“We can’t keep doing this. Every single time you pull this just makes our relationship harder. I don’t care if this is what I am but this is not okay!” I scowl at what I had formerly been able to call ‘feet.’ Instead my middle toes had started merging together into a solid light blue mass that I could wiggle back and forth. My right foot had nearly lost all evidence of my toes while my left seemed to be stuck more inbetween.

The previous night I had just hurried home not really paying much attention at the time. I mean, who looks at their feet on a regular basis? Getting home had been an exhausting process on its own. After seeing the crowd around the school I had just gone home and gone to bed. Trying to stay hidden for so long and the stress of sprinting across open areas really did a number on me.

I wiggle my mutated appendage again, the lack of horror I feel only makes me more terrified. A quick glance at the clock reminds me that I need to get going. “Just have to keep going. Just keep going…” I tell myself over and over trying to will it to be true. Walking on its own is a very unpleasant process. Hooves are very much not intended for bipedal locomotion at all. What had previously been my foot is several inches shorter and slightly wider throwing my balance off substantially.

“How the buck am I supposed to wear my shoes?!” I curse in realization as I move towards the shower. I carefully peek down the hallway, listening for activity despite knowing my family should be gone. If my aunt saw this I’d no doubt end up in endless exorcisms, something that in my case seems twistedly ironic. Entering the bathroom and nearly tripping over my pajamas tells me I’ve already lost some height as my semi-hooves clack on the tile.

Stripping down I see the developments have moved even further. Fur has started sprouting on my chest and back. What little facial hair I did have is tinted the same blue color. My ears are pointier, and my eyes are definitely a size bigger. The small point on my forehead has crested through the skin revealing the horn fully. My hair is barely long enough to cover it...at least when not flattened. At the roots I can already see an uneven spread of dark blue and a little pink from the newly grown hair. How much longer do I have before other people notice? Or worse yet, my parents?

I stagger into the shower, washing off as quickly as possible, though the new patches of hair soak up water like a sponge. What I couldn’t see earlier was a small protrusion at the base of my spine just starting to form. It’s just a nub for now, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out what it would become. The question now is just how much time I have left.

After grabbing toast I return to my room and stare at my shoes. I can still fit my feet inside at this point, but balance will be an issue. Thinking creatively I grab some duct tape and cut a hoof indent in the top of one of our plastic cups before doing the same to another and strapping the makeshift ‘feet’ to either hoof. Now at least I have a little forward balance and my shoes still appear to fit. “Well, there is one thing fixed.” I mutter. Taking a few steps it still felt off, but it was an off I could adapt to.

The walk to school is a long one, but in this instance was a welcome one for practice. At least I’ll have a car to drive home, though I’m going to get a talking to when I get home today. Lyndsey needed it to drive to work and take my sis to school. Even after the events of last night I’m certain there would be murder waiting when I got back home. I hadn’t even bothered to check my phone and I sure as hell wasn’t going to now.

English is the first period, thanking my lucky stars that today wasn’t gym. I’m pretty sure when the coach told us to ‘hoof it’ that he didn’t mean literally. At the start of class the professor starts passing out our essays that we’d turned in on monday. The trouble comes however, when I don’t get mine back.

“Everyone get your essays?” The class around me nods in affirmation. He must have just missed it. I swore that I’d put my name on the last one, I’d only triple checked it. I’d been known to ‘forget my own name’ as it was often mocked by earlier grades in school. So I remain quiet, I’ll just have to pick it up after cla--.

“That’s good, unfortunately it seems we got a new student that wasn’t on the roster.” He holds up a paper that immediately looks familiar...Especially after I recognize that it’s a mix of english and ponish… “Does anyone know who ‘Morning Star’ is? I really would hate to have missed a student. They’ve clearly done some good work here, though I have to say I’m not the most experienced in runes...”

My face burns with heat as he continues his speech. The name...the name that rings with such agonizing familiarity that shouldn’t. I want my grade certainly, but not at this cost. I couldn’t possibly live with the embarrassment. But it’s a missed assignment! Worth a large chunk of our current grade! He’s even looking at you! He knows it's us because everyone else has theirs turned in!

Buck my life.

