Act 2, Chapter 29: Shadows With Teeth
Starlight Over Detrot
Act 2, Chapter 29: Shadows With Teeth
It used to be that if you needed to repel a giant wilderness beast from a population center, you either needed all the town's magicians to get together and form a barrier, or you needed a unicorn with a talent for guardianship; The latter are scarce enough that they can’t be in all major cities in Equestria simultaneously.
Plans for a device that could create a selectively permeable magical barrier over an urban area based on the spellwork of a deceptively brilliant guard captain had been in development even before L.R. 0, but it was not until the Crusades that the Shield Project was really kicked into overdrive in terms of funding, horsepower, and thus, actual progress. Equestria needed ways to protect population centers from fast-moving dragon raids; a firm stare and harsh language can only repel so many draconic incursions.
The Shield's technology was in use on a small scale for general creature repellant functions for some years before the war, but efficient wide-spread implementation was only allowed via a breakthrough by the independently funded Ancile Research Group. Unfortunately for the research group, who’d publicly banked on being able to refund their debts with war funds, this breakthrough came very shortly before the dragons surrendered. The Ancile Research Group was nothing if not resourceful, however, and Detrot's position at the time -- being a wealthy jewel boom town amidst a monster-infested wilderness -- made it ideal for the Shield's continuous development and operation. The Ancile Research Group became the Shield Corporation, and has maintained the Shield ever since.
The precise operational methodology of the Shield was and remains a matter of national security; The obelisks that maintain the barriers are public knowledge, but little else is. This was not unreasonable, especially since the most development thereof occurred during wartime. If the inner workings of the Shield had been public knowledge, went the reasoning, the barrier could have easily been disabled or subverted by dragon agents, changeling infiltrators, bored insectoid hyper-intelligent collective consciousnesses, et cetera.
It should be understood, however, that The Shield isn't perfect. Determined, unknown, truly massive, or overwhelmingly numerous attackers can still get through, which necessitates the existence of PACT. Furthermore, attempting to get magic to be selective at that scale and power hasn't been without snags. On occasion it has inadvertently repelled griffins, buffalo, pet ferrets, and at one point, Mrs. Trotter of 504 Sandy Lane, who was ejected from the city at over 500 miles an hour. Thankfully, those errors have been scarce in recent years, and pegasi are necessarily quite durable when it comes to full-body impacts at high speed.
The city agreed that a relatively modest annual payment and the occasional hyperaccelerated citizen is a small price to keep out most of the nastiest beasties.
-The Scholar
It was about six hours into the morning and the list of errands had been whittled down to a short few remaining. We’d directed the clean-up of Goofball’s first major defecation, torn apart and re-sewn the Lunar Passage’s robes sans enchantments, and Limerence made a pitstop at the Archive to retrieve something for us to handle the heartseekers. He hadn’t been especially specific about what it was, which had me worried.
Taxi, Limerence, Swift, and I now sat around our living room table with a cloth spread out in front of us. On it was a veritable heap of weapons.
“I’m afraid I wasn’t able to get another police issue shotgun to fit your harness on such short notice," said Taxi, "but I had a contact in the evidence archive who was willing to let this ‘fall out of the back door’ for a couple hundred bits.”
I picked up the sawn off shotgun Taxi was pointing at, fitting it into my side holster. It was approximately the right size, although the wooden butt didn’t quite settle. The weapon was a nasty piece of work, probably made from a hunting weapon, originally, with most of the barrels removed. I hoped if I had to fire it that I’d have the option of being more than a couple meters away. Anypony up close was likely to be turned into a fine red mist.
“If you don’t mind my asking, where’d you get the rest of this mess?” I asked, gesturing to the mass of guns that Swift was eyeing with undisguised lust.
Taxi shrugged and reached back into her saddle-bag, pulling out a stack of bit notes I could have swum in. “Stella’s generosity knows no bounds. I was curious today. Do you know, under his ownership, they’ve increased profits three fold at the Monte Cheval? Having access to a stable of skilled prostitutes and a lunatic security officer operating the tables might have something to do with that.”
“Huh. Stella really gave Svelte a job? I’m mean, I’m not shocked, but…”
Taxi laughed, “She’s apparently happy as a clam, so long as she’s allowed to test security by breaking in now and then, and bust a few heads if anypony fails to catch her. Either way, the black market in Detrot still operates, even if the white collar market doesn’t. This stuff wasn’t cheap.”
I turned the sawn off shotgun over, peering at the underside. The serial numbers had been polished off entirely, right down to the surface; a professional job, then.
Swift lifted a machine gun in both hooves, using one wing to slap the release on the drum. It thudded on the carpet and she grinned, holding the monster of a weapon in the crook of her leg with the barrel propped across her neck. “Sir, can I-”
“No, kid, we don’t have time to get you a combat saddle. Besides, I think the recoil on that thing would give you whiplash. Take your pistol or something else you can hide.”
“Awww...”
Limerence had been quiet up till that point, but he didn’t look happy as he examined the table. “And what, precisely, am I supposed to use? My knives will serve me to a range of approximately five meters.”
I cocked my head and asked, “You can’t throw them?”
“I can, but if I throw my weapons out of range of my telekinesis, then I don’t have them to use again, now do I? There is also the issue of not being terribly easy to use in a non-lethal capacity if I am tossing them. Or was I assuming incorrectly that our goal is a low number of casualties?”
Taxi scratched her head, then pawed through the pile of guns. “I’m afraid I had to buy a ‘lot’ rather than a selection if I wanted these today. I think I saw...Ah! Okay, I know this is a bit on the exotic side...”
My driver lifted a strange looking weapon out of the pile that I couldn’t immediately identify. It was the size of a pistol, but there was no barrel, nor anyway I could see to operate it with one’s mouth. Taxi tugged back on what looked like an oversized hammer and two arms burst out from the side with a loud ‘sproing!’.
“Is that… an arrow… gun?” Swift asked, curiously.
“Buying hot weapons isn’t an exact science, so my seller wasn’t real specific on what was in this bunch, but he did say there was ammunition for everything.” Taxi gestured towards a duffle bag sitting behind the Nest’s front door. “Will this work for you, Lim?”
Limerence levitated the weapon out of my driver’s forelegs, tilting it this way and that as he examined the piece. “Interesting. I take it you didn’t notice the previous owner was a murderous unicorn racial supremacist?”
Taxi raised both eyebrows and he turned the weapon over, showing off the words ‘Sod-Suckers’ and ‘Turkeys’ carved into the underside of the stock. Beside each slur, a couple of hash marks were cut into the metal.
“Knowing my seller, the previous owner is dead or in prison,” she said, dismissively, picking up a blocky object and affixing it to the top of the strange gun. “This is a quick loader. You just pull this-”
“I’m aware of the basic functions of a crossbow, Miss Taxi,” Limerence said, shortly. Yanking back on a lever, he gave the gun a slight shake. A bolt fell into place from the loader, then locked when he let go of the lever. Floating the gun around in front of himself, he aimed down the sight at a discolored spot on the wall, then pulled the trigger. The weapon jerked as the arrow buried itself six inches to the left of his intended target. “Mmm… My aim is poor with conventional firearms, but… this weapon has some functional physics I can adapt to, if you don’t mind me taking a few hours practice before we leave.”
“We won’t be moving until tonight, so take all the time you need,” I said. “That...does leave you, Sweets-”
“Cannon,” she said, firmly.
“No, we need discretion in-”
She shook her head and pointed towards Limerence, “We’ve got a silencer in our group, remember?”
Limerence’s lips twitched into a small smirk. “I can fire my weapon and cast my silence, so long as my attention need only be in two places at once.”
I rolled my eyes at my driver and the librarian. “Suuure. Then explain to me how you two are going to hide that monster under a Lunar Passage robe? Sling it between your rear legs? I mean, Sweets, I always suspected you wanted a-”
“Finish that sentence and I begin picking bones to break that you won’t need today,” Taxi growled, patting her P.E.A.C.E. cannon with one hoof where it lay beside the table. “I’ll figure something out.”
Cracking the breach on my shotgun, I quickly went through the motions of popping shells into it with my mouth, then sealing and firing it. It wasn’t a quick weapon by any means, but I wasn’t going to need to do more than fire in the enemy’s general direction.
“One last thing. What’s our method for handling the heartseekers?”
