The Conversion Bureau: Stormriders

By Silvertie

Part 3 of 3

Daniel Garde gripped his wheel tightly, frowning as the winds and rain outside buffeted his car, focusing on the road as he cursed the forecast. The metservice had said it’d be a fine day today, and they’d been wrong, as usual. Someone was playing with the weather.

It was probably those fucking ponies, getting their damn, dirty hooves all over Earth’s weather systems. He’d raise a motion to go and hunt down more pegasi at the next HLF meeting, he was sure it’d go down a treat. After all, hadn’t it been his idea to go to that restraunt and make an example of those ponies?

He chuckled to himself. That had been the best idea ever. The HLF’s mission had been plastered all over national TV, and everyone knew that the HLF meant business. Ponies would never take Earth for their own, not while he and his friends still lived.

Another gust of wind rocked his car, and he cursed the weather once more. His daughter’s costume for the play tonight was going to get ruined, after all the time she and Daniel had spent on it, too. It just wasn’t fair.

He pulled up to his driveway, and popped the handbrake on as he prepared to make the sprint from car to front door, making sure he had his keys in his right hand and his briefcase in his left. No matter how quick he ran, though, his suit was still going to get soaked through. He hoped his wife had gotten around to cleaning his spare.

With one swift motion, Garde levered his slightly overweight mass out of the car, and with a flick of his hip, nudged his door, where it slammed shut, pushed by the wind and rain. He ran to his door, and stopped.

With a gentle thwack, the door swung on its hinges, the wind blowing it open and shut slowly.

“MARIE!” Daniel yelled. “LUCY!”

“Don’t bother,” a cold voice told him, as the door to the house proper was caught by a gust of wind and slammed shut. “They can’t hear you.”

Daniel turned around, to see a single white pegasus standing on the path behind him, mane blowing in the furious wind, face like stone.

Daniel’s face curled into a rictus of a snarl. “What the fuck are you doing here?” he reached under the back of his shirt, where a small handgun sat, riding in his belt in case of pony killing emergency. Like right now. “Where’s my wife and kid?”

“Oh, they’re hanging around,” the pegasus said, flatly, no hint of joviality in his voice. “I trust in my team to do what I ask them to do. What’s left of them, at any rate.”

Daniel was confused. “The hell is your problem?”

“My problem,” the pegasus said, looking Daniel in the eye, “Is that my weather team is one pony short, thanks to you.”

“Oh,” Daniel grinned. “You’re the ponies from the restaurant. How’s life? Good?” Daniel’s fingers curled around the grip of the gun.

“It’s been better,” growled the pegasus. “Our locker room is one voice short, there’s a desk that will never be filled again, there’s a space in our hearts, and a wedding ring I’ll never get to present to the love of my life.”

“Cry me a river,” sneered Daniel.

“We considered that,” the pegasus tilted his head. “We decided a flash flood was too vague, we might hurt people we didn’t need to hurt, and you might escape retribution. Can’t have that.”

“Shoulda’ just gone with the flood, you little shit,” Daniel spat, whipping his gun out. To his credit, the white-collar HLF man was quick on the draw, safety toggled and gun aimed in the blink of an eye.

The wind was faster. With a jackhammer blast of wind, the fury of the storm was focused squarely on Daniel and the gun in his hand. He staggered backwards, blinded by rain, the gun flying out of his hand, discharging as his finger caught on the trigger before it fell to the side of the path.

Daniel wiped his eyes quickly to see the pegasus hadn’t moved, and didn’t seem to be perturbed by the weather about him. He raised a hoof, and like a switch, the wind suddenly stopped dead. The rain ceased, and the sun came out. All around, the rain still fell, but here... all was calm.

“Eyes of storms are funny things,” the pegasus said. “You’ll be shouting to be heard one moment, the next...”

“DADDY!” a shrill voice screamed, clearly audible, now.