I only give a small nod at his look, he turns to the side and writes a little on it before setting it back onto his desk and starting the lesson. Thankfully he wasn’t feeling in a cruel mood for the day and decided to continue with the lesson instead of pursuing the topic. I bury myself into our reading as we go over the last few chapters we had read.

Calculus is next and goes relatively well, that is except for a constant cramp that keeps sneaking its way into my fingers. The stress and embarrassment from english clearly seems to exacerbate the issue as I see the tips of my fingers turning a light purple as I force myself to take deep breaths. I can do this, I can go a little longer without turning into a pony again. I could let it all out during lunch and everything will be fine.

In practice, however, trying to relax when I can feel the magic swirling around wanting to be released goes about as well as trying to hold in a hiccup. Despite my breathing exercises and attempts to relax I can feel the occasional warm pulse as the magic works its way to the surface. The room seems to grow hotter as I feel more fur sprouting around my legs and chest. The amulet burns with each growth, buzzing softly, but insistently like a hornet trapped within, though thankfully silent.

“Now can anyone tell me what use we might have for reduced row echelon matrices?” Our professor, Mrs. Descott asks the class, her eyes scanning the room for participation meeting my own before they stop and she tilts her head a little. She opens her mouth as if to say something, but the words die in her throat and she quickly looks away at the rest of the class.

“Solving Simultaneous equations without back substitution.” I state, only just realizing I hadn’t raised my hand to be called on and had just blurted it out to the entire class. Mrs. Descott looks more confused than upset though, a few of the students also glance in my direction, then give a snort and look back forward.

“Queer know-it-all.” I hear one of the guys mutter under their breath, which immediately makes me start to sweat a bit more as I try to figure out what could’ve triggered their attention as my ears...flatten against my head.

Oh no.

Despite the excessive heat of the classroom I grab my hoodie out of my pack and zip it up, pulling the hood over my misplaced ears. I expect Mrs. Drescott to point out school policy at any moment, but she remains thankfully silent and continues the lesson without any further interruption. Not risking to answer another question, no matter how painful the silence is after each question. At least now the magic seems to have calmed down a little and by the end of class both my ears and fingers seem to have returned to their normal-ish state.

The bell rings and we all slowly move towards the door. Not wanting to be caught in the way of anyone else I instead wait for everyone else to grab their things and leave before heading out the door. Even as I stand up at the end I know what’s coming.

“Artemis, are you doing okay?” Mrs. Descott asks, standing next to my desk with the rest of the class gone.

I really don’t want to answer, but I just have to. I owe it to her for her help today. I feel my throat tighten and my eyes water a bit as I try to hold it in. “N-no.” I manage to choke out. Swallowing back a half-formed sob I move down the aisle when her hand touches my chest and the world disappears around me.

I’m not in my body anymore, I’m in hers. My mind flailing about as if caught in an undercurrent as I reorient myself, feeling the sensations of two bodies into one. I feel her every physical ache. From the arthritis in her left knee, to the stiffness in her collarbone and back, then to the general stress in her circulation as I sense the pressure being higher than it should be and with a higher sugar content and--Snap! Just like that I’m back to normal, the lingering aches of her body fading away.

To her credit she just looks at me as if nothing had happened. To be fair it had probably only been a few moments of time before I’d managed to get away. “I-I’m fine, I’ll handle it. Thank you for your concern but I have to do this on my own.” I try to say as nicely as possible. She only wants to help but the only thing I want right now is to get far away from this scene.

The lunchroom is a mess of its own. The auditorium was a room over but with the amount of tape placed around and party wreckage it looked like disaster had struck. I quickly dry my eyes on my sleeve, cautiously feeling my ears to make sure they’d returned to ‘passable’ before taking off the hoodie. It’s just too hot for it in here.

The police are here checking out the scene, and likely several others examining every scrap of evidence of what had happened the previous night. I quickly slip into a lunch line to blend in as I recognize the girl from last night that had chased us across town. Of course, being a pony at the time she shouldn’t have a clue. I could only hope Angela kept her head down with all this going on. I don’t even know if they had cameras in there that might have caught us.

