Converge - Part Three

Noteworthy wasn’t quite sure what had transpired.

Whatever had breached the gate sent everypony into a chaotic mess, a mass of bodies charging blindly in all directions. Projectiles flew by, no doubt from those odd flintlocks wielded by the PHL. So alien were these weapons in design, they looked like something right out of a science-fiction novel, compared to a typical griffon’s flintlock. If what he had heard was true, these were man-and-equine-made weapons that sought to substitute wooden gun stocks for advanced composites – and evidently, they could spew out rounds like an angry beehive.

Down below, Locksmith’s thugs were fighting the raiders, as Noteworthy’s fellow Loyalists scampered around in a panic. Fighting being a relative term, for the pegasus mare and human soldier forming the opposition easily cut through the disorganized gangsters in a combination of bullet fire and melee strikes. One of the two griffons swooped down and joined the fight, easily swatting aside the charging thugs with his stout build. And from the corner of his eye, Noteworthy spotted green flashes as the Changeling soldier he had barely evaded swapped forms rapidly, blending in amongst the rabble.

Scrambling by the various pinups and newspaper articles about Fuse’s brickyard clipped from the Foal Free Press hanging by in the office wall, he saw a unadorned desk. Skidding to a halt, he grabbed a blank sheet of paper with his forehoof and a pen with his mouth, hurriedly setting these down.

And then, a thought crossed his mind.

‘Who am I trying to contact? Am I just someone’s patsy? Just like my cousin? Patsy?’

By all accounts, he hesitated too long, for the utilitarian door slammed open. And the imposing figure which stepped through was the last figure he’d expected, or hoped to meet.

The human stood tall and motionless, an inscrutable gaze hidden behind a mask of sorts. Clad in dark cloth and armor, the sight of it nearly caused Noteworthy’s mind to crumble.

Without another word, another thought for his unwritten letter, he fled.

“Clear!”

Harwood decked another foolish earthpony assailant to the cobbled ground with a kick. As the team’s medical officer looked up, he spotted Sergeant Jaka through the window, inside the office interior, kick-chop a fleeing Loyalist as they made a beeline for the doorway, knocking them flat on their face. Satisfied, the tall Asian man waved towards Harwood with the ‘all clear’ sign.

“Cease fire! Cease your fire!”

Jaka’s voice echoed out through the area, which fell abruptly silent as Snow Mist stopped firing her assault yoke. After their commanding officer had given the Loyalist he’d just knocked out a cursory glance, he jumped off the railing, and then silently motioned Gilford and Coxa to guard the nearest entrances, both to and from the courtyard.

“Casualty report?” Jaka asked without haste, his eyes scanning the prone and weakly stirring forms of the various Loyalists scattered around the courtyard. The non-lethal rubber bullets which the team had been supplied with, though somewhat a rare commodity given the time, had performed their task admirably.

“Two confirmed dead, the rest injured on the opposition. I can neither confirm nor deny the state of the poor buggers who tried bowling over the bloody wall, Sarge. Looks like they all got caught in that magical ‘net’ thing. Friendlies...” Harwood did a quick head count. “None, sir.”

‘Apart from that limp, don’t think I didn’t see you there, you old bird,’ he thought, spotting Gilford’s attempt to hide a slight, merely inconvenient leg injury as he hoisted an unconscious figure over his dowdy shoulder. ‘And, well, think Ana’s worked up a bit of a sweat by now, if that counts.’

With an estimated total of fifteen captors and fifteen hostages, that left all but two in the latter category accounted for, with two of the former dead, five captured or incapacitated, five more on the run with Snow Mist and Lieutenant Scratch in hot pursuit, and three more whose circumstances were yet to be determined. It had all gone by quite fast.

Before Jaka could reply, however, a weak grunt from Gilford’s charge interrupted them.

“Hold your fire, Sarge,” Harwood declared instinctively, hand outstretched. “Think I’ll pry some info out of this one, if you don’t mind.”

“Make it quick, Harwood,”

“I will, sir,” Harwood promised. “Gilford, if I may?”

Cautiously, the elderly griffon lowered the injured pony. A mare, it would seem.

"Mercy. Please, don’t kill me," she pleaded in a low voice, eyes widened in panic behind a tassled chartreuse mane. The canthus of her left eye was white with fear, and hot, salty tears fell down her cheeks whilst her peachy body shook like a leaf.

“Careful with that one, Harwood!” Wolfsschanze called out from across the courtyard. “She’s a bit banged up, she’s a jumpy one, that lass!”

“I’ll have to vouch for that,” Gilford added in agreement. “Some ruffian tried to rough her up. He’s still in the brickyard somewhere.”

Harwood acknowledged them both with a single nod, as he inspected the mare’s frightened, middle-aged face. Definitely a civilian, and even if she was a Loyalist, well, she seemed very far from home.

“Calm down, you’ve got quite the nasty bruise down here,” Harwood calmly said, ignoring the mare’s whimpering as he kneeled down to assess the damage done to her foreleg. Upon noticing how she pulled back, however, he carefully removed his mask with his other hand, lips crinkling into what he hoped was a comforting smile.

“Please, try not to shiver too much, would you?” he asked with about as much kindness as he could muster, carefully looking over her wounds, for the mare, much to his consternation, had clearly suffered a brutal impact. Nobody on the team could have done this without being in direct violation of orders.

“Are, are y-you a doctor?” she asked timidly.

“Chief medical officer, technically. And I can assure you, I’m a trained one at that,” he continued nonchalantly, spare hand reaching for a syringe in his slung kit. “I don’t usually spare this for injured opponents, so consider yourself lucky, miss.”

The mare flinched when Harwood injected his morphine syringe into her leg, but relaxed as the drug did its work. Satisfied, he gave the mare his best and most charming smile – though Ana might disagree on that last one. Might. She’d never admit to it.

“That wasn’t so hard was it? Try to loosen up, please, your heart rate’s a bit high.” Harwood told her encouragingly, patting the mare’s back. Terrified as she was, she seemed to ease up under his touch.

“T-thank you, mister,” she said nervously.

“It’s fine, miss,” Harwood replied graciously. “But in return, would you mind helping out a bit? Need a bit of intel here and there, and we can assure your safety, I guarantee it.”

The mare did hesitate, but she nodded anyway.

“Y-yes, mister, I’ll try.”

“Good!” Harwood cheerfully said. “Now, would you kindly tell us, ah, who’s that burly fellow you’ve all been cowering under? He seems to have given us the slip, and it would be very nice of you if you could tell us a few details, aye?”

The battle on the ground may be over for her teammates gathered in the brickyard courtyard, but to Second Lieutenant Snow Mist, the fight raged on in the skies, as a pair of hostile pegasi persisted in ducking and swooping on her position. Luckily, she had the best backup, and together they were busy tackling the stragglers and runaways.

“On your six!”

“Got ‘em!” responded Lieutenant Scratch from below.

“You’re quick!”

“This ain’t nothing yet, Misty! Just getting started!”

It was anything but over, she thought. She darted left and right down the air currents, hurtling against both her opponents with abandon, but for each blow she struck, her backup below would land two more, gauding her three opponents to come back for a third, a fourth helping. To be fair, Lieutenant Scratch had come equipped with a bass cannon. Now that thing’s a beast, technically non-lethal, yes, but a beast nonetheless. With every note booming through its speakers, enemies were sent flying up and away. It was loud, crude, and so very cool, not unlike its owner, in Mist’s humble opinion.

“Twelve!” she called out anew.

“Oop! Another one down.”

Still, she’d be damned if she allowed some unicorn DJ to take the lead over the finest cloudsmare in all of Vanhoover and Northern Equestria. Hauling forth a tethered stormcloud, no amount of shade would be enough to hide from her mighty thunder and lightning. Even in miniature form, thunder and lightning were no less than thunder and lightning. Every stomp upon her looming cloud sent bolts hurtling towards unfortunate earthponies and unicorns fleeing the scene, or those smart-flanked pegasi who thought they could evade the reach of Lieutenant Scratch’s cannon. Being a former cloudsmare did, after all, have its perks.

In short, it was a very, very cool tandem fight.

“Take take!” she yelled at one of the pegasi, who’d tried to sneak up on her from behind, only for her to spin around abruptly and, with a mighty kick to the jaw, send him cork-swirling.

Very cool indeed.

