• Published 13th Feb 2015
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Five Score: A Velvet Nightfall - kitsy-chan



A small group of US Army Rangers are caught up in a web of corruption and dark deals, as the attempt to deal with 2 of their own, who have had their lives forever changed, by the Five Score curse

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11: A little A Noi’d

***Yiska***

I power my way down the runway before climbing to about 200 feet, I really want to get away from the airport before I gain any real altitude, so I streak off in an easterly, keeping an eye peeled for other aircraft.

I look around and see transports above me, fighters in holding patters, tankers, even an AWACS, all packed into a few cubic miles of airspace, this would be a dangerous place for any small plane. I look at my foreleg and really hope this thing is working. I really don’t want to find myself playing tag with someone’s sidewinder.

I wasn’t sure how far I was from the air field but I figured it was about 20 miles when I decide to gain some serious altitude. I quickly go ballistic, powering my way straight up at probably close to 600 knots before pulling out of the climb at about 12 thousand feet, inverted and laughing. I let myself snap back over to the horizontal and cruise along, my destination, Grandfathers.

Glancing back I notice a pair of F-16’s maybe a mile behind me, I checked my wrist, speed was 640 knots, heading was 097 my squawk code was 0001, everything looked right, so I nuzzled the squawk button again and look back.

The lead F-16 rocked its wings side to side. I know I haven't done anything wrong, they were just following, or going in the same direction. Then a thought occurs to me, human pilots are crazy, maybe they want to play. I grin as I pull up, I backwinged quickly to shed airspeed so while I climbed about 500 feet. Doing so loses nearly all of my forward momentum and I watch the two f-16’s shoot past me while I stall and start to drop to accelerate again. Pegasi can’t stall unless they want to, but this time, I wanted to, I wasn’t moving my wings more than to adjust my angle before I pour power into my wings to accelerate after the military aircraft.

The F-16’s break formation in front of me, one heading left, the other to the right right in a circle, but I was on the trailing one, who went into an immediate hard climb and bank. My grin widens as I recognize avoidance 101 moves, this is going to be really fun. I keep my distance to about 1000 feet from his rear and kept my turn just inside of his to stay out of his wash as he begins a quick barrel roll. After 3 rotations he starts to level out. My wider angle of vision has already seen what is coming.

The lead F-16 was trying to sneak behind me while I was chasing the wingman, but come on, that’s such a foals trick, even my daughter would have seen through that one when she was in flight training. I did a side slide, changing my direction and speed, I swear I must have pulled 9 g’s because it hurt to get around so fast in such a tight circle but in a moment I was on the wing of the lead F-16.

If only I could see the look of shock on his face, darn flight helmets, the leader goes vertical, beginning a hard climb with the afterburners kicking in. Matching him at about 500 feet apart we begin vertically rolling scissors right up through the cloud cover. Bursting through the other side we both carry clouds with us in our contrails. The 2nd F-16 had headed off to the west in a circle and was coming back around, I laugh, this is fun.

At the top of the spiral I break off to the east and start to seriously accelerate, my move had surprised the flight leader who ends up having to pull a split S to get back to face me but by that time, I'm already pumping as hard as I can, breaking mach one and closing in on mach 2.

If those were F-22’s they could have caught me but the older F-16’s just isn't as fast, and I am already above their top speed with their external loads still on. As both fall behind, I look forward, I'm just enjoying the speed, the energy, the exhilaration.

***Twilight Velvet***

We pull up to Grandfathers place, his truck will be back here in a few days, the LT paid to have it shipped back. I can’t help feel though that we were imposing on the old man, he has already done so much to help us, teaching me especially.

Climbing out of the van, I trot up to Grandfather's door and tap a quick cadence, then use my magic to pull a small box of tobacco out of my bag to hold it in front of me. A younger man opens the door, looking down at me and saying something in Navajo.

Bowing my head to him I simply say “I’m sorry, I do not speak the tongue, I have come to see Grandfather. I have brought a gift.”

“So you are the troubled pet he’s spoke of.” He says as he opens the door further.

“Pet? I’m not a pet. I used to be human.” I stomp a hoof firmly.