Today’s menu was spaghetti which I only realize after getting to the front, just taking what I was given while trying to get as much of the greens and non-meats as possible. The lunch ladies hardly seem to mind someone putting more of the healthier stuff on their plate after all. The sauce tastes a bit off, and after some picking at it I just abandon it entirely. The hamburger likely does not agree with the coming pony as I grumpily resolve to just eat the rest around it, silently cursing the loss of the food group.

Part way through lunch Mike comes over and sits at my table, his buddy Ethan following with him as we exchange brief greetings. Aaron joins in too, giving me a very impatient look of ‘I know it was you.’ Which I respond to with stuffing more of my roll in my mouth and gesturing vaguely over towards Mike and Ethan.

“Hey uh, Arty was it? Mike mentioned that you’ve been hanging out lately.” He gives a small hearty chuckle. “Here I was asking about your friends and you’ve gone and taken mine.” He pats Mike on the shoulder. “No offense, but maybe we could hang out and get to know each other after school? Have to miss practice because as an SBO they want us to help cleanup the mess in the auditorium. Now that is some crazy news, I missed the party for one of my own, but I hear it was pretty epic.”

”Yeah, it was definitely something.” Mike says, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Quite an event, shattered glass and all those chairs getting flung around. Was definitely something. Probably had the music turned up too much or something. But hey, it would be nice if we could all hang out after school wouldn’t it?” He looks at me pointedly while nodding towards Ethan a little.

He wants to bring his friend into our group...I groan and rub my forehead with what seems like the beginning of a headache. “Michael…” I say with gritted teeth. “It’s a...support group. No offense but it’s kind of private…”

Ethan just stares at me blankly for a long awkward moment, his eye twitching before his vacant gaze disappears as quickly as it came. “Oh yeah, definitely. I wouldn’t want to be so intrusive, but I would like to hang out with you some more Mike. We miss you at our young men's group.”

“I for one think it’s a great idea.” Aaron chimes in much to my frustration, though it's not hard to see why. Being the only real human in the group certainly can’t be fun not to mention all of the things he’s missed out on.

“I wouldn’t want to intrude on Arty here though…” He says with a tentative smile that reminds me of that of a predator that’s just cornered its prey. He’s played our whole conversation like a chess board to get his way in.

“It’s...complicated, you see...it’s about this condition and…”

BRRRIIINNNNNNNGGG!

I smile in relief at the bell. “We’ll have to talk about it as a group, the uh...others aren’t here for me to decide.” I say, quickly gathering my things and tossing the rest of my uneaten lunch into the trash. Ethan catches my shoulder with a soft hand as Mike and the others head off to class, Mike giving me a pleading look as he leaves. My mind temporarily spinning as the magic pulses through his form. He seems quite healthy outside of a headache, least, as far as I can tell.

“Hey uh Arty? Where are you heading next?” Ethan asks, keeping his hand on my shoulder.

“Uh History, why?” I ask, a little curious as to what is really on his mind.

“Because I need to show you something, Morning Star.”

My blood freezes at his statement and I feel my amulet burn hotly from my anxiety. I quickly move out of his grip in shock. “Wh--how the hell do you know that name?”

He holds up his hands slowly, then leans his head towards the hallway. “It’s something I can’t just say, I have to show you.” He says, his words taking on a very different cadence than his speech pattern from before. His words slow and exaggerated, monotone and lifeless. And yet...with words like that I can’t just let it go, what else does he know?

Unable to resist I follow behind him as he leads me down the hall, down past all the lockers and to the doors towards the back of the school. Each step and moment instills dread of the second bell. “Can this wait for after school? I’ve already stressed my teacher’s tolerance enough…”

He doesn’t reply, instead pushing open the doors as I follow him through. What is up with him? My first impression of him was a lot more friendly then well...this. “You know, this can wait. I can’t do this right now, I’ll see you af...ter...” My breath catches in my throat as I see his fist curled tightly around a switchblade, his eyes slowly starting to glow green.

“Oh SHIT!”

I grab the door behind me trying to yank it back open and dive inside but he body slams it closed with enough force I’m sure half the building must’ve heard. His free hand scrambling to grab mine as I turn away and try to sprint around the corner of the building, his strength terrifying me even further from the intensity of his grip. I make it only a few yards before he catches back up and sends us both spinning to the ground.

