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Prologue/Pilot Episode.2,504 words
Meeting Hoity and taking a joy ride.1,091 words
Fast cars and Blood Thirsty Angry Mobs4,554 words
The Guild (Part 1)3,838 words

The Guild (Part 1)

A/N: Sorry, about the wait, but this next update will come a lot sooner.

The Guild: Part 1

It had been about a week since the Fleetwood incident and Spike along with Applebloom and Hoity were in the kitchen of the mansion. Spike was and Hoity had gotten into it again when the grey stallion refused to make Spike breakfast.

"I am not the butler, you cold-blooded hooligan and further more I sh--" Hoity was interrupted by Applebloom as she gestured toward the kitchen counter TV as it aired the news.

"Hello and welcome back to The Canterlot News Network, in big breaking news Haywaii police found the remains of wealthy auto dealership owner Fleetwood Brougham washed ashore on Takei beach. Here with us in the field is Glitchy Hooves."

The screen picked up video feed of the cycloptic earth pony as he stood on a beach. "Thank you Gale. Yes, it is confirmed that the body of Fleetwood Brougham as been found on this very beach. What is important to know is that the stallion in question was one of the more wealthy residents of the island. The police and forensics are saying that it most likely a boating accident. We do have police commissioner Quan here for a statement."

The camera colt then zoomed into the commissioner as he walked into frame. "I can assure the fine folks of Haywaii that this "incident" was most likely result of a boating accident, we are looking into the local marinas for questioning." He said but knew that a car recovered from the sea, large chunks of mane and a few limbs did not mean a body was found...

As Quan left the camera panned back and refocused back on Glitchy. "The commissioner and the forensics have said that they will prepare a formal statement later this afternoon. Back to you Gale."

"Thank you, Glitchy. We have received word from Eldorado Brougham the head of Brougham Autos and owner of The Brougham Casino in order to address the passing of his son and alleviate fears from the countless creatures employed by the Brougham name. In a brief interview with our own Buzz Newsworthy he stated that there will be restructuring of the management, but there will be no lay-offs."

Spike and Bloom knew the truth and wouldn't be surprised if there was a mass singing of "Ding Dong The Witch is Dead" and parties everywhere.

Little did they know how right they actually were as moments after that interview with Glitchy Hooves took place, every city from the coast all the way to downtown erupted in a carnival style celebration. There were bead thrown and a makeshift floats and free liquor.

At the airport a certain diamond dog named Chugs couldn't be more confused as he thought it was some kind of island holiday. The Rottweiler looking bipedal dog-man walked through Haywaii International looking at all the drunk and happy folk.

'When in Roam, I guess?' He said to himself while looking for his ride as lifted his aviator shades weaving through the crowded area, lucky that he was about two feet taller than the equine residents.

After about half an hour of waiting, he finally saw a familiar looking stallion. It was his brother-in-law Wilcox.

"Ay, bro what took you so long?"

"Traffic was a pain in the flank, getting here." Wilcox gestured to his 1958 Plymouth Fury illegally parked in the white zone.

The two loaded Chugs' luggage into the back of the car. They got in and made there way down the road. "I still see you got her." The diamond dog referenced Will’s car that was still a work in progress.

"Yeah, I do, but parts aren't easy to find and getting things re-chromed cost a small fortune. I will say this..." while at a stop light, he revved the engine. "She's worth it."

The two continued to make small talk as they drove through Downtown Reinalolu and finally Chugs' curiosity finally got the better of him as he noticed all the celebrating creatures everything from minotaur cows flashing from balconies, and stallion stumbling around drunk to a few police officers break dancing on the street corner. "Okay, I gotta ask what's with all the celebrations and insanity? It looks like the bastard love child of Marti Gras and Carnival. Is it a local holiday?"

"Enope, my old boss just died recently."

Chugs' hadn't been this confused since that time in college when Spike and Tookie got him drunk, dressed him up in clown makeup and left him outside the offices of Cat Fancy magazine. "Oookay. I'm not even gonna ask."

About 15 Minutes Later

The two arrived at a giant beach side manor with a K5 Blazer and Ferrari 208 parked out front.

"Um...what are we doing here?"

"I thought, you'd like to see a familiar face." Wilcox buzzed the intercom stating that he needed to see the detective. Once they were let in, they parked near the back of the mansion.

They walked toward two palm trees where a certain dragon mumbled in his sleep. "Stupid pompous fa--" He was interrupted when he heard the chatter of two familiar sounding voices. Spike stumbled out of the hammock he was in and noticed it was Wilcox and...