“Troubled pet is what he calls you, though the words for horse and pet are the same thing, so he may have been calling you Troubled Horse.” He chuckles.

“Great, even Grandfather's picking on me now.” I huff.

“He holds you in high respect and regard. He considers you to be kindred, to the Navajo, not a white man.”

“I’m Twilight Velvet by the way, Twilight works though.”

“Gaajii, it means Raven in our language.” He says as he guides me to Grandfather.

I hold out the box of tobacco with my head bowed. Grandfather chuckles as he takes it and shuffles to the kitchen to put it away. Returning he sits again “I did not expect to see you back so soon. Gaajii has been helping me with chores since my truck seems to be missing.”

“We’re sorry Grandfather, it should be back here in a few days.” I say as I look down.

Yiska trots down stairs chuckling “Oh don’t worry about it, he only used it like once a week anyway.”

Blinking, I looked at Blaze then at the door, “How long have you been here? I thought we were booking it at about 60mph the entire way.

Yiska chuckles “Oh I’ve been here for hours. After playing tag with some F-16’s I left them in my dust and headed here. I can supercruise.”

Sitting down hard I blink again “Wow, I knew you were fast. But that is amazing!"

He strikes a Rainbow Dash pose “Well I’m AWESOME!” Only to get his nose whacked by Grandfather, causing him to lower his wings and stand at attention.

“I think a little modesty would work too young pegasus.” I giggle and shake my head. I look over at Grandfather.

“We’ve come back looking…”

Grandfather holds up a hand “I know why you’ve returned troubled mare, and I will do my best to help.”

I blink a few times “Wow, how did you…”

“Yiska told me, after he calmed down from his flight.” Grandfather says.

“Oh yeah, right, sorry..." I sigh, "I guess I'm a little featherbrained right now.” I say, then something jerks my attention to the east, I rotate my ears that direction. Yiska is looking too. Then we both look back as the LT comes jogging in with Jay.

The LT looked at us “We've got three 4 wheelers out there, and someone is shooting.”

I head to the window with Yiska, and we see them, probably teens or tourists out from the city, zig zagging through the scruff, waving a rifle around and shooting occasionally. They seem to be chasing something but I can’t make out…

“It’s a pony” Yiska said. “They're chasing a little filly.”

“A filly!?!? But how, why…”

“They're trying to run it down, or they’re going to kill it from exhaustion.” Yiska turned and gallops out the door.

Once I get outside I can see what is happening better, the little one is running as fast as her legs can carry her, heart pounding, obviously in pain, bleeding from scrapes and scratches. She is driven by fear as she runs through the dust and the oppressive heat of the sun. Being followed by the laughter and the gunshot shots, if she slows or stops even for a moment they will shoot near her to get her running again. Her crying floats to my ears, making me snarl in anger, she hardly seems to be able to breathe as she runs for all she's worth.

I have to do something! I watch her stumble a bit, I need to get to her fast. I plant my hooves hard and my horn flashes bright. Something happens, because I feel a little woozie for a moment but I discover that I'm standing with the foal lying on the ground between my legs. I have beaten Yiska here, but I guess teleporting is cheating, I know that would be what he would say, as if flying against an earth bound pony is fair. I’ll figure out just how I did it later. Right now, my horn glows bright as I watch the ATV’s hitting the brakes hard, skidding to a stop in front of me.

“Well lookey what we got here. Another one, and this one looks like it wants to make a stand.” Rednecks, I swear, why did it have to be rednecks, they were teens or young adults, one has a rifle, the other two have coolers strapped to the back of their ATV’s.

“Maybe it’s her mama.” The driver of the second ATV laughs.

Blaze lands in front of me, his wings spread wide, yelling. “Leave them alone.”

“Or what?” The third calls out, chuckling, “Animals ain’t got no rights. So if we want to chase or shoot it’s all fine.”

He levels the gun at me and the foal, if Blaze tries to charge, even if he could dodge the round it would likely hit one of us. Holding his ground Blaze keeps his wings spread, watching the guy with the rifle.

“Maybe we should pluck you and see what horse wing with barbeque sauce tastes like.” The man on the ATV says, laughing.

