Love Amongst Monsters

by Jordan179

Rating: teen
Tags: Sex, Gore, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Sad, Romance, Drama, Original Character, Tragedy, Horror
Length: 11952

Can Ill Wind conquer his fears of personal inadequacy and succeed on his vital engineering project -- and perhaps find a love he never dreamed of winning?

Post-show, tentatively c. YOH 1508-12 (8 to 12 years after Luna's Return)

Ill Wind is a brilliant Pegasus engineer working on a vital project for High Commander Windvane which could prove crucial to winning independence for the Pegasi from the chimeric tyranny that currently dominates them. Only if he completes the project can the Pegasi hope to gain the power -- by draining it from sub-equine monsters repulsive even to contemplate!

Ill Wind expected to find professional rather than romantic success in his work. Cruelly-cursed by a witch, he does not believe that any mare could ever love him, But when he meets a brilliant but damaged master machinist, he begins to believe that love is possible for even for one such as himself.

Can Love bloom amongst monsters?

Published 2014-03-09 09:40:04 UTC
Last updated 2014-03-10 09:21:04 UTC

Chapter 1: Not Quite As Nice

"Sample transport system, all green," Twist Wrench called out from his position by the conveyor belt, an excited look on his big, thick-muzzled orange face, topped by the crest of his untidy straw-yellow mane. That mane was long but worn tied well back in a queue; after one literally-hairy mishap, Twist had realized why it was a bad idea to wear one's mane out around an experimental machine whose motors were powerful enough to process tons of biomass simultaneously. Quick thinking and the application of a box-cutter by his friend Clear Sight had cost him part of that mane, but saved his head from being processed -- it was assumed by all that Twist preferred the loss of some of his mane to all of his head, and at the time Twist had not been complaining.

"Discorporation unit, ready for operation!" Clear Sight was bending over the monitor panel of that unit, pale gray eyes in her pretty powder-blue visage narrowing as they made sure that every servo was reading normal. her pigtailed golden mane neatly tied off with cute little dark-blue bows. She had been known to more than once wish they could get a tech from the manufacturing company to help them in this phase of the project, but considering the rumored affiliations of the company president, asking someone from Spark Wheel Industrial Designs to come over would have been a very bad idea from the point of view of project security.

"Thaumic collectors are ready to go!" Gold Wire hovered near the complex and exposed arrangement of crystals and wiring which surrounded the sleeve of the discorporation unit and ran forward above the sample transport system, darting back slightly and replacing her tools into the belt she wore well back on her barrel to avoid fouling her own wings. She did not want to get hit by static discharge from the intense paramagnetic surge they all expected and hoped to achieve. She could not help but look cute even at a tense moment like this, with her pert little muzzle and ivory coat, topped by the delicate straight golden mane and sweet little tail that were the first source of her name.

Dr. Ill Wind, thaumaturgic-mechanical engineer, flipped a switch and sent a small thaumic charge into the main battery. This was a big metal sphere, its wall lined with crystalline paramagnetic semi-conductors threaded with gold and silver wiring. He viewed the results with satisfaction.

"Storage efficiency at 93 percent," he told his team. "We'll want to improve the paramagnetic insulation on the final prototype, but for this experimental model, this should be more than adequate." He smiled with satisfaction. There were only a limited number of things that could give him much pleasure, since he'd been cursed by the witch, and achieving professional success with a team of Pegasi he respected was one of them.

They were good colts and fillies, all of them. Twist Wrench was a slob, but one of the best mechanics in the Mandate, and big and brawny enough to brute-batter a recalcitrant component into place should it be slightly off-specs. Clear Sight was a bit intense -- an intensity that served the project in her role as his engineering assistant. Gold Wire looked as if she should have been a pretty little receptionist -- and was in fact a compulsive perfectionist, the best electrician he'd ever seen.

It was amazing that they had managed to get as far as they had, as fast as they had. They were trying to take a design concept first imagined over a thousand years ago by a Unicorn emperor, based itself on the lost science of the Age of Wonders which had ended three thousand years before that, as combined with magics from a time two thousand years before even that golden age; take that idea and merge it with the magical technology of modern Equestria. Getting the secrets he needed to do this had itself been an epic quest, carried out over several continents, with the minions of the Tyrants on his hooves every step of the way. Several times, he had only managed to escape capture by the merest chance. It was as if some secret Providence were watching out for him.

Then, just two years ago, he had met an agent of that secret Providence. A mysterious black Pegasus named Random Flag, whose cutie-mark was no random flag, but rather the noble emblem of the Old Mandate, had put into Ill Wind's very own hooves the plans for the Paradise Transducer, the legendary device which had enabled the Age of Wonders to convert electricity directly into magic; a coupling which could easily be re-tuned to convert biomantic energy into electricity and thence into paramagnetism. With the Paradise Transducer, it was merely a matter now of actually building the machine which would give essentially-limitless thaumic power to the New Mandate that High Commander Windvane was organizing. Building the machine which would finally win freedom for the Pegasi!

Every part of the machine had now been tested separately, and in unison with mere animal subjects. Now it was time to test it on one of the monsters. The energy collected should be at least two orders of magnitude greater. This would stress the components as never before. Systems failure -- possibly catastrophic systems failure -- was a distinct possibility at this stage of development. This would be a dangerous phase of testing -- he must keep sure that his colts and fillies were safe at this crucial moment.

"All right, team," he said in a soft voice that carried through the whole laboratory. "This is the live run. Twist, I want you to place the prepared test subject into the feed end of the sample transport system, but do not. repeat do not yet start the system. Clear on that?"

"You got it, Dr. Wind," replied the burly mechanic. Twist Wrench stepped over to the sample containment cage where a test subject was already bound and gagged for easier handling. Gagging was not entirely necessary, but did have the considerable advantage of avoiding stressing his staff by exposing them to the disturbing distress cries that the monsters commonly emitted at this stage. Wrench opened the cage door, reached in with his massive hooves, and extracted the sample monster, fluttering his big thick orange wings to better balance himself on his hind hooves as he performed this task.

The sample monster writhed in Twist's grasp, but the mechanic's powerful forelegs easily restrained it as he flew it over to the feed system. It was only a small monster, no bigger than an unmarked Pegasus colt, and its capacity for resistance -- bound as it was -- was limited. Even from this distance, Ill Wind could see the mechanic wincing as some part or another of the monster made contact with his own coat. Ill Wind sympathized -- the creatures were so repulsive!

Ill Wind made a note to himself that the feed would have to be better-automated in the deployed device. Even if he picked fairly low-mentality Pegasi to handle the feeding, such extensive contact with the raw material would impair their sanity after a mere week of full operation. He could see that even the members of his staff who were not physically touching the creature were recoiling in revulsion as Twist shackled the small monster to the restraining bolts

Clear Sight's job made it vital that she ensure that the sample was correctly positioned in the restraints -- otherwise the thaumic release unit might fail to effect complete discorporation, or worse still actually strike and damage the restraint frame. She gulped once at the disgusting creature, but then firmed her jaw and did her job without complaint. Gold Wire at first paled, then flushed and looked at the monster with a sort of sick fascination. Then she remembered what she was supposed to be doing, and flitted over to a circuitry monitor board, doing a last-second check to ensure that there was no loose wiring.

