Thunder tipped over his canteen above his mouth to double check it was empty.

“I am so thirsty,” He groaned. “I need water. Now. Before the hour wait.”

Thunder looked at the river they were besides and swiped water into his canteen before dumping it into his mouth.

Silent’s hoof slammed into his forehead and the others shook their heads.

“We will have to at times,” Thunder shrugged. “I am tired. Even with this armor, its slow work flying this distance.”

“It’s been two days,” Shadow said rolling his eyes.

“You are lucky,” Nor warned. “Its relatively clean water compared to the south. Nothing hit near here to cause mass contamination.”

“We are going to need to get more canteens,” Slice warned. “We are under prepared.”

“We will add it to the list,” Silent affirmed. “We could not have seen four as too little. We got two in Basic and did fine.”

“We won’t have to push this hard soon enough,” Shadow reminded them. “But two more should be enough to start. We can carry less as the mission dictates.”

“How much further?” Thunder asked as he dropped a PWT into his last canteen.

“Two days to my desired start location,” Shadow replied pulling out a map. “We are south of Neighargra Falls, and we have to skirt close to Canterlot. Follow the river, but we will have to fly by at night. We all know how much our saddlebags weigh and stop our maneuvers. We can’t risk being seen in our current situation.”

“Are you saying what I think you are?” Storm gulped.

Shadow just nodded.

“I agree,” Silent said backing him up.

“If we push hard, we should be able to make it to the forest on the southern side,” Shadow told them. “We make it, I say we can spend a day resting.”

“Then lets be off,” Silent ordered. “It is a good plan.”

They snapped their helmets back on and took off. Shadow set a fast pace, encouraging them as they flew. They pushed on well into the night and were rewarded by it.

“That was tough,” Slice said tossing his helmet aside.

They didn’t bother trying to set up a perimeter and Shadow took first watch. He ignored the second watch and kept patrolling as they rested up. He could get rest later once the others woke up.

“Oh, its you,” Silent said standing down. “It is past noon.”

“I was just out patrolling,” Shadow replied.

“Why did you not hand off watch?” Silent asked annoyed. “You need sleep as much as any of us.”

“I know,” Shadow nodded. “Now that you all are rested up, you can trade off watch while I sleep. We continue on hoof in the morning.”

Silent looked at the rest as they slept with concern. “Hoofing it will be horrible, but wise. We keep our wings tucked in and if we run into anypony, we can blow it off as Earth Ponies. Get some rest, I will wake the others.”

Shadow slept all the way until it was time to rise next morning.

“I hate Canterlot’s mountain looming over us,” Thunder said as they began to walk. “It is like it has a giant eye and is ever watching. Searching. Seeking us out.”

“It is just a mountain,” Slice commented as he watched their back.

“Get used to it,” Silent told Thunder. “It watches over a lot of Equestria. Little we can do for now. We will make a closer pass when we head to the gorge.”

“If there is something where we are headed, we can get out of it’s gaze,” Shadow added. “For a city pony, you do not like a tall object.”

“Hey! Las Pegasus has a lot of tall buildings, not just one,” Thunder shot back. “Big difference.”

“Just shut up you two,” Slice growled. “At least you are not playing scout. Damn stupid rabbits dashing around every so often, scaring the shit out of me.”

“That is promising,” Nor stated. “Small animals living gives promise to being able to set up permanent stations below.”

“Some have glowing green eyes and tails,” Slice added. “Not exactly normal.”

They kept walking past noon and eventually came into a clearing littered with broken structures. They passed by overgrown hedges and broken down picket fences and found themselves at a street.

“There is a bridge spanning the water,” Slice said from his spot on the edge.

“So the Colonel’s eyes were right,” Silent said looking at Shadow.

“What exactly he saw is still in question,” Shadow replied. “But it is good I spoke with him. Our first find.”

They held for a good twenty minutes before they headed out into the deserted street. Better safe than sorry.

“I found a sign,” Slice informed them. “Half broken, but it has ‘Welcome’ before the rest is broken off. I could use some help flipping over the rest.”