The gunshot catches me by surprise, I hear it clearly, followed by the smack as the round impacts into the side of the kid's rifle. Looking to my right I see a good 500 yards away, the LT with a pair of Binoc’s, on the porch, beside him, Jay, with a large hunting rifle. 1500 feet for a qualified sniper, with even an average scope and rifle, was deadly but jay was holding a Remington 700 MDT, not an issued sniper rifle but with that, he could probably put down a target at three times the distance we were at without a problem.

I look back at the ATV’ers “Now then, that was a warning shot. Just to let you know he’s there. I suggest you drive now. As fast and as far as you can, and if you ever see a pony, avoid it, because if we even catch wind of you hurting one. You won’t hear the shot that kills you.”

Blaze snorts and scuffs a hoof.

The humans look at Blaze and I, then over at the house, then back at us,

"C'mon, let's get out of here, we can find more fun elsewhere." The three ATV's are quickly specks of dust in the distance.

Looking down between my legs, the little form lay there, panting heavily, she seems to be bruised and beaten. Her coat is a very pale olive green, with her mane a brilliant amber orange, with lighter amber highlights. With my magic, I carefully lift her onto my back, then turn for the house. Blaze walks beside me, keeping an eye on her. Her cutie mark looks like a pillow.

Henry meets us part way and starts to check her over while we walk, he looks very worried. “We need to cool her off slowly and get fluids into her fast. She could go into shock, or cardiac distress.” He says, as we clear a spot on the kitchen table and lay her down. Yiska appears with some towels that are soaked in cool water and we place them over her while she continues to pant.

“Noi,” The LT says, his phone in his hand, “Seen as the sister to Golden Harvest.”

“A foal, they would do this to a foal.” I snarl.

Grandfather comes in with a horse bottle and quickly warms up some milk. Henry looks over at him “She’s not a baby.” But grandfather keeps working.

“She needs fluids, warm milk will keep her internal temperature from dropping too fast. Since we don’t have another way to get her to drink maybe this will work.” Grandfather say quietly as he finishes getting the bottle ready.

Henry shrugs, “Point taken, I’m a people medic not a vet,” he starts, then looks at the LT “Damn it, Jim.” He finishes with a smile.

Grandfather gently puts the bottle into her muzzle and rubs her neck and chin to get her to start drinking. It ends up being very slow going but we take turns, changing the wash cloths, to keep her cool, while Henry cleans and dresses all her wounds. All of us take turns watching over the little thing over the next few hours, but finally she seems to be coming around.

Her head jerks up, the poor thing looks around, terrified as she tries to scramble to her feet, but Yiska puts a forehoof on her “Calm down, you're safe here.” He says gently and we all watch as her breathing slows. “You’re not in any danger anymore.”

Her eyes dart around the kitchen as the LT comes in with Henry. She keeps an eye on them, trembling. Henry takes out a small flashlight and checks her eyes carefully.

“It’s ok little one, I won’t hurt you.” Henry says.

“I’m 25.” Noi says meekly. “I’m not little.”

“Well, compared to Blaze and Twilight you are.” The LT says, motioning to us.

“I know, I don’t know why I’m so small.”

“Noi was a little foal, maybe when she changed she changed back to the foal she was.” I say, looking at the LT.

“That would mean the ponies are changing back to how they were the moment Discord cursed us.” Blaze says, blinking.

Noi looks up, “I started changing May the first, and shrank down to this.” She says as looks at her foreleg.

Carefully, the LT picks her up off the table and sets her on the ground so she can shake herself off.

“I was in a motel room when I started to change, my work sent me down here to help with some of the oil wells.” She continues, “When I got too small I found I couldn’t even open the door. Maid service let me out on the fifth and I ran out. I lived out of dumpsters and off grass for the next few days, I was making my way away from town, and ran into them at a camp ground. They took me out here and started… hunting me.” She said, lowering her head and shivering.


“That’s awful. You didn’t have anyone you could call?” Blaze asks.

“I wanted to call my wife and daughter but I don’t know how they’d take it.”

The LT looks at Henry, “Wife… daughter…”

We all cringe, and Henry's simple reply… “Ouch.”

She looks up between us and whimpers “Do you know what’s going on, what’s happening?”