Ill Wind felt so proud of his team at that moment. They were facing up to a difficult duty, a disgusting duty, a duty that required they make direct physical contact with foul parodies of their own kind, but they were doing it bravely and without complaint nonetheless. When the final version of the device went into full operation, the work crews would be insulated from this contact by the safety features which he and his team would design into that operational model -- safety features that he would know to install only from the psychological damage that his own brave colts and fillies were suffering on behalf of their Flock. At that moment, Ill Wind was prouder to be a Pegasus than he had ever been at any previous moment of his life.

"Sh -- It's -- I mean, sample restrained," Twist Wrench reported, standing back from the restraint frame, within which the sample writhed energetically. He seemed strangely shaken, emotionally drained, as if the creature's struggles had weakened him more than one would expect from its small size. No doubt the disgust that contact with the beast evoked had affected him almost physically.

We'll have to do something to lessen resistance in the next version, mused Ill Wind, whipping out his pad and noting the idea for future reference. Those things fight more at this point than one would imagine -- brute instinct, I suppose.

"Very good, Twist," said Ill Wind. "Team, on my signal start the process on automatic mode, then step away from the test unit. Are we clear on the procedure?"

"Yes, Dr. Wind," came the replies.

Ill Wind positioned himself before the master control unit. "All right team, three ... two ... one ... start!" He flung his switch, then darted back to the main power control on the laboratory wall. Twist Wrench, Clear Sight and Gold Wire did the same.

The Device rumbled into action.

With a clatter the conveyor belt of the sample transport system began moving. The discorporation unit was on a simple geared system, which had the great advantage of allowing much of the inertia to be regeneratively stored in a flywheel as the half-ton head of the discorporater -- basically a half-ton steel pile-hammer driven by several tons of force -- slammed again and again into the anvil plate. THOOM! ... pause ... THOOM! ... pause ... THOOM! the Device said, speaking decisively of its intent to aid the Pegasus Mandate in its struggle for liberty.

The monster turned its head toward the trip-hammer and its eyes bugged out in utter terror. Its struggles intensified, but Twist Wrench had done his job too well for the creature to evade its role in this important test. The conveyor belt drew the test subject under the discorporator at the precise moment that the tuned gear system drove down the trip-hammer. Splootch-THOOM! -- such was the force of the pile-hammer that the sound of a half-ton of steel driving through fur and skin and flesh and bone was almost completely drowned out by the greater sound of the hammer making contact with the anvil-plate.

Blood and less identifiable fluids, gobbets of what had been the monster's flesh and organs, sprayed in all directions. There were splatter guards around the discorporation point, but these had been installed with the mice and chickens they had used in their earlier tests in mind. The team had neglected to factor in the greater mass of even a small monster, and the splatter guards were too small to capture all of these fluid and colloidal ejections.

Ill Wind was fortunate -- from his position at the side by the Device's main power switch, he entirely missed the organic explosion. Not a single drop landed on his labcoat. Twist Wrench, toward the feed end of the conveyor, was touched only by a small gout of blood. Gold ducked behind the main circuitry monitor panel but still got her hair drenched by a spray that struck her at an unusual angle. "Ewww ..." she said, wiping her straight gold mane with one hoof then ... incongruously ... licking it off with an oddly intense expression.

Clear Sight was less lucky.

She was drenched by a tremendous quantity of blood and other bodily fluids, carrying with it some bits of other organic materials. Some of this struck her directly in the face, temporarily blinding her; the rest doused her mane and forequarters. Clear Sight choked and coughed. Her breathing passages cleared, she then wiped her eyes with her hooves. It was only when she had opened them that she fully realized how extensive had been her baptism, both by blood and less nameable substances. Her eyes widened in horrified disgust, and she leaned over and was noisily sick all over the laboratory floor, adding her own most recent meal to the mess on that surface.

Need to increase the area of the splatter shields, Ill Wind thought, and was about to make a note to that effect, when he heard the screech of tortured metal from the discorporator sleeve, and looked up from his retching engineering assistant to see something much, much worse.

***

Afterward, they were able to figure out what had happened. Some hard part of the monster -- from what remained it looked as if it had been a large tooth -- had been propelled upward and managed to lodge itself in one of the smaller cogs of the pile-hammer gear train -- in fact of one the components which had come from Spark Wheel Industries. Those gears had been well-made, but nopony had envisioned them working with enamel pressed into their notches by other cogs. Though the tooth was of course crushed by tons of force, the pressure exerted back into the system pushed the gear slightly out of alignment.

Need to put a protective cover on the gear train, on all the moving parts, had been Ill Wind's later thought, which he had written down on his notepad. But that of course had been when it was later, when the crisis had been resolved.

That damage should have simply shut down the machinery. The Device was a modern, electrically-powered and controlled machine, and Ill Wind was by no means an incompetent designer. He had included safety features, most importantly a power cutoff should there be significant back-pressure on the system, and ratchets to limit the ability of the Device to mechanically-operate in reverse. At worst, the Device might have stripped some of the discorporator gears, and those gears had been machined out of molybdenum steel. It would have taken a tremendous force, more than the moving parts of the Device were capable of generating, to strip those cogs.

What he had not taken into account was the possibility of a backblast from the thaumic collectors. So far, the Device had only been tested on non-sapient creatures. This was the first time they'd fed it a Monster. And Ill Wind, working with the old notes from the Secret Archives of the Imperial Library, had not fully-grasped how much superior modern electrical equipment was to the primitive, kludged-together medieval copies of Age of Wonders originals with which King Sombra had been working.

The collectors got almost almost all of the Monster's life force, not the mere one-tenth or so with which Sombra had been satisfied. That would have not been a problem, had the entire system been modern from front to back. But the crystalline paramagnetic semiconductors Ill Wind was using were almost direct copies of the designs originally, lovingly crafted and tested by a younger Prince Crimson Quartz and his faithful Lady Tourmaline, when this had been part of their Crystal Healer. Those two worthies had never meant their crystals to stand up to this sort of load. And they didn't.

Had this been a purely electrical system, all that would have happened was that the fuses would have blown. Which is in fact what did happen to the electrical parts of the thaumic collectors. Cute little Gold looked up first in annoyance, then alarm from her compulsive hoof-licking as half her circuit monitors went red, and electricity sparked amidst the framework of the power transmission. Cursing, she threw switches, manually cutting off the flow before it could actually destroy the terminal transformers at the battery end.

But the system was not merely electrical, it was paramagnetic, with all the devilish interactions betwen electromagnetism and paramagnetism that had made it so difficult for the Ponies to climb back up to the technologies of the Age of Wonders in the first place, which had driven Crimson Quartz first to frustration, then despair, and finally a dark pact over a thousand years ago, when his own quest was stymied by the same consideration.

In this case, the paramagnetic flow, stymied by the fuses overloading, was unable to reach the battery. Behaving not like electricity, but instead like some impossible hydraulic force, it backflowed through the lines, crashing into the tail end of its own stream. . One after another, the junction boxes and transformers exploded, showering brilliant yellow sparks over everything below. The process was far, far slower than electricity, slow enough that Ill Wind could actually trace the passage of the backflow, and in a flash of horrified insight, realize what was likely to happen.