Storm went to help while Shadow and Thunder patrolled up the street. Nor and Silent were poking their heads into the houses.

They all jumped as the sign crashed down from being flipped, slicing through the silence.

“It says this place is ‘Sanctuary,’” Storm radioed. “’Welcome to Sanctuary.’”

“We have no word on this place from the war,” Shadow stated. “No towns of places were called such. It must have been late, late war.”

“These buildings, or what is left of them, could be used to put up a strong base,” Thunder added as they came to the end of the street. “It is susceptible to attack from ground in all directions and not optimal that way. But a good enough location.”

“Or, just a thought,” Nor replied. “We could follow this path that goes into the mountains.”

“I missed that. It would be smarter,” Thunder chuckled as they headed back to meet up with them.

“A total of sixteen houses,” Shadow pointed out as they gathered at the path.

“Inside indicates that the houses were indeed lived in,” Silent added. “Little left after the decay, but even at almost two hundred years, there are enough personal effects to point to a thriving community. Small, but thriving.”

Shadow took point as they followed the path on up until the came to fenced off plateau.

“Still intact,” Slice said. “Good sign that we are the first to step into this area since the war.”

They flapped over and continued to the last bit of the hike. Several construction vehicles were around and other broken down objects and crates. There was a small building with a reinforced glass window looking over the plateau.

“Is this a landing pad?” Slice asked as he stood looking at a giant circle in the center of the plateau.

“No,” Shadow said joining him. “68 and the gear pattern means stable.”

“Set down?” Slice asked.

They jumped into fighting stances as a bang rang out.

“Warn us next time!” Silent ordered Thunder.

“I probably could have unlocked that door,” Slice added. “Now it is open for good.”

Storm pulled Thunder out of it to take a look. It wasn’t big enough for the both of them.

“A unicorn died in here,” Storm stated looking at the skeleton and it’s tattered Stable-Tec jump suit. “Looks like it was at the controls when the bombs fell. Probably sending ponies down as the shit hit the fan.”

“Do they work?” Shadow asked. “A Stable would make for the perfect base of operations.”

“Get on the pad,” Storm ordered. “If this works, be ready. Give me a few minutes.

The pad shifted and groaned, tilting to one side where it jammed.

Storm walked to them and stepped into the center with them. “Slice?”

“Well,” Slice said looking around. “It looks like it is jammed badly. It is getting dark, but worth a little effort.”

“Let’s just blow it open,” Thunder said.

They all looked at him annoyed.

“What?” He asked.

“It is a Stable-Tec door,” Storm answered. “These things were built to survive a direct blast from a megaspell. In theory at least. I do not know if any were hit with an absolute direct strike.”

Sliced walked over the edge that was jammed.

“I think we need to jump,” He said a minute later. “Or more accurately, fall. Like Shadow taught us. But we will have to land as one to get it to work. And at the other side.”

They followed Slice’s lead, but failed the first three attempts at landing together. Thunder was early, Nor was way late, and the others were within a second of each other.

“Someone else lead,” Slice said frustrated.

“On you still,” Shadow replied. “We are getting better at falling with you.”

It was well past dark when they gave up and began to set up camp in the shelter of a large shell of some pre-war digging equipment.

“Shadow, can you do it alone?” Silent asked. “You can drop really fast and hard. Perhaps better than us.”

“Actually a really good idea,” Slice yawned. “If Shadow strikes at the right angle, he could, in theory dislodge it. We may have been putting too much pressure elsewhere.”

“You want me to slam into it at bone crunching speeds?” Shadow yawned.

“Yes,” Slice nodded.

Shadow looked back at the door. “Alright. I will give it a go in the morning. I will only be able to get one shot at it.”

“Then no watch for you,” Silent decreed. “We need you at your best.”

Shadow nodded and didn’t fight it.

“What do you think it will be like down there?” Nor asked as Shadow settled into sleep as best as possible.

“Whatever it is, they will not like us,” Silent answered. “We will probably be attacked on sight and not welcomed in any way.”

Shadow did a quick workout to loosen up in the morning. Slice and Storm calculated the proper place to strike and the angle. Shadow did several practice runs before kicking things into high gear. He flew high and fast. It was well worth the risk of being seen.

