Chapter 3
Velvet raised her head up from the brush of trees she had been sleeping in, and instinctively tightened her grip on the handgun she had kept as her sleeping companion. She got out after checking the area for any of the soldiers she last saw checking the wreckage of her plane for survivors. Velvet stretched out her wings, and then blinked, staring at them.
I....Could have just flew out of the plane.....
She shook her head. Even if she somehow managed to have opened the door and jumped out of the plane as it crashed down, she would still have plummeted to her demise, the saddlebag stopping her wings from spreading. Anf if she were to abandon the bag, then she surely wouldn't be able to survive the island afterwards.
Velvet's mind raced with more and more alternatives to the crash she had suffered not 24 hours ago, but she stopped herself. The crash was over, and no matter what, she can't do it differently now.
And she can't save her pilot.
Taking out her mobile, Velvet took out the GPS to see if she could get to the place outlined in the coordinates given to her by the mobile. The path would take her straight through the jungles of the island, for almost a mile. She packed up her things in her saddlebag, and took it in hoof, beginning to lift off, but stopped herself.
If they could spot our ship from that length away, there's no way they could miss a brown mare flying less than a mile away....Looks like I'm hoofing it.
She landed once again, strapping the saddle bag on the proper way, and trotted onto the path, and took a breath. The air smelled crisp, as it was full of untouched forest life. The air was left unpolluted, and the trees left intact. She felt at peace here, the scenery was a wonderful change of pace from being drugged, kidnapped, or being shot out of the sky.
The trees towered over Velvet, but she appreciated the beauty of it all. It wasn't intimidating, but humbling. Here in the untouched wilderness of the forest, Velvet felt at peace with herself. She felt as if she were home, away from the hustle and bustle of the proper city, escaping the illusion of order set by the society she had been born into.
Velvet's peaceful contemplation, however, was interrupted by the rude realization of just why civilization had been walled off and out into order.
"RAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWR!"
Before Velvet stood one of the most terrifying things she had ever layed eyes on, one of her few true fears. Staring her in the eyes was, in her mind, the most dangerous thing the wilderness had to offer, a terrifying beast that wanted nothing but to tear her to shreds. Velvet stood, petrified.
Bears....It had to be bears....
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The massive behemoth stood up on its hind legs, staring down at the terrified vampress as she trembled in fear. He was a monster. In front of her was a massive, brown grizzly bear, on its hind legs it stood 8 feet, and as noticed by Velvet by her intensive study of the beasts, was a female.
She must think I'm threatening her cubs....
As Velvet failed to move out of the way, the beast came down on her, slashing at her wing. The mare let out a painful grunt, trying not to alert any of the soldiers on the island to her position. She had the element of surprise, and she knew she needed to keep it that way. That meant no screaming, and no gun.
Velvet had to act fast. Ever since she was a filly, she had been terrified of bears, and knew their biology, mating habits, behavior, everything. And she knew for a fact that she couldn't fight it, not even with her knife, and she couldn't just fly over it, not with the wing the beast had slashed. No, Velvet had to outrun her, or outsmart her.
Velvet's legs were hurting.
She thought fast, taking in her surroundings as effectively as she could without taking her eyes off of the grizzly, which was preparing her next strike. She thought back to everything she had observed on her short walk here. She went to her mind palace, recalling every memory that she could, analyzing every detail within the microseconds that the world outside of her mind would allow.
Come on...Think...Think....Oh!
Velvet looked forward, and smirked a bit. She galloped ahead, just barely missing the grizzly's massive paw. The beast quickly took chase, bound and determined to eliminate the threat to her cubs.
Velvet looked behind her at the beast, and gulped slightly, trying not to recall the fact that it was her greatest fear running after her, and she couldn't use the gun she had packed. She needed this plan to work. The bear outran her, and Velvet turned to face it.
Time slowed for a moment in Velvet's mind, her massive assailant coming down on her. Her life flashed before her eyes as the quickly dwindling chances of her survival caught up to her. Her mother, her father, her first love, Sparky.
Sparky.