Oh, no ... he thought, and leaped from his position to drive with desperate speed for the master control panel. Simply turning off the main power wouldn't work, he'd need to manually shunt the paramagnetism into the safety rods atop the lab building, discharge it harmlessly into the atmosphere ...

The paramagnetism arced back into the discorporator sleeve. The unit was already under considerable mechanical strain as the safety systems cut in and stopped the pile-hammer right on its next downstroke. Greenish paramagnetic energy slashed into the structure -- not of the molybdenum steel gears or the face-hardened steel of the hammer itself, but into the far weaker and softer steels of the hammer's housing. The back-blasting biomantic forces were insufficient to cut through steel, but they were sufficient to soften the steel. The immense inertia of the discorporator bent, then broke its steel housing.

Welds popped as the discorporator hammer separated from its housing, leaned over, and began to fall right on Clear Sight.

Ill Wind looked up from his control panel and realized that it was too late for anything he could do to save Clear. He felt a sinking sensation. Because of his curse, he had known better than to pursue it, but Clear Sight had always been very special to him, more than a mere engineering assistant. She had been his friend: under other circumstances, she might have become more.

Now, she was going to die right before his eyes, because of his design error.

Clear Sight looked up at the scream of tortured steel, and must have come to the same conclusion. There was still a few instants of time, but she did not move from the spot. "Damned ..." she said, for no apparent reason, closing her pale gray eyes, tears leaking out from beneath her lids. "We're all damned." Her wings folded in complete passivity as the huge mass of steel descended to obliterate her --

There was a blur of yellow-topped orange motion. Twist Wrench, flying faster than anypony on the team had ever seen him move before, streaked across the lab to gather up Clear Sight into his forehooves and throw them both clear of the collapsing discorporator. Just a foot or so behind Twist's tail, the hammer head struck the tiled laboratory floor right where Clear had been standing, striking with enough force that tiles shattered and shards of them sprayed in all direction. A moment later, the rest of the assembly crashed in ruins around the hammer -- if Clear had by some miracle been able to survive with mere maiming from the hammer, the ensuing rain of wreckage would have certainly slain her.

Twist flared his wings back, air-braking to avoid hitting the far wall. He and Clear landed badly, but Twist saved Clear from taking any harm from this by turning in midair so that he took the brunt of the sliding impact with the floor. The big stallion grimaced and grunted at the sensation, but did not drop Clear. As he came to a stop, she was still cradled in his forelegs. He held her as if he never wanted to let her go.

Clear Sight opened her eyes, obviously surprised to be opening them once again in the world of the living.

"Twist?" she said, almost disbelievingly. "You ... you saved me?"

"Hey," replied Twist, "just returning the favor. Remember the time you gave me a haircut?" He grinned down at her powder-blue face. "Anyway, that's the kind of thing friends do for friends." His tone was light, but his body language made obvious to Ill Wind the intensity of the mechanic's emotions.

"Friends ..." said Clear, faintly, her eyes defocusing. "But ... why would you care about me? I'm a ... we're all ..." her voice trailed off, her eyes closed.

"Clear?" Twist asked "Clear?" He shook her. "You okay, babe? No ... you weren't hurt, I saved you, you gotta be all right!" His voice was becoming frantic.

Clear's eyes snapped open, and she looked straight at the wreckage of the discorporator.

"Monsters!" she shrieked once, twice. "Monsters!"

Then she fainted in Twist's arms

"Aw, crap," said Twist. He turned, looked pleadingly at Ill Wind. "Doc, get a medic! We need a medic! Clear must be hurt bad! We gotta save Clear!" He was almost bawling.

Ill Wind nodded. He ran to the lab phone, cranked the mechanism, then spoke into it. "Dr. Wind, Lab 103. We have a casualty. Need medical assistance. Repeat, urgent medical assistance!" He listened, then turned to his anxious team mates. Twist's eyes were tortured, and Gold -- who was now standing beside them -- was looking down at her two friends with concern. "Help is on the way."

Ill Wind quickly flitted over the Device, shutting down each part section by section, then shoved the master power switch to "off." There was enough sunlight coming through the skylight to see by. He counted to ten, then turned it back on. The ceiling lights went back on; the Device remained quiescent. No actual fires had been started, so there was no need to grab one of the carbon dioxide extinguishers.

We should put the room lighting on a separate circuit, he thought. What if this had happened after dark? They sometimes worked late hours on the Device, so such was certainly possible. He'd wanted to be modern and go with electricity instead of magelighting, but neglected to compensate for the obvious flaw. I could also put in a backup battery for the room lighting, in case the whole facility loses power. He pulled out his pad and quickly jotted some notes down. Then he flew back over to the rest of the team.

"How's she doing?" he asked Twist Wrench.

"She seems to be breathing normal," Twist said with relief. "I think maybe she just got a bit startled and fainted from the surprise." It was deemed extremely rude among Pegasi, especially of the Mandatial Flock, to allege anything like cowardice in reference to each other, and Twist obviously had a very high regard for Clear's reputation.

Ill Wind was no medical doctor, but his education had included basic first aid. He bent down to Clear, touched her throat with his hoof, focusing on the sensation through the suckers lining the bottom. He could feel a strong pulse; looking down, he could see her chest rising and falling. He scanned her anatomy. It was difficult to tell through all the blood, and stringy bits festooning her head and neck, but she didn't seem to have any actual wounds, nor was the amount of blood under her visibly increasing.

"She'll live," said Ill Wind. He looked up at Gold. "Bring me a first aid kit."

"You got it, Doctor," said the small electrician, flitting over to the lab wall and coming back with one of the aforementioned items.

Ill Wind opened it and checked the contents. There, he thought, reaching in and pulling out a bottle of smelling salts. He flipped the cap open and waved the bottle under Clear's muzzle.

She sniffed, snorted out some more blood, and then her eyes went wide open.

"Unngh ..." she said. "What happened?" She looked inquiringly at Twist, whose face had brightened with joy. "Why are you looking at me like that?" She looked down at herself, realized that she was still drenched in monster ichor. "Yuck," she said very firmly. "Splatter shield needs to be bigger."

"Gold," asked Ill Wind, "could you get me a towel? Um," he added as Gold got up to fulfill his request, "Make that two, and make them damp, please." He could feel himself calming down. It seemed as if nopony had been seriously hurt, though there were a couple of possibilities about which he was still worried.

"Sure thing, Doctor," she replied, and went to get the towels from the small washroom attached to the lab.

"When the hammer hit the monster it sprayed all over the place," Twist was explaining to his friend. "That blinded you and you didn't see the whole discorporator sleeve was falling on you. When you did, you couldn't move quick enough, so I moved you. Then you screamed and fainted -- I -- we was all worried you were hurt bad."

"Uh-huh," Clear said, sitting up slightly. Twist did not totally release her from his forelegs, and Ill Wind noticed that Clear wasn't complaining. "Well I'm a little sore," she admitted, "I think we made a rough landing here. And -- phew! -- I feel all funky, I really and seriously need a bath. Oh, by the Sky, is that what happened to the discorporator?" She stared at the ruins of what had been a high-capacity industrial hammer assembly.

"Yeah," said Twist. "It's a real mess."

"I was standing right there," she said in numb astonishment. "I would have been smashed to pieces ..." She looked at Twist with open gratitude. "You saved my life!"

