MLP 40K: Trial by Fire

The Inquisitor's primary conference room was enormous. Sophic Fortune had originally set the room aside as a meeting place for all of her Inquisitorial staff. It was able to hold dozens of ponies and had been used the previous evening when she had announced that Tracks would be her new Interrogator.

The wooden table that dominated the center of the room was a single solid piece over a hundred hooves long and had been carved from the trunk of a massive tree. High backed cloth covered chairs lined the table on both sides, also supposedly framed with wood from the same tree as the table itself. The walls that lined the room were covered in a single elaborate mural which depicted the triumph of The Royal Pony Sisters over the forces of Hate and Disharmony. The carpeting was extremely plush and was colored a deep red color, like something somepony would expect to see on a planetary governess.

Tracks had contacted all of the members of his retinue and had told them to meet in the primary conference room an hour after lunch to discuss the upcoming mission. He had given specific instructions that everypony come wearing their field gear, and that all of their packing needed to be completed before the meeting started.

Able entered the conference room and was not surprised to find that she was apparently the first pony to arrive for the meeting. A habit she had picked up with the Equestrian Guard was that she always had a kit bag ready to go, so she had not needed to pack.

She was dressed, as always, in her olive drab carapace barding, though she had the helmet off and attached to the left side of her armor. She wore a combat saddle that consisted of a large battery pack on the left side and a rig for holding her tartarus-gun on the right side. The tartarus-gun, which she had carried since she had been a storm trooper for the Equestrian Guard, was currently in safe mode and pointed upwards in the rig. Her data-slate with the team's equipment roster was wedged into a pouch somewhere. She had also stuffed some of the saddle's other pouches with grenades of various types.

She noted, with mild distaste, that somepony had used the conference room before them and left many of the seats all over the place. "They have a party in here or something?" She grumbled to herself as she dragged some of the errant chairs back towards the table. She briefly considered straightening the rest of the room but a quick glance to the chronometer on her left cannon's plate informed her that she wouldn't have nearly enough time, despite having arrived fifteen minutes early. She settled for giving the sides and backs of the other chairs a mild glare of disapproval.

Pinion was the second pony to arrive, he entered the conference room exactly as Able's chronometer showed that there were ten minutes until the meeting. As per usual, nothing could really be seen of the tech-pony under his robes. The only distinguishing features were those metal wings he sported. Able knew some of the newer members of Sophic's staff had taken to gossiping about Pinion's actual gender. Some of the more unscrupulous ones were actually taking bets on what lay under the robes. Able had gone to great lengths to dissuade the behavior, which she considered to be rude and even cruel, whether Pinion said he cared or not. Able accepted the tech-pony for what he was and felt no urges whatsoever to need to see more than the red cybernetic eyes and the mess of tubes and wires that was his lower face.

Pinion's eyes locked with hers. "Greetings, Sergeant Body." The tinny voice issued forth from somewhere in the tangle of metal under his muzzle.

"Hi, Pinion." She said. "How is the Equila?" She wasn't sure why she had asked, she didn't particularly care for any tech-pony's tendency to ramble on about the most boring topics. Still, she couldn't deny that Pinion seemed to have an energy about him, like enthusiasm, though he would never admit to having actual pony emotions, whenever he was able to talk about something he had worked on. As Pinion started regaling her with the unknowable mysteries of aircraft maintenance she couldn't help but smile at how animated he had become.

Interrogator Tracks entered the conference room with about thirty seconds to spare and Free Fall walked in literally right behind him. The purple unicorn was wearing a dark gray cloak that covered everything below his neckline, and would have covered everything above as well had the hood been up. Able almost did a double take when she saw the Interrogator's face. The color of his coat seemed a little off and was lacking healthy sheen, almost as if he were sickly. The dark rings under his eyes completed the look and convinced Able that he probably hadn't slept well at all.

Then there was Free Fall. The cyan pegasus had on her periwinkle blue flight suit with matching saddle. Sheathed across the saddle was a wicked looking chainblade. Able had never seen Free Fall use the thing, though she had definitely seen them used during her time in the Guard. She never understood how anypony could prefer such a weapon considering how they tended to leave the wielder covered in gore. Able had never gotten to ask Free Fall about the preference before and decided against it now because, if the scowl on her face was to be believed, Free Fall appeared to be in an especially foul mood.