“E-ethan! Sn-snap out of IT!”

I yell in a very wasteful use of breath, but I don’t stand a chance against this guy! The blade slashes across my forearm making me scream as I see its depth. I bring my knee up and nail him right in the groin, but it only delays him for a moment as I slide under his left arm and twist my hips to pull myself free crawling across the ground on all fours. He quickly catches up also crawling before I rear my hind legs up and buck. The force of my kick sends him skitting a few good feet though not without a resounding ‘Crack!’ My amazement at the force of the kick makes me realize that in my attempt to escape I had lost my shoes entirely.

Unfortunately Ethan still gets right back up and charges, waving the blade menacingly with murder in his eyes. I dive forward grabbing a clot of loose dirt and fling it in his general direction. I have to get back inside the school, I get stuck out here I’m dead! I sprint for all my life is worth, but hooves just don’t like that kind of motion. Only a few steps in and I’m sent into a roll only to be immediately pounced on again. My head is pounding, and my arm is throbbing. I’ve lost a lot of blood.

This time he puts his full weight on me, his left hand firmly grasping my neck and squeezing as he raises his right arm then thrusts it down and I feel it connect as I feel like I’m starting to drown.

BOOOM!!

I see a burst of light as the school explodes behind me, chunks of brick flying everywhere with a resounding aftershock. The tension on my throat eases for only a moment, he was clearly as surprised as I was. At this moment I realize it doesn’t matter if he’s brainwashed or not, I’m not going to die! I feel my horn build up strength once more and I aim it right at him as he raises his hand to stab me again.

As he stabs downward again I release what little energy I had been able to push into my horn as he disappears out of view and I start to see spots color my vision. It hurts...god it hurts so bad. Pressure...have to apply pressure. The thought bubbles up through my addled mind as I flop my left arm over my chest and push, then just roll over onto it and cough blood all over the grass.

I can feel my blood gushing out between my fingers, too weak to hold it any tighter. I hear a siren going off from the building and the front doors of the building opening as a few students run out of the building. I can just see Ethan lying on the grass a few feet in front of me by the building. I hear screams from behind. My body seems to have just given up on trying to tell me how painful everything is instead telling me to sleep.

“Holy shit! Anna call an ambulance!” I hear a teacher call as I feel a hand on my arm that rolls me onto my back, fresh blood streaming from the wound as I feel something shoved into my side. The pain only sends different colors across my vision. I can’t even see anything, so much of my vision is covered in black smudges. The last thing I hear before it fades away is the sound of sirens in the distance.

Getting a call about a terrorist attack and potential mass shooting is not something any medical professional wants to hear. The hospital had been sent into overdrive and the local military base had been brought in to reinforce both the hospital and the school. I’d gotten the call from Mike some time ago telling me that he hadn’t been hurt, but I still felt like I was sitting on pins and needles. When the first ambulance arrives I take a breath and try to swallow my anxiety, and I’m not the only one. The rest of the staff looks as shell shocked as I am. We don’t know what’s going to happen, or how many to expect.

When the EMT’s move the patient into the ER and we start to work it doesn’t look good. The patient is a teenager covered in blood with a breathing mask while the staff is applying gauze and pressure onto their chest. “We’ve got a pulmonary laceration from a stab wound, and a cut across the left arm. Patient’s lost over a liter of blood…” They drone on the details as we get the trauma shears to get a better look at the injuries. With the return to procedure the tension seems to drop a few degrees.

“Do we have a medical history on this patient? ID?” I look at our resident then see what he was looking at. Our patient… has fur. To say that was a bit unusual would be an understatement, but looking at the rest of the staff we just push on. We’re here to do our job, not make unprofessional comments about our patients. As we finish stuffing the wound with gauze and stitching up the rest of him it seems to be going well.

...until we see his feet.

Or rather, where his feet should be. For a brief moment we comment that we really should’ve done a better intake. We had all been so distracted that we’d made an elementary mistake of not doing a full check of the patient. Their legs seem fully lacking any trace of toes or appendages, instead they have what could only vaguely be described as a hoof along with more of the oddly colored fur.