He could not see the target or even the plateau when he started. They were waiting for him back there with his bags. If it worked, they would need to hop on fast. Shadow banked into a wide turn and then put all he had into the flight. It was a lot of risk for him.

He saw his target, adjusted to come in properly and flipped so his rear hooves slammed into the target spot. Shadow was forced into a back flip to stop himself from being crushed. He landed hard on his stomach. Shadow coughed and didn’t try to stand as Silent rushed over.

“I think I am fine,” He coughed. “Just need to rest a bit.”

The sound of metal groaning changed that. The others scrambled to hop on as it descended. Silent pulled Shadow to his feet and rushed off. Blast doors began to close over the elevator as the continued down. Silent made it easily, Shadow slipped in closer than they wanted.

Shadow landed again on his stomach, groaning in agony. He didn’t move as they rode the whole thing down. Cage doors opened at the bottom to let them out. They found themselves facing the real stable door.

Slice immediately headed to the door while the others helped Shadow into the raw cavern. Storm went to look for some way to open it from the outside.

“This will help,” Silent said to Shadow. “Just a bit of Med-X. Enough to calm your aches a bit, but still be able to hold your own.”

Nor joined Storm at examining the door. Thunder stepped back onto the platform to check it for defensibility. It shuddered and suddenly took him up. The cage doors dropped to protect ponies from the danger of being underneath it. Thunder was trapped.

“Stay on the center!” Slice ordered Thunder. “I will bring you back down in a minute. Somehow.”

“Somehow?” Silent asked.

“It recognized he stepped onto it,” Slice replied. “Which means sensors.”

“And that means tech we can hack,” Storm finished coming over.

They began to search every inch of the place.

“This isn’t stone,” Nor called out a little while later. “Great imitation though.”

They soon pried it open to find a control box of sorts. It was easy to bring the elevator down.

“If we keep it down, we could make a hatch in the blast doors,” Thunder said as he stepped off. “That will make a strong case for defense. Climbing down is easier than going up. But we have wings. Assuming you two are up to the task of disabling it.”

“You doubt us?” Slice poked.

“It won’t matter if you cannot get the stable door opened,” Nor pointed out.

“It may not,” Shadow commented. “It isn’t choice, but we could successfully set up everything here. A bit odd if they ever open the door, but they would be stuck down here with elevator inoperable.”

“Lets get that door open,” Silent replied. “If we need to, we can set this up as a location in the mean time as we try and find a better one.”

Slice kept clicking a button until Storm yelled at him to stop it. It was annoying them all.

“I think you insert the special key there,” Slice said a minute later. “Then you press the button and it opens. Simple.”

“If we had the key,” Storm replied annoyed.

“Hey, this is all you, not me,” Slice shrugged.

Storm took over. After a bit he pried the entire thing off the wall.

“Not much room to work with,” He commented. “I may be able to cross the wire and complete the circuit, hot wiring it.”

The Med-X wore off for Shadow but he refused to take more. He was doing well enough.

“I think this will do it,” Storm said a little while later.

There was a spark, a boom and then smoke as Storm touched the wires together.

“Or not,” He coughed.

A minute later thud came from behind the door.

“Or the door was blocking the sound,” Nor commented as they perked up.

They put their helmets on and tossed on their Saddle Bags. The door was pulled back and then rolled off to the side. They walked onto the extended walkway and crossed the gap.

A door slid up and opened. Three unicorns walked towards them, the leader was a mare. They all looked to be in poor health. Their coats didn’t shine, their manes where thin and their didn’t seem to have much energy.

“We are so happy Stable-Tec finally got our distress calls,” She greeted them. “We really need the help.”

Silent looked at everypegasus. They were not expecting a welcome party.

“You are from Stable-Tec? Right?” She asked nervously.

Silent shook his head, unsure what to say.

“Then what can we do for you?” She smiled holding her ground, despite the obvious desire to flee.

“We want your stable,” Silent declared.

“I am sure we can work something out,” She replied with a smile. “We have plenty of room and you would be gladly welcomed.”