The grizzly let out an ear-shattering roar, as she swiped down onto her target. The bear could feel the flesh split in two, splitting for just a moment. The beast's primal heart was assured of the safety of her cubs, all until she came to a realization.
She didn't cut flesh.
The bear had, in fact, cut a vine. As Velvet was walking the trail earlier, she had taken a few things of an exotic nature, that one simply wouldn't procure in a civilized area. One of which, a rope-like vine. As the bear came to deliver its final strike not moments ago, Velvet had used her swiss-army knife to pin one side of the vine to the ground, and pulling herself onto the branch that was above her. Velvet's senses were enhanced dramatically when she was threatened, she was able to coordinate her movements flawlessly.
As the bear swept at the vine, the force had not broken it instantly, but instead pulled it. Namely, pulling down the weak branch that Velvet had clung to. The branch came crashing down on top of the bear, directly on top of its head. The blow had knocked the grizzly out cold.
Velvet rolled off of the bear that her and her branch had fallen on, and got to her hooves, retrieving her knife. She took a moment to catch her breath, and looked back at the beast.
"Looks like you're not much smarter than the average bear...."
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After a fairly uneventful walk, Velvet had finally come to the camp. The first thing that she noticed was, of course, the most obvious. This was no small camping ground. It was a full-fledged building.
In and out of the building were an assorted mix of soldiers and scientists, the prior outnumbering the latter about three-to-one. Velvet needed to get in somehow. She surveyed the area, and found exactly what she needed: A group of 5 soldiers, one of them female, and not too differently colored than Velvet.
The female soldier had left her post for a moment to have a smoke, and Velvet saw it as her perfect time to strike. She silently got up to the mare, and took her mouth in her hooves. Velvet bit into her neck, and the soldier's scream soon dissipated into a soft moan, and after a minute, was silenced. Velvet was confident that she had muffled the soldier's scream enough to make it inconspicuous.
She stripped the soldier of her uniform, and put it on herself. Surprisingly, it fit her well, maybe a bit short, but nothing too noteworthy. Luckily, the armed mare had pockets covering her uniform, enough to conceal most of the contents of Velvet's bag. Putting on the pair of sunglasses that the guard had on, she was able to conceal her now-glowing eyes.
Velvet approached the other four guards, looking as normally as she possibly could. The foremost guard called to her.
"'Bout time you got back. Come on, boss-man needs us up to guard the main labs for some sort of special experiment."
Velvet only nodded, afraid that her Trottingham accent would give away her disguise if she were to speak. This was exactly what she needed, being invited straight into the head of the camp. Velvet was feeling proud of herself as she followed the squad, happy that she effectively executed the first rule of disguise: Hiding in plain sight.
They came to a metal door, a scientist there to meet them. The foremost guard showed him ID, and the scientist nodded, looking into a retinal scanner to the right of the door. The door slid open, from the bottom up. The squad walked in, and found themselves in a massive, wide-open laboratory. The interior was covered in computer monitors, the interior crawling with scientists. In the middle of the room was a vat of a strange, white liquid.
The liquid looked to have all of the same properties of water, or milk. Velvet shrugged it off, trying to stay focused on the mission. Somewhere around here had to be Sparky, or someone that knew where she was.
Velvet didn't have to look far.
Battered and broken in a cell, lay Sparkling Spoon. She was alive, even conscious, but she was hurt badly. Between her and the outside was a thick layer of glass, most likely bulletproof. Sparky scrambled to her hooves as she caught a glimpse of Velvet, easily seeing through her disguise. Behind Velvet's glasses her eyes widened with relief at seeing her fledgling was alright. She nearly mouthed out some sentimental message to her, before she felt the cold, hard impact of the butt of a rifle on the back of her head.
As Velvet fell to the ground, her vision fading, she caught a glimpse of a stallion in a lab coat, armed with an automatic rifle and a knife. The stallion was gray, with red eyes. He had a scar across his cheek, and had an especially hate-able smirk on his face.
"Put her in with the other one", the stallion said, the soldiers taking her in their hooves without hesitation.
"Project Genesis will continue as scheduled. We launch tonight."