Limerence scratched at his mane, then spoke with clear reluctance. “I… erm… I was... able to find one legend of a zebra prince sneaking into a nest of daevas.”
“Go on,” I prompted.
Opening the pocket of his vest, he pulled out a gemstone and set it on the table. His horn flashed as he aimed it at the jewel and a rhythmic thumping filled the living room.
“That sounds like… a heartbeat,” Swift said, cocking an ear.
“Very astute. The zebra in question used a device made of a drum, wheel, and rope, but the purpose was similar. Unfortunately, I’ve only been able to make three of these without giving myself a horn ache or risking total depletion. I fear enchanting is not my forte.”
I examined the rock, then shook my head. “What good is drawing them to us?”
“We don’t draw them to us, Detective. Before we enter the daevas’ lair we will place them at various entrances to the sewers around the area, as far as possible from the place we intend to pass through. With luck, it will lure them away from us.”
Swift chewed on her lower lip, then asked, “If you don’t mind… what happened to the zebra prince in the story?”
Limerence’s expression fell and he carefully studied his hooves. “Well... you must understand, this is a zebra morality story and there are social connotations and cultural flavor which is somewhat lost in translation-”
My partner glared at him. “What...happened...to the zebra prince?”
“Ehem… His heart was torn out and he was eaten alive when the drum device ran out of beats.”
At first, none of us could think of anything to say to that. I felt briefly light headed and tapped my chest plug a couple of times until Gale remembered he needed to beat.
Taxi picked up the pulsing gem, then shuddered and quickly laid it back on the table. “Oof, that’s weird. It really feels like a tiny heart.”
“I want to go back a step here. This whole ‘heart being torn out’ thing is entirely understandable, but if we’re going to put our lives in your hooves, I want to know what you meant when you said ‘with luck’. Exactly how long do these operate for?” I asked.
“Truth? I’ve no idea. Minutes, perhaps. I would consider our upper limit to be a half hour of relative safety. Again, I am not an enchanter. I study things that others have enchanted, but the best I could do was a simple spell matrix and a charge. I can silence our own heartbeats and we must pray the daevas are drawn away. Once these magics are exhausted-”
“-we’re screwed. Alright. Is this the best we could do?”
“If we had a few more days, I could take this to one of the other Archivists...”
I shook my head and picked up the stone, dropping it into my pocket. “I don’t want to find out how long Cerise has before something bad happens to her, if it hasn’t already. Taxi, can you go ring the Essy office and get a few of Queenie’s brood to join us?”
A soft tingle in my mane gave me quite a jolt, then a tiny black and red creature crawled out of the fur behind my left ear, skittering out onto the tip of my nose. I stared at it with crossed eyes.
“How long have you been there?” I asked, not really expecting an answer. The ladybug began self-consciously cleaning its forelegs with its mandibles. I reached up and carefully plucked it off my muzzle, setting it on the table.
“I… take it then that this is one of those… police surveillance creatures I’ve heard of?” Limerence asked. “Weren’t they hideously unreliable?”
The ladybug let out an indignant buzz, then turned its back on him, crossing its forelegs grumpily.
“They’re reliable enough, so long as you know how to keep them interested,” I replied, then got down on my knees so I could be face level with the insect. “Hey, could you make sure the collective has a few of yours ready to join us at Supermax? I can promise some ridiculously dangerous escapes and probably somepony getting shot.”
The bug made a big show of pretending to think, then it nodded, which was a full body action for something so small. Taking off, the creature flew up and re-settled behind my ear, burrowing into my mane. I wondered just what percentage of the last couple of days Queenie was storing in that vast, networked mind for later perusal when its soap operas were on commercial break.
“Sir, I just had a really scary thought. Does that thing being here… does that mean Chief Jade can watch… everything that we just did the last couple of days?” Swift asked, uncertainly.
“I… uh… Celestia preserve us, I hope she doesn’t have that kind of spare time. Either way, I suppose it doesn’t matter. We’re going in, one way or the other. If she wants to bust us, she’ll have a bumper crop of evidence once this is over.”
“That does remind me…” Limerence trotted out of the room, returning a moment later with a long, square cardboard box floating behind him. Lifting the lid, he plucked out a sheet of reflective metal that appeared to have a hoof-strap attached to the back of it. “This should work for the basilisk eyes.”
“A mirror shield… huh. I like it. Simple, reasonably foalproof to use,” Taxi murmured.
“The security system at Supermax seems based largely on being a relative unknown to any would-be escapee. I have learned a filtration spell I do believe should protect us from airborne contaminants.”
“So… that’s it then. We’re ready,” I said.
“Detective, I don’t think we could be ‘ready’ for this with six weeks preparation, much less six hours. What we are is desperate, endangered, and probably going to die screaming while an unseeable demon claws our organs out.”
“Come on, Lim! Think happy thoughts! I’m alive, aren’t I?”
The librarian poked me in the chest over my heart socket. “In open defiance of probability. Still, we proceed as needs must.”
Goofball, who’d been napping, raised his two of his heads and wagged his tail, almost toppling Swift as he batted her legs.
The four of us looked at him, then at one another.
“Who gets to go tell Wisteria we’re leaving Goofball with her?”
****
As it turned out, the dog was the least of our issues.
At first, Wisteria insisted on guiding us through the sewers herself, but I vetoed that and the Ancestors concurred. Nopony could fault her for loyalty, but they were not happy with the idea of the pregnant mare going out of the Skids, much less participating in any sort of dangerous mission, so Wisteria saddled us with her daughter.
Jambalaya was still sore about having to be dragged bodily out of the Nest by her mother, but she agreed to take us to the edge of the Aroyo underground territories, which ran considerably farther than their above-ground haunts. From there, we’d have to make our own way using a sewer map and Saussurea’s blueprints.
****
“What’s the plan for once we’re inside?” Taxi asked, accelerating down the vacant motorway. It was just after sundown and we were well out of the Heights, moving at a speed that would leave police cruisers out of puff and miles behind.
I sat, watching the empty and near-empty industrial estates on either side of us. Here and there, a Shield monolith poked out above them, like giant caltrops to stab the feet of giants. The Wilderness loomed up behind them, a vast field of green climbing up one side of the mountain, bookending the valley Detrot sat in. I saw what I thought was the shape of a small dragon veer towards the city from far up, but as it reached the top of the Shield’s coverage area a soft flicker of light surrounded it for a moment before it reversed course, darting back towards the forests.
“I don’t know,” I replied, finally. “We’ve got disguises and I hope those will give us some leeway. We need evidence of what Skylark is doing and, if possible, a way to shut the magical construct down. The best I think we can hope for is probably Cerise extracted with minimal casualties. If things go badly, prioritize escape. We do nopony any good if we’re dead. Swift, did you get your camera? We’ll need pictures, if for no other reason than to turn over to our lawyers when they ask us exactly why we were trespassing in a convent with enough weapons to gut a Tatzelwurm.”
My partner nodded and pulled a small, bright green film-loading camera out of her vest’s front pocket. Turning, she grinned and aimed it at me. It flashed, and a sheet of thin picture paper spat out of the front. “Oooh, Sir, can I get one later with you standing in front of Miss Stella? Or maybe one with Goofball?”
I smiled involuntarily and pointed to the lens-cap, which was still on. “Sure, kid. If we survive, yes, you can take pictures of me and your dog all you like.” I turned to my driver. “Sweets, where’s this sewer entrance we’re meant to be taking?”
“It’s about a mile and a half from the building, but if Saussurea’s blueprints are to be believed, the actual territory of the heartseekers extends two kilometers in every direction. There’s no listing of how many there are now, unfortunately.”
“Damn. I hope these things aren’t that fast…”
“All indications are that they are very fast, Detective." Limerence added. "We will need to move quickly once we’re in the sewers."
Jambalaya, who was sitting in the back seat with Swift and I, said, “I and I have run de underland near de Hole. De… de ‘heart seeker’ ye be callin’ dem… I and I have been near dem. Dey not come away from de edge of dey lands nor above de ground, but.... If ye meet one, dey be tricksy.”
“I’ll try to keep that in mind,” I replied to that rather ominous piece of advice.
Looking up, I poked at my mane around my ear. “Ladybugs?” My neck tingled and I took that to mean they were listening. “I need three of you to move the heart beat stones to the places we pointed out on the map, then whoever is coming with us into the building needs to be waiting where I told you we’d stop. Clear?” The fur on the back of my head twitched twice, which I took to mean ‘yes.'