"Chugs!!!" Spike yelled out as the diamond dog and the dragon engaged in an elaborate multi-part handshake.

"Dude, what brings you out here?"

"It's spring-break for the high school I teach at and instead of being responsible and grading papers and creating lesson plans, I decided to visit family instead. I didn't even know you were down here. What's with the nice set up?"

"The short version is that I got hired by the pony of pop to be a Private Investigator a--" Suddenly from out of a nearby palm tree fell a certain light yellow mare whom landed on her hooves.

"…and his lovely assistant Applebloom." She said as she struck a pose.

Chugs once again had the look of complete and utter confusion plastered on his face.

Wilox broke the awkward silence. "Anyway, Spike I stopped by for another reason."

"What could be better than seeing an old friend?"

"I got it." The mechanic shot Spike a look that said, "You know what I'm talkin' about."

The drake squeed in a manner befitting a young filly. "Show me!!!" Spike ran towards Will’s Fury parked out front while the other three rushed to keep him from taking off without him.

Soon the four of them were in the capital city of Mai Tai Bay at Will’s private garage. As they approached the large steel door of the building, the aforementioned stallion got his keys out, unlocked a set of locks and raised the door.

"Here's she is Spike." What stood before them was a 1970 Plymouth Cuda and it looked like it had seen better days; The vinyl top was cracked, the upholstery was shredded, the tires were all flat and to top it off it looked like it had been in a demolition derby.

Spike looked at the salvaged auto with melancholy expression. "Errr...."

The mechanic grabbed an oxy-acetylene torch, and his welding goggles. "I can fix it!" He yelled to the distraught dragon relieving him of some of his fears as if there was anyone who knew Mopar inside and out, it was Wilcox.

Applebloom was about to ask Will if he needed any help, as she was adept at fixing damn near anything; However she never go the words out because just as she trotted towards him the ground shook violently.

KABOOM

Two blocks away and without warning a piece of city hall came down in a large explosion shaking the entire bay area sending concrete, glass and into the streets and sending pedestrians and nearby motorist in a frenzy as they tried to escape the falling debris.

In the garage the two ponies, dragon and diamond dog were shaken up.

"You guys stay here stay here."

"Ah'm comin' with ya Spike." Applebloom said defiantly while Chugs and Will ducked for cover under the tow truck parked in the back praying to each others gods to save them and vice versa.

The drake and the mare rushed outside. Spike unholstered his gun in the fear that the loud explosion they heard wasn't an accident and there was trouble.

When the two reached their destination the streets were covered in dust, creatures were fleeing the area while cars and trucks crashed into each other from the dust and panic created only a few minutes ago.

The city hall was looked liked it was going to give away any second as emergency vehicles piles into the area with their sirens creating a cacophony deafening sounds. The drake put his weapon away as his main concern became the safety of anyone trapped in the increasingly unstable municipal building.

The pair skidded to a halt as they saw an earth pony pair trapped in a flipped over and mangled Jetta. "Ah'll get them out, ya got get them ponies in that there building." Applebloom bucked the hatch back door off its hinges. 'Years of apple buckin'.' That would haven't been her reply if the situation wasn't dire.

Spike slid over car hoods, and as the dust from the still falling debris kept coming he ripped his floral print button down shirt off and used it as a face mask leaving only the white undershirt.

When he finally reached the building he could see how bad everything truly was as bodies, broken glass, concrete rubble had smashed the the front desk area and small fires littered the lobby.

He climbed the stairs to the second and top floor of the once elegant art deco city hall. After going room by room and making a clean sweep of entire area, Spike found the group of survivors that he and Applebloom had seen from the ground whom were hold up in a small corner office. There were five of them and quite frankly looked like hell with a mixture of dirty, dust, tattered suits, blouses, disheveled manes. One of the them, a mare who could be older than her early forties appeared to have a broken foreleg but had used a some kind of ripped clothe as a makeshift sling.

"I'm here to get you out of this. Can you move?" He said as he pointed to the previously mentioned injured pony only shook her head 'no' before descending in to a coughing fit.

"Okay, I checked and the rear set of stairs are still relatively stable."

"What*cough* about...the firetrucks?" An ash grey stallion commented as Spike told them that they'd have to risk the stairs and falling chunks of building as they'd have to cross the lobby.

"There's too much interference." Spike recalled the insane amount of cars blocking the entrance to the city hall. "We need to get going and you..." He pointed to the broken mare. "...I'm gonna half to carry you, ma'am." Without protest he carried the middle-aged pony bridle style as the group made its way down the creaking hallway that moaned under the stress of today's events as well as the weight of five ponies and a dragon.