“LUCY!” Daniel shouted back, and he choked back a scream of rage as he saw what the pegasus had wanted him to see. High above them, two pegasi carried two humanoid shapes that were squirming and struggling in their hooves, one large and one small.

“Oh,” the pegasus said, a mock expression of surprise on his face. “Are those... is that your family? The love of your life and your legacy in this world?”

“You bastard,” Daniel grunted. “You fucking coward.”

“That’s not very nice,” the pegasus sighed. “Besides. You had first shot, you didn’t make it count. Now it’s our turn. Turnabout is fair play and all that.”

Daniel ignored him, and shouted once more. “MARIE! LUCY! EVERYTHING’S GONNA BE OKAY!”

“You know,” the pegasus said. “That’s what Sleet told Snowflake. You know, right before you and your friends killed her and stuck her head on a spike for the world to see. I think... yes, Sleet’s carrying your wife. And Wind Chill’s carrying your daughter. Hmm, they’re squirming a fair bit, there. I wouldn’t do that, Sleet and Wind Chill are notoriously butter-hoofed...” The pegasus raised a hoof, and Daniel saw what was going to happen.

“NO!”

A shrill pair of screams split the air, before they were cut off with a vicious cracking-splat sound. Daniel’s face went slack, and the pegasi in the sky shrugged to the one on the ground.

“Oops,” the pegasus said. “Their bad. I guess they still haven’t gotten over the death of Snowflake, it’s made their hooves a might unsteady of late. Would you know anything about that, by chance?”

“You... motherfucker,” Daniel wept. “Why me? What about the others?”

“Well,” the pegasus rolled his eyes. “We can’t carry all of them and drop them from a high height just for you. We are a little understaffed, after all, and Snowflake was the one who handled temp hires. I wouldn’t know what to do if we needed more wingpower and she wasn’t around. But we do have another... three. I think you’ll recognize them, I believe you hang out together.”

Three more pegasi hovered into view, carrying three traumatized bundles that struggled only weakly.

“Carl... Robert... Frank...” Daniel recognized them. “W-why are you doing this?”

“Why are we doing this?” The stallion waved a hoof again, and the three men attempted to emulate Daniel’s family. “It’s nothing personal, just gotta make an example of ‘em. Put the word out.”

The pegasus lunged forward, and with a scrabble of shoes on wet path, Daniel backed up to the door, pressing against it as the pegasus reared up, planting his hooves on either side of Daniel’s head, his face right in front of Daniel’s.

“Give me one good reason why you should get to walk away with your life,” Hailstone snarled. “One. Good. Reason.”

Daniel began to weep. “You- I thought Equestrians didn’t do violence!”

“Oh, so you pick on them for sport?” Hailstone countered. “Like a bully? YOU KNOW WHAT WE DID TO BULLIES BACK IN STALLIONGRAD? WE TAUGHT THEM A LESSON WITH SNOW AND ICE!”

“Please!” Daniel sank down, hands raised to shield himself. “I- is this what Snowflake would want?”

Hailstone suddenly recoiled, as if hit by a sudden epiphany, and Daniel sensed a weakness, pushing harder.

“Would she want you to repay blood with blood? Or would she want you to forgive me, to show kindness?”

Hailstone stepped back, looking Daniel in the eye, and gestured with his hoof. The pegasi in the air dispersed, flying above the grey stormclouds once more, as Hailstone addressed the human.

“You’re absolutely right. Snowflake, she’d have us turn the other cheek, give forgiveness.”

Hailstone lifted into the air, backing off as he did, and Daniel sagged, closing his eyes and weeping on his front doorstep. There was a thin whistling noise, the sound of a softball-sized hailstone screaming along at some seven hundred and fifty miles per hour. Daniel never saw it coming.

A red flower of gore was painted across the now vacant house, and it filled Hailstone’s heart with a small amount of satisfaction.

“But Snowflake’s not here, is she? You killed her.”