Jambalaya gave me a funny look. I thought about trying to explain who and what I was talking to, then decided it wouldn’t matter to her estimation of my sanity if I did.
****
I hadn’t been to the Hole more than a decade.
I remembered it with a sort of vague horror at what we as a species had let happen, first to the draconic prisoners and then later to our own, but you can’t spend your entire life outraged at mistakes made and corrected. The Princesses managed to bury and redress the worst of the abuses, largely by taking anypony who’d committed them and either sticking them in prison or making sure they’d never work anything more complicated than a hay frier.
A part of me refused to stop chewing over the question of how we were going to deal with Skylark herself. Shut down the magical construct and whatever spells were manipulating the populace should go with it, but that still left a cult of personality that spanned the entire region. Assassination was just not in my bag of tricks.
A month ago, I’d have dealt with this situation by drinking myself into the grave; I'd examined every fresh case for a new opportunity to give the reaper his due.
Funnily enough, in spite of various factors colluding to put me in harm’s way this time, I was surprised to find myself no longer quite so eager for the end.
****
There was no way, if you were anywhere near it, to mistake what was once Supermax for any other building in Detrot. It hacks a perfectly square swath of stars out of the horizon. The structure defies perspective until you’re near enough to realize just what a towering monstrosity it really is.
The buildings around us were thinning as fallow, empty farmland took over. Much of it had been poisoned beyond use during an especially irresponsible period of gemstone mining, before regulations were put in place to protect the local aquifers.
“We’re getting close…” Taxi murmured from the front seat. I began patting my pockets, checking for each essential accessory before peering out the windscreen, trying to pick out our destination in the low light.
Once Supermax was built, there were two good reasons to avoid that particular section of the city.
I glanced over at Jambalaya, who was leaning half out of the car window, holding a torch with her horn and pointing it at the roadway. She was counting off sewer grates as we passed them.
“How do you know where we are?” I asked, speaking a little louder to be heard over the sound of the rushing air.
She pulled the torch to her hooves and called back, “I and I be knowin’ dis place! We be almost de’re! Tell she what moves dis mad t’ing to stop!”
Taxi applied the brakes and I flicked my eyes at Swift. She nodded, then rolled down the opposite window. Sticking both wings out, she let them catch the wind, which swept her out of her seat and sent her soaring up into the night sky.
“De wee pegasus… she be mad flying like dat!” Jambalaya gasped as my partner was sucked out into the open air.
“Not crazy. Just very, very good at what she does. She’ll be back. She’s just going for a little scouting run. I want to make sure we aren’t watched.”
We pulled to a stop some distance further on, got out, and began arming ourselves.
The field we’d stopped beside was empty and the road, pock marked; a ‘low traffic’ area. An old farmhouse squatted in the distance, decaying in the middle of a disused field of gravel. It might have been wheat, or it might once have been rocks, but it was empty and that’s what mattered.
I looked back towards the center of the city. We were quite some ways out from uptown, but the sprawl surrounded Supermax whilst simultaneously keeping a respectful distance. Few ponies were likely to be on the lonely road at that hour. The weather factories were shut down for the evening, leaving the untended clouds crowding the sky. It was a starless night. A perfect night for skulking about.
Jambalaya crawled out of the car and stood unsteadily, trying to get her hooves under her. She wasn’t used to being driven. Chariots were still commonplace; cars were a bit of a luxury in Detrot.
Swinging her torch around, she scanned the road until she found a removeable sewer cover. Stuffing the light away, she reached into a bag around her neck and produced a metal stick with two prongs on the end. Bracing her rear hooves, she stuck the ponyhole key in and heaved the cover off, then shined the light inside.
“Dis one be clear, Crusada.”
Swift came in for an almost silent landing beside me.
“Nopony anywhere near, Sir,” she reported. “There’s a bunch of cars at Supermax, but nopony was outside keeping watch.”
“Why should they? It’s a convent,” I replied with a shrug, trying to wedge my shotgun a little more tightly into its holster. After some fiddling and a half roll of gaffer tape, we’d managed to get it to fit, but it still wobbled when I moved.
“Yeah, but… Sir, why do a bunch of nuns and priests need cars?”
I paused, mulling that over. “I… think we’re going to find out.” Rooting around in my pocket, I pulled out the heart gems and laid them on the pavement. “Alright, ladybugs. Are you here?”
A thin buzzing filled the air as about two dozen tiny insectoid creatures dropped from the skies, alighting on the brim of my hat
Jambalaya drew back, her flashlight swinging up into my face. “What be dis?!”
I held up my hoof as she thoroughly ruined my night vision. “Friends. Jeez, watch it with that thing.”
“Dey be bugs! Little...little demon bugs! Parasprites!”
I laughed and gestured to the field. There was a soft chirping coming from out there. “Trust me, these things are parasprites like those crickets are a swarm of locusts. We’re fine.” I shifted my attention to Limerence. “Lim? Set us up.”
His horn fired and he pointed it at the three gems, one at a time. They began to pulse with a weak light and the faint thump of an equine heart. Six ladybugs detached themselves from the group, swooped down, and snatched up the gemstones before flying off into the night, a pair clutching each jewel.
“I and I… be… be not wishin’ to know what ye be doin’, Crusada. Ye be too strange a pony,” Jambalaya muttered, pointing to the open sewer. “We be go from dere.”
Swift pulled open the trunk of the Night Trotter, dragging out the box with the mirror shields in it and hefting it across her back. “Alright, good to go, Sir!”
I backed down the hole, fitting my hooves into the sloping rungs of the ladder. I paused halfway into the dark pit. “Keep your flashlights on and your eyes peeled. We don’t know what these neurotoxin launchers look like and there’s still the possibility we could run into a heartseeker before we’re out. Limerence, you have your spells ready?”
He nodded, then hesitated and patted the crossbow strap keeping it slung across his back. “I feel I should warn you that I will not be able to use my magic for anything but silencing our hearts and filtering the air once we are in the daevas’ territory. My attention is best split only in two directions at once.”
“If we have to fight before we reach Supermax, I think we have either got plenty enough weapons or so few that a crossbow won’t matter,” I replied
“That is not… comforting, Detective.”
“Wasn’t meant to be,” I answered, then began my descent, letting myself be swallowed up by the darkness.
****
The climb was a long one, but Limerence’s horn provided a little bit of illumination on the inside of the shaft. It’d been awhile since I climbed a ladder and I kept waiting for the burn to start in my thighs. Certainly, Limerence was huffing and puffing as the floor came into sight.
“My...goodness. I swear, I must add more aerobics to my calisthenic regimen…” he murmured between rough breaths.
I stepped off the bottom rung of the ladder and fished in my pocket until I found my light. I’d opted for a couple of electrical lanterns on neck straps, which were bright without being blinding. Flicking it on, I turned in a small circle, getting a good look at our surroundings while the others made their way to the ground.
We’d come down into a disused cistern and the smell was, thankfully, milder than it might otherwise have been; still crap and mold, but not bad enough to knock over a charging minotaur. There were flood water marks high on the walls, which might have accounted for the relatively clean state of the place.
Tunnels stretched away from us in two directions and a thin trickle of sewage water ran down the middle, but otherwise we seemed to have come into a relatively quiet part of the network. I breathed a sigh of relief. Part of me expected demonic shadows or a whole army of cultists just waiting at the door.
Taxi was climbing down in front of Swift and having a real time of it. Dangling from her shoulder, her P.E.A.C.E. cannon scraped the far wall of the narrow shaft with every step she took. I shook my head, but didn’t feel like restarting the argument of whether or not she should have that wretched thing.
Jambalaya was the last one down, her horn focusing a circle of light on the walls. Her nose twitched as she sniffed this way, then that, before pointing off to our left down the nearest tunnel.
“Lead the way,” I said, trying to breathe through my mouth.
****
I was lost.
Lost, lost, lost.
The map we had with us might have been adequate, to a point, but if the little unicorn Arroyo hadn’t been there, I’m fairly certain we’d have wandered until we starved or the daevas ate all four of us. Taxi had a sublime understanding of the surface roads, Swift could navigate the skies with unerring accuracy, and Limerence could read a map upside down and backwards, but in the sewers they were all as hopeless as I was.