Tracks sat in one of the chairs that Able had gathered up and set his hooves on the table. "Ok, everypony, let's get this briefing started, we're out of here within the hour." He said in a weary sounding voice.

"Umm, Sir?" Able asked.

Tracks shifted an uncomfortable look in her direction. Instead of asking why she had interjected or remaining silent with a motion for her to continue, he completely floored her with his single statement. "Able, you know you can just call me Tracks, this isn't the military."

She felt a mild flush come to her face as she tried to recover. "Of course, Si... I mean Tracks"

"So, did I miss something already?" Tracks asked, with genuine concern in his voice. After a short pause he clarified. "I'm a little out of it today." Able noticed the remark had earned him a glare from Free Fall. Tracks didn't seem to notice and continued to look at Able expectantly.

"Shouldn't we wait for Devoid?" She asked.

Tracks' muzzle twisted into a sort of grimace and he looked around the room. His horn started to glow a light crimson color. One of the chairs that was fairly close to her own, one that had been turned away from where they all sat, was surrounded in a halo of light that mimicked the light of Tracks' horn. The seat turned in place until it faced them, revealing the inanely grinning jet-black unicorn.

Able immediately felt her hackles rise and reflexively bolted upright, sending her chair flying away from the table. She stopped her right hind leg a mere hair's breadth from releasing the safety catch on her rifle. She made up her mind in that moment, as she stood completely embarrassed and a mere nudge and bit pull from hosing down part of the conference hall with high powered las-blasts, she hated Devoid.

Oddly enough, nopony was staring at Able or giving her odd looks for the, almost extremely, violent reaction. Tracks eyes were closed and he was shaking his head from side to side. Free Fall was giving Devoid a withering look. Pinion just looked confused by all the pony emotion that was flying around. The only one who even spared her a glance was Devoid himself as he shifted to a more comfortable position in the chair.

He wasn't really wearing anything, which didn't really surprise her, the unicorn seemed to eschew just about all clothing. She seemed to remember him spouting some nonsense about it getting in his way. The only things he ever consistently wore were a sheathed knife on the cannon of his right foreleg and a magical nullification gauntlet on the cannon of his left foreleg.

"Don't be too upset, honey cakes -" Devoid began in one of his casually condescending tones.

Her eyes narrowed and she let her right hind leg bump her saddle's safety catch, causing the tartarus-gun to fall into its armed position. Able had reflexively moved so that the weapon was pointed directly at Devoid's face, which quickly replaced its grin with a frown. The high pitched whine of the gun's capacitors quickly decreased in intensity until it reached a low hum which indicated the weapon had reached maximum charge.

"Apologize." Able demanded of the frowning unicorn.

"Really? For hiding in the room?" Devoid voice was as flat as a cake subjected to a filly on a pogo-stick during baking. He eyed the weapon warily.

"Honey cakes?" Able hissed through her teeth.

"Ah." Devoid's placed his forehooves into the air in surrender. "I didn't mean anything by it, I apologize." Able bumped the weapon with her back hoof again and it snapped back into the upwards facing position. Devoid's grin returned to his face with the same alacrity as the weapon's powering down sound. "I was just about to say that Tracks here is the only one who seems to be able to just find me. Don't feel bad if ya missed me." He winked at her, sending her hackles rising again.

Tracks clopped his hoof on the table a few times. "Ok, fun time's over everypony." While he certainly looked bad, he sounded even more like he was about to drop from exhaustion. Able noticed though that Free Fall, who was sitting next to him, was looking in Devoid's direction and covering a smirk with one hoof.

Tracks reached into his cloak, placed a portable holo-projector from it onto the desk and hoofed it into operation. A giant indistinct blob was projected above the device. "Horse apples." He muttered, then whacked the device with his hoof. Able saw Pinion visibly cringe at the blatant disregard for the spirits within the device. Tracks' impromptu benediction seemed to mollify the soul of the machine however, as the image of a rotating sphere snapped into focus. Visible upon the globe were continents and oceans and three gargantuan structures, hive cities.

"Abyssinian Prime." Tracks said, with a lazy flourish of one purple hoof towards the rotating image. "As I'm sure some of you are aware, Inquisitor Scisco, a former student of our own Sophic Fortune, was killed thirty years ago while defending the galaxy from the forces of Disharmony." Tracks hoofed another button on the projector and the image changed to reams of figures. "Scisco was only about forty years old at the time of his death. Even an Inquisitor of his... relative youth -" Tracks had pulled out a data-slate and was looking at whatever was displayed on it as he spoke. "- tends to acquire a great sum of both bits and other assets during the course of their career." He looked up from the slate. "Our mission is to go to Abyssinian Prime and recover the Inquisitor's assets there."