After the doctor checks them for any pressing injuries they shake their head and we wordlessly start to clean up, making sure we do a thorough check this time of the patient. A small protrusion on their head gives us lots of worry, but an inspection and X-ray later doesn't seem particularly malicious so we let it go. Countless other notes are taken on the subject, but before any of us leaves the room we go over doctor-patient confidentiality.

A good thing too. As soon as we wheel the patient to their room I get paged to head to the front desk. Sheriff Redmond is wanting, no, that’s putting it too nicely, he is demanding a full report on the patient we’d just taken in.

“I’m sorry Sheriff, but you should know the rules. We can’t disclose anything about the patient and no, we are under policy not to let anyone in there.”

“I know what the rules say, but fuck it! There is something big here, something you can’t possibly fathom going on. There are lives at risk. I have to know what happened out there. It's a matter of national security, you're putting other people's lives in danger here. I'm not going to ask twice.”

I flinch at the threat, we had gotten along well enough in the past, but he knew the rules. With a nod to the desk staff I hear her calling security. “It’s not that I don’t care, but we listen to these rules for a reason. Now you walk out of here or you’ll have such a big lawsuit on your ass that you’ll never be able to sit again.”

He gives me a long scowl as our two security guards arrive. “You don’t know what you’re doing. There is something out there that very well might kill you. I’m trying to do my job here!” Yet I can see in his eyes that he knows that this is a losing fight. The last time an officer had tried to force a medical professional to break the law in Utah with a blood transfusion it had made the news.

“You’ll regret stopping me.” He glares at me one last time before leaving back through the double doors. I step back over to the desk staff, the two guards remaining below just to make sure he leaves.

“God Mary...this is the last thing we need today. I know any number is a bad one, but I’m really relieved that it was just two. I couldn’t stop thinking about all the other attacks we’ve heard about. Being so close to a military base and all made me think they might be staging something bigger." I tell her.

“I know what you mean, Did Mike make it out okay?” I just nod in response, resting for a moment against the desk. “Only kid I really know is Jake, haven’t heard a word about him since you both went into the ER. What happened there? It honestly seems like everyone just forgot he was here. I just went on break and when I got back I asked about him returning and everyone seemed to have forgotten him. The scheduling for his appointment was changed too. Not to mention Dr. Judas, he seems to have just disappeared from our record entirely. The government trying to pull a fast one on us?”

“Jake stopped having appointments a few weeks ago. Why would he be here? He was in remission. Doctor Judas retired ages ago too. Apparently whatever cure they discovered was worth quite the fortune. Honestly Mary, I thought you would have heard about it already.” I feel a twinge of a headache and the world tinges green for a moment and I blink a few times from a wave of vertigo. “I’ll see you later Mary, I think the stress is getting to me. I’ll be on break.” Then I go on my way.

I wish I could say that we made a clear escape, but it wasn’t. The metal chariots that the humans had could easily outpace us on hoof. Only our pegasus seemed like they could outrun them. Not to mention the tireless endurance of their autonoma, something reminding me of our ships back home, though they didn’t have the smell of coal or steam.

“And you’re sure that we can’t blast them? Not even a little? Just to slow them down.” I ask Patch who has breathlessly kept pace beside us.

“No! The device is too complicated and moving at too fast of a speed for it to survive a complication. Why they even have such high speed death traps is beyond me. Their body structure is way too fragile from what I’ve identified. Seems like a bunch of lunatics!”

I groan as we turn another corner as I lead the squad out towards the trees towards our target, ditching the solid road in its entirety. The soft dirt a welcome feel on our hooves that will undoubtedly ache for some time. The metal carriages speed past us on the road, a few of them stopping to let out passengers but they are hardly of any concern to us on foot. I let off a strong blast at the road that sends them scrambling for safety.

“These creatures don’t take a hint do they!” I growl as we try to disappear in the foliage, the humans seeming to finally fall behind though I see several flashes that momentarily remind me of spells but they turn out to be nothing. “Flitter, Soarin, give us some cover!” I order watching them fly around in formation, Soarin seeming to take a moment to follow Flitter’s lead. Most...unusual of him. However the job gets done. Dirt and leaves erupt from the ground as they create a windstorm to cover both our retreat and tracks, not underestimating their tracking skills.