The primary issue was that all the tunnels looked almost exactly identical. We trotted from one to the next, down broad cut-throughs and some that were barely cracks in the wall and I soon felt like we were going in circles. I was painfully aware of our timer ticking down on the heartseeker lures, as well. Twice, we passed through cisterns that were, to all appearances, completely identical to the one we’d entered from.
“Are we… almost there yet?” I asked, for the third time in five minutes.
Jambalaya blew a breath out of one side of her muzzle. “We be nearly dere, though iffen ye be askin’ me dat again, I be leavin’ ye here to make ye own way, Crusada.”
I dropped back beside Taxi, pulling the collar of my coat up against the slightly cool air in the tunnel.
“You know we can’t make this any faster, Hardy…”
“I know. Part of me was hoping that we’d at least be able to leave via the sewers, though.”
Taxi sucked on her upper, then lower lip before finally shutting her eyes and “I didn’t want to ask earlier, but what is our exit going to be? The fire alarms don’t strike me as a terrible effective method if shooting does start.”
“The sprinkler system will automatically call the fire department if it’s set off. I doubt anypony would see fit to disable that, weird cultists or not. We start shooting, they’ll be on their way, along with the police. All we have to do is cause some proper chaos until they get here, then leave with the rest of the crowd.”
“Yeah, Swift wasn’t kidding when she filled me in. Optimistic horseapples. Sooo...what’s your plan B? You wouldn’t be taking us in there without one.”
I frowned at the floor, plodding along behind our guide with my tail tucked between my legs to keep it out of the puddles. “There was something in the hoofnotes on the blueprints, yeah...”
“And?”
“I sincerely hope we don’t have to use that one. Trust me, it’s nothing nice.”
“You mean less nice than this?” Taxi asked, waving her hoof at the ceiling of the sewer.
“Significantly. It’s a one way exit. I’m reserving that in case things don’t go anything like to plan. If I’m honest, I’d like to just walk in, get Cerise, then sneak out. Who knows? Maybe they’ll let us out the front door. It wouldn’t be the first time a dumb lackey let a hostage walk out with somepony who looked like they should be there...”
****
Another five minutes passed, and Jambalaya came to an abrupt halt at a side-passage covered by a set of heavily rusted but sturdy looking bars. Reaching out with her magic, she grabbed the middle one and gave it a light twist. Somewhere in the stonework, something groaned, then the bar scraped its way up into the ceiling.
“Dis be it, Crusada. I and I not know de way from here,” Jambalaya said.
“That’s fine. We’ve got a map,” I replied, poking my head through the bars and looking both ways. The space was just big enough to wiggle through, if I breathed out.
“If ye be lost, find dat line,” she added, pointing her horn at a length of faded, off-yellow-colored pipe running along one side of the tunnel until it vanished into the distant dark. “It lead back here.”
“Alright then. I guess this is it.” Hauling my coat back, I freed my shotgun and adjusted the strap on my bit. “Jambalaya, you okay making your way back on your own?”
“Aye, Crusada. Ye come back alive, hear?”
I grinned at her and blew a little kiss off my hoof. “Awww, I didn’t know you cared.”
She gave me a black look, and stepped out of where the kiss might have landed. “I and I be not de one cleanin’ up after de mutt. Ye come back, or I find ye grave and make He wid Three Heads crap on it.“
With that, she turned on her heel and marched off back the way we’d come.
Chuckling, I squirmed between the bars and joined my companions.
“How long do you figure we’ve got left before the lures run out?” I asked.
Limerence tugged his watch out and checked it.
“Perhaps ten minutes, at the outside. We are less than a kilometer from the prison. At decent speed, we should make it in time, assuming the daevas have been drawn away from their lairs.”
“Cheerful thoughts, Lim! Cheerful thoughts. Now, I’m ready when you are.”
The librarian’s horn burst to life, lighting up the whole tunnel then guttering to a soft glow. Silence descended like a hammer blow. I felt like my ears should have popped or something. Swift winced and pawed at the side of her head for a second, then opened her mouth to say something before remembering just how futile that would be.
I pulled the sewer blueprints out of my front pocket, unfolded them, and held them up for Limerence. He studied them briefly, then nodded and peered at the walls before picking a tunnel that appeared, to me, just like every other. We started down it at a pace slightly faster than a walk, but not quite a gallop.
Taxi and Swift took up positions on either side of him, with myself bringing up the rear. My driver’s ridiculous cannon was draped over her back, balanced between her saddlebags, both of which sagged with extra ammunition for all of our weapons. I’d asked if she needed me to carry any of that mess earlier, but she seemed to be trying to prove the stupid blaster was practical in some way, shape, or form.
At the next junction, Limerence swept out one hoof, bringing the rest of us to a sudden halt.
I stepped up beside him, and gave him a curious look. He pointed ahead, then levitated his glasses off his face, holding them in front of mine. Through the lenses, I could see significantly more light than was actually there and a short distance further. I supposed that late night reading was easier if somepony didn’t need to turn on a lamp.
Up ahead, I caught sight of a figure standing in the middle of the tunnel. It was equine, male and seemed to be straining towards us while looking up and to the left. One hoof was upraised, as though warding us away. It took me a second to realize that the pony in question wasn’t moving. His original coloration was probably not granite, either. A stick of some kind was clenched between his teeth with rags wrapped around one end; an old, makeshift torch, long extinguished.
I followed the stone pony’s gaze up to the corner of the room, but couldn’t make out exactly what he was looking at. Limerence’s glasses floated back to his nose. He grabbed Swift’s tail in his teeth, pulling her around sideways. She gave him an offended swat with one wing, then hauled the mirrors off her back and passed them to him.
Separating the four pieces of glass, he showed us how to hold them up. Hobbling along on three hooves wasn’t ideal, but it was better than being turned to stone like the poor sap up ahead.
Lim held his shield high and walked forwards, slowly. The rest of us followed. After ten paces, he let out a low grunt as something seemed to press against the mirror with a tangible weight. Two seconds later, the weight relaxed and he let his shield drop. I reached out to stop him, but he shook me off. Moving to the wall, he lifted himself up on his rear legs and reached into a tiny hole in the brick work, tugging something out.
He returned to us with an eyeball on a stick clutched in his teeth.
From the look on Swift’s face, she’d have been okay not knowing exactly what it was, but I was curious. I took the stick from him and examined it closely. The eye was attached to the end with an elaborate set of wires buried in the area of the former optic nerve. All of it was tied tightly around a power gem in the base. The entire construct was solid stone.
Limerence picked a piece of cardboard out of his pocket and held it up.
It said ‘Filtration spell now active. Can maintain for seven minutes. Shields should clear path to Supermax. Watch sides of hallway. Eyes are positioned in corners for best coverage.’
Limerence raised his shield, then his horn brightened and a thin glow formed around our bodies. My neckfur immediately stood on end and it felt like whole armies of fleas were marching around my ears. I couldn’t help a firm scratch and Swift almost toppled onto her side, giggling so violently that I felt certain we’d call down every daevas in the building on our heads if she weren’t under the comforting blanket of the silence spell.
The librarian held up another card: ‘Apologies. Tolerate or die.’
Swift recovered shortly, but her rear legs did a little jig every time she wasn’t walking. Taxi, as always, seemed completely unbothered.
We edged around the statue, moving into the tunnel he’d been running from. Whether by luck or sheer cleverness he’d been only a few meters from escape. There was no telling how he’d gotten that far, but unless he’d known about the trick bars up ahead, he would probably have been trapped one way or the other.
I studied his slim, handsome face, noting the fear, and underneath, a slight resignation.
We moved on.
In the next tunnel, we formed a tight diamond, shields held out and forward to keep a vanguard with full coverage of a cone in front of us. Every few seconds, I felt a slight pressure on the mirror that reminded me of a stiff breeze as another of the eye emplacements turned itself to stone.
The walls were slick with something green and slightly furry. Without warning, Swift grabbed my tail coat in her teeth, hauling me back. I stumbled and almost dropped my shield, but managed to hold onto it. She jabbed her foreleg at the darkness ahead.
Limerence squinted, then he went round eyed and took two or three steps back, scrambling for his front pocket, spilling more cards on the floor. Snatching up one labeled ‘#33’, he flashed it at me.
‘Something out there.'
I waved my leg at his horn and then my gun, but he shook his head, digging out another card.
‘Living.'
