read aloud many of the inventions, leaving Twilight to browse along. Guiltily enough, she got so caught up that she began to read ahead. "Energy Masking Device; made by Equitronics" one read. "Stone reformer; made by Reach Mining Co." , "Magnetic Tracking agent; by the Rich Family Investors". She was absolutely fascinated by everything she was reading! So many ideas, so much potential, and this organization had the resources and the power to make them happen. "Robotic Surveillance Mouse; by Equitronics", "Unicorn Energy Reactor; by Manehattan Energy", "Essence Extractor; by Cloudsdale Weather Corp." The last three were fascinating at first, but then she paused and re-read them. Looking at the power generator and the extractor, she couldn't tell exactly how they worked, as they were almost completely enclosed, and many openings had blockages with warning labels on them. How do they get unicorn energy? How does it generate power? What essence is that thing extracting? Why do either of these companies need these devices? She had toured the open-to-the-public sections of both main buildings at some point, Rainbow even showed her the weather factory personally, and in neither place did she see anything resembling these contraptions. She turned around and was about to ask the librarian some questions, when Twilight realized that she was still speaking. "...And by using magnetism, the unreliability of magic is negated, and allowed Mr. Filthy Rich to keep track of his assets, and we of ours. But, there are plenty more interesting things to show you than the old, how about the new? Come with me," the librarian said happily, oblivious to both the fact that Twilight had walked ahead, and to her questioning look. She clearly loved working in this department, and although calm and relaxed on the outside, the excitement of being able to show off these technologies to someone new sparkled in her eyes when she spoke. Twilight hesitated before following along. I suppose I could always ask later... This was decent enough reasoning to her, and she trotted after the mare into the prototype room. Upon entry, her concerns were drastically overshadowed by sheer wonderment, as she saw fully-functioning concepts working, rather than merely being tested out like in the lab room. She saw a mare put on a cloak and disappear completely from sight, without any unicorns nearby to make her invisible, it was all the cloth's doing. She watched another stallion jump into a pool of jelly-like liquid, and run out into a pit of flames... and walk out completely unharmed. Whatever that substance was, it fully protected his body. "If you do decide to join us, I trust you'll stop by this room fairly often!" she said to the princess, which earned her an affirmative nod. "I most certainly would! But, I think I should look around some more before making a final decision. I'll go check behind the blue door next," she said. The librarian nodded and shook her hoof formally. "I must be back at my post, but I'm very glad to have met you, princess!" the mare said gleefully, yet professionally, before leaving to return to the documents room. Twilight herself however, traveled in the opposite direction, back to the small, initial hallway. She glanced over at the red door, tempted to open it, but she shook off the thought and went towards the blue-arrow-bearing door instead. This one read "Operations", and upon entry, she saw a hallway identical to the R&D hall, save that the doors bore blue arrows and had different labels, but with the same capitalized, clean lettering. Current Operations, Training Rooms A and B, Local Barracks, Strategic Command, Documents, and Council Meeting Room, among others, populated this hallway. She briefly poked her head into the training room, which was the same size as one of the labs in the last area. She saw well trained elites fighting each other blindfolded, while unicorns carrying clipboards watched and judged. Their moves were so perfectly timed, she could have sworn that they must be able to see each other, but the thick blindfolds said otherwise. If that gray pegasus was trained here... no wonder he was such a tough match for an alicorn. She thought that to herself as she walked back into the hallway. She decided to see what kind of administration there was here, and walked into the strategic command room. Inside, she was met with an enormous wall map of Equestria, covered in multiple dots of all sorts of colors, and through the room, many ponies in more formal, collared clothes and blue sashes milled about. "Excuse me," she said politely to one attendant standing alone, a light blue stallion with neatly combed brown hair. "What exactly does all this mean?" "Ah our special guest! This is a major operations center. Those green dots indicate field operatives stationed in the area, while the blue dots indicate strategic control points that we have an interest in. Purple dots are where benefactors are located. I know you're from Ponyville, so you may notice Filthy Rich's land is marked with a purple dot!" He spoke very kindly, and smiled much more than the chill librarian did. "Very interesting! But, what about those red dots, and the black ones?" the princess inquired curiously. At this, the stallion's smile turned down a notch, and a bit of mild disappointment could be seen in his eyes. "Aw, I'm sorry princess, but I can't tell you what those mean unless you join the Trident. Truth be told, some people in this very room aren't even allowed to know what they mean." She wasn't upset about it, but nodded with understanding, which returned him to his former smiling state. "If you have any more questions, I'll be here! And if I may say, I hope the next time you come by, you'll be proudly wearing that red sash!" With that he returned to his former spot, leaving Twilight to observe the map. There were purple dots all over big cities, but only one red dot in each, the exception being two in Canterlot. The black dots were far more rare, but she tried to see a pattern in it anyway. One or two in Canterlot, none in ponyville at all, although there were a few blue dots over her town. There were however, a few black dots speckling the Crystal Empire, indicting more of... whatever it was. Twilight decided to head back to the main hall after poking her head into the very well organized barracks. Just as she entered the primary hallway, she saw the red arrowed door swing shut. It had looked slightly darker inside than the other halls, and she walked up to the now-closed door and just stared after at it for a moment. The grainy, deep, dark-gray texture of the door was interrupted only by a smooth, solid red arrow straight up the center, as if breaking through cluttered darkness. She shook her head and started trotting back to Reach's door, but halted. Let's just do a little thinking... she thought to herself as she slowed her breathing and sat on the cold black tile. This organization is amazing, and clearly very powerful. They have immense resources, brilliant minds, and incredible funding. Their projects are probably the most miraculous things I have ever SEEN, and most of them didn't even use magic! But there were many things that weren't answered... like exactly what this organization stands for, who it really protects, and it's primary goals. I DID spend a very long time running from these guys, after all, so there's still that ambiguity. And I have searched two of the three departments and still haven't found out what this Brander is and what it has to do with Cutie Marks. As it stood, Twilight had two options. I could ask Far Reach for more answers, being that he offered me this position... She considered it, looking at Reach's door, then looked at the red arrow standing tall on the opposite door. ...Or I could find the answers for myself, unbiased. "Decisions, Decisions..." she muttered to herself, as she sat halfway between the two paths that now lay before her.