They rushed down the stairs safely only freaking out as the railing gave way and crashed to the bottom of the stair-well. Once the group had made it to the lobby, all but Spike had let out a collective gasp as they discovered the dead bodies of visitors, fellow employees and the security guards.

The six of them were almost out of the building, but without warning the chandelier that hung towards the security station broke free and came hurdling towards them. Spike made a tough call as he threw the mare towards her companion and took the full force of the heavy lighting fixture knowing his dragon hide could take that kind of punishment.

The rest of the looked in awe as sure enough their dragon savior got back up in his shredded, stained, shirt and equally grungy jeans.

He walked back towards the mare he had thrown to safety and picked her up once more as she winced in pain. Sadly, the chandelier was the least of their worries as they picked up a high pitched whistling sound that could only mean more trouble.

"Get out of here!!!" There was no time to do this by the books because just as they clambered out of the gaping hole in the wall The were met by another...

KAAABOOOM

Followed by large fire ball caused the rupturing of an underground gas line. Spike rushed to get the survivors to safety as that aforementioned fireball followed them burning and singing his clothes. It was this delayed detonation thta brought the government building down and severely damaging the adjacent parking garage and office buildings.

Once the smoke settled thanks to help from nearby pegasi and griffons all there was left was a pile of twisted concrete and steel. The dragon looked like he had just been through hell, but Spike was lucky to save those few survivors as he guided them to the flashing lights of the nearest ambulance. He looked over his shoulder and back towards the the demolished city hall, he scratched his chin and noted that there was some kind of organization to this madness.

There must have been about twenty or so cop cars at the scene of the inciddent.

Just as those same officers were about to radio headquarters for a damage report, all the sirens and lights of their cruisers as well as the those from the various other rescue vehicles flickered off and it was replaced with an errie high pitched static. Little did the know that this was happening across the entire island and to all forms of media.

A deep booming voice came on over the radios and a cloaked figured appeared on the screen of every television set. "We know you weren't in your office today Madam Mayor or should I just say Spitfire for old times sake? We are the Guild of the Purple Balloon and this was just a taste of what is soon to come. In approximately five hours I will teleport instructions to you and until then have a super fantastic day." The cloaked figured giggled as the radios and televisions resumed their regular communications and programs.

Meanwhile Mayor Spitfire whom after she retired from the Wonderbolts had gone into politics was visiting a local elementary school when one of her aids walked into the room and informed her of what had just happened and with that she excused herself.

"I'm sorry kids, but something urgent has come up and I'm afraid I'll have to cut this visit short. Remember to stay radical, do your homework and eat your alfalfa." She said with a fake smile knowing what would happen if she caused a panic. She and her aid left the room and got in her limoscine parked in the front of the school.

The long car peeled out of the drive way towards the police station.

Twenty minutes later

After arriving at the station and flying to the roof access to avoid most of the reporters Spitfire made it inside and rushed past the the chaotic interior of cops frantically answering phones and paper flying every which way as she made it to Quan's office.

"Mayor Spitfire, could I offer you some coffee before I show you what we have?"

"Let's cut to the chase." She said curtly.

Quan composed himself. "As you know there was a major incident earlier today. City hall has been destroyed, half the city's firefighters are working to contain the blaze and roughly forty-seven are dead with sixteen in critical condition. That's just the bulk of it."

The mayor was visibly shaken up. "Do we have any leads?"

"Yes, shortly after the explosions all communications were breached as a group called the Guild of the Purple Balloon claimed responsibility for the attack. Here is recording of their message."

Quan got up and put a VHS into a VCR in the small television set at the corner of his office and pushed play. They listened to the message. When it was over Spitfire looked like she had seen a ghost.

"C-can you tell me what you know about them?"

Quan waved his hoof dismissively and pulled out a manila envelope and emptied its contents on to his desk. "Not much, other than they have never done anything this big and that they're a mercenary group comprised mostly from disgruntled ex-royal guards. Their leader a massive white stallion who goes by the name: Snowflake and is the shadiest member of the entire group. There are no records of him even existing before five years ago."

The yellow pegasus just stood there silently. There was no mistake over whom the 'stallion' really was in her mind. The giggle at the end of the message, the mane and coat colors and seemingly person vendetta...