"Really? We're going there for money?" Free Fall asked, seemingly taken aback.

"Of course we are." Devoid said with a flash of his grin. "Go ahead and tell them why, Boss."

Tracks made his own feeble attempt at a grin of his own, but only managed something resembling a wince. "Our own, and I might add, quite incomplete, records show we have something in the realm of thirty billion reasons." He said, putting the slate down on the table.

"Why did Sophic wait thirty years to take care of this?" Able asked, genuinely confused. It wasn't like Sophic to put off things that needed to be done.

Tracks looked over at her. "Sophic says it wasn't a priority. Reclaiming a few billion bits pales in comparison to some of the stuff we've been doing. Honestly? I think she was probably putting it off on purpose. Scisco was her student. Reclaiming all of his assets means there's nothing of him left out there. I never knew him myself, but I think I can relate to how she feels.

Everypony was silent for a few moments.

"Still, just thirty billion bits? I know that seems like a lot to one pony, but the Admanestratum could easily take care of that, right?" Able asked.

"Thirty billion, three hundred and seventy-five million -" Pinion started to rattle off the figure.

"It's not just the bits." Tracks interrupted. "If it were just the bits, we could trust the Admanestratum to collect everything. Problem there is that Abyssinian Prime was the center of all of his operations. There will be estates, equipment." He leaned forward onto the table and shifted his eyes from pony to pony as he spoke. "Records. Secrets." He paused again, most likely for dramatic effect. "Inquisition secrets." He sat back again. "We will need to make sure that any and all sensitive information, equipment, etcetera are reclaimed."

"Oh, One more thing." Able saw a gleam of fire in Tracks' eyes now. He seemed miraculously energized. "Note I believe this to be our true mission. Sophic may have crushed the cell of haters that personally took Scisco's life, but she was never able to track them past the tunnels where it all went down. I'm willing to bet that, somewhere in his records, we might find some clues that will point us to the rest of them."

"And then?" Devoid somehow asked without sounding rhetorical.

"Then we end them." Tracks said through gritted teeth. "We send them straight to Tartarus."

"How long till we head out?" Free Fall asked. "My wings are getting itchy."

Tracks looked over at her. "Glad you asked. The reason I called this meeting on such short notice and told you to be ready to go is that I've scheduled a ride with the Equestrian Naval Frigate 'Accord.' They leave orbit in -" He checked the chronometer on his data-slate. "- eight hours. I expect us to be en route to the Accord within the hour." He pointed a hoof towards Able. "I want everypony to do a quick check of their equipment with Able here before we go. If it's not on her list, don't you dare complain about not having it later." He then pointed at Pinion. "Is the Equila ready for takeoff?"

"Every system has been blessed and sealed." The tech-pony replied.

Tracks hoofed the holo-projector off and stuffed it back into the recesses of his cloak. He then pushed his chair away from the table and stood up. He grabbed his data-slate and looked at the chronometer on it. "I expect wings up in forty-two minutes, ponies. See you all on the Equila." He pocketed the slate and started walking towards the door.

Devoid swiftly made his own exit, managing to pass Tracks on his way out of the conference room. Pinion stopped to double check Able's own data-slate and then made himself scarce.

Since nopony else seemed to want to check their equipment with her, Able stood to leave. Free Fall suddenly leapt over the table with a quick flap of her wings and landed in front of her. Able wasn't sure what to expect from the cyan pegasus. The look on Free Fall's face was one of... amusement?

"Bravo!" A smile spread itself ear to ear on Free Fall's face as she spoke. "Way to put Devoid in his place!" She said, placing a forehoof on Able's withers. "If I knew all it took to get some respect out of the old coot was to pull a gun on him, I'd have done it ages ago!" She started chuckling. Despite not being very happy with the fact that she had pulled a gun on a team member, Able actually found herself laughing along with Free Fall. She felt that it did wonders to relieve the tension she had been feeling.

"C'mon, lets go get our stuff and go to the Equila." Free Fall said. They walked out of the conference room and towards their living quarters.

"So, -" Free Fall asked after they had been walking for a few minutes. Able looked over towards her. "- would you have really shot Devoid if he hadn't apologized?"