I grabbed Limerence’s glasses off his nose, popping them onto my own face. He blinked, then made to reach for them, but I pressed him back with one hoof on his chest. Raising my shield, I turned to the tunnel and stepped forward, peering just around the edge of the mirror with one eye.
With the glasses on, I could see what’d stopped my partner. I could also smell it; the faintest hint of something rotten. I looked down, worriedly, but my fur still glowed with the filtration spell. Time was counting down.
Towards the opposite end of the tunnel, something seemed to be growing from the walls. It reminded me of a furry carpet, with lumps and protrusions sticking out of it. The creature or plant or whatever it was stretched across the ceiling and back down the other wall. As I got a little closer, a protrusion popped up from the floor and I hastily yanked my head back behind the shield as something hit the front of it. Glancing down, I saw what looked like some kind of stinger or needle, leaking a green mist that curled around my hooves as though hunting for a way in.
I took a step or two back, then cast around on the ground. Finding a chunk of broken masonry, I chucked it down the hall.
The other end of the tunnel came to life in violent fashion. Dozens of those little arms exploded off the ground, peppering the entire hallway. I hopped backwards another meter to avoid the spray, raising my shield.
We’d found our neuro-toxin launchers.
Motion activated, living neuro-toxin launchers. The sick mind of Saussurea was, yet again, going to try to kill me.
Retreating to my companions, I gave Limerence back his glasses, then picked up one of the cards and made the motion of writing with a pencil. Lim floated one over to me and I quickly wrote a sentence, then held it up in front of Taxi.
It said ‘Got Party Poppers?’
Taxi grinned like a fox who’d been told she has the run of chicken coop full of crippled hens. Unslinging her P.E.A.C.E., she set her saddlebags down and rifled through them until she came up with a bandolier slung with a dozen bright colored shells. Opening the gun’s drum, she switched out the rounds as quickly as she could, then sealed it and reared back, grabbing the trigger in her teeth as she aimed it down the hallway. I reached out and gently put my hoof on the barrel, lowering her intended target a few inches.
I felt like I should put my hooftips in my ears, but there was nothing to hear. I’d been on the receiving end of a Party Popper during riot training in basic, but that was many, many years ago. One does forget just how vicious the tools of the policing trade can be when the goal is to keep an opponent alive. It tends to mean inflicting maximum pain and confusion without killing them outright. My abiding memory of being hit with a Party Popper was watching the floor coming at my face and wondering why I needed to sneeze.
The gun jumped and flashing light filled the tunnel, along with a concussive blast that reverberated through the stones underhoof, but made absolutely no sound. We ducked behind our shields as the far end of the tunnel went wild. Confetti burst in all directions along with eye-piercing fireworks that danced along the walls, spinning in circles and dancing through the air.
When the lights faded, we peered over our shields at the far end of the hall which was still weakly lit by a few burning embers.
A few tentacle-like arms were frozen in mid-air and the ground was littered with spent needles. Several were still trying desperately to throw their payloads at the sparkling lights, but there was nothing left to throw. Thick, green smoke billowed around the floor.
Taking a deep breath, I plowed forward. The toxin launchers didn’t even notice me as I carefully stepped over them. Whatever they used for senses would -- if the equine reaction was any indication -- be completely overwhelmed for minutes or hours.
My companions followed me through the tiny forest of twitching tentacles. Limerence paused just long enough to grab one of the stingers and pop it into a tiny glass jar, then we continued down the next tunnel.
****
Our luck lasted for five more tunnels.
With preparation, we’d managed to skirt things that had bested dragons and the most cunning criminal elements in Detrot history. Granted, we’d had to use half the Party Poppers we’d brought along and the tunnel was absolutely filled to brimming with a sickly, green mist; I’d had a moment of genuine worry when we came upon the corpse of a young dragon entirely blocking one part of the hall, but he’d been picked down to the bone.
In the room beyond him, however, we ran into our first heartseeker.
Taxi saw it first, and raised her hoof for everypony to stop.
Swift scooted close and mouthed, ‘What is it?’ at her, trying to pierce the fog filling the hall.
My driver quickly took the pencil from Lim’s pocket and wrote something on one of his flash cards, then held it up.
‘Count the shadows,’ it read.
I looked down at myself, glowing slightly in the darkness, then towards the other end of the corridor. Up ahead, there were four pipes running floor to ceiling, each casting its own shadow on the walls of the tunnel. Another came from a broken lighting emplacement laying smashed on the floor.
‘One, two, three...’ I silently spoke each number, then snatched for my trigger bit.
There were six shadows.
The sixth stood halfway down the hall. I tried to make out general shape of whatever was casting it, but the impression was too strange. It seem somewhere between a pony and a large insect of some kind. There were certainly more legs than a pony should ever have and something like an enormous tail waved in the air behind it, sweeping back and forth across the hallway as though searching for something.
Most importantly, it was right in our path. It wasn’t moving towards us yet, but I didn’t know if that was a good sign or not.
Limerence put his hoof on my shoulder for attention, then pointed at his horn. The light surrounding it was almost out and the toxic fog still choked the ground around us. He jerked his head sideways, and I noticed a thin cut through between two tunnels. We edged over to it very, very slowly, praying the creature was either facing the other direction or asleep. There was no way to know.
The space was barely wider than a pony.
Swift slipped in first, followed by Taxi. Limerence gave me a worried look, then flinched as his horn sputtered. The glow around us began to fade.
The daevas wasn’t moving, so I pushed into the little space with him and jotted a quick note on a flash card.
‘How long?'
He shook his head and shrugged, then pinched his eyes shut for a moment.
I went back to writing.
‘How far are we?’
Taxi pulled the blueprints out and pointed to a spot on them, then mouthed, ‘Not far.’
I nodded, then quickly wrote, ‘Can you keep the filter spell if you shut off the silence?’
Limerence thought for several seconds, biting his lower lip. Taking the pencil he wrote back, ‘A little longer.’
I looked back and forth between Taxi and Swift. ‘Be ready to shift,’ I said, hoping they could read lips well enough to get the gist of what I had in mind. Taxi bobbed her chin and Swift switched off Masamane’s safety.
Limerence took a deep breath, then his horn’s light faded to a dull glitter.
Sound crashed into my ears so violently that I moaned. My own heartbeat was like thunder in my ears. Breath was the rushing of waterfalls. There’s no comparison where real silence is concerned and there’s a reason it’s used as torture in some of the less civilized parts of the world.
I became quickly aware of another sound, back the way we’d come. It was a keening shriek, building in intensity until it began to reverberate in my very bones.
Something skittered on stone. I felt a breeze jostle my tail and a thick, wet breath blowing on my flanks.
“Move, move!” I shouted, giving Taxi a push with my muzzle. My companion’s squeezed through the narrow space and out the other side, looking both directions. I glanced back at the passage. The shadow was just outside, and I had the eerie sensation that it was studying me. It moved off to one side and another of those strange shrieks echoed down the hallways.
“Limerence, which way?!”
“Give me a moment! I need to recalculate!” Limerence yanked his map out and Swift held it for him.
Far off, there was a sound like a whole flock of screeching hawks howling out the chorus of some sort of war song. Fear crept up from the direction of my chest and I did my best to project calm thoughts I wasn’t really feeling.
“Calculate faster!” Taxi yelled, wrenching her cannon up into her hooves and leaning against the wall for support as she pointed it back down the hallway. “We don’t want to be in an enclosed space when I fire a Popper!”
Swift was hyperventilating, her wings spread for flight as she clutched her trigger bit between her teeth. The next shrill hunting cry sounded much, much closer than the last one. She backed towards the far end of the hall, her shield raised and eyes wide with fear.
Limerence smacked the blueprint so hard he put a hole in it with his toe. “Ha! There! Ahead! That way! There’s a passage to the left up ahead! Look for a broken valve!”
That was enough for me. I grabbed Swift, tossing her onto my back by her tail; short legs were not a positive evolutionary mechanic when you’re stuck underground and running for your life. She didn’t even have it in her to argue. I legged it in the direction Limerence indicated, my driver and the librarian close behind.
More of those terrifying cries shook the brickwork, seeming to come from all around us. My partner clenched her eyes shut, pressing her hooves over her ears.
“It’s alright, kid!” I called back. “We’re almost there!”
“Nothing about this is alright, sir!” she cried, her wings clutching my sides to keep her balanced.