“No, we can’t,” Silent replied. “Nopegasus can know about us.”

“Get to the armory!” She cried.

Thunder picked off the first runner but she threw up a shield as the other slipped through the door. It cost her her life as she couldn't put up a new one for herself. It came up and then shattered on it’s own before Thunder drove a round into he chest.

Silent led them past her body, avoiding the blood that was pooling. Shadow saw her move her eyes in panic. She was able to see her life literally draining away. They opened the door and sirens were going off.

“Slice and Storm, hold the door,” Silent ordered. “Thunder, Shadow. Each of you can handle yourselves. Nor and I will stay together.”

“Avoid the lasers,” Thunder cautioned them. “Their shields might be able to refract them easily. Probably not the Novasurge, but the laser for sure.”

“Avoid explosions as well,” Silent added. “We need this place intact.”

Shadow walked down a hallway and saw a unicorn and two foals dive into a doorway. Another stepped around the corner and shot a bolt from his horn. It harmlessly struck Shadow’s chest. Shadow fired back at him as the hidden unicorn put up shield to protect him. The bullet shattered the shield like glass and drove home.

Shadow walked over the to doorway and dodged a few books launched at him. He put a round into her head and looked around. The foals were somewhere in here. It was a school room from the look of things. Shadow walked over to a table and looked underneath. He headed to the desk at the front and found them shaking beneath it. The filly’s horn began to glow. Shadow ended both of their lives with one blast from the shotgun. 00 Buck always does it’s job.

Shadow continued on. Dodging random objects thrown at him here or there and then putting them out of their misery. He ran into a group of at least a dozen. Half opened fire from their horns and the other half put up shields. Shadow had no chance to dodge and was blasted back by the fire.

He really hurt from dislodging the door and the blast made it worse. He was not going to let the pain win. He rolled around until he was facing them and opened fire with his Novasurge. It’s power shattered all the shields and he picked half of them off as they ran. The others escaped around a corner.

Shadow followed them into a recreational room. They threw pool balls with all they had and ran at him with broken pool cues. The balls gave his armor a good rattle and a jolt to his body, but the pool cues were worthless. Shadow sliced them open with his hoof knife.

The room had no exit so he backtracked. The main area had bodies leaking onto the floor. Shadow came into an open area. He saw Silent in a circular window that viewed the open area. Thunder and Nor were below dealing with resistance.

Shadow saw a directional sign and headed off to the reactor. He soon ran into four unicorns sporting armor and pistols. They opened fire at the same time as he did. They only hit him seven times before he put a round through each of their pathetic armored vests. The bullets did no damage to his armor, but he felt each one as if he had been kicked, hard.

Shadow followed the signs to the reactor and trotted down the stairs. There was only an old unicorn in the area.

“I will not give up the talisman!” He yelled before launching every tool he had at Shadow.

It was a wide spread and did not allow Shadow to dodge. He took the impact and fell. The Unicorn charged at him with a heavy pipe wrench. Shadow rolled out of the way as the unicorn swung hard and missed. The sound of the wrench thudding into the floor made Shadow very glad he was not there.

Shadow recovered first and fired his Novasurge. The unicorn turned to glowing ash and plopped into a piled on the floor. The wrench dropped to the floor with a heavy clang.

“All areas are clear,” Silent said over their coms. “I can track everything from here. Meet back at the overseer’s office.”

It wasn’t had to find. Shadow was the last to join them. He was moving slowly after everything.

“The place is secure,” Silent reiterated. “Storm and Slice, get on locking down the elevator. Shadow, there is a hydroponics farm thing. I want you to check it out. Nor and Thunder, get this mess cleaned up. Find someplace to toss them all out of the way while we come up with a better solution. I will comb through the records here and maybe find something more promising.”

“The reactor level is barren,” Shadow said walking out. “It will be a pain to move them out of there, but it is out of the way.”

The hydroponics was next to their cafeteria. The waste from the cafeteria along with the solid waste from the unicorns was recycled into a fertilizer.

“Check that,” Shadow radioed. “They have a whole system here to recycle food and bodily waste for fertilizer. It will break down everything and in a sanitary manor.”