Able thought for a moment. Honey cakes her brain reminded her. "Yes."

Free Fall started laughing again as they continued walking.

*          *          *

Free Fall couldn't believe that she had been purposefully missing out on Able's company for the last few years. She supposed that she had never really had high opinions of military types. They had always seemed so stuffy, unimaginative, and well, boring. She had never thought about the qualities in a military pony that she might actually find enjoyable. The assertiveness, the candor, the guts.

And what guts! She had been absolutely amazed when Able had pulled the gun on Devoid. Able probably hadn't seen her jaw hit the table, but she probably had caught the grin that Free Fall had been attempting to hide. Able was probably still wondering why nopony had reprimanded her for the action. Free Fall, and probably anypony who had ever spent any significant time with Devoid, knew the truth of it was that he deserved it. Probably would have deserved getting shot too, if he had allowed it to escalate that far.

Free Fall had been making all kinds of small talk with Able all the way into the living quarters. Able seemed particularly interested in her chainsword. She had asked all kinds of bizarre questions about how one avoided getting their opponent all over themselves. Free Fall never really thought about it, she'd never had the issue before.

When they had gotten to their quarters, she had been surprised at how little luggage Able was actually bringing with her. Efficiency, another Equestrian Guard attribute she wished she possessed. She felt downright embarrased when she hauled her own bags from her room. The feeling amplified slightly when Able actually offered to carry one of the bags for her. She had declined as gracefully as she could, though she regretted having to drag both of her bags through the halls.

Now, on their way to the landing pad, the conversation between the two of them had taken a turn towards the team. "You work with Tracks often?" Able asked her.

Free Fall couldn't help but laugh. "We've been on so many missions together, I couldn't even begin to count." She said with a smile. "I've pulled his sorry rump out of the fire more times than he would probably care to admit. He's even saved me a few times." She knew it sounded sappy, but decided to say it anyway. "He's a good friend." When he isn't being an idiot. Her brain griped.

Able nodded with a smile and they continued onwards. A few minutes more and they had reached the landing pad. The hangar was open and the Equila just inside. Free Fall noticed with satisfaction all of the fresh wax seals on the various panels on the vehicle.

The two ponies walked around to the rear of the majestic vehicle and trotted up the rear boarding ramp. It looked like everypony was already aboard, Tracks and Pinion were sitting in seats in the common room and she was pretty certain she saw Devoid's form in his sleeping compartment. Free Fall moved through the common room and stuffed her bags into her own sleeping compartment before turning to wave to Able. She was happy to see Able return the wave.

Free Fall moved past the sleeping compartments to the front of the Equila and opened the door to the cockpit. Hundreds of blinking lights and a dozen readouts and screens greeted her. As she sat down in the aged cloth covering of the pilot's chair she noticed a folded piece of parchment on the instrument panel. Even though she was pretty sure she knew both who it was from as well as what it said, she resolved herself to read it anyway.

Sorry,

T

She sighed. She had forgiven him earlier, when she had woken him up instead of throttling him. She sighed again, she didn't have time for this. She pocketed the parchment and started going through the rituals of pre-flight.

She hoofed the onboard speaker system. "Alright, everypony, ramp is coming up, all aboard who's coming aboard!" She hoofed the rune to close the boarding ramp. She watched the indicator runes as well as felt the vibrations of the ramp hydraulics. When she heard the satisfying thunk of the ramp slamming into place, and the indicator light glowed green, she smiled. Time to get this bird rolling.

She stretched her wings out and used them in addition to her hooves to manipulate the Equila's controls. She used the secondary thrusters to taxi the Equila onto the landing pad. With only a few more rituals to perform, Free Fall was moments away from takeoff. When she was satisfied that the machine spirits of the Equila were cooperating, and less likely to incinerate them mid flight or void them into space, she engaged the main engines.

She always enjoyed takeoffs. The Equilla rocketed upwards at ever increasing speeds. The late afternoon sun of Baskhir Secundus illuminated the landscape in all manner of beautiful colors. She wished she could see the sun reflecting off of the hive, she always enjoyed seeing that. Still, she couldn't complain as the vessel rose ever upwards.

The blue sky slowly gave way to a field of stars. Free Fall dug a hoof into the neckline of her flight suit and pulled out a necklace, from which a silver crescent moon pendant hanged. She held it tightly and uttered a prayer to Princess Luna. She had entered space countless times before, but it just never seemed right without a supplication to the Princess of the Night.