“Watch your back!” Mist shouted, giving her stormcloud another stomp. The precise lightning struck a burly-looking earthstallion just as he was about to stomp on Vinyl. The unicorn gave Mist a hearty nod, before firing her cannon onto the last pegasi standing, or rather, flying.

And with that final bass drop, the fight was over.

“Great job with the cover, Mist!” Scratch called out, as the pegasus hopped down from the dissipating cloud, beaming.

“Nah, it was nothing special,” she replied cheerfully. “You, on the other hoof, did awesome.”

“Hey, just another day on the job, Misty,” Scratch said with a casual shrug, one hoof outstretched for a hi-hoof. “These thugs look like tough ponies, but are lightweights compared to the Tyrant's newfoals, royal guards, and PER, believe me! I’ve had martial arts sparring sessions that gave me worse headaches than this. But, now what?” she wondered, nudging an unconscious stallion.

“Well, Wolfsschanze should be joining up with us soon enough,” Mist said, tapping her chin. “But we’ve got cleanup to do over here and I have no idea how we’ll start.”

“Present!”

The booming voice of Corporal Wolfsschanze suddenly chimed in, earning the expected results from two startled mares.

“GAAH! Wolff!” Mist exclaimed. “Don’t do that!”

“Sorry, ma’am,” their griffon teammate said sheepishly, compounding his words by giving the two mares a respectful salute.

“Right, right,” Mist grumbled, ignoring Vinyl’s snickering. “Anything new you’ve got, Wolff?”

“Nah, nothing particularly good, Lieutenant, but saw a couple of them move to the claypit,” he explained, thumbing towards a wooden barrier at a fair distance from the brickyard proper. “Gilford’s off with his own tasks in the courtyard, I believe.”

“Tough luck,” Vinyl groaned. “As I recall, strange goings-on in the pit are what provided Command with the impetus to enact Plan B. We’d better check this out. Could use a helping hoof or hand here, or two,”

“Vinyl?” Mist asked, her tone growing wary.

The Lieutenant nodded slowly, levitating her cannon closer to her. “Listen, Misty,” she said. “Get a cloud cover up. Somethin’s about to go down here.”

The ritual was close to completion.

Although eye contact was no requirement, Cihuateto preferred to keep these charges of hers within her sights when she called them forth, perhaps due to some lingering sense of an obligation which had been unjustly torn from her a long time ago. Hence she never did blink while she beheld the ever greater mass of boiling steam the claypool was becoming.

Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Blackjack nod approvingly, if a little tensely.

“Good show, Macua. Proof that come what may, the house always wins.” Making a display of chortling at his own wit, he stalked over to face the still-bound Fuse. “Well then, Shorty, guess this’ll at least give the boss something to smile about. Seems you haven’t quite passed your use-by date after all.”

The brickmaker made a half-hearted attempt at giving him the evil eye. “Oh, shut yer trap. Just go ahead and do me in, see if I care. Ain’t like being the bad guy didn’t lose its charm long before any of this went down,” he stated wearily. “Only regret I’ve got is how bad I turned out to be at acting one’a the good guys... and maybe it’s me age talkin’... but from what I see, as time goes by... the bad just keep getting worse...”

“A parting grace, from you? How charming, and so very uncharacteristic.”

“Ya oughta be ashamed of yerselves,” Fuse seethed, gesturing, as well he could through the rope bindings, towards her. “Time was, I remember, when we wouldn’t dream of touchin’ that sorta stuff, all them black mystical doohickys and alien tech. Aye, trade ‘em off to the highest bidder, sure, but that’s business, not the same as takin’ it all for one’s own. I knew it weren’t loyalty that brung Locksmith back to me. Yet, never would I’ve thought he’d stoop so low as any money-grubbin’ collector or schemin’ general, actually wanting those things.”

Hearing this, Cihuateto permitted herself a word for this stallion she’d never known, or would know now, without looking around once.

“Loyalty is a two-way path, colt. You made your choice when you chose to leave Doctor Caballeron’s gang in years past, and if it has changed in ways outside your liking, you’ve none to blame but yourself.”

Blackjack smirked cruelly. “I notice your dear little wife isn’t at your side, Fuse. Am I to take it, then, that she knew nothing ‘bout your new misbehavior?” He tutted in mock sympathy. “Should have considered the grief it’d cause her, trying out your game at going solo. Oh, you were a good player, aye, but even at your prime, you always fared better in a partnership.”

“A most valued gift,” affirmed Cihuateto, gracing at her companion with the slightest of smiles. “Not one thrown away lightly. In, or out…” She tapped a hoof meaningfully, in the direction of where something was rising from its bed of churning earth. “There is no middle ground.”

A rotten-looking hoof burst from the murky depths of the pool, clawing for the solid ground of the sunlit world above. What it heralded was the emerge of an equine skull pulling itself out from the dirt, its yellowed teeth clicking together as sand and dust began weaving themselves around its skeletal form, but not the entirety of it. Half the skull remained open for all to see as it snapped downwards, thrashing, to proudly raise its head.

With no little satisfaction, Blackjack patted the gawking Fuse on the shoulder. “Brings back fond memories, doesn’t it, me ole pal? Gotta admit, our world is so full of amazing sights.” A light began to shine atop his horn, the dull grey of his aura appearing in fibres all around the brickmaker’s sturdy frame. “Be glad this’ll be one of your last. Or the last, if you’re lucky.”

At these words, Cihuateto felt her eyelids sag somewhat. Yet she made herself ignore the burdensome weight threatening to close in, never far away, always for her to accept like a proper, dutiful workhorse. This was who she was now.

“Mother has to feed her newborn,” she said simply, looking over the monstrous, beautiful creature struggling to get out and into the light. “Another single drop would do, but… it’ll remember its first taste of life, and keep wanting more.” The earthmare was surprised to hear she sounded almost apologetic. “I cannot allow it to get distracted by earthly pleasures. Best let it satisfy its hungers immediately, if I’m to gain its full obedience.”

“Unless you’d rather it took someone else,” Blackjack specified. “Could be anyone. Ideally, though, you’d best give it something it’d like very much. Something so close to you, their blood would taste nearly as sweet to it as yours...”

“Look, if ya want me to plead with ya to spare Minus’ life…” Fuse breathed in. “Ya can go take a leap off a pier. Be wastin’ your time, anyway. She don’t need me to keep her safe… except maybe from herself.”

“Ah, now we get to the rub,” said Blackjack. “Couldn’t stomach her flirting with danger by hanging around humans, could you?”

“She… always did…” Fuse let his head hang low. “Like playin’ with fire… too much…”

“My, my. If I didn’t know better, I’d call it jealousy on your part.”

But the brickmaker only closed his eyes at that. Evidently, he had nothing left to say.

Something wet splashed upon Cihuateto’s cheek. She blinked twice, bemused by the unexpected moisture. Surely she wasn’t shedding a tear for this fool? No, surely not. Frowning, yet hesitant to divert her gaze from where her concentration was truly needed, she willed her eyes to wander only an inch, then two and three more, upwards, straining against the temptation to blink.

Up in the skies was a blue pegasus riding a cloud, forehooves raised for a downward kick.

Gasping, heart-in-her-mouth at the realization of what was about to happen, Cihuateto forcefully pushed aside her abrupt shot of panic and diverged her energies into the force holding up her sword, urgently ordering it to take flight and pierce the offender before they could ruin everything by bringing the rains.

Unfortunately, this wasn’t quite what the blue pegasus had in mind, for no sooner had Cihuateto drawn out her sword, did a lightning bolt strike the ground in front of her, the backblast knocking her backward.

“No…”

And then came the downpour.

The world turned into a wall of water, obscuring everything from view so that Cihutateto could barely see three paces ahead of her, turning the already sodden ground underhoof into a mess of sticking, sucking fury, as she felt herself almost go under once more, the torrential rain beating down on her like the fist of an angry god.

“Macua!” she heard Blackjack call out.

That was bad enough. What was worse, though, was the sight which met her in the bubbling chaos the pool had turned into. Her creation, still only half-formed from clay and bone, began to dissolve before her eyes, earthen components congealing into pure mud, running down the ribcage and the spinal column like a stream of melted wax.

But her senses did not fail her. “Take the brickmaker!” she roared in Blackjack’s direction. “This will not stop me forever!”

