Search and Rescue
Search and Rescue
Duke and Frost could already feel the stress of the mission melting off of them. As they walked back to their room, the men could hardly wait to dump all of their gear in a pile in the corner and just lay down on their beds, free of annoying stallions and near-misses on missions. All men need a moment to sit down after a mission.
They approached their room and noticed that the door was slightly ajar. Frost furrowed his brow, suspicious, and sped up his pace to the door. Duke followed suit, and the men stopped as soon as they reached the door.
“Ready?” Frost asked.
Duke nodded, and the men threw the door open and went into the room. Frost went in first and did a quick scan for any unwelcome visitors. He found none; in fact, there was no one here. He immediately went over to the gear pile and checked everything. After a few minutes, he concluded that nothing was stolen. Duke checked the beds for anything that might not be pleasant to find in their sleep, but also came up with squat.
“Boss, everything is still here.” Frost said.
Duke looked over the beds one more time. “Not everything, Frost.”
Frost turned around and looked around. Everything seemed to be there; the pillows and sheets were on the beds, the paintings and wall hanging’s were still on the walls. The windows were undamaged, and-
The beds were perpendicular to the wall.
Frost just stared for a moment, then sighed in mild frustration. “I’ll go see if she’s still in the castle.” he said.
“I’ll go, too. Got nothing better to do.” Duke walked over to the gear pile. “Might as well drop off the heavy stuff here first.”
Frost agreed and the men set aside all their gear except for their knives, the KaBar and the FE9, which they kept hidden. They opted to wear them openly, since it looked like that kind of thing wasn’t frowned upon in this city. Duke considered bringing his pistol, but decided that it would be unnecessary and using it would probably not go well with the locals. When they were ready, the men left their room, locked it, and decided to first check the dining room where they previously ate.
Frost took the lead down the halls, walking as fast as he could without getting in trouble with the guards, who watched on with mild curiosity. He was followed somewhat slowly by Duke, who didn’t have as much invested in this as Frost. Though he did want Amel around for translation and travel purposes. She could be useful.
When the men reached the dining room, they didn’t bother trying to be polite to any who might be inside. Frost burst through the door and did a quick scan of the room; there were nobles, sure, but Amel didn’t seem to be present. Frost walked around the table hurriedly, earning a few looks from those at the table who weren’t too nervous to look at him, and he concluded that she wasn’t around.
“We should ask some guards or servants where she might be.” Duke suggested. Frost walked over, slowed for Duke, and then they both exited the room. “Odds are, they won’t be so ashamed of sending her away that we won’t get an answer.”
“Sounds good boss.”
The men talked to the guards immediately outside the dining room first, but it was no dice. They didn’t know anything. The men moved on, going back toward the wing with their quarters, questioning each guard as they passed. None seemed to know that Amel was even in the palace at all.
“Makes sense.” Duke said. “It wasn’t like she ever went anywhere without us.”
“Yeah.”
When they reached their wing, they started off in the direction of their room. On the way, there was a distinct lack of guards. Duke noted this, wondering where on earth they might have gone to. Before, there were plenty of guards. Maybe they were there for when they weren’t permitted to go where they wanted, though.
Eventually, they finally found a lone guard, standing outside another door in the wing, looking incredibly bored. He wasn’t paying any attention to his surroundings; he didn’t even see the men down the hall, even though he was looking in that general direction. When the men finally came right up to him, he noticed their presence, and straightened his posture completely.
“You speak Eng- Equish?” Duke asked.
The guard nodded. “Yes, I learn when we have Equestria guests here. They are very nice ponies.”
“Good.” Duke pointed down the hall. “Our room is down that way. Living in that room, along with us, was a mare named Amel. You know anything about where she might be?”
The guard put a hoof to his chin. “Now that you say, I did see a mare there. She was taken away by my fellow guards. Lots of yelling, hitting.” The men furrowed their brows, but the guard didn’t seem to see. “They took her out of the palace. Don’t know where.”
“Thanks.” Frost replied, unhappy with the news. “Do you happen to know who the guards were who took her?”
The guard pondered his memories. “Yes, but I do not know names. They guard treasure room right now.”
The men nodded and decided to head off in that direction. They decided to take their time to make sure that Frost was cooled off and wouldn’t do anything irrational.
Duke had wondered at first why he felt so strongly about people, or in this case, intelligent ponies, being mistreated, but he had figured it out eventually. Frost had an abusive father and neglectful mother and hated them, and he did everything he could to get away from them. When he saw it happen to others, like Amel, he probably remembered it all. He could easily have been doing all this just to try to forget his crappy childhood.
So they moved at a significantly reduced pace to make sure that Frost didn’t pick any unnecessary fights. The other guards in the halls must have noticed their evidently serious and/or stressed out appearances, as they stepped off to the side whenever they passed by. No one seemed too intent on picking a fight with the humans.
The men showed up at the treasure room door, albeit after a time, since they required help finding the way. The first few guards had been suspicious, but when they saw that the men seemed unarmed, they gave them directions. Now, Duke and Frost were looking at two very bored-looking guards outside a big golden door. Neither noticed Duke and Frost looking at them from the other side of the hall, and were ill-prepared for the men’s arrival.