(Flashback Seven Years Ago)

Spitfire, Soarin, Doc and Surprise comprised the Alpha-team of the Wonderbolts. The four of them were in a drug processing plant. What had been a routine intelligence gathering mission had been botched as members of the Chupacabra Drug Cartel were closing in on the three remaining Wonderbolts as it was revealed that Doc had sold them out. They were pinned down in a refueling depot and sustaining heavy injury. Spitfire had taken heavy shrapnel to her side. Soarin's wings were pretty tore up, Surprise was the most damaged of the three and had to resort to using surgical tape from the saddle bags Doc left behind to hold her insides together. The traitor opened fire on the group and tagged the white pegasus causing her to fall to the ground and her breath to come out shallow.

When all hope seemed lost the Equestrian Royal Marines flew in for extraction. They laid down suppressive fire and were carrying the two to the chopper.

One of the heavily armored unicorn marines turned to Spitfire. "Any other survivors?!" He yelled out over the roar of the engine.

The yellow and orange mare looked at her no longer moving comrade and a tear formed in her eye. "We're all that's left of Alpha-team, move out."

Another marine whom looked to be medic looked at the bloody white pegasus and called out an order. "Tag her and bag her."

A marine got out of the gunship to recover Surprise's body. However, fate has a way of sucker punching you when you least expect it, just as the soldier was about to run in and grab the mare, the static from the helicopter blades ignited a the jet fuel that had covered the ground during the massive shoot out and sent a large fire trail towards Surprise whom tried to crawl out of the flames and cried out in a barely audible voice. "Do~on't...leave...me..."

Spitfire saw this from the window of the chopper. She was about to give the orders to go back for her friend, but it was too late as the entire complex went up in a fiery explosion.

Days later, recovery teams couldn't find any trace of the white and blonde pegasus amongst the wreckage. A funeral was held for Surprise in the following weeks. The wonderbolts and her family from Ponyville and Rockston attended the service. Her tombstone read:

Here Lies
Surprise Antonette Pie
Friend, Patriot, Cousin and Daughter
K.I.A.
"If you ain't laughing you ain't living."

Shortly after that, Doc was found dead in a rundown little motel south of the border and given a Coltlumbian necktie. A few weeks later the last of Alpha-team disbanded and went their separate ways. Soarin moved to Ponyville to be closer to his wife and two boys on the farm. Spitfire on the other hoof wanted to travel to the furthest point in Equestria which just happened to Haywaii.

(End of Flashback)

"Mayor? Mayor Spitfire? Spitfire!!!"

The pegasus wiped a tear from her eye. "Sorry, It's just I think I may know who this Snowflake character is, but there's a problem that pony died years ago."

As if on cue the radios and television sets of the station went to static as they had before the last mysterious message. A white pegasus stallion with blonde mane appeared in front of the camera. "Hiya, You've probably figure out who I am Spitty." The deep voice of the stallion reverberated with absolute venom in his tone. "It doesn't matter. We're here to liberate the world from corruption. The same corruption that allows friends to leave you to die in a burning processing plant, I'm not bitter, nope, I'm happy...always happy." His tone changed from serious to angry to upbeat rapidly. "This is simple, in an undisclosed location I have a number of ICBM's and magic seeking missiles. If anyone leaves the island...boom. Our demands are the release of every military detainee from the dungeon in Canterlot and the following political enemies from the Griffin Empire and Dragonia. City hall was just an example, do not test us. Now you guys have super special day." The video feed ended and a list of names printed out on every fax machine in the station.

The station broke into complete chaos and the airport that only a few hours ago was the site of a massive party was now a mess of panicking creatures.

In a fortress off the coast of the mainland a room was filled with a dozen or so heavily armed mercs and a television camera set up.

A shrouded figure turned to the white stallion who just minutes ago sent their message. "Do you think they'll really fall for it?"

"By the time those fools realize that this is just a farce, we will have sunken the Hawaiian island chain and have looted the remains."

Once police headquarters had some semblance of order the mayor spoke up.

"Listen I need all remaining street cops to head down to the heavily populated areas and try to calm the fears of the citizens, let them know that everything is going to be all right." Spitfire's plan was to avoid riots and end of the world style looting and crime. The public's best interest came first in her eyes.

As soon as all the patrol cops in the station had cleared out Quan looked at Spitfire. "Now, that all my officers are patrolling the city we may not have the man power to solve this problem we're in."

"Do you have any suggestions?"

"Yes, I'm thinking about hiring a private investigator on this one that and using my best, but least viable undercover cop." He winced at the latter of the two solutions.

"If it's our only options then I expect a dossier on both of them in fifth teen minutes."

The fifty year old stallion left to gather information and make a few phone calls.

....to be continued.

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