He did not respond, not in words, yet somewhere through the thick of curtain of water, Cihuateto was sure she spotted Blackjack beating a rather hasty retreat, dragging their prisoner uphill with his aura.

Not before time, either, as the freak storm began to recede as quickly as it had burst.

“Incoming!” called out a loud, booming voice..

From behind her, the wooden barrier separating claypit from the greater brickyard exploded into splinters, one of them striking Cihuateto as several blurry figures stormed the area. Disorientated, the earthmare fell to her knees, feeling as though several needle-sharp impacts had just embedded themselves into her hocks. Though no real damage was done, the pain finished breaking her focus.

From the corner of her eye, she barely spotted a shadow submerged in the claypool...

“Net Launch!”

And no time to register the fat griffon’s shout, when she found herself entangled inside a net.

“You know, Wolff,” the blue pegasus cried from her cloud, “No need to call all your attacks, this ain’t a LARP.”

“But don'tcha see, that’s the whole fun of it!”

Snow Mist wiped a trickle of sweat from her brow. Even if she was feeling a bit annoyed at her griffon friend’s behavior, there was little reason not to be satisfied. Their ambush had worked; the strange prisoner Vinyl was currently scrutinizing served as proof enough of that.

“What now?” she started, looking uncertainly over Vinyl’s shoulder.

“Just you wait,” the lieutenant responded officiously. “Got a few questions for this one here.” Pushing up her shades, Vinyl leaned in closer to their captive. “So,” she said cooly, nudging the struggling earthmare. “Whatcha planning over there?”

But the captive had nothing to offer them except for a spit to the ground.

“Well, guess if she ain’t talking, she ain’t talking,” Snow Mist stated matter-of-factly. “We’re not outfitted for interrogations.”

Vinyl grinned fiendishly. “You so sure ‘bout that?” she demanded, tapping her bass cannon. To Mist’s alarm, it was pointed at their captive’s head. “They do say music soothes the savage beast, like a good friend of mind could tell you…”

“Pretty sure,” Mist replied with anxious rapidity. “With all due respect, Lieutenant, we don’t need her brains splattered all over the courtyard. We’ve got a sniper for that, and if I know her at all, she doesn’t do pink vapors.”

“Oh, oh!” piped up Wolfsschanze. “I can help!”

“No, Wolf,” Mist told him off. “You’re not using this emergency as an excuse. No singing.”

Her friend and comrade looked so dejected at that, she felt bad. It wasn’t that she dreaded the prospect of his singing voice, much on the contrary, it was just that Corporal Wolfsschanze, no songbird on the outside, most certainly was one at heart; he didn’t always understand there was a time and a place.

“What’re our options then?” Vinyl inquired, leaning back against her cannon.

“We could bring her to the Sarge.”

“From what I understand, your Sergeant Jaka doesn’t condone police brutality.”

“Could always do a Good Cop, Bad Cop routine?” suggested Wolfsschanze. “I think I know exactly who’d...”

“Nah,” said Mist. “She’s too nice for questioning things, especially with these types.”

“I was talking about Morning, not Ana.”

“Well, shucks,” Vinyl said, sniggering. “You guys better come up with something, if you’re so fixated on doing things the ‘soft’ way!”

A low, raspy chuckle wiped away her grin. The captive, it would seem, had finally chosen to express herself openly.

“Soft?” the strange earthmare repeated in a monotone. “You came here expecting only to find the childlike fears of these Equestrians. You may find that all your night terrors, the deeper shadows which lurk behind the trees of the Everfree, or far below the surface of the Eastern Ocean, can find their face here too… and you shall be unable to rid yourselves of them through mere laughter!”

Something in her tone made Snow Mist shudder. No great surprise there, for words such as these still had the power to bring back echoes of the filly she’d once been. But she hadn’t expected their effects on Wolfsschanze.

“Oh, no...” he clucked. “Guys? I think she means it. Look at her markings.”

As Vinyl Scratch, outwardly exuding professional calm, lowered her shades to peer over the bizarre tattoos all over the captive’s body, Wolfsschanze was pointing at, Mist was shocked to see something new appear in her eyes. Something raw, animal.

“Corporal,” she snapped, with none of her previous levity. “Where’re the others?”

Uneasy, Mist kept silent as Wolfsschanze replied. “Second Lieutenant Gilford’s busy with perimeter cleanup, ma’am, and Second Lieutenant Coxa’s dispatching stragglers from the last report.”

“Scram ‘em here as fast as you can, we need all the help we can get, and on the quick!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! What’s the sudden rush!”

“Second Lieutenant, listen,” said Vinyl. “This whole thing’s been fishy from the start, and I can’t afford for anything else going wrong. Those tattoos… I don’t know what they mean, but I’ve spent the last three years serving under a guy who’s got more’n blood and ink running through his veins for it. Whatever she was jabbering on about, she can follow up on it. And it won’t be pretty.”

“So, what’re we waiting around for?” Mist exclaimed, ruffling her wings in anticipation. “C’mon, let’s go, time’s short!”

“Hold on,” said Vinyl, glancing back towards the vacated clapit. “I think I’ll go check whatever she’s hiding. Second Lieutenant, you go bring our lil’ prisoner over here to the Sarge. Best option we’ve got. Corporal, I need you get to Gilford and Coxa, and then rendezvous with the Sarge.”

Mist began to protest, yet her unicorn friend shushed her with a hoof.

“Sorry, Mist,” Vinyl affirmed as her horn glowed, as she channeled a field of thaums around the bass cannon. “But I got a feeling this needs a bit more firepower.”

Miss Peachbottom, the injured mare, was, to Harwood’s great chagrin, not quite as useful as he thought she might turn out to be. No matter how calm, how friendly he behaved, how he’d taken the care of moving her to a secluded office, the frightened little pony couldn’t spit out any sort of salvageable info about the Loyalists.

“So, let me get this perfectly straight, miss,” Harwood began, addressing the hurt yet recovering mare lying on the office couch, his most polite of voices in full sway even as he strained against the urge for sarcasm. “You’ve got no clue how, when, or why you’ve found yourself in this brickyard, and there’s nothing you can tell me about, ah, Mister Icewind or Doctor Catseye?”

“I’m sorry, mister, but… no, I can’t remember it.”

Pause. Harwood was now resisting the urge to groan out or slap his forehead in frustration. But a look at the mare’s bruises, healing as they were, gave him an idea.

“Miss, I need you to listen very carefully,” he said calmly, reaching for one of the bandages he’d placed on the desk. “These injuries of yours... who did this to you?”

His patient mumbled under her breath. But Harwood would have his answers.

“Miss, I’ve seen my fair share of injuries in the field, and yours are quite clearly the result of consistently applied abuse, something I’m hardly fond of myself. Now, I can assure you we’ll find whoever’s the bastard in charge around here, and between you and I, I’d love to put him in his place.”

Without smiling, Harwood reached out for her hoof. She did not pull away.

“Would you be so kind as to tell us who did this?”

“... Locksmith,” she whispered. “I-it was Locksmith. He’s th-the big grey pegasus.”

“Ah,” Harwood stated, hands working diligently to bandage Miss Peachbottom’s injuries. He didn’t know the extent of her wounds, but the bruises’ positioning implied some of her internal organs might have got damaged. Best not to reflect upon that.

“There we go,” he said, patting the mare as he gazed upon her newly bandaged barrel. “I apologize for the lack of hygiene here, but, well, it’s a bit difficult all things considered. This is the best I could do.”

Miss Peachbottom nodded, forming a small, grateful smile, one which Harwood gladly returned, even though it hardly met his eyes.

‘Anything for some intel, I suppose.’

“Right, miss,” Harwood began, preparing to hoist his patient over. “You can rest now. It’ll be quite a while before I’ll check up on you later.”

“Th-thank you, mister.”

“Nah, it’s all good, jus’ calm down a bit, and the pain should wear off.”

A familiar static crackle emanated from his radio.

“This is Nordjell reporting in. Is the situation under control? Over.”

“Will you excuse me, Miss Peachbottom?” Harwood apologized to the mare on the couch, who merely closed her eyes to sink into blissful, recuperating sleep after her ordeal. Satisfied that she’d be alright, the medical officer crept out the office, gently closing the door with both hands before grabbing the radio slung over his breastplate.

“Harwood speaking, go ahead, Ana.”

“Oh! Er, got everything covered, Har?”