I was about to agree when I saw, just down another hallway, the shattered remains of a valve wheel sticking out of the wall. I braked hard enough to almost throw her over my shoulders, then turned and charged down the side-passage. Swift swung off my back just as we reached the valve, raising her gun and grabbing her bit between her teeth. I winced as she fired a round back down the hall just as Taxi and Limerence plowed into her line of fire.
Something behind them screamed and tumbled, scratching at the tunnel floor as it tried to right itself.
Limerence’s horn was flickering as the last of the filtration spell started to fail. His coat was matted with sweat, but he still found the strength to grab the broken half of the valve, wrenching it around. I expected a loud groan of rusting metal, but the half wheel turned easily on a greased cog.
The wall the wheel was attached to crunched inwards and stopped after just a few inches. The space wasn’t anything like wide enough for us to fit through. He threw his shoulder against it, but the slight frame of the librarian wasn’t heavy enough.
Turning, I bucked it with both rear hooves and the door crashed open, tipping over a piece of furniture that’d been shoved in front.
A shadow was in the tunnel. It hissed and I got the barest impression of claws swiping at Taxi’s head. She ducked and leapt through the door, then turned and grabbed Limerence by the mane, hauling him through. Swift drew her wings in tight, hopping over the broken cabinet. My ears were still ringing from Masamane’s shot, but just as I could have sworn I felt the beast’s claws or tentacles or whatever it had closing around my ankle I tossed myself at the doorway, banging my head on the frame. I tumbled through, stumbling forward into a wall then crashing to the floor hard enough to make my ribs ache.
I heard the door slam shut and glanced up to see my driver, one back hoof planted on it, bracing herself against an upturned bookcase. The books were scattered across the floor.
Swift lay beside me, her wings spread open on the soft carpet while on her other side, Limerence held his darkened horn with both hooves. There were tears at the edges of his eyes that were just starting to run down his cheeks.
I stared at the shut door, imagining the creatures on the other side throwing themselves against it, but I couldn’t hear them. Hopefully that meant nopony had heard the gunshots, either.
The room we were in was barely more than a broom closet, with a bookcase full of technical manuals and a mop, but it seemed safe enough.
After holding the door shut for a minute or two just to make certain nothing was coming through, Taxi staggered over and collapsed against me, using my stomach to rest her head.
“Limerence... you okay?” I asked.
“I am... going to be, Detective. Nothing a cup of tea won’t fix, though I fear we may have to do without my silence or filtration spells.”
“S’fine. You couldn’t pay me to go back that way. Swift?”
“I’m...ugh, my fur smells like sewer and I don’t think I’ll feel clean for a month, but I’m alright.”
I glanced down at my driver’s head where she rested on my belly. “Taxi?”
“Heehee... whoo... Luna’s great and glorious plot. I could go for some whiskey right now…”
Edging around a little so I could see her face, I found her grinning.
I realized I was, too.
Then Swift let out a little snort. It developed, over a few seconds, into a giggle. Limerence’s eyes were shining as he wiped tears from his cheeks; even the ever-stoic and unflappable librarian was smiling. It was only moments before all four of us dissolved into rampant, helpless laughter; desperate, weak kneed, heartfelt laughter. In the back of my mind, I knew there was a possibility we might be heard, but even being found by cultists struck me as a nicer option than being torn apart by heartseekers.
Besides, unless you’ve been there, a breath away from death, with the demons baying for your blood, you can’t know what it’s like in the moments afterward. Often, the only thing left to you is to laugh. Laugh and laugh until all the terrible memories are tucked comfortably away in your subconscious for your therapist to dig out later. Laugh because you’re alive and damned be whatever vileness may still be coming.
We’d done the impossible and our night was only just beginning.
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oooh dear that was a close one. seriosuly though hardy, you kill a magical creature of that nature by breaking its magic. its like how a zombie is killed by healing magic. you are negating the magic that animates them. negate the magic tyhat makes an insibile monster invisible, and it iwll likely perish as that spell is what holds it together.........
that or you attack the shadow s it is possible THAT is its true form.
nifty chapter and glad they made it through. just gotta make sure no cultists figure them out. that and there is nothing demonic left in that place.
styill waiting for the tartarus retcon. hell even a statment that the common belief was that tartarus was a physical prison or something.
This just keeps getting better...
Good grief. What ELSE might be lurking around down there, ostensibly for 'security reasons?'
Molestia?
4499916 Luna has the whole of space. She could totally grind down a few asteroids to make enough concrete to fill in Tartarus.
-Chessie
Whoo!
4500332 well the sky likel is missing a few ALL of the stars cause, you know, infinite hell void and all......... celestia would have beaten her till she looked like nightmare moon again if she killed so many being. not to mention that kind of action would have let most of the evulz of tartarus escape.
magic is capable of a lot of thins. filling infinite hell voids with any substance is not one o dem. at least have it being a cover story or something. hell who knows, maybe tartarus has like a primary hub. else all Celestia would have had to do is open up a portal and push Cerberus through. can't fill a void wih cement but you can figure out where the portal is accessed, turn it off, and fill THATwith cement.
actuallyl that would make sense. with everything else either the portals open for a certain stretch of time, which would make the use of tartarus too difficult, or they have some portal crafter for it. deactivate the portal and make it too difficult to access the 'on switch' or sorts and it will do the job.
a) Great chapter. Good pacing, tension, monster designs, solutions.
b) You could do to mix it up a little; Supermax is almost exactly the School so far. Tight corridors, swarming with danger, Taxi and her PEACE Cannon, pipes... Hopefully Supermax will distance itself from the School in the next few chapters, because right now it feels like Act 2 is ending as "Act 1, but worse."
Also, I "made" (read: found) some daeva fanart for you:
dev.w3.org/2007/mobileok-ref/test/data/ROOT/GraphicsForSpacingTest/1/largeTransparent.gif
4500753 Yeah, I know. It shall. This is a different beast.
It's one of the problems with writing a serial that takes place in a city. There aren't a whole lot of differing options for where to set it.
-Chessie
Calling it now: they're gonna end up having to use Plan B to get out.
4501083 Well duh...you don't load a Chekov's gun like *that* and leave it unfired.
-Chessie
4501089
Exactly.
A great chapter! Personally I can't wait to see how these plans go entirely ass over elbows.
And until I see the next chapter for any more clues, I'll keep my newest hairbrained plot thoughts to myself.
Great chapter! I really liked the killer fungus
The heartseekers, their entire lore and what lovecraftian bits we can glimpse of their true nature, are also really cool.
A good but risky in the long run policy.
Given the context, I suspect Hardy means to say "I mean"
4500332
Alternately... One does not neccessarily need to fill the hole completely, merely plug the opening.
Racist (or Tribe-ist, I guess) crossbow is a Walking (or Trotting) Dead reference, isn't it?
No apostrophe. (And holy crap, I've been so into it right up until this point. Wow.
Nice suspense. Totally coming back to this next time I run a dungeon crawl.)
What's the saying? Do three impossible things before breakfast? Sounds like they're well on their way.
Delicious. Glorious. And they aren't even "properly" inside yet!
Now I know what to get Swift as a present, a minigun!
MFW when I saw that Starlight updated:
derpicdn.net/img/view/2012/7/22/52634.gif
So "shield" renames itself to... "SHIELD"?
SHIELD technicians were stymied as they had been experimenting with barrier harmonics that would exclude small insects. To Mrs. Trotter's mortification, a SHIELD investigation reported to the Board of Enquiry and to the Detrot papers the barrier was reacting to the fleas Mrs/ Trotter contracted from a wild hen party she recently attended in Los Pegasus. The red-mast tabloid press wasted no time speculating in lurid detail all sorts of debauched fantasies. Mrs. Trotter was unavailable to reporters for comment. Her house was found empty and a bespectacled,moustachioed pony claiming to be Mrs. Trotter's cousin said she had just recently moved to Hollow Shades.
Hardy missed a golden opportunity here.
"Take it from me Taxi. I know from experience hauling something that massive is fatiguing on your lower back and quads if you are not used to the weight. If you know what I mean."
Please tell me that zebra was named "Edgar Raven".
Happy Thoughts Lim! Positive thoughts!
"Very well. We are positively going to die screaming while an unseeable demon claws our organs out."
Background music for the sewers: House of Leaves by Kevin MacLeod
4501083
I agree. Hardy has pretty much guaranteed that they will use plan B now.
4500753
Ha. Ha. Ha.