“And then we eat the food?” Thunder asked disgusted.

“You won’t even be able to tell,” Shadow replied. “The system breaks everything down into its minerals and core components, leaving a fine, dry substance to use as fertilizer. It is more sophisticated than our compost system on my farm, but the same idea. And yes, bodily waste was recycled there. It makes for a very good fertilizer. Sanitary and you can not tell.”

“It sounds horrible,” Silent added. “Wrong.”

“Shadow is right about how safe it is,” Nor said. “It is perfectly safe, and a much better disposal system than rotting into sludge somewhere.”

“To the hydro system thing,” Thunder declared.

“You have no idea what hydro means, do you?” Shadow asked Thunder.

“No I do not,” He declared confidently.

“Hydro means water. It is kind of like cloud farming,” Shadow explained. “It used water infused with minerals to grow everything. No soil. It requires less room and if given the right nutrients, it is better than cloud farming. But cloud farming is more sustainable. Much more.”

Shadow poked around more, checking up on the health and growth of each row. They were all doing very well. They had an impressive herb garden as well. Shadow used their seeds to plant ten more rosemary bushes along with the five large ones they already had.

Their system could easily support over a thousand residents. They were well fed and barely using the facility. It did not add up to how sick they looked.

“Silent,” Shadow radioed. “Do you have any reasoning behind their apparent poor health? They have a more than healthy diet with plenty of food.”

“I was about to call you,” Silent replied. “What do you know about breeding, genetics and charting families?”

“Probably more than Nor,” Shadow replied. It was in no way a slant against Nor.

“Come here and see if you can make sense of this.”

Shadow walked to the office and began to look at what Silent had pulled up. It was in depth records of who married who and what children they had. Each was assigned a number. The oldest were 1-32. After that, it appeared to be numbers pairing up from each side. There was a whole chart like his Homestead book, but bigger.

Shadow finally turned to Silent. “They ran out of ponies.”

“What?” Silent asked.

“If a community begins to intermarry too much, they have health problems,” Shadow explained. “My home would make sure we changed up things enough so that we remained diverse. They didn’t. They had two distinct points where most of their blood was cut out of the picture.”

“They started with sixteen families. But after all this time, with no new blood, they began to become sick and weak. It explains why they couldn’t keep up a shield and their blasts were pathetic.”

“How?” Silent asked. “Thunder hit the residential quarters. He had to reload four times and then gave up and used his laser rifle. There were a lot. Around 75 drew arms.”

“Just because you have a lot of fouls, it does not mean they have new blood,” Shadow replied. “It is surprising they are able to reproduce like they can. As soon as a mare and stallion back home shows problems, that family gets a boost from outside the next generation or two to counter it. Rare, but it happens.”

“Shadow is right,” Nor spoke up. “I do not know much, but I learned the basics in school. The Enclave is concerned about that problem. We started with a lot of Pegasi to begin with. But being so pure, we could, conceivably, fall prey to genetic bottling and have our society weakened as a result.”

“Sixteen families is small,” Shadow continued. “Very small. They survived, but several generations ago their health began rapidly deteriorating. Another ten generations and they probably would be unable to reproduce at a fast enough rate until they died out a few generations later.”

“How can you be so accurate for no real schooling?” Silent asked.

“Oh,” Shadow chuckled. “That prediction was in the terminal. It was a lot of information all at once to take in. And there were notes about their door jamming. They were unable to leave and forced to knowingly watch themselves deteriorate and die.”

“Elevator disabled,” Slice announced, ending the discussion. “We will teach you how to get it going again, in case we need to. But it is successfully stopped. We will get to work on the hatch later.”

“We are coming to help with cleanup,” Storm added. “Get that out of the way so we can sleep easy tonight. And there should be a robot or two around here to help clean up. Once the bodies are taken care of, we will find it and get them working.

It was horrific, messy work moving all the bodies to be disposed of. They had to be stripped of any clothing. The older ones wore hoof terminal things, labeled PipBuck. Shadow just kept telling himself that they put them out of their painful misery. The recycler was able to handle them all. It had just done a batch of fertilizer and was capable of sustaining the same amount that the hydroponics farm could.