The voice of his partner-in-crime and friend brought a glow to his heart.

“It’s pretty clear down here. Good job on the cover.”

From the radio, Harwood could hear his friend exhale a faint sigh of relief.

“Well, it’s nothing, Har. It’s mostly you guys, I guess, thanks anyway. But, how many?”

“Two. Neither of them yours, Ana, I can assure you.” Harwood answered quickly, keeping his eyes averted from the door behind which the mare lay sleeping. To his inward gladness, Ana let out a small laugh.

“Happy to know it, Har. I’m running a bit low on ammo here, down to one mag. Sorry.”

“It’s quite alright, we’re moving out of your range.” Harwood said, checking over his SMG. “We can handle ourselves in there, they seem quite terrified. And don’t worry ‘bout anyone else we’ve knocked out, they’ll be safe till backup comes.”

“I think they’ve got it covered, Thomas. HQ’s sending ‘em within the hour. You keep yourself safe down there, alright?”

“Why, thank you, fair princess, I’ll keep that in mind,” Harwood crooned in his best gentleman’s voice, as he strolled down the hall, off to meet Sergeant Jaka in the kilnhouse.

“As a matter of fact, the radio is far from a place to make small talk during a raid, Corporal. You know better than this, I presume?” Jaka’s stern voice cut in.

With a bemused sigh, Harwood shrugged.

“Sorry, Sarge, thought she’d feel better with answers and such, eh? And hey! It’s Ana we’re talking about here, so I believe it doesn’t actually count, Sarge.”

“Yes,” Jaka deadpanned. “And speaking of answers, have you gotten anything useful from that mare you were bandaging?”

“Ah, as a matter of fact, I did,” Harwood said. “They’re all quite, quite safe in those office spaces right over there, so if you’d like to ask them yourselves you’re welcome to try. Anyways, I have a name, Sarge. Locksmith, think that’s what she told me. That burly, ashen pegasus fellow Ana spotted from her perch, the nasty little fuck.” Harwood knew the Sergeant frowned upon his choice of words, but he didn’t quite care. “Ringleader of sorts, the bugger personally had a hoof in beating up some of our prisoners over there.”

“Where’d your patient say he was going?”

“The delivery depot, I believe,” Harwood said. “We have to assume he was planning to lie low as everything fell apart around him, but there’s only two ways in or out to that particular warehouse, and one of them, the door connecting it to the kilnhouse, has been cemented shut, probably to keep the hostages from hiding inside a crate.”

“Noted. And what of Sergeant Bauer’s location?”

“She… said she didn’t know of anyone by that name, Sarge,” Harwood admitted. “Very hard to credit, I know, yet something about her voice suggests she was being truthful. Hopefully, Command will know what to make of that.”

Jaka’s mouth tightened at this revelation.

“In that case, we may have to proceed towards interrogating these criminals themselves.”

“What’s the matter, Blackjack?” Fuse wheezed fitfully, hunched over the grassy knoll. “What, can’t ya deal with a lil’ surprise every once in a while?”

Blackjack fixed him with a nasty, murderous stare. “Surprises are workable. Utter steamin’ mess where we don’t get paid? Not so much.”

“That ain’t,” Fuse paused to catch a breath. “That ain’t no excuse, Jackyboy,” He struggled to look towards the unicorn. “Second something goes south, you jus’ decide to high-tail it,” he commented, in-between a growing snicker. “Cihuateto ain’t gonna be happy ‘bout that!”

“Shut UP!” Blackjack roared, decking him in the jaw. “You don’t know when to stop, do you?”

“I dunno,” Fuse replied, shrugging wistfully behind his bonds. “You tell me.”

“My pleasure,” snarled Blackjack, grey aura alighting around his ‘tie’ of a baton. “Macua’s fancy ritual was a good idea, but guess what? I’m finishing this now…”

“Hey! YOU!” yelled a furious voice. “Get your stinkin’ hooves off my husband!”

“Wait!” another voice, more refined and anxious, called after the first.

Even with this forewarning, the blow came with such startling speed that Blackjack failed to react in time when something crashlanded into his side, both he and his assailant, knocked higgledy-piggledy into the verdant density of the undergrowth. They each vanished from sight in the bushes, but when Fuse saw a white forehoof raise itself from the leaves and promptly punch downwards with a resounding ‘crack’, he knew it was too lithe and manicured to belong to the unicorn stallion.

Within a matter of seconds, Blackjack had gone down for the count.

“Wow, Rarity,” gaped the first voice. “Way ahead, girl, didn’t know you were that strong!”

Oh, no. Fuse gulped, recognizing who the voice belonged to.

“I… I just wanted to shove him back, not bury him,” muttered Rarity, that fashion-obsessed mare whose sister kept climbing over his workplace’s wall with her two troublesome friends, marching back into his field of view. “Well, when you train with the princesses and personal trainers, something is bound to happen.”

“Right.”

Minus gave a little chuckle, yet it soon dissipated as she walked over to his position, a frown forming upon her face as she took in the sight of him.

Fuse grimaced, knowing he was in deep, and now there was nothing more he could do other than simply take it like a stallion.

“Miney, I’m…” he started, only to earn a glare in response.

His wife waved him off. “We’ll talk about it later,” she hissed, giving his fastenings a tug. “Right now, what matters most is that I get you outta these ropes. Ah… yep, whoever did this knew their knots... looks like I’m gonna have to prove my bite’s worse’n my bark. Again. Don’t you move an inch.”

Fuse kept still as Minus worked on the ropes, but saw Rarity fixing him with a small, ummistakeable look of displeasure. “Can I help you, miss? I know my pretty looks ain’t there at the moment, but staring at me ain’t gonna make it go away.”

“I’m just wondering what possessed you to do such a cruel thing,” Rarity commented as she peered around their treeline. “Shiftless ruffian though I always knew you to be, and a lout, kidnapping an officer of a foreign army isn’t something one does on the spur-of-the-moment.”

“Well,” said Fuse after a moment’s thought. “I wish I could say, but… someone cut them out of my brain, it seems.” He chuckled. “Thought that wasn’t very legal.”

“Oh, like t‘atf e’er ftopped ‘ou?” Minus harrumphed between her bites, yanking the ropes a little harder than strictly necessary.

“Hey! Watch the teeth now, sweetheart.” Fuse tried giving Minus a roguish grin, but it faltered as her glare turned threatening. Playful banter wouldn’t help much here. “I’m being serious. Can barely remember the last few days, heck, more than a few days, if memory serves.”

“You don’t know why?” Rarity prodded him. He just shrugged.

“Heck if I know. Locksmith’s the one spouting out a mare’s name without meaning to me,” Fuse replied, straining against the ropes for a second. “Probably fake.”

“Bro’a’ly?” Minus asked.

“Too neat,” Fuse explained, stretching his forehooves experimentally thanks to the leeway his wife had lent him. Then, channeling an earthpony’s preternatural physical strength, he held both forelegs out and pushed…

The ropes snapped open. “Thanks, Minus.”

A hard stare and a grunt were her sole acknowledgement, yet he knew his Minus, and so he turned around swiftly to wrap her in a bear hug, catching her off-guard, yes he did. At first, she made a feeble gesture to push him away, but soon caved and tightly returned the hug, letting him know in silence that, despite it all, she was happy to see him alive and kicking.

Rarity just coughed and looked away. Funny, that. He thought she enjoyed this sort of stuff.

After a while, Minus broke off the hug. “So, Locksmith as well?” she whispered. “But why’s he still here? Figured he’d have ran, first chance he got, once the authorities entered the picture.”

Unsure what to say, Fuse winced at her words. “Doc Caballeron… he… the gang’s different, Minus. Really different. Not sure why I called them, but I think it had t’do with the humans… now, I sort of regret gettin’ involved at all, if this is the new gang.”

Minus and Rarity stared in shock while he explained as fast as he could what small bits and pieces he did remember – Discord, the pure brutality the gang had displayed, the strange magics at their disposal.

“I can’t believe this has been happening in Equestria…” Rarity murmured, still trying to process the information. She heard a muffled sound in the bushes behind her.

“I may have tried something myself...” Fuse admitted. “But, I’m not sure… I know that it was for you, but now I just feel…. tired.” He closed his eyes in regret.

And something propelled by magical force hit Rarity in the hocks.

“Augh!” she yelped, collapsing on herself from the surprise blow to her lower body.