Several minutes later we regroup. Checking on the beacon we also sharply change directions. It’s well over an hour before I call a break, wanting to make sure that we had put some distance between us and our pursuers. The landscape had shifted a bit, from the dense foliage into a grassy plain with hints of farmland up ahead. We all stop and get out our food and water from our packs, each checking out enchantments to make sure this world isn’t siphoning off too much of our magic.

“How much farther do we have?” Stellar asks, looking a bit worse for wear from the long adventure. Not to mention that she still seemed a bit shaken from her capture earlier. Our hooves all ache from that solid substance we had run over resolving never to sprint across that again. Wouldn’t those creatures' feet also hurt from such hard ground? Thinking back they had a lot of clothing and appeared to be wearing things around their feet. Though it seemed a bit absurd, why make the ground hard in the first place? These humans were certainly strange creatures, though there were several others back home they could match.

“Tempest?” She asks again, foolish of me to get distracted.

“Apologies Stellar. The beacon doesn’t get a good signal here. It updates every few moments, however I was informed that the brighter it got the closer we were. Given the data the princess gave me on its scope I would say it's at least from ponyville to canterlot in terms of distance, I’d ask our pegasi to scout ahead but we don’t know the terrain or if any of the humans might be watching for us.”

“Not to mention we don’t have a train to take.” She grumbles a little, but munches on her oat-bar before drinking from her flask. The others seemed to have mostly gotten some of their strength back, but my business wasn’t done just yet. “Soarin? A moment if you would…” I ask, looking over their expression as their eyes quickly avert from my own and they trot over.

“I’m surprised I didn’t catch you earlier, though I’m not sure it's from your skill or my lack of perception. You’re not the real Soarin, and you’re too bad at the role for me to think you’re one of hers.” The changeling looks away, glancing back towards the others now out of view before they drop their disguise.

“I’m sorry, I was part of the invasion crew and Soarin broke his wing on the entrance.” Ocellus states. “We didn’t really have time to talk, but from the messages I’d gotten from Twilight and our briefing I knew he was part of the rescue squad. Please tell me you aren’t mad?” She asks, looking up at me with her big bug eyes that I definitely was not influenced by.

I give a sigh. “The portal is unhinged, we’re in hostile territory, and leaving you behind wouldn’t serve any purpose. You knew this once we entered and that even if you were revealed it wouldn’t matter.” I look back towards the others, more than one sending glances in our direction, Ocellus having angled herself perfectly out of view. She may be quiet but she is no slouch with her skills.

“You’re lucky I caught you before one of the others did, they might’ve...well no, they’re much too soft for that. I know you’re not Soarin, but we will still have recon missions for you, none of the other changelings would volunteer for this place, so why did you?” I ask. It was something that had bothered me to a high degree from my position as Twilight’s council. The changelings as a whole had tried to avoid this whole conflict as much as possible up until we had a plan.

“With all due respect Commander Tempest, they have a few of us captive here as well, including perhaps our last chance to avoid extinction. Without Chrysalis we don’t have any queens to lay any eggs, Thorax and Twilight both agreed we should stay out of it until we could strike properly.”

“About time somepony told me that.” I grumble, Twilight I realize had probably kept it from me because I’d have called on them for dozens of missions already with how badly we needed their infiltration abilities. “I see your point, but I don’t like it. Twilight vouches for you, but remember we are here to evacuate key targets, exfiltrate with what information we can, stabilize the portal and let in the reinforcements once they take back control of Equestria.”

She nods. “I understand. If...if I don’t make it back, will you tell Smolder and my family that I love them?” She asks, her emotions and gentle form making me almost reconsider having her camp out here, but we’re too far past that. Maybe, like the ponies once had, she would surprise me.

“I will.” I say, patting her shoulder softly. “Now, I believe you have something to tell the rest of the squad…” I say as I lead her back. Perhaps we could make this work for us…

I really wish I could fire her. Oh so badly I wish I could kick that rookie out so fast that her head would spin. “Insubordinate, blind, and seeming to willfully endanger our mission!” You just barge in there and chase after them? What were you thinking?! Command may have refused my request to haul your ass back home, but let me make this clear. You endanger this mission again and I will put you down.”