In total, there were 262 residents. 64 of them were foals. 18 were pregnant. The robots needed some work, but were soon operational and cleaning up the floors and walls. A full clean would take several days.

Silent assigned them each a clean room. One that nopony died in. Silent took the overseer’s room, which was connected to the office. It felt very good to get out of their armor and be in a safe place.

Shadow laid there in the room wide awake. He acted earlier. Acted. Now he was forced to think. Now he saw every face. Especially the faces of the two foals and then the result from the shotgun.

Suffering or not, they had slaughtered them over this place. They had taken what was these unicorn’s by force. Horrible, bloody force.

Yes, they fought. Of course they tried to stop the intruders. But he had shut off his heart and killed them, even the young and defenseless. They all had set aside their hearts. Was fearing the wasteland worth this price? They never even considered trying to find another option. Could they have come to a happy medium?

The only reason Shadow slept was because Silent gave him a full dose of Med-X to sooth his body. It had taken more than it’s fare share of a beating. Silent kept Shadow in bed for the next day, even after giving him a healing potion.

Nor, Slice and Storm combed the entire stable for problems before they even considered trying to do the hatch. They put Thunder to work on patching his holes. Shadow’s lessons in cooking came in handy as the next few days passed. They were happy that they were all about to begin to use rosemary in their water.

It also was Shadow’s job to survey the armory. In total, there were 32 unused armor vests, 100 light assault rifles, 20 12 gauge shotguns and 100 9mm pistols. All weapons and armor were stamped with 68. The ammo stock was massive. 10,000 5.56mm rounds, 5,000 shotgun shells, all 00 buck, and 15,000 pistol rounds. There were plenty of magazines and maintenance equipment as well.

Silent did a survey of the medical supplies. They were low. Very low. But that is what happens when you have residents, and suffering ones. The medical logs from the last year alone were staggering. Stillbirth and miscarriages were happening to almost every mare. They were in more trouble than the computer projections said they were.

“The hatch is done,” Slice finally announced. “Storm and Nor are heading to blow up the control room top side. Only we will be able to easily enter here. And only we will be able to open and close the stable. We are working on that override and command sequence.”

“First lets set up the terminal and send our first report,” Silent ordered. “We have been below like two weeks. I do not like having sent nothing to the Major. I was waiting for this place to officially be ready for use.”

“I can also securely tie in the overseer’s terminal to ours,” Storm added. “And I have been working on a way to keep the system set up down here all the time.”

“Lets get the report sent the simple, proper way, first,” Silent replied.

Silent sent a message relaying their current position, successful set up at the stable, and asking for the first supply drop. They also sent a flag designation system to say whether they were in or out of the stable. It was simple flags that would blend in as old construction equipment.

“I am impressed,” Silent said at their next meeting. He was sitting at the overseer’s desk. “We did it. And quickly considering the hurdles we jumped. This base of operations will be an amazing resource to have for the years to come. We can house dozens of scout and recon teams easily. We could land an officer to have charge over all of them from this base.”

“We ought to christen this base,” Shadow added. “Give it an appropriate name.”

“We could just call it sanctuary,” Nor stated. “It was the reason why that place was founded.”

“Seems plain,” Shadow shrugged.

The name bothered him in more ways than one. The innocence of this place was broken. It was no longer a sanctuary for anything other than blood and death.

“That can be the back up idea,” Silent said. “For now, think of some other names. Along the line of our mission.”

Shadow guessed Silent was as unnerved with that suggestion as he was. Silent was trained to patch ponies up, not cut them down. Especially like they did.

“We have a time and location for the supply drop,” Storm reported. “South of us and near the train crossing of the river.”

“They are going to end up dropping it into the river,” Shadow stated. “At least they have trackers for us.

“I hope you are wrong,” Silent said. “But I fear you are right. And we are looking at a potentially populated area.”

“They gave us some bullshit about not being able to drop it closer to the mountains,” Storm said rolling his eyes.