Before either Fuse or Minus could do anything to help, a pallid grey aura materialized around his wife, grabbing her in magic and slamming her to the ground.

Roaring with a sudden surge of rage, he leapt up to confront the attacker, but Blackjack’s baton merely swerved around and bashed the side of his face, as it had done so many times earlier on this unending day, sending him rolling.

Minus hissed in anger, pushing herself up. “You should've stayed down, Blackjack!”

“And you should’ve stayed a good housewife,” Blackjack taunted her. “But we can’t both get what we want, now, can we?”

From his vantage point, Fuse groaned as he saw his wife take flight and unleash a veritable tidal wave of blows that would have caused him worry all those years ago. Alas, Blackjack merely appeared insenstive to, if not outright bored by her furious knocks, be it to his crest, his withers or his back.

Dismayed, he witnessed Blackjack punch the full weight of the baton into his wife’s barrel. She leapt backwards with a pained yelp, bent over in attempt to regain her breath.

“Blast,” Minus exhaled, cradling her chest. “I’m not as young as I once was.”

“No, you’re not,” Blackjack commented as he stood over her, baton raised high.

But he’d forgotten a very special someone in the melee. Fuse barreled into his side, launching his own attack against the unicorn. Yet this did nothing to deter Blackjack, who, though knocked aside, was quick to seize back his standing and return a vigorous blow to Fuse’s point-of-shoulder. Through the daze, he believed he heard Minus wince in sympathy.

“You’re not young either, Shorty… Perhaps it would be best to put you out to pasture.”

Blackjack narrowed his eyes at the stallion. And vanished in a flash of light, a second later, before he could make good on his threat, as several hastily-sharpened branches impacted on the spot he’d just been standing on.

“Drat!” Rarity exclaimed. She reacted with admirable reflex, though, rolling aside to avoid a blow to the head, levitating up piece of logwood and throwing it at Blackjack. He avoided it, but barely, scowling as he lifted his baton with practiced ease to confront the fashionista.

“That would've killed me.”

“And I’m sure it would haunt me later,” Rarity said quietly. “But at the moment, you are an enemy who’s proven willing to kill. Believe me, darling… I would rather not, but you clearly have no qualms in doing so… So, I have to revert to the training I gained from Major Bauer. To which end I’ll worry less about you, and more about my friends’ well-being.”

Beside Fuse’s prone form, several scattered rocks began to rise in the air, channeled by the wilful mare as she held her ground, legs spread out in position, ready to pounce if need be.

The brickmaker sighed to himself, feeling nearly as spent as when he’d landed in his kiln. He’d seen the look on Rarity’, fussy, preening Rarity’s face, and it was the picture of a person willing to get themselves dirty.

However, when Minus scuttled over to him, clinging onto her battered campaign hat, he felt a new calm wash over him. He and Ponyville’s snob dressmaker may never get along, yet she fought for those she called her friends, and by extension, those closest to them.

Harwood scanned the crowded room, with its assortment of inmates, presumed kidnappers-turned-hostages on one end and presumed career criminals on the other, each group kept separate by a cordon under the watch of Gilford and Coxa, as much on the lookout for suspicious movement as he. His lip curled.

“Now, I’m sure this all seems a… little uncomfortable,” he told them. “But rest assured, you will all be safe here until this whole business is over.”

Even his words felt a little empty, for the room, presumably some sort of storage area, was not looking so safe with gangsters and Loyalists alike imprisoned inside.

“Don’t you think I’ve forgotten about you criminal cunts. If I see so much a scratch or yet another hoofprint on one of our prisoners here, I’ll make sure you’ll regret every single breath for the rest of your sorry-arse lives. And that’s something I mean quite literally.”

A certain blue pegasus came running, carrying a netted earthmare slung over her shoulder.

“Snow Mist? What’re you–”

“In a rush here, Harwood. Got this criminal mare bound, she did some magic thing, and Vinyl stayed to check on it, being a unicorn and all. Really, where’s the Sarge? This cloudsmare right here needs to go to the him and–”

“The Sarge is busy overseeing the clean-up, Mist,” Harwood replied curtly. He gave the earthmare in the net hoisted over Mist’s back a lookover. “Hmph. You’re a bit of an Aztec wannabe, aren’t you?”

The earthmare merely shot him a hateful glare, one of her oversized earrings jangling against her exposed nape. For some reason, the sound sent a small shiver down Harwood’s spine. Despite his glibness, he suddenly felt glad at seeing her all netted up.

“She’s, uh,” Mist began sheepishly, “With the ‘gangsters’, I think,”

“Throw her in with the rest of the lot,” Harwood said quickly. “We’ll talk to Jaka later.”

Snow Mist obliged him, setting down the net and its captive none-too-gently amidst the other cordoned ponies.

Only, though it was perhaps just his imagination, as the out of place earthmare touched back down, the moment she pressed a single hoof to the ground, Harwood thought he felt a tremor pass through the floor of the storage area, past the doorway, into the open space beyond, and for the tiniest second, a wicked grin of triumph lit up the earthmare’s face.

Vinyl followed the trail of strange magic, tracing all around the edge of the circular claypit.

She hadn’t expected she would need to call upon these honed-in senses here, on the world rapidly becoming known as ‘Equus Prime’ to her and her peers. The senses of a unicorn who’d learned to attune herself with peculiar magics in the heat of battle, oftentimes marking the difference between friend and foe, living and Newfoal. Whatever witchcraft that earthmare had performed, it was magic such as she had never felt before. Not dark per se. Just different, closer to zebra magic than anything she could categorize.

Feeling a tingle beneath her hooves, Vinyl glanced downwards, but saw little of note past the permanent purple tinge of her shades. With a stifled noise of discontent, she lifted them to peer closer at the track circling the claypit. There, very indistinctly, it was if tiny ripples traced along the surface of the earth, like the disturbance on the water’s surface after a pebble thrown into a pond. Except they were all moving towards the centerpoint of the pit.

“Fishy...” she muttered to herself. “Something wicked this way comes…”

A commotion caught her attention, somewhere from a treeline a couple dozen paces off to her left. North-West, she reminded herself sharply, that position would be roughly to the north-west of the brickyard, far end of the claypit, according to scout’s estimate – one must never fall out of military parlance when on a mission.

Dragging her bass cannon along for the ride, Vinyl hurried towards the spot, and what a peculiar view befell her in a clearing behind the trees. Miss Rarity, of all ponies levitating a bunch of logs and sharpened branches as impromptu weaponry, all pointed towards a large white unicorn holding a baton aloft in his aura.

Both turned to see Vinyl looking at them. Relief spread across Rarity’s demeanour, but the unicorn stallion spat at the ground and promptly vanished in a flash of light.

“Damn it!” Vinyl scowled, acutely aware of being the last of the three white unicorns to walk this clearing in the past minute or so. “Teleporting is such a hack! Now I’m gonna have to radio and warn the guys we could have an imminent security breach…”

“Vinyl… Oh, I’m sorry,” Rarity corrected herself as she took note of her attire. “Lieutenant.”

The erstwhile DJ shrugged it off. “Ponyville,” she laughed. “The one place where monsters, evil villains, and Cutie Mark Crusaders all come together to cause disaster after disaster.” She let her mirth runs its course as it should, before looking to Fuse and pointing.

“You,” Vinyl said sternly. “You match our operative’s description of Major Bauer’s abductor. Although it’ll take a while to digitize everything in Canterlot’s records, we found the time to run up your files. Originally from Gildedale, ran away due to rejection of authority, accumulated previous convictions for charges ranging from petty street theft to complicity in the illicit appropriation of national treasure. Four years out of eight served in the Canterlot dungeons. All in all, sir, one can say you’re in a lot of trouble.”

This did not have quite the reaction she anticipated. “I wish I could tell ya ‘yes’,” Short Fuse muttered abashedly. “But I’m having a bit of an issue on why exactly I’m in trouble.”

Vinyl cocked her head at this. “What?”

“Memory loss,” explained the sandy pegasus standing by Fuse. “Some sorta spell, I think, wiped him and everypony in his group clean. My husband could still drench up something, former tomb raider and all, but you won’t get the whole story at once.”