"Yeah, well," said Twist, flushing slightly, "You did the same for me last month." He helped Clear to her hooves, stroked his own mane sheepishly. "Gave me a quick manecut, never needed one so bad." He grinned at her.

"Yes, but --" she looked at Twist as if she was seeing him in a new light. "You rushed toward the collapsing equipment to push me out of the way?"

"Well ... um ... that was the only way I could do it, you see ..." Twist seemed to be stumbling over his own words. "See you woulda got squashed, and ... mmph!"

Without warning, Clear turned toward Twist, flung both forelegs around his neck, and gave him a long and sincere kiss.

Twist was obviously caught by complete surprise. So were Ill Wind and Gold. Clear was not normally the most forward or demonstrative of mares; Ill Wind had always thought of her as a rather shy intellectual type.

I suppose she has hidden depths, thought Ill Wind to himself. He felt slightly jealous of the attention Twist was getting, but knew Twsit more than deserved it. The big mechanic had put his own life on the line to save Clear Sight, and nopony could begrudge it if Clear felt grateful to Twist for saving his life.

Ill Wind knew there was more to it than that. Twist, in his barely-articulate way, had clearly worshiped the air Clear Sight flew through since the moment he first set eyes on her. And he'd thought Clear had been warming to Twist, who -- while not the most charismatic of stallions, was a good Pony through and through in Ill Wind's opinion.

And, evidently, in Clear Sight's opinion as well.

Gold stood by in astonishment with the towels drip-dripping on the laboratory floor. She had meant to apply them to Clear Sight, but under the circumstances that smacked too much to her of an orgy. She cast Ill Wind a silent questioning look. Ill Wind merely shrugged. They stood waiting for a few seconds longer, until Clear deatched herself from Twist and stepped back, still smiling.

"Thank you," Clear Sight added -- quite unnecessarily, Ill Wind thought.

Gold handed Clear Sight one towel, then another as the first one became too blood-soaked. When Clear was finished, she was not entirely clean -- that would take a long hot bath -- but at least she no longer looked as if she had gone swimming in a blood pool. Ill Wind kept a careful eye on her during this process. She did not seem to be unsteady on her legs, nor did she appear to be wounded.

Clear Sight had been doubly lucky -- firstly, in that the assembly had collapsed slowly; and secondly, in that Twist Wrench had possessed the presence of mind to do the one thing which could have saved her. But Ill Wind wondered if she did not have hidden damage.

The medical team -- Nurse Joy Wing, who was one of Windvane's many cousins, and her assistant Sure Hoof. Both medics, of course, were highly-trusted to be allowed into the Device Project's main lab. They checked over both Clear Sight and Wrench Twist.

"They may have electrical burns or thaumic effects," Ill Wind told Joy Wing. "There were both electrical and thaumic discharges when that assembly blew. And Clear Sight here was saying some very strange things immediately afterward."

"Yeah --" asked Twist in an aside. "What did you mean by all that creepy stuff?"

"Creepy stuff?" said Clear. "Wait -- I was saying something other than 'Oh no' or 'I'm going to die' when the discorporator blew?"

Ill Wind nodded. "I couldn't hear it perfectly, but first you said 'Damn,' and then you closed your eyes and stood still, right under the collapsing assembly. "Almost as if you didn't care if you were crushed."

"I heard it distinctly," interjected Gold. "You said 'Damned. We're all damned.' Then you just froze in place."

"Wow," said Clear Sight. "I can't remember any of this. All I can remember is that the Device blew what looked like half its fuses all at once, and then the Discorporator started to break out of the sleeve, and then --" she looked at Twist with a smile. "-- then we were lying over there, with you wrapping those big legs around me and holding me like I was the world's biggest foal."

Twist blushed.

"Not that there was anything wrong with that," Clear Sight added, grinning more widely. "Under different circumstances -- say with less explosions and nearly-being-mashed-into-paste and getting bounced off the floor -- it might have been an enjoyable experience."

Twist blushed brighter.

"Did she say anything else unusual?" Ill Wind asked. He had nothing against a little laboratory romance, but he wanted to get everypony's impressions while they were still fresh.

Clear looked at him and shrugged. "I don't remember saying anything strange, just waking up and asking Twist what happened."

Gold shook her head "no."

Twist concentrated, then said, "Yeah ... there was something else you said, Clear. Right before you fainted the first time."

Everypony looked at him inquiringly.

"You asked why I'd want to help you. Which is weird cause we're on the same team, and we've always gotten along all right. And you helped me out before. Then --" he paused, trying to think of how to put this. "Then you screamed 'Monsters!' a couple times, and then you just went out like a light. Didn't make much sense to me."

"She may have a head injury," pointed out Joy Wing. She took out a small magnifying glass, held her hoof out. "Clear Sight, try to follow my hoof with your eyes." She moved her hoof back and forth, observing Clear Sight's reaction. "No excessive dilation or swelling," she said, "tracking perfectly -- I don't see any signs of a concussion here, though the doctor will probably want to repeat this test." She frowned.

"I wish we had a medical mage on staff," Ill Wind said, "though of course security considerations would prohibit having a narwhal at this facility, save as --" he did not complete the thought. "But still -- are you set up at the infirmary to at least do some simple detection on her? She may have taken a thaumic backlash."

"Yes," said Joy Wing. "We've got the standard pre-loaded wands and potions. We can check for contamination -- I'll tell the doctor that you recommended it, Doctor Wind."

"Very good," said Ill Wind. "Now, about Twist Wrench here ..."

"What about me?" protested the burly mechanic. "I'm right as rain when a town's callin' for it, Doctor. I ain't been acting weird!"

That got Twist a slightly sour look from Clear, though he didn't notice it.

"Oh no," said Ill Wind. "I saw the way you landed." He looked at Clear Sight. "For your information, Clear, he took the impact on his side to keep you from harm -- held you safe in his forelegs while he slid halfway across the laboratory floor."

Clear's expression softened, and her eyes glistened as she regarded Twist Wrench.

Ill Wind turned to Joy Wing. "Check Twist over here for possible breaks, maybe hairline fractures, wing sprains -- that kind of thing. I think he'll need the infirmary as well."

"Yes, Doctor Wind," said the nurse.

"But Doc, you're gonna need help cleaning up so we can --" protested Twist.

"Indeed," said Ill Wind, "but your assistance can wait. Gold and I can get started on it. I'm not running the Device again until I address some of the design flaws I noticed in this test -- this version obviously isn't yet safe for use with actual monsters. I want you back on the job -- but not with undiagnosed injuries. Besides, look at it this way -- it means you get to have some rest in the infirmary." He leaned in more closely. "With her," he said very softly, flicking his muzzle toward Clear Sight.

"Oh," replied Twist, in an equally low tone. "Oh --" he said again, suddenly realizing the engineer's point. A thought struck him. "But I always figured you --"

"No," said Ill Wind, still softly. "Mare chooses, my good colt, and it's obvious who she's chosen." He pulled back, smiled at both of them. "Keep each other company," he told them both in his normal tone of voice. "Get some rest. Come back here when you have a clean bill of health."

They smiled back at him. The medics put both of them onto their little wagon, and wheeled them out of there. As they disappeared down the hallway with their living burden, Ill Wind could hear Twist still protesting that he didn't need to be wheeled like this, and Clear telling him to just be quiet and enjoy the ride.