“You!” Frost shouted as he walked over to the door. The guards, shocked out of boredom, stood at attention and stared straight forward. Frost placed himself just in front of one guard so that his spear was too long to come around and get him. “I want to know where you sent Amel.”
“What?” the guard replied.
“Where is the mare you sent away from here?” he asked. The guard tried to formulate his words, but took too long. “Where is she?”
“What?” he responded again. He seemed fairly shocked at the clearly unhappy human before him.
Frost took a quick glance at Duke, who seemed to think that this would be entertaining. “What do I look like to you?” Frost asked the flustered guard. He looked at the other guard to direct the question at him.
“Human?” the other guard said.
“Do I look like some kind of idiot to you?” he asked.
“What?”
Frost sighed loudly. “You know what country I’m from?” he asked.
“No.” the first guard said.
“America. We speak Equish in America. You speak Equish here, boy?”
The guards both blinked. “What?”
“Equish, little hustler! Do you speak it?”
“Yes?” both replied.
“Then where did you send Amel?”
The guards were still visibly shocked, and looked at each other, not sure of how to respond. “What?”
Frost shook his head and walked in a little circle. “Say ‘what’ again. Say it again. Do it, I dare you. Try saying ‘what’ one more damn time!” Neither guard spoke. “Good. Now,” Frost pointed at Duke and himself. “We had a friend named Amel who was staying in the guest room with us. You two,” he said, pointing at both stallions. “Took her away rather violently. Now, I would hate to get forceful with you, but if you don’t tell me where she is, I will get forceful.”
The first guard he spoke to swallowed hard. “We brought her back to previous owner.” he said. “We were trying to do right thing and return property-”
Frost put his hand up and stopped the guard. “I don’t care what your ‘best intentions’ were. She isn’t his any more. Does she look like a slave?” The guard replied saying that he didn’t know what slaves looked like. “Then why did you treat her like one?” He didn’t know. “Don’t ever treat anyone that way again.”
Frost walked away from the terrified guards with a smiling Duke in tow. “What’re you smiling about?” he asked Duke.
“Nothing.” Duke replied, not dropping his grin.
The men didn’t speak anymore for the moment, as they were busy trying to figure out how they were going to go about taking Amel back from that stallion who had previously owned her. If he had Amel again, he probably wouldn’t be happy with the prospect of giving her up a second time. The men might be forced to sneak in and take her in the coming night. Or they could just go in and take her.
As they exited the palace through the gardens, the way to that section of the city where their target was, the men kept their eyes open to all sides in case it was some kind of ruse set up by Nedal. They put nothing below him, a mentality that they got from how he treated civilians and hostages. There was no trust there.
The men moved swiftly through the city and quickly found themselves before the large home of the slave owner. Duke took a moment this time to take note of any important features on the house. Most of it came off as normal and flat, but certain parts stuck out to him: Some of the decorative bits on the walls could serve as perfect footholds and gripping points if they had to climb into the house. There were cutouts in the walls instead of windows, so they wouldn’t need to force their way in. These two prominent features would make it easy to get inside. Duke wondered if all the wealthy homes in this strange nation were like this.
The men were about to go in through the front gate. “أرى أنك قد عادوا.” they heard from off to the right. The men turned and saw the homeowner there. “What brings you back to my home? I trust you don’t think that I went back on the deal.”
Duke breathed slowly. “Actually, we do.” he said, eliciting a very ungrateful look from the homeowner. “Two guards took Amel from our room while we were gone and returned her here. We came to get her back.”
The homeowner balked. “That you would insinuate that I, Melaysh Naijela, would do such a thing is offensive and intolerable! Leave my home now.”
Duke sighed. “We’re not leaving without her.” he explained. “Maybe your son decided to take her? He didn’t exactly have a deal to honor.”
Melaysh considered this. “To dishonor the deal I made would be most punishable. And I do not appreciate what you say about my son.” He paused. “But I suppose you will not leave until you know for certain?” The men nodded. “Very well.” Melaysh said with a sigh. “You may find him in his room most likely on the top level. It will have a silver placard.”
The men nodded and made their way into the house much easier than expected. They passed Melaysh uncaringly and strutted into the house, making their way straight to the top floor. On the way, they did see that, indeed, Melaysh honored their deal and no longer seemed to have any slaves. There were well dressed servants now, probably paid just enough to not be slaves, who gave the men nervous glances when they passed. The men simply ignored the looks and continued their beeline to the top floor.
The top floor was marginally smaller than the rest of the house, taking up vast amounts of space and having many more rooms than a family of even twelve could use completely. There were open rooms and balconies, letting in the hot air of the afternoon to warm up the house. Some rooms were closed, but upon inspection of the doors, they were confirmed as not being Melaysh’s son’s room. The silver placard had to be somewhere.
Eventually, they were able to find it. Frost spotted it at the end of the hall and pointed to it. “Let’s go.” he said. The men briskly walked on to the door.
As they got closer, they could hear some kind of rumbling and thudding from the other side. “Thump-thump.” Duke said as they approached. Frost nodded and they moved to either side of the door, fully prepared to wait for the stallion to be done.