“Let it go,” Shadow told him. “It isn’t worth bitching and moaning about. We will just be there, ready.”

They made preparations and headed out.

“Are you sure this will open again?” Silent asked as the door sealed behind them.

“Yes,” Storm replied. “We tested it a dozen times. And if it doesn’t, we haven’t lost anything of real value.”

“Except over two weeks of our time,” Silent grumbled.

“Lets focus on the supply drop,” Shadow said launching.

It was a large, but simple hatch at the top. Very heavy since it was made from the blast doors.

“I am thinking through an easier system to open and close it,” Slice informed them. “But as you can see, there are no close or easy anchor points to rope down into it. And the edges are rough and should cut most ropes sliding across them. Storm and I plan on working on a detection system.”

“For now, lets get this equipment,” Silent said focusing them.

They jumped off the plateau’s cliff side and took off to their planned stopping point. The drop would happen at night. They were flying low, staying just above the trees and hopefully out of sight. Shadow was sent ahead to play scout.

He shot off well ahead of them. His E.F.S. was useless at these speeds, but his goal was to get to the spot and then head out from there. He met up with the train tracks and found them in good condition. The bridge too.

Across the bridge appeared to be a crashed train at the split. Shadow slipped across and got close. There was plenty of activity. Shadow slid up to see what was going on. He peaked his head around, E.F.S. ready.

It was a group of griffins. All of their armor was marked with the same mark. In a way, it resembled a griffins clawed front leg. Shadow watched them as long as he dared and dashed back.

“Griffins to the east of the drop site,” Shadow relayed. “Not far. We have to be careful. An engagement while trying to get the supply drop could prove to be disastrous.”

“Armament?” Thunder asked.

“Decently armored, depending on the individual,” Shadow answered. “They are armed enough to warrant avoiding them as much as possible.”

“We have to avoid contact,” Silent said. “We are Reconnaissance, not soldiers. And we are still setting up our base. We can not force a fight unless we are sure of the victory.”

There was not enough miles in between them for Shadow's liking. Silent was being stoic, but it was obviously a front. They were each laid out along the tracks, trying to hide in plain sight.

As the sun faded, their helmets began to beep as the tracker was fired up. Shadow looked above and his E.F.S. soon picked up the falling crates. They were bundled together and in free fall. Their parachute would open soon enough and carry them to a soft landing.

The parachute opened and they slowly watched in descend. It was picked off by the griffins.

“Damn it!” Silent swore. “Shadow?”

“Thunder and I come in heavy and force them to split. It will be a lot of weight, but you will have to move the crates. Dump them quietly in the water if you have to. We split. Thunder and I will head south and drawing them away. You guys split into two groups, heading for the patches of trees to the north.”

“You heard him,” Silent said. “Keep wings in tight.”

Shadow and Thunder took point and were not being subtle. Shadow bounded up onto a boxcar and opened up with his minigun. Thunder slid into the center, opening up with his as well. They took out several griffins and forced the others down and away.

Shadow suppressed while Thunder flanked. Thunder took a few shotgun blasts but was able to get a rocket on target. Shadow began to fire at a group trying to come back in. They were a ways off, and he didn’t hit any of his targets. His goal was to force them to split and he was rewarded by it.

“Dumped!” Silent exclaimed.

Shadow and Thunder took off south. They were quick on their hooves, but no match for the griffins. Thunder slid to a stop and let his GPER loose. Shadow slid around a few seconds later and began blasting away with his Laser Rifle.

Several more griffins dropped before they began to retreat.

“We are clear,” Shadow panted.

“Lets move fast,” Silent ordered. “While they are hopefully too distracted to notice us. Regroup at the small forest north of the site.”

Shadow and Thunder hopped the river and headed north. The packages were all picked up when they got to the railroad and they pushed on through the darkness to the meeting point. They met up with the others and found themselves at gunpoint.

“Next time warn us,” Silent chastised. “Friendly fire will be an embarrassing report. We pushed to get these here, now lets get them back to base.”

Next Chapter: Chapter 35 - Ghastly Gorge Estimated time remaining: 11 Hours, 13 Minutes