“Well,” said Vinyl, digesting this unwelcome bit of news, “that’s neither here nor there,” she curtly affirmed, magically reaching into her vest’s front pocket to pull out a pair of hoofcuffs. “I’m sorry to say, procedure and duty require me to put those on you.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know the procedure already,” said Fuse, reaching out with his left forehoof – Vinyl noticed the right one appeared quite badly injured, with the pegasus who’d identified Fuse as her husband was stroking it reassuringly – and allowing the cuff to clamp down on it. “Just a shame those ain’t so pretty as any in the home collection,” he commented off-handedly, now letting the other cuff clamp his right forehoof.

Vinyl resisted the urge to make a snappy reply. “Let’s just go,” she told the other two mares. “Once this perp is in, all we need to do is retrieve the Major, my personal responsibility as PHL, and get out of here.”

“Lieutenant,” Rarity began hesitantly. “There’s something you should know. In the woods…”

“Tell me about it on the way,” Vinyl said, starting back down the track she’d come from, pushing her bass cannon ahead of her.

And so the group walked on in stony silence, past the rim of the claypit, Vinyl silently saying her prayers that nothing truly bad had occurred today. But Rarity might need a pep talk after that moment in the clearing. Perhaps Marcus could provide, as he’d done for her back at Donut Joe’s this morning.

It felt so long ago.

The pegasus, a Ranger if her outfit was to be believed, was also visibly battling her feelings.

“I am still mad at you, you know,” she told Fuse. “Only, it’d feel kinda wrong to chastise a guy for something they don’t remember… and much as I hate to see you in the slammer, I sort of feel proud you’re as good as asking them for a cell your size.”

Fuse chortled. “Hey, not all selfless on my part. Still feeling a bit roughed-up here, and don’t mind me, but say what ya will ‘bout home comforts, there ain’t no better than prison bars for a bit of the ol’ butt-scratch.”

The Ranger punched his shoulder at this vulgar remark, yet it was obvious how she choked back a giggle. Or perhaps simply choking, for she was suddenly sent into a series of wheezing, racking coughs, forced to halt midstep and pull back her forehoof. Before Vinyl, or Rarity, could beat him to it, Fuse had stopped by his wife, looking her over with concern.

“What’s the matter, Minus? You’re all sickly.”

“Blackjack… truncheon…” she groaned, nursing her belly. “Oh, this is gonna ruin my appetite. Ugh! Well, maybe that ain’t such a bad thing,” she added chipperly, putting on a brave face. “Without you, I’m left to do my own cooking, and best I can say there is, haven’t had any juice burnt yet, at least.”

Vinyl noted that for some reason, this made Rarity pull a face. In any case, Fuse gently nuzzled his pale-looking wife’s forehead.

“Shh… easy there,” he whispered. “Think back, imagine yourself in the forest depths…”

The pegasus mare, Minus, perked up slightly. “That… brings back… memories, as it were.” She placed a forehoof on his shoulder, the same shoulder she’d punched. “And, in a way, guess your missing remembrances... make us even now.”

“Ah, maybe I messed up. But hey, at least I can officially claim I lost my mind.”

He laughed out loud at his bon mot, only to to be cut short by a hiss of pain, as a clawed hoof burst from over the claypit’s edge and latched onto his foreleg.

“YOW! Let go, you TOSSER!”

Furiously, Fuse slammed his hoof several times into the emerging face, but the cuffs severely hampered his efforts, and worse still, the thing was ignoring the blows and attempting to bite straight into his foreleg.

Alerted by this, Rarity and Vinyl’s horns shone as one, unlatching the claw and shoving it back down the hole. For a whole two seconds, as it turned out.

With a roar, something burst back over the edge in a blinding cloud of dust and dirt, both its claw-like appendages digging into the track where everyone was left standing stock-still, watching the ghastly apparition in mute shock, none daring to approach and look closer.

“... Why does Lyra like hands again?” Rarity muttered in a low monotone voice, while staring at the scimitar shaped claws. “That looks like… someone took a hoof and cut it up into five… how aesthetically awful…”

Vinyl’s eyes widened as she felt a blast of uncanny magic surge forth, in synch with the moment the creature chose to fully reveal itself. With a collective gasp, all four ponies took a horrified step back, scarcely daring to believe the sight before their eyes.

“ZOMBIE?! What the fuck!” Vinyl screeched. “You three, get outta here!”

And it did very much look like a zombie. Without thinking, Vinyl swiftly channeled as much energy as she could into her horn, firing off a lazer-beam at the creature’s skull-like face. It turned out she might as well have been spitting at the sun.

With a chatter of its teeth, the zombie-thing no less than ate the shot which should have shattered its jaw, swallowing the energy in a ball of light sent travelling down its throat, all-too-visible through the half-exposed layers of clay and bone as the digested shot reached the creature’s belly and vanished.

“What… how…” Vinyl muttered. “Okay, that didn’t work… Just go, for Lyra’s sake!”

The Ranger nodded, pulling Fuse along as quickly as she could muster, but Rarity resolutely moved to hold the line at Vinyl’s side.

“Sorry dear, I’m a soldier too. I have been training with Major Bauer all this time.”

“Oh good, cos’ I think I may need help.” Vinyl commented, watching in bewilderment as, instead of going for them, the creature pulled itself out of the pit to stalk after the couple retreating down the track. “Hey! Dead Head Fred! Fresh flanks right here!”

“I think it's ignoring us in favor of those two,” said Rarity, magically picking up a sharp rock. She’d plainly deduced that, due to his hoofcuffs, Fuse would not outrun the creature, even with his wife to fire him up. Vinyl silently congratulated her quick thinking as she hurled the rock at the thing’s head, but they were equally startled when it bounced off with no effect. “Shouldn’t that do the trick? Going for the head?”

“I think so?”

“It’s not a zombie!” Minus called out, pulling desperately at her husband. “It’s a ghoul!”

“There’s a difference?” Vinyl shouted, gesticulating wildly. “My bass cannon… where’s my bloody bass ca–”

“It’s a terracotta ghoul,” called the flustered Ranger. “It’s not really alive to begin with, it’s… it’s like a summon of sorts.”

“Great, I know how to deal with that!” Vinyl quipped, rushing forward, past the goul.

In hot pursuit, Rarity stared after her. “You do?”

“Yeah, a shit-ton of firepower to rip it apart, except I don’t HAVE any with me!” Vinyl yelled, her exclamation punctuated by a reverberation of earth as the nearby ghoul stomped down, narrowly missing Fuse, whose wife shoved him away in the nick of time.

With a snarl, Vinyl locked her horn’s energy on Fuse, Rarity doing the same, their forces combined with Minus’ wingpower sufficient to drag him away from the creature. It raised another forehoof, but reacting quickly, the Ranger slammed into it, long enough to knock the creature off-balance and send it tumbling back into the claypit.

They had brought themselves half-a-minute’s respite, off in the confines of the treeline again.

“It’s going after me,” Fuse panted, trying to rest his forehead upon a low-hanging branch. “Just leave me here so ya find what you need, I’ll buy–oof!” he exhaled, getting jabbed in the gut by his wife.

“Yeah, no thanks,” Minus growled at him. “I didn’t work this hard to save your flank just so you could go sacrifice yourself for the ‘greater good’, and all the stupid perks it entails. You keep running, you big oaf.”

“Yes, dear,” Fuse said meekly, ears drooping.

“You seem to know a lot about this, this ‘terracotta ghoul’. Any way we can slow it down?” Vinyl demanded as she caught up to the duo, wading through an inconvenient bush, while Rarity set herself up in a lookout position.

“Sorry,” the Ranger said unhappily. “He’s the one who remembers the great times, not me.”

Fuse heaved somewhat, obviously tired from all of today’s ordeal. Then his downcast eyes found his cuffed forehooves, one of them still sporting an injury which his running had done nothing to help, and he raised it to show Vinyl.

“I have an idea, probably won’t like it.”

“Let me guess… You’re going to smear the red stuff on me.” Vinyl sighed as Fuse nodded. “Frankly speaking, I’d tell you to sod right off, but we need you alive for questioning. I can handle myself long enough, yet it’s imperative you two reach the main building and tell my team I need help, and pronto.”

“I’ll get him there, ma’am, I promise as a Forest Ranger,” his wife pledged to Vinyl. “I know he is my husband and I love the fool dearly, Celestia help me, but he has to make up for what he’s done.”

Fuse didn’t look so put out by this, only smiling and giving her a quick peck on the cheek. “Thanks, Miney.”