Taking a deep breath I sit down “As far as we can figure so far, but we need more information or proof or something, is this. Discord started attacking and cursing ponies, if that’s true then we were ponies then became human.”

“That… so… I can’t change back?” Noi asks whimpering again.

“I don’t know, I don’t think so. You’re not the only one going through this. We’ve all had problems.” I say, looking at Blaze.

Noi lays down and whimpers “What am I going to do?”

I lay down, curling around her a bit and nuzzling the foal, “It's ok, we’ll get you to someone who can help, then see about getting in touch with your family.”

Noi yawns, curling up to against my belly, and nods “ok.”

The LT looks at me, then at Blaze “You know Blaze, there’s just some things a mare can get away with doing that a stallion couldn’t and that’s one of them.”

Blaze looks down at me, blinking then nods “Yeah, she does look like a mom there. I know that little foal was a 25 year old, but still, all I can say is Discord was well and truly twisted.”

I start to get up, but Noi whimpers in her sleep, looking up at the LT I sigh, “I’m stuck. She needs rest but if I move she’s not going to.”

“Yep, you’re stuck." The LT looks around, "umm, we’ll bring the TV in here for you."

Blaze lay down behind me, his side to my back and put a wing over Noi and I, laying his head on his forelegs and looks up. “Might as well keep you company." He smiles, "Hey LT want to grab my phone, take a picture of this.”

The LT chuckles and snaps a picture. “Got it.” Tapping away on the phone the LT looks down “Ok I’m sending a request for pickup and extraction to Soarin's group. With luck they should have someone here tomorrow.”

I look up “Pick up and extraction, you know you’ve been in the field to long when even day to day lives now start sounding like ops.” The LT laughs as he puts the phone away.

Shortly the TV is set up, it's got some drama show running now, I very quickly lose interest in it, the teleport had taken a lot out of me I guess, because I close my eyes and sleep overtakes me.

***

“No teleporting when you’re pregnant!” Night Light puts his hoof down.

“What? Are you afraid I’m going to wink out and leave the baby behind? You know that’s not how it works.” I respond with a huff.

He looks sternly at me. “Teleporting puts a huge strain on your body.”

“Only when you rush it, and have not pre-prepared the start and or end points. If I teleport home for example, it’s no strain or stress. Just like if I teleport from home to the guard house. Both home and the guard house are prepared locations.” I state flatly.

“When did you prepare the guardhouse?” He looks confused.

“A week after Kibitz put me on the EUP roster. I figured I’d have to get back and forth between here and there quickly if needed.”

“I really don’t like it that Celestia reinstated you, even if you are just consulting.” He says to me, “I know you are doing it to keep your magic in practice but I don’t know how safe it is.”

“My mom teleported with me and was casting powerful spells till the day I was born. And look how I turned out.” I say, standing proud.

Nightlight hugs me tight, “I love you but sometimes your magic scares me to bits. You may not always see it but, your eyes glow, your mane and tail look like they are about to catch fire, even your cutie mark glows… And I’m scared when you’re channeling that much energy you will hurt yourself, or worse do something that will destroy half a town.”

Cringing I shake my head. “When have I ever…”

“When you faced down the dragon, the magic blast you fired to knock him back, you could have just teleported away.” He grumbles.

“If I had, he would have killed those earth pony foals. And no, I couldn’t have teleported them without risk either.” I huff.

“It’s still scary to see.” He states.

“So what about when I start teaching our daughter magic?” I said nuzzling my side.

“Oh no, you are not teaching her casting. No Celestia’s school for our little girl.” He says with a chuckle.

I humph and trot up to our room, "Stallions, sometimes.” Then I nuzzle my side and giggle “Don’t worry, mama will teach you all her tricks, first rule to teleporting, visualization, see and build a clear picture of where you need to be. Then concentrate your magic on that spot and be there.”

***

“No… no… no… no… no…” Cynthia moans, sitting in the bathroom of the Pentagon, rubbing her leg with a wad of towels. “Come off come off… don’t be real…”

She looks at the red skin around the newly formed marked on her leg, a black ink pen with gold tip and inkwell, while the skin around it was raw from all of her rubbing, the mark stubbornly remained there, unchanged, with perfectly defined edges, sharp and clear to see.