When they had gone, Ill Wind closed the door, looked at Gold, and sighed.

"Gold," he said, "go over to maintenance and get some cleaning supplies. Oh, and hunt up a small motor crane if you can -- we can bring it in through the freight door." He looked over at the mass of debris that had been precision industrial equipment and sighed again.

"Doctor, are you all right?"

"No," said Ill Wind. "I'm not all right. The Device is wrecked, two of my team -- my friends -- were just nearly killed, and I'm still not sure what exactly happened to Clear Sight." And a mare I was obviously attracted to more than I realized has just fallen in love with a slob, he thought. Though he's such a nice slob I can't even really blame either of them -- I rather wish them both well.

He walked over to his desk, sat down, buried his head in one foreleg and rubbed his forehead with the hoof of the other foreleg. Not that I could have been more than a friend to Clear Sight anyway, he thought. Not since that witch --

He sighed again, looked up at Gold, who stared back at him with a hurt expression.

"I'm sorry, Gold," he told her. "It's not been the best of days. I was just taking it out on you."

"It's all right, Doc," she said. "I'll get right on the cleaning supplies, then."

He nodded.

He watched her leave, cute little tail bouncing to her steps, and sighed again.

This wasn't going to look well to Commander Windvane.

Author's Note

These first few chapters take place around YOH 1508. eight years after The Return of Luna. Or as the Mandate Flock would say, the return of the second Chimeric Tyrant..

Chapter 2: A Great Responsibility

The catastrophic failure of the discorporator had occurred toward noon. As soon as Clear and Twist had been safely sent to the infirmary and Gold Wire gone off for the cleaning supplies, Ill Wind dashed off a memo to Windvane describing the accident and asking for some help with clean-up and repair.

It might seem strange that Ill Wind was sending such a routine request directly to the High Commander of the entire New Mandate, the self-proclaimed leader of the Pegasus nation. This only emphasized just how much a new and vulnerable thing was that nation. The vast majority of Pegasi had barely heard of Commander Windvane; and the Realm of Equestria, front as it was for the rule of an immortal alien tyranny from beyond all sane space and time, officially regarded him as an eccentric radical.

Windvane's New Mandate Flock comprised perhaps a few hundred thousands of peripheral and twenty or so thousand core members. The peripheral members agreed with Windvane on some general points, such as the inherent superiority of Pegasi to the other two Kinds, let alone to sub-Ponies such as the Asses and Zebras. They wanted to see special privileges for the Pegasi, and restrictions upon non-Ponies within Equestrian borders. They were far too lukewarm to understand the importance of something such as the Device on which Ill Wind was working. They paid dues and increased the Flock vote for seats in Parliament.

The core members were more committed. They agreed that it might take a violent revolution, someday, to bring the Pegasi their rightful due. They understood that something must be done about the way in which the soft ethics and lax morals of the ground-crawlers had infected Pegasi culture, that some sort of culling or expulsion would be needed to restore the Pegasi to their old martial virtues. Of these, maybe a couple of thousand really grasped that many enemies of and traitors to their own Kind would need to be removed from society, perhaps in a permanent manner.

Less than two hundred of the most faithful of the Flock were stationed on the cloud island of Valhalla.

Valhalla appeared on no officially-designated sky charts. It drifted high in the skies over the Northwest, so high that flyers carried oxygen tanks aloft and the main structures were kept pressurized, so high that no normal patrols ever passed there. Sometimes a Courier or a South Wind would pass far below, gazing up idly at what appeared to be a high cirrus cloud, never dreaming what secrets that lonely little cloud concealed.

Loyal members of the Flock, who were risking their lives by keeping positions within the so-called Royal Guard which served the Chimerae, made sure to keep patrols routed away from an area whose contents they were never told, to avoid their revealing it to interrogators, should these moles be compromised. They were not expected to survive once the Sun-Witch realized what Windvane ws doing; their brazen plaques had already been inscribed for placement upon a Wall of Honor, in anticipation of their demise.

There were obvious problems with this arrangement. Supplies and messages could not be delivered directly to Valhalla along normal routes. Instead, they were shipped to a warehouse owned by a front company in Cloudsdale, ostesnibly for reshipment to a variety of other domestic and foreign fronts. Their filed cargo manifests were always rather boring, though a perusal of their real cargoes might have attracted the attention of the Night Watch, had those dark-coated Ponies ever been permitted to read them.

There air-freighters, working for a company owned by one of Windvane's disciples, and crewed by Flock loyalists, set out west, ostensibly for destinations across the Cruel Sea. Their circuitous flight paths twisted to Valhalla, before they resumed their journeys westward. Often they would run into storms and be forced to ditch surplus cargoes -- or so their official logs would state. A variety of ruses ensured that the loss of the actual cargoes -- unloaded at Valhalla -- appeared to be spread out among factories and wharfs all over Equestria.

This meant, unavoidably, that it took a long time to get anything shipped to Valhalla. The quartermaster, Long Manifest, got constant headaches submitting and timing orders to ensure that the base had a steady supply of consumables, such as fuel and food. A single real storm -- and the Weather Patrol was far from perfect, especially in the sparsely-settled parts of Equestria over which Valhalla floated -- could spoil the supply schedules for a month or more.

It was not just the purchasing and shipping. It was all the work which needed to be done to hide the very existence of Valhalla from the Guards. For, at this point, secrecy was Valhalla's only defense. Valhalla was heavily-armed by the standards of a civilian facility -- among the things that had been diverted to the cloud island was a whole boxcar-full of the new automatic weapons the Moon-Witch had ordered for the Guards, and there were even some flak cannons -- but a single Equestrian warship could have reduced the whole base to ruins in an hour's engagement. And everypony on the base, starting with Windvane and continuing all the way down to the lowliest Airpony, knew it.

One day the New Mandate would boast a fleet of warships of their own. One day the wonder-weapons upon which Ill Wind and his fellow engineers were working would give them the power to blast whole cities of ground-grubbers into flaming ruins. Then, the New Mandate might reveal itself, and the lesser Kinds would cower in terror before the power thus revealed!

But that day had not yet come. For the Mandate Flock, at this point in its existence, in secrecy lay survival, as Windvane did not tire of pointing out during his frequent speeches to his inner core of Flock loyalists.

Had one pointed out to Windvane that this was also the motto of one of the races which he most despised, he would not have been amused.

***

It was well into the afternoon when Ill Wind finally received a reply to his memo.

By then, he and Gold Wire had managed to clean the laboratory, which no longer looked like a Griffin abbatoir. Ill Wind had personally hunted up a portable crane, trundled it around the back of the lab and working together he and the cute little electrician had gotten the wreckage of the discorporator arranged by type of equipment and degree of remaining functionality. He really needed Clear Sight and Twist Wrench to help him on a final analysis -- in particular, he wanted Clear Sight to give the pieces a once-over with her talent to look for minute deformations and hidden cracks -- but the infirmary was still being cagey about their condition.

They were pretty sure Twist Wrench had a hairline fracture on his left foreleg and a slight wing sprain, also on that side -- the side on which he'd slid to protect Clear Sight. That alone was a good reason to let Twist Wrench get some rest. Pushing him too hard right now might mean invaliding him for days, or possibly even sending him back to Cloudsdale, either of which might set the project back severely.