“Yeah, yeah, mushy stuff over,” Vinyl gagged. “Guh, by the Golden Lyre, there’s some things I don’t miss so much about the old Equestria...” She picked up Fuse’s foreleg and began to tear at the scabs, making it bleed once more. Fuse barely twitched as a trickle of blood oozed free, and Vinyl quickly smeared it on her own foreleg without issue.

Rarity shivered a little at the scene, but otherwise remained silent, before noting the silence.

“Um… not to be a bother, but that thing hasn’t–”

Vinyl snapped her head to the grassy knoll beneath them. Familiar ripples moved across it.

“Back up!” she cried out in alarm, and the group backed away from each other as the ground bubbled up, then imploded into a freshly-dug pit. Had they moved any later, they’d have gone faling into the depths of the earth. As it was,.the undead creature wrenched itself free and all the way up to the surface world, a baking, steaming mass as rapidly superheated clay finished solidifying around its half-exposed skeletal structure.

It was a sight from Tartarus itself.

“Hey, bone-tard! Fresh blood right here!” Vinyl waved her bloodied leg.

From what they could tell, the beast hardly heard her. However, if the twitch at what passed for its nostrils was anything to go by, it had caught the scent of fresh blood. What’s more, by the look of things, it cared not for where the blood originated, only that it got as much as it could guzzle in the least amount of time – which meant Vinyl, who stood herself much closer in its path than any of the others.

“It’s working,” Rarity whispered to the DJ.

“Yeah…” Vinyl muttered in grim determination. “Get psyched, Rarity. You’re my backup, I’ll take this one. And Miss Ranger?” she added, nodding curtly at Minus. “Either put him under lock and key, send him in a parcel to the authorities, or grab a snack at Sugarcube Corner, I care not, just get the meatbag out of here.”

She moved the bass canon, which had never left her side, into position to combat the ghoul.

“Most of the surrounding area has been cleared of hostiles, Sergeant,” Harwood reported back to Jaka, as his immediate superior and the PHL-assigned chief trainer for units like these Vanhooverites whom Ana seemed so fond of. “Lieutenant Scratch of the PHL and Second Lieutenant Mist of Vanhoover Company managed to secure several stragglers who were attempting to flee the area.”

“I can confirm that, sir!” Wolfsschanze chimed in. “We’re all set and ready to go, Sarge.”

“And where is Lieutenant Scratch?” asked Jaka.

“I was with her, Sarge, together with Corporal Wolfsschanze,” Snow Mist reported. “We captured this weird earthmare, she seemed to be performing some sort of summoning magic, but I’m no expert. The Lieutenant went to check what all the ruckus was about. Haven’t heard from her since, though. I gave the earthmare to Harwood, so you could ask her yourself in the room.”

“She’s right, sir,” Wolfsschanze said gleefully. “Caught her with the net gun, I did!”

“What he doesn’t tell you is that the earthmare plain freaked us out, sir,” Snow Mist added. “The Maker only knows what devilry she’s got up her sleeve.”

“Yes…” Harwood hissed. “Didn’t much like the funny look she was giving me, that one…”

“Corporal Harwood,” Jaka told him sternly. “Anything else to add?”

Harwood retracted guility. “Well, sir, good news is, I can report that prying Major Bauer’s location proved easier than anticipated from the gang members. Several of them were quick to confirm he’s being kept in the drying shed, behind those double doors cemented shut.”

“That is good news,” Jaka acknowledged. “We may soon enter this mission’s final phase. However, until such point, I believe our next priority should be to complete placing the hostage-takers into custody. And that means the capture of the final one unaccounted for, Locksmith, last seen shoring up in the delivery depot.”

“You never said a truer word…” commented Harwood. But he said it beneath his breath.

Sergeant Jaka must have noticed something amiss, though. “Dismissed, Thomas,” he told him gruffly. “If I may, I’d suggest you get some fresh air.”

“Sir?” an elderly voice chimed in from next to Harwood, that of the griffon Gilford. “How are we to proceed with the retrieval of Major Bauer?”

“Once the news is relayed to Overwatch, responsibility for the act of retrieval itself shall revert to PHL authority. And that means passing supervision on to our liaison, Lieutenant Scratch. She had better show up here again soon.”

Everything went wrong so fast.

Having moved back out onto the exposed track at the claypit’s rim, Vinyl managed to dodge left and right, struggling to avoid the creature’s swipes and thrusts with her huge cannon. Again and again she attempted to fire a concentrated blast, but alas, the weapon was simply too bulky and heavy to maneuver with speed.

And eventually, the beast found its mark.

Rarity watched in horror as Vinyl was knocked into the dirt, her bass cannon crushed under the monster’s weight with a sickening ‘crunch’ of breaking metal. As the ghoul retreated to prepare another charge, the DJ, Ears tilted, shades off, unsteadily hobbled over.

“Fuck...” Vinyl said in a small voice, kneeling before the charred wreckage of her speakers. “I’m so sorry, girl,” she whispered, picking up one of the denuded bass ports. “You never did let me down… Should’ve known better, really. What’s good is, playing music loud enough to wake the dead, when faced with a shambling corpse?”

“Worry now, mourn later!” Rarity shrieked as she ran to hook her right foreleg around Vinyl’s left foreleg and then dragging the dejected DJ away from the wrecked bass cannon. Not a moment too soon, for the ghoul reared and crushed with a metallic thud whatever was left of the speakers.

Apparently, Vinyl had no intent of following good advice.

“I WILL AVENGE YOU!” she screamed heavenward.

Now understanding what the Colonel and Major meant when they said war could skewer people’s priorities, Rarty merely huffed, her tug at Vinyl’s leg growing more insistent. Her own magic was busy trying to keep the ghoul off its hooves by slamming various improvised, hastily-shaven wooden spears into its joints, but did little to slow it down.

“This is getting us nowhere!” Rarity cried as the ghoul ripped out the spear from its hindleg

Roaring angrily, the creature’s spat in their direction. No spittle ejected, but one of its rotten, pointy fangs came loose, flying at them like a thrown dagger. It scantly missed the mares solely by virtue of Rarity, with a small squeal, making them both duck to the ground, and the blade landed just inches from their snouts in a cloud of dust – coincidentally right between the railtracks leading out from the pit’s far end into the nearby pugmill-house.

“Yeah, you know what?” Vinyl snapped out of her funk, glaring at the fang which had nearly skewered the two of them. “This fuckin’ thing’s going down no matter what.”

With a flick, her shades returned to their proper position. The DJ stomped her hoof, eyes locked onto the creature which had so thoroughly destroyed her beloved device.

“Rarity, gonna need you to stay behind cover till the others come,” Vinyl said in a low voice. “I’ve got myself a monster to slay.”

Before Rarity could do so much as protest, the other unicorn manically sprinted down the way they had come from, firing volley after volley of magical energy at the lumbering beast, her horn glowing red from the overexertion.

“Just fall apart already, you damn fucking puppet!” Vinyl roared out in anger, steam rising from her loins. It did her no good when she ducked beneath another swing, only to get hit by the creature’s free claw and get sent rolling back to Rarity.

“Vinyl!”

“I’m ok-k-kay!” Vinyl groaned in-between heavy coughs, forcing herself back to her hooves, fixing her shades to stare at the ghoul as it stalked their way. “But without guns, we got nothing to hold it down. And I’m not dragging it towards the others, not while there are ponies still in need of treatment.”

“I’m starting to think Applejack was right about keeping weapons within reach,” Rarity mumbled as she lodged a piece of wood into the ghoul’s eyesocket, an even more useless move than any before. “Nothing for it, then. We’ll have to brave the Everfree Forest...”

It was at that very moment she heard a metallich shriek coming from up the railtracks.

“Head’s up, girls!” called out the voice of a dear friend of hers.

Rarity’s eye widened as, emerging from within the pugmill-house, she spotted a metal railcart screeching straight towards her and Vinyl, ridden by a certain farmer. Instantly, she grabbed Vinyl’s neck, who cried out in alarm at this mishandling, but it was for the best as, no sooner had she pulled back, did the railcart pass them by in a whoosh.

Applejack leapt off then, while the cart continued downwards and careened into the ghoul.