“I can’t be one, I can’t, it’s just not fair. The Admiral will kill me. Or worse send me to…” Gulping, she stands up, and adjusting her skirt. Then she looks at herself in the mirror and sighing, “Maybe I should just… end it… I was born today, maybe I should just die today. I can’t go through this. Not now. ”

Washing her face, she turns and heads back to the Admiral's office, to end up sitting behind her desk. Putting a thumb drive into the computer she begins moving a few files to the drive. Finally a noise alerts her, so she glances up as the Admiral walks in.

Her professional demeanor takes over, "Sir, the Joint Chiefs of Staff meeting has been moved up to today at 2 pm, and the meeting with 7th Fleet Joint Operations is at 3 pm now.” She says, keeping her head low.

Admiral Volker nodded “Thank you, I’ll be in my office.”

Removing the thumb drive, she places it in her purse, fighting back tears, and sits transcribing documents from the morning’s meetings.

***

I yawn, look up and blink, Grandfather is sitting in the chair across from us in the living room rocking slowly watching me, Noi is still at my belly but she has her muzzle on my foreleg and is watching TV, and Blaze is still behind me with his wing over my side and Noi.

Looking down I gave the foal a nuzzle, “I never did get your name.”

“Noi, I’m Golden Harvest's baby sister.” She says in the cutest little voice.

“I meant your human name, silly,” I say and nibbled her ear, causing her to giggle.

“Martin Richards. I think I like Noi better though.”

“I know, I was Wally, but Twilight Velvet just feels so right.” I say, “Especially since I don’t have the parts to be a Wally anymore.”

“What parts is that?” She says, looking wide eyed and innocent.

“You’ll find out when you’re older.” Dear Celestia it is hard to believe I am talking to someone the same age as me.

She puts her head back on my foreleg and continues watching TV, I can feel her tail wiggling against me. I look back at Grandfather and huff, “What?”

“How many foals do you have?”

“If they are mine, I have two, but it’s hard to reconcile.” I said slowly.

“Well you teleported to protect Noi, so now we know the next thing we are going to practice.” He says firmly.

“That’s going to hurt, I felt woozie and such after doing that.” I say meekly.

Grandfather just looks at me.

“Meaning I need to practice.” I sigh, “Grandfather, we came here looking for answers.”

“How can you search for answers, when you don’t know what questions to ask?”

I blink and look at him. “All right, that had to have come from a fortune cookie”

“Sometimes the wisdom of the spirits can be found when you are not looking for it.”

I droop and put my head over Noi. Strangely I feel like I am actually in a family for a moment, then Henry walks in with the LT, behind him are a pair of ponies. Lifting my head again I nod once. “Noi, some friends have come to take you somewhere safe, where there are no evil rednecks.”

Noi blinks, yawning and looks up at me, “Can I stay with you?”

“I’m sorry, I work for the military, so I’ll be going to a lot of dangerous places. Most of them won’t be friendly towards ponies. These two however are going to take you to a farm where other ponies are, and they can help you.”

Noi nods and gives me a tight hug before moving up to the ponies. Henry looks at them “She’s in good condition but keep her hydrated and make her rest for at least another two days.”

“I thought you weren’t a vet,” I say with a giggle.

“You can’t go wrong with rest, and fluids.” He chuckles.

With one final wave from Noi I stand up, causing Blaze to roll over onto his back, snoring away. I walk over to the window and I watch as she gets into the truck, with two ponies I didn’t know, and I know I'll probably never see her again. She was 25, but still, she feels like a little foal to me. Like my own foal.

“Ok let’s get to work.” I say as I turn to my companions.

The LT looked at me, “So you actually know how to teleport?”

I look at the LT and smile “It’s it just takes understanding something that humans have yet to figure out.”

The LT blinks in surprise, “Oh? And what’s that?”

“That time, Space, and Mind are not the different things humans make them out to be.” I say and turn, trotting out with my head held high.

The LT just covers his face as Henry groans. “Of all the Star Trek quotes she could have used… she had to use that one.”