Clear Sight they were less certain about. She'd definitely received some sort of thaumic backlash, almost certainly from as yet unprocessed bio-energy from the monster. They wanted to keep her under observation for the night. Ill Wind really wanted her back, but had to concur with their caution -- shifting the heavy pieces of wreckage was a dicey job, and he didn't need her freezing or fainting again.

The damage was depressing enough. While the main hammer of the discorporator had taken no real harm from being bounced off the lab floor -- as far as he could tell with his straightedge it hadn't even been bent a little, and there were no signs of stress fracturing -- the sleeve had been almost totally-wrecked by the malfunction; many of its components had been twisted into steel pretzels. As for the gear trains -- some of them might have been very slightly bent, he couldn't be certain, and that means they'd need re-machining. It would be crazy to ship them back to Spark Wheel Industries for that task -- the turn-around time would be a nightmare, and questions might be raised about exactly how they'd gotten damaged in the first place.

Between them, the team could do ordinary casting and machining work, and Valhalla had shops for those purposes. But some of the gears were really precision instruments, and this wasn't just a matter of perfectionism: the inertia involved in the Device under full operation was such that a tiny imbalance could cause the system to rip itself apart, maybe even more catastrophically than it had the first time. Ill and Clear were simply not good enough machinists to do precision work like that given the limited facilities at the base. The alternative -- trying to do the work in Cloudsdale, or worse, some ground-grubber city, sounded like a security breach waiting to happen.

Gold Wire had checked through the circuitry, both paramagnetic and electrical, and found out to her happy surprise that nothing irreplaceable had been blown. She would have to spend a day or two rebuilding the system -- to the new and improved specs that Ill Wind would calculate -- but that was the least of their problems. Both wiring and crystals were available in great abundance in existing base stores.

Between them, Ill Wind and Gold Wire had gotten a damage report and requisition list written up by three o'clock.

"Well done," Ill Wind smiled at the electrician. "From an administrative point of view, we've got this well wrapped-up."

She smiled back. "Thank you, Doctor."

"It's too bad that paperwork won't collect thaums for the Flock," he said, winking to take the sting off his remark.

At that moment, Ring Binder, one of Windvane's office assistants, came into the lab.

"You're to meet with the High Commander at four," the officious little brown-coated, gray-maned pegasus told him, a look of prim disapproval on his small-muzzled face at what he clearly considered the messiness of the Device in its current condition. It was clear that untidiness bothered the bureaucrat more than the fact that two Pegasi had nearly died in this accident.

"Very good," replied Ill Wind. "You may inform my esteemed cousin that I'll be there with my reports on the situation. Shall I bring my assistant Gold Wire?" he asked, indicating the electrician.

"No," said Ring Binder, sniffing at the suggestion. "Only the senior staff -- yourself and Clear Sight."

"Clear Sight is currently in the infirmary," Ill Wind pointed out, "and I really think she should be kept under observation. Thaumic backlash."

Ring Binder wrinkled his thin lip, clearly annoyed at the inconvenience Clear Sight had put him to by getting injured and thus throwing off his detailed plans. "I'm fairly certain that this meeting is only for top personnel," he said, looking at Gold Wire as if she were little more than an unsightly piece of lab equipment.

The young electrician bristled, and Ring Binder smiled thinly at her reaction.

"You have no problem with attending alone, do you?" the aide asked.

"I can handle it by myself," Ill Wind said, "Though of course I will regret the absence of my highly qualified assistant, Gold Wire."

Ring Binder sniffed again. "You will be expected," was the aide's only comment as he walked out of the room, nose held so high that Ill Wind was slightly surprised not to see him collide with the lab door.

"What a prick," commented Ill Wind, after Ring Binder was gone.

"Oh, I doubt it's exceptional," added Gold Wire "Probably barely visible."

Her statement was so dead pan that it took Ill Wind a moment to realize exactly what she'd said. Then he snorted. "You're probably the wrong sex for him, anyway," and was rewarded by a giggle.

"So I guess I don't need to wonder what's stuck up his ass," Gold Wire retorted.

"Probably some strapping young airpony stallion of similar inclinations ... if he's luckier than he deserves," replied Ill Wind.

This was relatively safe banter. Gold Wire was a friend, and the dangerous subject of his own sexual capabilities -- or lack thereof -- was unlikely to intrude itself into the conversation. For a brief moment of warmth, Ill Wind felt almost normal.

"Seriously, Doctor," Gold asked, "what exactly does he have against me. Is he the kind of colt-cuddler who hates all mares? Or does he have something against blondes?" She ran a hoof through her mane.

"No," Ill Wind explained. "It has nothing to do with you. It's me."

"What does he have against you?" Gold's near-worshipful expression made it obvious that she considered such a prejudice incomprehensible.

Ill Wind sighed. "Well, to begin with, I'm Windvane's first cousin. That gives me an unfair advantage over Ring Binder, from Ring's ponit of view. What's worse, I've never been all that conventional -- until two years ago, I was adventuring all over the place, assembling the plans for the Device. Ring considers such outdoor activities rather disreputable."

Gold snickered. "Why does he even bother to have wings, then? Might as well be a ground-grubber."

"Ring Binder is one pegasus who lives happily in his own little coop," Ill Wind said, arranging the paperwork on his desk, "putting everything into his neat little categories and building his own little bureaucratic empire. And I don't fit into his neat little categories. So I should be on the outside, begging to get in. But I'm on the inside, and he can't deal with that. Especially because he can't duplicate either my kinship with the High Commander, or my engineering talents.

"So he resents me. And he resents you, because you're my associate. He probably resents Clear Sight too, for the same reasons, but she's my 'engineering assistant' on the formal organizational charts, so she has the rank to attend this meeting." Ill Wind pulled out a fresh sheet of paper. "Can you get me the plot of the energy levels on the thaumic battery?" he asked Gold.

"Of course, Doctor," She flitted over and in a moment was back with the papers in hand.

"I'd like to be able to report more than catastrophic failure here, and I recall -- Yes," he said with some satisfaction. "We actually retained a considerable charge from that test run. The battery wasn't damaged at all. Mind you, I have to redesign this so that we don't have to rebuild half the Device after every subject processed, but this proves the basic idea to be sound!" He arranged the papers on his desk, began writing," then looked up at Gold again.

"The truth is, Gold, you're a bit inexperienced, but you know your stuff," Ill Wind said. "If we can get the Project expanded, I'm pretty sure there'll be higher-rank positions opening up for you as well. You're learning on the job, just keep cracking the books too and I wouldn't be too surprised if in a year or so you were rated as master electrician -- another few years, you can maybe get a degree in electrical engineering -- a lot of our work is secret, but you'd be surprised how I could write a recommendation without specifying the details too much."

"Wow!" said Gold. "That would be really super if you could do that!"

"Well," Ill Wind said, "first I have to convince my cousin to keep backing the Project." He worked on the report, scribbling with his pen, a modern steel-gray fountain model. "But yes, as long as we don't get shut down, it should be possible. So be patient, and don't let fools like Ring bother you too much." He handed her the parts requisition list. "Here, double-check this for me while I finish this report, then I'll be all ready for the meeting."

She beamed at him, and he tried not to notice too much. It was not as if he could do anything about it.