She just sits there, fiddling with her device like a petulant teenager just waiting for their parents to stop ranting so they could go back to doing whatever they wanted. “Feel better?” She asks, in a way that startles me with what seemed like genuine concern. “Now, would you like my report before or after you shoot me from behind like a coward?”

“You really don’t care, do you?” I ask as she just stares at me without a care in the world adjusting her device a little like one might a fidget spinner. “Go on then, tell me what you’ve found that’s so important that you tried to destroy our entire mission.”

“We have a confirmed unicorn. What’s more is that I saw a half transformed pegasus.” She levitates the object in her hand watching it spin and click. “What that means is that they seem to have human forms, disguised to live among us in ways we couldn’t see outright. Your entire crew scoping out the forest and wildlife isn’t going to find anything useful.” She spins her device again.

“I have the feeling you have a lead.” I say, sitting in the chair across from her, watching my computer scanning through the social media feeds in the area in an attempt to pick up possible chatter regarding the subjects. Unfortunately the vast majority of it seems to be random internet spam or roleplays. Kids these days.

“The passive magic in this area is increasing. Something that could likely be quite dangerous to non-magic users like yourself. Not to mention the effects it will have on the local biosphere. What you don’t know is that, a certain...organization that I run tends to clean this kind of stuff up. Keeping it from infecting and hurting other people.” She smiles in a way that reminds of a smug politician. “Put it to...better more...productive uses. Military or otherwise…”

“That’s not what it says on your file.”

“Oh? You read that bunch of hogwash I gave those suits? That’s cute, but we both know what they really want out of this.” She leans in a little closer. “Power.” She whispers as her device gives off a powerful glow. She’d been using it a lot more often lately. “You want to know the very first thing your people wanted out of this? Not a cure, not armor, not protection, not a word of our healing spells. They wanted a weapon. So scared of facing an enemy that had something they didn’t, terrified, that for once, they could be the ones on the receiving end of so much of the destruction they cause elsewhere…”

She levitates the device over to my hand, one of my knuckles stained white from how tightly I’m clutching my chair. “What we do, we do to protect people.” I growl, wondering how long it would take me to pull out my gun and just shoot her. If I could make it before whatever other sorcery she has could get me. “You know my loyalties, why are you even bothering to tell me this?”

“Because…” The device spins in my hand, making it burn from the energy flowing through it as I quickly yank my hand back. “Unlike the masters you serve, I believe in one principle above all.” She leans back, looking at me seriously for perhaps the first time. “Equality.”

“What do you have to gain from this?” She’s sounding more and more like the leader of some sort of cult. I don’t care what she says, I’m reporting this whole incident and every word of her betrayal once I get the chance.

“You see, that right there.” She points her finger at me accusingly. “Your thinking is so limited by what you have to gain. This world has conditioned you to think that is how people think, or at least how any logical person would. But I don’t. I don’t fit your little box of what you’d call a normal person. The people who follow me do so not for what they have to get but what they have to gain by working together in harmony. Think of how much this world could learn about magic! What devices and what powers and benefits to life it could bring!” She holds up her device for emphasis.

I’ve had enough. “You have left out the fact that as you’ve said before, magic is poisonous. Save your preaching for your own church.” I glare at her, knowing there is something much more sinister behind her bravado than she is letting on. I grimace as I leave the room though, brushing over my pistol. They hadn’t approved of her dismissal, she’s too powerful to simply kill. Leader or not, some high up individuals wanted her gone. If she interferes again, my only call would be to the morgue.

Author's Notes:

Didn't have any character questions last chapter. Feel free to ask them!
Not another alliteration chapter name this time, but this one was just too specific and "Orders and Obligations" just didn't fully capture the gravitas of the events. Hope you enjoyed it regardless!

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Inspired by the wonderful Damaged I've started doing a few "Ask X a questions." To help answer some reader questions from the perspective of the main characters. Feel free to ask any character a question for a chance at having it answered in the next.

Thank you as always for reading and supporting this little story of mine. Another thanks to Alsey for a pre-read. Feel free to hit me up on Discord (Aremna #7250) for a chat.

Comments, as always, are appreciated!