(Actually I think that a remarkable likeness of a daeva. You really captured its raw, feral ferocity. Quite a testament to your skills as an artist.
)
Cheeky!
perhaps it would have been a good idea for lim to get some sort of magic boosting artifact to preserve the spells for longer
4503539 Secret? You want to run a campaign, think of something that scares the pants off of you and then make your players do that.
I hate invisible things, sudden loud noises in quiet places, dark and empty buildings, anything potentially poisonous, anything having to do with suffocation, bullies, all-powerful bureaucracies, hideous uncontrolled deformities/mutations of the body, being covered in bugs, and being chased.
Starlight has been...distressing...to write in some ways. In others, it's been a fucking ride.
-Chessie
An interesting point to finish this on. And from the start to end of reading. Its unique.
Im almost expecting you to three part this. You've left a clear point of contention in the three, which is either the alicorns, or the real masterminds of it. Or simply nothing directly said yet.
For the rest, the issue of boiled as a ghost in the system is a great impetus of change. You've laid plenty of good reasons why he is a ghost in the system. And more as the story has progressed. I'm still partial to the nature of justice is blind, as the saying goes. If you judge on what is, there is nothing emotional to pick up on correct? The little hiccups on what scrying does. He is not doing this out of right and wrong, but something more is he not? A 'crusader' as its been dubbed. He was worked with the good, with the bad, and even those unaligned in the cosmic scheme of things. His war, his journey.
You've tossed a bit of swift's change to the side after the first bit, and given its alluding in the more recent aspects. I still view to the third part for this reason, as you've addressed one of the chimeric heads in the room, as it were. The PACT itself has likely been a recruiting ground for this as a long while, in celestia's shadow as this place was, or luna's own, respectively.
That you have the missing weapons, and also made note to the effective range, it would be pretty easy to get a happy fellow with those robes to up and doing this with a little adjustment. And what you've clearly at least in part been building this 2nd finale. The nature of what they will find, and hard boiled having to make a choice that defines the city. The first, cost him his life, this will cost him a friend, or something even more dear to him. I'd almost bet on it. You've dropped little things alluding.
Though one thing i've noted, for all his purview, you've said very little on the gun he carries itself. I'd suspect a chekov's gun or variant lethal brick joke, but time will show it. As you've shown more than plenty of the rest of the cast, and their weaponized assortment of choice.
Still, for all the speculation, and guesswork. You have written something very well done in this field. The characters work, and the nature of interaction comes across very strongly, good and bad. the pace works as not to fast, or to slow as the way of things go. The only complaint I have, is oddly enough in the names of swift and sweet in places, but it is otherwise a minor quirk of dislike.
I hope you have a good day, and well assuaged your muse remains.
4504701 I promise I will tie all the loose ends. We've already started on that, but the story is so massive and so obtuse that when one loose end is tied, it appears to open up ten questions. I WILL say that it is *not* opening new questions, mostly. It is just suggesting directions for questions that've already been asked.
-Chessie
4505249 Given that you have as the story has progressed, it is no worry, and if my words seemed to imply otherwise. It was hardly my intentions, but rather, more a fun enjoyment at what you had placed down, and happy to see that such a lengthy little story has been such a delight to read.
4505253 I'm actually surprised that the length hasn't detracted from people's enjoyment of it. I knew it was going to be a monster at the outset, but just how big didn't even enter my mind. Kasen and I committed to 'goofy little fanfic'.
Epic adventure didn't even enter into our calculations until two or three months after we'd started, and even then, it didn't get DEMENTED until...well, until just before Cosmo.
I will say, neither Kasen nor I knows precisely how this will end. Hardy could be dead. So could Swift, Limerence, or Taxi. It's not 'Game of Thrones' level killing off main characters, but we've always left open the possibility. They've got to get their own crazy asses out of these situations. I'm not helping.
-Chessie
4505685 That was more half the fun, and interest for me. I enjoy bigger works, because you can get so much more done with the right pacing, and work so much more on the interactions between place and character than most aim for. I've many works in my enjoyment that are 600k+ ones that are a blast because of the above. A good few are 300-500k, but its enjoyable to sit and read something like to pass time on my side. Overall, a good completed work for me is 200k+ in word count, because the author, depending on style and approach, can get anything they need done, at the pace they want, with clear and fun routes without skimping and cutting out excess stuff for the sake of saving words.
4504109
A golden opportunity to have his face broken.
4505685
4505783
+1
This. Very much this.
I certainly agree with Strat. The long length of this story really helps build the interesting universe and fleshes out the characters. I certainly have had a lot of fun reading (and commenting) all the chapters thus far.
The story certainly has had some dark parts in it, but you and Kasen have skilfully kept plenty of levity to prevent the story from descending into Linkin Park levels of grim depression.
4508890 In general, length gives you time. On the downside, length can also give you a cop out ending because you didn't wrap up things, or it went in a different direction and you just wanted done with it. (AKA Background Pony.) But as a general principle, it lets you do what is right and end it on that same note. (Most of my longer ones are Fo:E stories, but many aren't) And being able to end with a good windfall behind you, gives you a sense of closure you enjoy. To know its "Done" and "Finished" in no uncertain terms.
But then again, the best of shorter stories, in the right hands can do the same. It just takes a far more deft hand in doing so. There is so much more balanced, and far too easy to lose bits that keep folks hooked.
But I fully agree to your statement. Its a Noir setting, and for all the danger, it never loses that feel.
A job for the stare master.
Upon looking up what Ancile means from wikipedia;
Neat.
XD
I suppose he could always pretend he had his own ancestors. :p
Charisma check failure from Hardy. Again, I want to stress that capital A in again. That guy could learn a thing or two from a few other characters we have met in the past.
Limerance the MVP fo sho in this segment.
All the action was intense and engaging, nothing like a good old fashioned sewer crawl to start off the fireworks.
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I'm hoping they go through plans C-Y before this little jaunt ends.
I'm afraid to think about what they will face inside.
I imagine Hardy and Swift have another mishap with the phone:
I had sent Swift off to the payphone to call some cleaners to haul off Goofball's mess. Gale tried to warn me about something (ambulance and Diamond Dog mine?), but I ignored it. Shortly thereafter, the shouting, and barking, and gunshots began.
I approached the bunker door with concern, only to have it thrown violently open in my face by a panicking Jambalaya and a furious Wisteria. Jambalaya fled into one of the spare rooms while Wisteria threw me up against the wall as she delivered me an impressive 7 minute stream of invective that would make a drill-sergeant blush. Her pidgin creole made it difficult to understand the entire message (the spittle flying out of her mouth certainly did not help things either) but I was able to make out "Mafia stompahs", "cleaning ponies", and an obscene, anatomically impossible (unless Wisteria made good on her promise to break my spine and ribs) suggestion involving myself, a banana, and princess Celestia's horn and wings.
I finally mollified her by repeatedly saying "Yes yes I understand you are upset. I will take care of everything. No it will not happen again". I left her fuming in the bunker, stepped outside, and trotted down the alley towards the commotion. There was Goofball snarling and growling at some huddled shapes at the end of the alley, and Swift trying to swat him away with a rolled up newspaper. It reminded me of a butterfly trying to spank a granite cliff.
"GOOFBALL! SIT!" I bellowed in my best, commanding policepony voice. I added the fail-safe Essey command phrase from DPD for good measure "PICKELBARREL KUMQUAT!"
Goofball and Swift both immediately sat down.
Resisting the urge to facehoof, I edged around Goofball to get a better look at the interlopers he had corralled in the alley. There was a group of Bitalian Mafia ponies with hoof-mounted luparas and body bags, a group of Stalliongradi special agents with umbrellas and body bags, some Griffons in dark suits and mirrored shades with silenced pistols and body bags, and a slim, frightened Neighponese maid with stiletto blade horseshoes—and a body bag. Every firearm was clicking on empty chambers, every eye wide with terror, and every suit and article of clothing in dire need of some dry cleaning.
"Officer Cuddles, what happened here?"
"I'm sorry sir!", she cried, ears folded back. "I didn't mean to start a war! I just did as you said and called the number for some cleaning ponies from the phone book!"
"From the phone book?!"
Her ears pressed tighter into her skull from my outburst. "Uh huh. I asked the operator for some cleaner ponies, some garbage ponies, and a maid cleaning service. For the Nest and all"
"You asked for cleaners without knowing what they were? Did they not teach you anything about operational euphemisms in PACT?!"