***

Ill Wind walked down the main corridor of Valhalla, his reports safely in the briefcase he carried in one side-bag. His hooves clopped on the floorboards, the pressurized fabric of the corridor bellying around him. The clouds themselves leaked so much air that all chambers and corridors needed to be lined with air-tight materials; rubberized fabrics being the best light substance for this purpose. Hard-packed cloud could have kept the air in, but Valhalla was a hasty improvisation, not a real cloud-city like Cloudsdale or a fortress like ancient Derecho.

Such is the life of Rebels against an Evil Realm, Ill Wind thought to himself. Humble beginnings, and all that. Things will get better soon.

Around him hummed the life of the base. Past him walked the other pegasi, and it thrilled Ill Wind's soul to know that those around him were the fellows of his own Kind, and not merely of his own Kind but of the subset of the Kind who had come to realize their own high destiny, after two and a half millennia of enslavement by inequine monsters. First the Twister, then the Two Chimeric Witch Sisters.

Why were the Pegasi finally rising? Many reasons, he suspected. Technology was finally beginning to be able to duplicate the powers which had previously belonged to the Chimera Witches and the narwhals. And the Chimera Witches were themselves somehow multiplying, perhaps following whatever were their alien urges in some unguessable fashion. There had been one when he was born, then two, then three -- now there were four of the creatures, foul spawn of remote regions of spacetime, as the notes he'd found from Crimson Quartz and Lady Tourmaline so clearly indicated.

Those two Crystal-Imperial narwhals had trusted Princess Luna, considered her their friend, even (he strongly suspected from some of Crimson's private notes) in some horrible way loved her. The Witches were rumored to be able to enthrall any who were in their presence -- so far, he'd carefully avoided encountering any of them, save for that one unfortunate meeting with Twilight Sparkle -- and he was certain he'd gotten away fast enough to avoid her evil enchantments.

Here one evil had marred another -- the witch who had cursed him had rendered him somewhat immune to what he was certain would otherwise have been Twilight's overwhelming feminine charms. He had been able to see no deeper into her nature than that of the socially-awkward noble mage, though her vile nature was obvious from the obscene multiplicity of characteristics of kind she bore -- he still shuddered as he remembered those impossible wings allowing her to intrude into the domain properly belonging to the High Kind, while her narwhal-horn shot bolts of radiant energy after him, undeterred by the traps he had laid, with the animal vitality of the groundgrubbers cousring through her alien veins.

Once she realized his purpose, he had barely escaped with his life. Flying at his fastest he could not outrace her, as she time and time teleported ahead of him. He had lived only due to his quick wits and reflexes, both of them manifestations of his racial superiority. Twilight Sparkle was a horror that should not exist in this or any other sane world.

How could such monstrosities walk by broad daylight? How were they permitted to command the most fundamental forces of Nature? Every time he speculated thus, the thought threatened to send his sanity reeling, for it implied that the Pegasi lived in a very unfriendly Cosmos.

He was so proud to be living in the age when the Pegasi finally fought back against their ancient oppressors, to be such a vital part of the Project which would make their victory possible. The Device he was building would let the Pegasi command magics as powerful as those of the Chimera Witches. They would wield the lightning, the Dark Rainbow, even wrest control of the Sun and Moon away from the Witches. It would give the Pegasi the mastery they deserved over all the lesser kinds, catapulting them to the rightful rule they had somehow failed to win three thousand years ago.

This time, justice would triumph. And Ill Wind was ecstatic to be part of this glorious and holy cause.

***

The High Commander's office was the biggest single office in Valhalla, as befitted Windvane's high position. A great picture window, which could be covered by an armored hatch, looked down from miles of altitude on the trackless forests of northwestern Equestria, the ancient homeland of the Pegasi before the Snow Griffons had ever been driven south by the expansion of the Northern Wastes and the pressure of even more monstrous creatures behind them. The floor was carpeted in a thick bluish-gray pile, lined with wood paneling, each piece of which had to be brought up by air-freighter.

Against one wall was the venerable banner of the Old Pegasus Mandate: the stylized light-blue on blue head and wings of a Pegasus bearing the old Mandatial wreath, against a dark-blue field filled with light-blue stars. Against another the banner of the New Pegasus Mandate, the same design on a more dramatic red field full of white stars, with the Pegasus head and wings in black and the old Mandatial wreath replaced by a new symbol representing their new magical might: a reversed black hooked cross in a white field.

The room was large enough that the entire staff of Valhalla could have fit in there. But at present it contained only three individuals aside from Ill Wind himself.

There was High Commander Windvane. He was a tall and regal middle-aged Pegasus, pale blue coated and black-maned, with intense brown eyes. Ill Wind had remembered his eyes being considerably less intense when both he and his cousin had been younger. Indeed, Windvane had in every respect become more energetic and charismatic since Ill Wind had introduced him to his new Special Adviser, the second Pegasus in the room.

Windvane smiled and nodded to Ill Wind as the engineer entered the room. His familiar face seemed to his cousin to be wise and careworn. This was the Commander on whom the whole Flock, soon the whole nation, was counting. Ill Wind almost saw him with a sort of double vision; the older cousin he had remembered from family visits and parties, overlain by the almost-holy national leader. What was certain was that the bond between them, the ties of loyalty, were unbreakable.

Special Advisor Random Flag was a midnight-black pegasus with black mane and eyes that were like pools of even deeper shadow in them. When he had first met Ill Wind, his cutie mark had been the flag of the Old Pegasus Mandate; now, strangely, it seemed to have shifted to that of the new one, making a dramatic splash of red and white color against his black coat. Random Flag was that rarest of ponies, a Pegasus capable of performing overt magic, and his occult lore considerably exceeded that of Ill Wind himself.

Random's expressions were as always difficult to read in his black-on-black face. Yet it seemed to Ill Wind that the mysterious mage gave him a friendly look, black teeth gleaming against black lips, a merry twinkle in his black eyes. Once, Random Flag had assured him that he and his cousin Windvane were utterly-essential to Random's own work, so Ill Wind knew that Random was a true benefactor of the Pegasi. It had been Random who had suggested the flag insignae of the New Mandatial Flock, calling it "traditional," though he evaded all questions regarding the exact origins of this tradition.

The third Pegasus in the room seemed almost washed-out against the other two personages. High Home was the chief of the Special Services unit of the New Mandate Flock, a term which meant that he led the Flock's enforcer company, a unit outside the normal chain of command of the Mandatial military. Its purpose was plain: to deal with potential enemies within the Flock itself, a mission which terrified even the Inner Core of the Flock.

High Home was an unimpressive-looking pony for such an important poltiical post. He was a little weedy Pegasus, more fragile-looking even than Ring Binder, whose coat was black like Random's, but somehow on High Home it looked a scruffy grayish sort of black. His mane was grayish-white. His eyes were a weak watery sort of gray, and he had to wear glasses to correct his short-sightedness. Outdoors he of course wore goggles, but indoor he preferred rather fragile-looking rimless ones, giving him the impression of a particularly-timid accountant.

It was said that he took daily medication for a weak stomach. It was also said that he could order an execution without so much as blinking those weak watery eyes. Those who knew of the degree to which he had the ear of the Commander, and the deeds to which he liked to urge Windvane, feared High Home.

Ill Wind was no exception.