That was not to last, though. Frost was listening in the whole time, hoping to glean something from the voices that sounded from the other side. There was a triumphant voice and sad whimpering; He gleaned something unpleasant to imagine. “Boss, that’s not the fun kind of thump-thump!” he said, stepping off the wall and getting in front of the door. Duke’s eyes widened, and in an instant, he was behind Frost, ready to break the door down.
“Ready?” Frost asked. Duke tapped his shoulder, and they began the attack.
Frost kicked the door down and the men ran in, yelling loudly for those present to get down and not move. The stallion in the room was on the bed with a mare under him and looking wildly at the men running at him. Before he even knew what was happening, Frost clotheslined him with his arm and brought him to the floor. He tried to get up, but Duke came up and uppercutted him in the stomach, knocking his wind out. Frost got up behind him and yanked his tail, pulling him backwards and toward a wall with a window hole.
The stallion couldn’t react in time as he was pulled off the ground by the men and thrown at the wall. Unfortunately for him, there was no wall; only a window hole. The only thing that saved him was the fact that the men never let go.
“ما الذي يجري؟!” he shouted. “واسمحوا لي مرة أخرى في الداخل!”
Frost was above him, holding him up by his back left leg. “You understand a word of that?” he asked Duke.
“Not a single one.” Duke replied, holding the stallion up by his front left foreleg.
The stallion switched to English. “I remember you! You took my slave away!”
Frost clicked his tongue. “No, your father lost to me and honored the deal he made.” He checked how far down the fall would be; at least forty feet. “You know, we came here looking for Amel. Instead, we find you violating a young mare.” he turned to Duke. “Tell me Duke, how long is the punishment for this back home?”
“I heard that the average sentence is over ten years in prison.”
“You hear that?” Frost asked the stallion. “For this, you could get locked up for over a decade.”
“We are not at your home, though. Are we?”
Frost shook the stallion. “Maybe not, but there are reasons for this punishment. We don’t appreciate people who harm people like that. You know, back in the day, they got the capital punishment for it. In some places, they still do.”
“If you kill me, you will suffer.” the stallion shot back.
Frost turned to Duke. “I don’t know if we’ll kill you. But if we pull you back up, we will be trying to save you. And I don’t know about my friend here,” Frost loosened his grip just a tad. “But my arm tends to get tired pretty easily. How about that, Duke?”
“I have been meaning to work my arms out more.”
The stallion looked up, terrified. “Fine, fine! I won’t do it ever again! Now let me go!”
“Bad choice of words.” Frost stated. He and Duke let go for a split second.
“AHHH!”
But they made sure that they didn’t drop him.
“We’ll pull you back up, but you’re gonna sit tight for a bit.” Duke explained. The men yanked the stallion back up, getting a pop from a joint and a scream of pain, and threw the stallion to the floor.
“كتفي!” he shouted, writhing on the floor.
The men walked right past the painfully hissing stallion and over to the bed to the crying mare. “Are you alright?” Duke asked. He put his hand on the shoulder of the mare and turned her around.
The men stood stock still as they realized that it was Amel crying in front of them. She had numerous bruises on her face, hopefully from those guards, and had her eyes shut tight. She was shaking violently on the bed, like she was in the Siberian wilderness without protection from the cold.
“Amel?” Frost said softly, sitting beside her. Duke stepped back to watch. “Amel, it’s Frost.”
Her eyes shot open and fully rook in her savior. “F-F-F-Frost?” she said. He looked at her sadly. “Frost!” She leapt at him and wrapped her hooves around him, bawling into the Pararescueman’s shoulder. He patted her back gently and hugged her back. “Y-y-you found me...”
“I won’t let harm come to you. Never again.”
Duke looked on from the sideline, a small smile making its way across his face. It doesn’t matter where you’re from, what your culture is, or what your experiences have been. Seeing someone being rescued from their pain is enough to make you happy.
“The first reason I joined up.” Duke thought.
Duke decided to let Frost handle the situation with helping Amel while he dealt with the stallion. “You.” he said quietly enough to not be heard by Amel. The stallion looked up. “We’re gonna chat with your dad.”
He brought the stallion to his feet and made his way to the door.
“Hold up.” Frost said from behind. Duke turned around and saw Frost carrying Amel on his back. Duke really wanted to know how these ponies and horses and things could grip at all without fingers. “Let’s get her out of here.” Duke nodded.
They dragged and carried the stallion and Amel respectively and remained completely silent the whole way, proud that they did their jobs, but sad that they were needed in the first place.
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I was originally going to wait till the last chapter to review the three I missed while I was away, but, just, wow. This is really good, it sucked me right in as it should. Excellent job as per usual.
Dat pulp fiction reference
i really dont know if i have ever seen a more obvious reference in my life.
Wait! Is she now pregnant?!
Poor Amel
DRAG DAT STALLION IN THE STREETS AND HANG HIM UPSIDE DOWN AND BURN HIM!!!
Why that low down ....
I'll stand by with one of my interrogators...
Awesome pulp fiction reference
6848253
I’ll help.
5918876
He never finished