"N-n-o-o. I'm sorry sir! I'm sorry! They didn't tell me any thing!" Swift's eyes began to tear up and her lower lip began to tremble. If her ears pressed any more tightly against her head, we would need to solicit Stitch and his scalpels to remove them.
Celestia preserve me.
I massaged the bridge of my muzzle with my hoof, trying to rub all the frustration away. Gale tried to comfort me by offering me a cherry cream soda (my favourite!) like my brother did so many years ago on that hot summer day when I was last in line to the soda cart because I was too slow because I could not breathe properly, and they were all sold out, but Jingle gave me his soda, and we shared it together in the shade of a tree, and Jingle helped carry me home...
Not helping there Gale! Focus, Hardy. Focus.
"Officer Swift, how about you take Goofball around the block one or three times and get him some exercise?"
"Yes sir!"
Swift brightened up and flew off down the street with Goofball in tow.
I turned my attention back to the "cleaners" Swift had inadvertently hired. They were all to a pony staring sheepishly at the ground, tracing little circles in the asphalt with their forehooves.
"As for the rest of you, here are your options: you can either act like the cleaners you are posing as and use your body bags to clean up that big pile of Goofball's business on the street corner behind me, or Goofball can have another breakfast and leave you behind in a little pile for the next set of cleaners to clean up. What will it be?"
30 minutes later, 17 very grumpy and very smelly assassins walked dejectedly out of Aroyo territory with several squishy body bags and orders to deliver the contents therein to the offices of Armature, Umbra, and Animus.
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You're now on a mission to sneak into prison
The most horrible one built by ponies
A black project slough outside of the law
To house dragons and all of their cronies
Dread Cerberus now bounds through the wide prison grounds
And unicorn sentries up in towers
With bright spotlights below there is nowhere to go
While the magical wards drain your powers
Spiked manacles displayed and iron chains arrayed
Like a scene from a Hieronymus hell
And deeper you will find oubliettes for the mind
A magic brainwashing mind control spell.
Armoured guards out on beat with black jack-booted feet
Watching all with their magical viewers
And patrols on the stairs, but then nothing compares
To what's lurking below in the sewers...
There's a fresh new horror
Around every corner
The bare passage belies
Hidden basilisk eyes
Fungus cov'ring the floor
Shooting poisonous spores
Unseen demons that lurk
In the thick heavy murk
And they're tracking your heart
And they'll tear you apart
Then your unicorn fails
To maintain the stealth spells
They are tracking your trails
Very hot on your tails
And they give out a roar
As you race for the door
And you're all out of breath
From your brush with death...
You block the passage and tremble all over;
But the danger has passed, and you're all safe at last!
The chase has been long, ditto, ditto my song,
And thank goodness they're both of them over!
Gilbert and Sullivan make everything 20% cooler.
4519347 So much win
See, the trick here is that Hardy needs to tell his heart to "beat without rythym", if you catch my drift. What's a little cardiac arrest, compared to very messy disassemby by invisible monsters?
4525139 Oooh! Oooh! Oooh! New reader! I am so glad to have you.
-Chessie
4525437
I assume this is what you have in mind?
-Chessie
4526075
Heh. Well, we're both referencing the same thing...
soundonsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/dune-illustrated.gif
...Though I must admit, it was the improvised thumpers that got my mind thinking along those lines.
4527384 I adore Dune, but Fatboy Slim is more awesome.
-Chessie
4526075
Heh heh heh.
I cannot wait to see Gale break into dance and drag Hardy along the first time he hears one of Stitch's musical numbers. Swift can join in as well. Taxi and Lim watch all deadpan.
4527384
I can see Vinyl working as a daeva security consultant at M6 with her Bass Cannon LRAD.
derpicdn.net/img/2013/7/10/369367/medium.jpg
Forget about luring them! 200Hz bass drop at 180dB will
probablypound everthing in those sewers into goo.4528673
Fatboy certainly sounds interesting. I will have to check out more of his(?) work. I think I am going to have to walk into the production floor at work to that tune now.
4529344 I do guarantee you've probably heard a fair chunk of it down through the years. He's a major part of popular culture.
As to Gale taking over and pulling the strings, it's entirely possible he might at some point. He and Hardy have a good thing going, but who knows how long that might last?
Incidentally, I adore electro-swing. If you find more, feel free to hit me with it.
Kasen and I are working on the next chapter for release ASAP, but he's a mess and I'm a mess.
I am persistently reminded that this story must mix comedy with darkness for maximum effect. The next segment I'm working on seems to ride that train pretty hard. A laugh through punctured lungs, as it were. I truly can't wait for your assessment!
-Chessie
4529402
It will certainly be interesting to see what you and Kasen do with Gale. Coincidentally, did Jingle/Stitch/Taxi ever manage to disable Gale's energy/love syphon thingamungie? If not, I imagine whomever/whatever is at the other end is probably sharing a ginormous tub of popcorn with Queenie as they watch the train-wreck drama thriller that is Hardy's life.
I will say! Mind controlling Lunar cults and wartime incarceration and research centre all coming together like an unholy union of Jonestown with Unit 731. What could possibly go wrong?
I imagine Lim with his knives and stealth spell will have ample opportunity to creep up on any ponies in Tartarus and interrogate them with his black gallows humour like Sam Fisher
As grim and foreboding as it appears, I am certainly looking forward to it.
For the delectation of your earballs:
Anything by Caravan Palace
Anything by Parov Stelar
Biboulakis & Nina Zeitlin - If Only Alarms Didn't Ring
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy - Jumpin' Jack
Cissie Redgwick - Gimme That Swing
Jamie Berry - Sweet Rascal
Riva Starr - I Was Drunk (Instrumental Mix)
Swingrowers - Senza Ciatu
Tape Five - Geraldine's Routine
Youtube has a nice selection here, here and here.
4535828 Glad to have you back! I know Starlight tends to 'leap forward' and leave people behind a bit, but it's gonna go on for a long time. I do promise to tie up all ze loose ends.
-Chessie
I was sitting here hyping myself up to read chapter 3 when I started reading the chapter titles...
And I can't help but see that a lot (if not all) are ether playing off of a song, a movie line, or an old saying...
I have a feeling this story, the author, and myself are going to get along rather nicely.
And also, I'm going to see if I can pick out what the title is from as I go along.
A little extra game never hurt anybody.
(some may be wrong as they could cover a wide range of things.)
Ch 1: Welcome To Detrot - Welcome to Rapture(?)
8tracks.imgix.net/i/001/489/600/fanmix_cover-615.png?q=65&sharp=15&vib=10&fm=jpg&fit=crop&w=521&h=521
Ch 2: Your Princess is in Another Castle - That's gotta be Mario
Ch 3: Griffin the Third Degree - The only thing I can come up with is that "third degree" means "interrogation" in a not so good way.
Feel free to tell me if I'm right on any along the way or just ignore me and my silliness.
4540159 No, you're right. They're pretty much all references to various things. Not every one, but most.
Ch 1: Welcome To Detrot - Welcome to Rapture -You got that one pretty much spot on.
Ch 2: Your Princess is in Another Castle -Well, yeah.
Ch 3: Griffin The Third Degree- It's a play on 'giving the third degree', which is a nasty form of interrogation, yes. Because, Sykes. I haven't had him in the story for awhile. Will be fixing that soon!
-Chessie
Wow ... I just finished the first act and I've got to say, you have me hooked on this.
)
I really love the story thus far and I'm really looking forward to seeing the characters explored a bit more in the chapters I still got to catch up (especially taxi
Great story, keep it up, have .... 5 blushing twilis out of ... 5 ?
Ch 4: Daisy, Daisy, Give Me Your Answer, Do -Well that ones not too hard.
)
(I'm now going to have that song stuck in my head so thanks for that.
I'm half crazy all for the love of you~
Hal! get this song out of my head!
I can help with that Dave.
Wait n-
I was re-reading this, on a long night, (while watching the various four job fiesta's going about) and noted that on one chapter, when hard boiled met the sister to talk about the book. A small something stopped him from moving, a bit of magic that was really easy to simply skimp over. But it never mentioned leaving or just vanishing, it was right as she asked him, "Would you kill them?" in a slightly out of body tone.
Is there much you can say on that?
4559043 Eeeyup. That'd be it. It's one of my favourite songs.
-Chessie