“Yeehaw!” whooped Applejack in face of the impact. Clearly, the ghoul had sought to sneak up on them from within the claypit, yet got foiled by her fortuitous arrival. “Now that’s they way ya do it! What’d I say, Flutters?”

“App-Applejack! Fluttershy!” gasped Rarity as she saw the pegasus in question flutter down beside her, giggling. “When’d you get here? What about that mare in the cloak, our ruffian prisoners, all of it?”

“Don’t worry your head about that, Rares.” Applejack quickly trotted up to the two, giving Vinyl a curious look. “Flutters went t’get Zecora, for real! She’s keepin’ watch on the ruffians, so nice of her to oblige! Figured she’d handle a lil’ hocus-pocus if the mare came back!”

Her ears flicked once, hearing a low growling noise behind her, she turned to see the terracotta ghoul push a broken railcart off itself and slam its rotten hoof into the ground, prior to pulling out another of its fangs between its claws.

“Looks like Ah made a bad call ‘bout where ‘twas we’d need Zecora the most…”

Harwood stood out in the glorious sunshine, leaning against the wall next to the entranceway into the kilnhouse, one hand holding his radio, the other nursing his forehead in a vain attempt to stave off the leaden knell weighing on his skull. Not for the first time, the medical officer wished he weren’t under oath to save his painkillers for those who truly needed them.

“You don’t sound all that alright, Har, did something happen?”

“What, apart from the raid?” Harwood quipped, if a bit wearily. He was, frankly, flattered by Ana’s concern. Not that it made things much easier.

“Please don’t. Just… did you slip again, Har?”

That alone was enough to give Harwood a pause.

“Well, if you could call a barely-veiled, nasty threat of physical retribution delivered to prisoners-of-war a ‘slip’, then I suppose yes, yes I did, Ana.”

“Oh. Then, did you...”

“Heavens, no! I adhere to the Convention, Ana, you little doe, really. I’m fine. Just… well, you’d understand if you had been here.”

“Well, nice to hear that, Har. But… did you get anything from the Loyalists?” Ana said hurriedly, making it painfully obvious how much she was trying to divert the talk. But that was more than welcome in Harwood’s book.

“Nah, nothing good in particular. Look, it’s all complicated. Very complicated, as they don’t seem too good at remembering things. But something did come up... those gangsters were looking for a cloaked mare of sorts.”

A crackle and, if his ears didn’t deceive him, a small gasp.

“What’s wrong, Ana?’

“I... no, no it’s... It’s nothing. Now I, I gotta go, Har.”

“Eh? Ana, what’s the rush–”

“I mean, hey! We’re not supposed to do small talk over the radio or anything, right? I’ll catch you around later, Har, and stay safe, will ya?”

“But... oh fine, I’ll see you around then.”

“Right back at you, and lykke til, Har!” Ana replied, slipping back into her native Norwegian as the radio fell silent.

“... Lykke til, Ana,” Harwood replied, smiling fondly.

The bubbly way his Norwegian friend pronounced her Ls and Bs had always been a soft spot for him, helping to lift some of the pressure bearing down on him, as it did now. With a sigh, the medical officer gazed outwards – and squinted his eyes at two very peculiar figures approaching the brickyard’s front gate.

“Halt,” he commanded, a hand motioning towards his sidearm. “Identify yourself!”

The sandy-brown mare wearing a hat and outfit vaguely reminiscent of law enforcement was the one to speak, after throwing a quick glance at the lumbering stallion she was supporting.

“Sir,” she said in a careful and guarded pace. “As a member of the Ponyville Forest Rangers, I must inform you that a dangerous beast is on the loose close by.”

But Harwood wasn’t really listening. His attention was fixed on the battered-looking stallion whom the diminutive pegasus mare was somehow holding up, despite being over twice her height and girth. In a jolt, the memory of a description provided by Operative Cutter, sinister individual though she was, flashed inside his mind.

“Corporal,” said Jaka, coming out from the doorway beside him. “What do we have here?”

“Sergeant Jaka,” said Harwood. “If I recall correctly, this would be Major Bauer’s abductor, last spotted by Ana getting dragged off to the claypit, looking much the worse for the wear. But who might the mare next to him be?”

“The abductor’s wife, that’s who!” snapped the Ranger, holding her hoof protectively around Fuse’s shoulder. “And there’s hardly any time to explain, sir. What you need to know, you can ask from DJ Pon-3, or whatever she calls herself now, if she’s even still alive! We’ve got a feral dark magic creature in the claypit, and it’ll come for us all if you don’t act fast.”

“A dark magic creature?” Jaka repeated with a doubtful tone.

“Macuahuitl terracotta ghoul,” said Short Fuse. “Got a jungle witch’s work to thank for that.”

“Jungle witch…” Harwood echoed, stroking his chin nervously. “Sarge, I… might know of just such a mare. She’s with the gangsters, Wolfsschanze caught her in a net.”

Jaka raised an eyebrow.

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely, listen,” Harwood said urgently, “if we concentrate all our efforts on dealing with whatever this new thing is, we run the risk of losing Locksmith. Wouldn’t put it past him to take advantage of the distraction and escape!”

“Corporal Harwood,” Jaka told him firmly, “I am hereby affording you the immediate command of operations in the claypit. As for Locksmith, I shall deal with him personally.”

“But, sir!” Harwood started, scarcely recovered from the shock of being given command. “You’ll need some backup. And who’s to provide it, what with Gilford busy watching the prisoners, and Ana miles away?”

“Survey of the depot indicates that its windows only open out onto the east and south, both positions within Corporal Bjorgman’s sights. She can do her services as a sniper by keeping the thug ringleader pinned down inside, should he try to fly away. Besides, Thomas… we want this individual brought in alive.”

Harwood could have said “no”, of course. He could have pulled his prior credentials as precedent to take over combat duties for the Sergeant against the ringleader. But the ex-SAS begrudgingly admitted that the criminal wouldn’t come out alive should he, not Jaka, take the upper hand. His talk with Ana was evidence enough as it was.

“Alright, Sarge,” he relented. “Give ‘im hell.”

The Sergeant regarded him, before disappearing through the creaking wooden doors.

Prasad, the pilot, picked up her hand-held communications’ device.

“Hey, Dula,” came the doe-like voice of the young human Blackberry had heart earlier, “Remember the fellow whose head I ‘grazed’? Well, the Sarge’s gonna need me to, ah, cover him, while he goes in to beat up the punter. Oh… Nordjfell, over.”

“Here’s Sleja,” replied the pilot, chuckling at the step’s delay in proper military procedure. “Alright, I’ll patch you to Overwatch. Think you’ve got it in you? Sleja, over.”

“Low, squat red building to the North-East of the brickyard,” the voice recited mechanically. “Yeah, got that in my sights, no prob.”

Blackberry thought he caught a small tremor in her tone, which seemed not to have escaped Prasad’s notice, either.

“Pegasus, isn’t he?” she commented with that eerie detachment which he’d learned could come over her as readily as barely-restrained anger or surprisingly honest joy. “Well, then, not to teach a girl her job, Ana, but aim to pierce the wing and you’re good. It isn’t nice, yet what works for the Commander or the Spy, I hear, should work for you. Sleja out.”

As she busied herself fiddling with her device, presumably to ‘patch’ the sniper as she’d said, Prasad noticed him give her a funny look.

“Kid, what is it now?”

“You…” Blackberry began, feeling self-conscious about how he was still, technically, her prisoner of war. “You were talking about putting a hole in a guy’s wing like it’s nothing.”

She didn’t attempt to whitecoat the fact. “Yes. Would you rather Ana put the hole in his head?”

“No, no, of course not!” he stammered, every instinct imprinted by medical study screaming to protest the simple wrongness of her nonchalant undertone. “But…”

Instead of sighing and staring him down, like she might have done before, the pilot diligently returned to her work, doing whatever mysterious things her flying machine expected of her.

“Believe you me,” said Prasad. “It’s nothing compared to the shit I’ve seen… some of which I myself had a hand in. You got off lucky, that’s a fact. Little more than two years ago, I was a very different woman.”

“Yeah…” whispered Blackberry, glancing downwards. “You told me some of it.”

There was something akin to a pegasus, he decided, in the manner which Mridula Prasad tended to the machine she called a ‘helicopter’ – or ‘chopper’, sometimes, although he hoped those blades at the top weren’t actually meant to chop anything – much as though it were a living creature she’d been given to look after.