Moving away from everyone, everything I stood, spreading my legs a bit, “Line of sight teleports, see the spot, see yourself at the spot.” My horn glows, “Put your magic at that spot, and be there.”

Wobbling a bit after I appear I find myself breathing heavy. Bracing myself again I teleport back but find myself missing my mark, appearing further than I expected. “Ok, so I need to work on accuracy too. Just great.”

I spend the next hour just practicing popping back and forth between locations, after every 3 or 4 teleports I have to rest though, and by the end of an hour I find myself really dizzy, light headed and starving.

Wobbling back inside Grandfather smiles at me and puts a HUGE plate of pancakes, jam, syrup, home fries, and even biscuits and gravy. I look at the meal in shock and awe, then at Grandfather.

Sniffing the air Yiska, sits up “Oh breakfast.”

Grandfather shakes his head “That’s for her, if you’re hungry there is some Alfalfa and whole grains for you.”

Yiska blinks “That’s not fair, why does she get the huge meal?”

“Look at her, she’s weak, dizzy, light headed, she’s been outside for the last hour practicing teleporting, she needs sugars, starches, and vitamins.” He says sternly.

Sitting down in front of the food I find myself starting to tremble a bit, but Grandfather is quick to put a cold towel around me and he starts to feed me, it wasn’t until then that Yiska becomes concerned. “How many teleports did you do?”

“I wasn’t counting,” I say between bites, “It wasn’t easy and got harder later on.”

Yiska nodded and grabs some of the alfalfa bits, watching me intently.

“I did get my accuracy up though, and I can do it without a lot of warmup.” I say with pride.

“What’s your range?” Yiska asks.

“Currently, line of sight, I haven’t tried to teleport to anywhere I couldn’t see yet. That’s much harder, I think and much more dangerous.” I say and then giggle, “And I’ll stick to calling it teleporting. I’m not going to use the other term for it, that’s just silly.”

“What other term.”

“Winking, according to online, some versions of the show called the power winking. Saying the unicorn would wink out at one location and wink in at another. I guess that version was meant for kids who couldn’t say teleport.” I looked down and was surprised that I had already finished my pancakes and home fries. Poking the biscuits and gravy I decided to give it a try.

“Grandfather, what kind of gravy is that?” Yiska asked dubiously.

“Thick Mushroom gravy using vegetable stock,” Grandfather smiles, “Its pony safe.”

“It’s delicious.” I say as I finish my plate, and relax a bit.

“Feeling better? You look better right now.” Yiska asks.

“No more wobbles, no more sparkles in the eyes. Yep.”

Grandfather pats both our heads “Good, then you will be ready for the medicine circle tonight.”

Both of us groan at that, the last one had not turned out so hot. I stand up and walk out “LT, medicine circle tonight, I’m going to take a shower, get changed into some civvies.” Then I trot into the bathroom with my saddle bag.

My shower was quick this time, I think I only spent 5 or 6 min in there, before getting out and getting dried off. Dressing in the shorts and t-shirt I bought I put my mane back into a pony tail and trot down the stairs. “Ok, I'm ready.”

Something about a grey white unicorn, wearing navy blue shorts, and a red t-shirt with the white and gold airborne logo on the front, showing between my forelegs as I sat, must have looked different because the entire squad was looking at me smiling. I could tell they were trying not to laugh, but I didn’t mind. Narrowing my eyes I made my horn glow.

“Ponies, live the adventure. Sign up now and get your own cutie mark.” I say with a giggle.

That did it, everyone was having a good laugh now, “They actually had PT uniforms at the PX?” The LT asks.

“I figure there was likely 2 or 3 on base before we got there. PX probably had them made locally.” I giggle.

Blaze just keeps laughing “Oh now I wish I bought a set.”

“Oh sweet Celestia, picture if we could get a group of us trotting down the training run, I wanna be an EUP… guarding ponies from the everfree… defending the kingdom from changeling hordes… facing griffons with their deadly swords.”

Jay and Sanchez looked at each other, “I can just see the drill sergeants now ordering more antacid. For the amount of yelling they would have to do.”

Puffing a few times I stood up, “ok, let’s go, don’t want to keep our hosts waiting”

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