High Home looked at Ill Wind with some irritation. For a moment, the engineer wasn't exactly sure why, and then he remembered that he had neglected the formal mode of address which Random Flag had unearthed from one of his ancient tomes, and convinced Windvane was necessary for a sense of Flock unity. It had quickly become a mere ritual, but High Home took these rituals seriously.

"Glory to the Flock!" said Ill Wind, not neglecting the slight flare of his wings as he did so.

"Glory to the Flock," repeated the other two at the table, Windvane with a look of boredom and Random Flag with yet another merry smile, as if he were but a colt playing a game.

"Be seated," welcomed Windvane, motioning to a chair at the table.

Ill Wind sat, opening his briefcase before him.

"What news do you bring me of progress on the Device, my trusted cousin?" asked Commander Windvane.

"We conducted the first full test of the Device on one of the monsters today," reported Ill Wind. "The results were mixed," he admitted, "but far from fatal to the Project as a whole. The discorporator worked as planned, but there was a thaumic backlash in the power couplings which unfortunately damaged the discorporator and slightly injured two of my staff, including my top assistant Clear Sight. They should be out of the infirmary by tomorrow.

"The test was successful in that we succeeded in harvesting 34 percent of the monster's life force and retaining it in the main battery. The failure of the couplings indicate that we need to greatly-reinforce both the thaumic and electrical conductors, and the insulation of those elements. The test also indicated the need for more extensive fluid containment systems around the discorporation baseplate, as there was a significant ... mess ... which may have contributed to other systems failure."

Ill Wind noticed that High Home winced at that statement, and the engineer felt a certain malicious mirth at the knowledge. He was well aware that High Home was willing to order deaths, but not willing to directly observe the consequences. He had heard that High had once been a chicken farmer, and wondered how he'd been able to deal with the need to take away the eggs -- had he employed someone else to do his dirty work then as well?

"I have here a complete report on the test results, the damage to the laboratory, and my requisitions for replacement parts and plans for design improvements to enable a more successful second test," he said, pushing a stack of papers toward his colleagues. As he expected, Windvane scanned the first pages perfunctorily, Random Flag looked through the entire report very quickly, and High Home gave the report only a cursory examination.

"This is actually well done," said Windvane. Then he gave his cousin a sterner look. "Though next time you must be careful not to blow up the discorporator!" He smiled to rob the criticism of its sting.

It had actually been the discorporator sleeve, but Ill Wind knew better than to correct the High Commander before his subordinates. The engineer was proud of his present social skills -- the young stallion he had once been would not have known why it would have been a bad idea to do that.

Windvane looked inquiringly at Random Flag, soliciting his comments.

The dead-black pegasus mage inclined his head. "The colt's doing good," Random said in his usual charming and folksy manner. "Why, I think he'll have it up-and-running, full-scale, within one or two years, dependin' on how fast we can do Operation Reclamation." Random turned to High Home.

The security chief nodded grudgingly. "I can only fault Ill Wind on the safety of his laboratory," he said, "and this is of course cutting-edge research. Accidents are unavoidable, save to the most meticulous of workers -- and alacrity is essential in this matter."

Couldn't avoid the digs, could you? Ill Wind thought, but did not say, to High Home.

"I see that we are all in agreement on the need to push forward the Device Project," the High Commander said. "And confident that my cousin Ill Wind is the best Pegasus to trust with this task." He leaned forward to look intently into Ill Wind's eyes. "My old friend, I must impress upon you what a great responsibility I entrust to your wings. The Device is the key source of all the power we will need for all our wonder-weapons. Without a reliable source of thaumic energy on a very large scale, everything else -- the Dark Rainbow, the Bells of Doom, the mighty engines we will need to drive our old home once we have reclaimed it -- all these will be useless. Do you understand the importance of success?"

A great thrill ran through Ill Wind.

"My Commander," the engineer said, in a voice almost choked by emotion, "I am tremendously happy to have the chance to play such a pivotal role in helping our Kind achieve the inevitable victory over the lesser breeds. I promise you that you shall not be disappointed in your choice of Project Leader. Glory to the Flock!" This time, the salute was delivered with unfeigned enthusiasm.

"Do you have any special requirements which would expedite your work?" asked Commander Windvane.

All thoughts of Windvane on the part of Ill Wind as his old companion at family get-togethers was utterly-eclipsed by his awareness of High Commander Windvane as the destined leader of the Pegasus nation. And this great leader was asking him what needed to be done. Windvane might have swooned with excitement, were it not important to answer the question.

"I can produce a detailed long-term requisition," Ill Wind said, "but at the present what I really need are the ponies and equipment to rebuild the Device to the new specifications I have devised. My two injured staff will soon be out of the infirmary -- I could also use a few more workers to assist them in the grunt-work -- any loyal Flock with basic technical skills will do here. And I very much need a skilled machinist, so that the Project can be rendered independent of any requirement on groundgrubber support for any small parts production, such as precision gearing."

"The additional workers will be made available to you at the start of tomorrow's shift," promised Windvane. "As to a good machinist --" he frowned "-- those are always in short supply. We Pegasi tend toward more glorious occupations." He looked at his Special Advisor. "Random," he asked, "weren't you saying something to me about a master machinist your staff had recently recruited? That you would have already brought her to Valhalla, if there weren't certain -- questions -- about her?"

"Yes, my Commander," said Random. "Aw, heck, Metal Shriek's a good Pegasus at heart, and she used to be a hell o' fun at parties." He winked broadly at the Commander, who chuckled. "She's just been a bit -- down -- in the year since her accident. A bit -- heh -- damaged." He tapped his head, grinning jovially. "She's a top master machinist, though, and perfect for what Ill Wind needs her. Heck, she can always keep her mask on, if she's too much to look at these days!"

"Then it's settled," said the High Commander, turning to Wind Vane. "We can get you your master machinist, I would think within a matter of days." For small-scale personnel transport, the Flock maintained a number of private air-yachts, and there was no necessity of cumbersome cargo rerouting to elude the Night Watch.

"Thank you, my Commander," replied Ill Wind, with heartfelt gratitude.

"You are most welcome, Dr. Wind," assured Windvane. "I shall dismiss you to prepare for the next shift," he continued. "We want no delays now!"

***

As Ill Wind walked back to his laboratory, he was overflowing with happiness. He had his Commander's confidence. Nopony would blame him for the damage to the Device. He was still in charge of the Project, which was about to get even larger!

He would even get the master-machinist he had so long wanted!

Metal Shriek, he thought to himself. I've heard that name before. She was a troubleshooter -- one of those Pegasi who get about all over the place. Was then, anyway ... haven't heard anything about her in a long while ...

He thought he had seen her once. He had a vague memory of long legs, a shapely barrel, a steel-gray coat and long blonde mane and tail. He'd never seen her close-up, only from a distance at some engineering conference. She'd been a notable beauty, as he recalled.

Apparently not anymore, based on what Random Flag had said. He wondered what sort of "accident" had occurred to change that, what sort of "damage" had been done to her. He felt an odd disquiet at Random's manner. Always, he had felt he could join in on the joke with Random, but this seemed ... cheap ... to so mock a tragedy.

Ah well, he thought. I'll be meeting her soon enough, I suppose. Time to give Gold the good news, then after the shift I can check in on Clear and Twist.

The future, he was now certain, would be a bright one.