Though Free Fall was flying by instruments, she kept an eye out the front viewport for the Accord. One of the most enjoyable parts of being a shuttle pilot was being able to see the massive forms of the Everfree faring vessels from the outside. They never failed to impress her, and the Accord was no different.

The frigate was just over a kilomare and a half in length. The light from the Bashkir system's sun illuminated the vessel from fore to aft, reflecting from the metal surfaces and making it shine like some celestial jewel. As the Equila drew closer, more details could be discerned. The spindly communications towers, the armored prow, the bulk of the main engines, and the rows upon rows of macro weapon batteries.

A series of blinking runes indicated that the machine spirit of the Equila had begun to interface with that of the Accord. Free Fall sat back in her seat and let the machine spirits do their work. "Ok everypony, we're on final approach." She announced over the onboard speakers. It would only be a matter of minutes now before they were docked.

*          *          *

The hallway that lead to one of the Accord's landing bays was lit by a series of regularly spaced illuminators. The deck plating had been polished to an immaculate shine and fresh wax seals and parchment marked all of the maintenance access panels. The airlock door to the bay was a massive slab of metal that was designed to retract into the ceiling, as well as to slam down in into a trench in the floor in the case of a decompression incident.

A charcoal coated pegasus stood at attention before the airlock door with an air of dignity. With his short clipped red mane and piercing violet eyes, not to mention the heavily starched officer's uniform, anypony could feel the authority practically radiating off of the Accord's executive officer. Commander Sen Eschal's ears rotated as they picked up the faint clop-clank of hooves on the steel deck-plating as somepony approached him from behind.

Without turning he addressed the quite expected arrival with a brusque tone. "Mister Tar Mack. I trust you have a sufficiently good reason for being late?"

Sen had received the order earlier in the  vessel's day cycle that a group of Inquisition agents would be boarding the vessel. Included with the orders were strict secrecy policies including one to minimize the number of ponies on-board who saw or interacted with the group. He had ordered Tar Mack to minimize the number of load crew that would be present for the arrival of the Inquisition.

Judging from the sounds reaching his ears, Tar Mack had decided to leave the entire loading crew out of it. The clop-clanks continued until an unruly slate mane and silvery muzzle entered Sen's peripheral vision. Sen remained at attention, eyes locked forwards even as Mack's head turned to face him.

"Sorrah, Sir. Had ta find duties for the rest of ma crew. You said that ya wanted dee-scretion, and I reckon'd ya wouldn't want nopony showin up un-spectedly." Replied the load-master.

"Understood." Sen replied. "You'll be fine with just yourself and the servitors?" His tone was not one of compassionate concern, it was more one of stern expectation.

The pegasus load-master gave Sen a confident look with his golden eyes. "Don't worrah none 'bout me, Sir. It don't take two ta get them servi-tars in line."

"Word of advice, Mister Tar Mack." Sen started. "These ponies are Inquisition. Be careful. Watch what you say and do, I don't want my best load-master to wind up floating in the void."

The golden eyes widened for a moment. "Thay couldn'... Ah mean thay wouldn'..." Tar Mack's accented voice died in his throat.

Sen spared the load-master a sidelong glance with his eyes. "They're Inquisition. If they don't take a liking to you, then who knows what they'll do?" Tar Mack seemed to consider this for a moment before turning his head towards the airlock door. Sen returned his gaze forward and heard Tar Mack swallowing quite loudly.

A harsh buzzer sounded and the amber light above the airlock door changed to an emerald green. With the whine of hydraulics and a sharp hiss of equalizing air pressure the heavy airlock door began to lift open. As the door slowly rose Sen felt the void chilled air wash over his pasterns, then his fetlocks and cannons. The door's snail like pace might have been excruciating had Sen actually been looking forward to this meeting.

He despised VIPs, especially ones that somehow outranked him. They always wanted the impossible from him; to get a grand tour of all parts of the ship, demands to see the captain, suites that were better than the other passengers. Always, and they always wanted it "now." And these are Inquisition agents, nopony knows what in Tartarus they will want. He thought glumly.

Everypony had heard stories about the Inquisition. Sen had listened to the outlandish stories that spread like fire throughout the ship regarding the Inquisition. Even so, most ponies thought that most of what was said was just bridle gossip. Sen knew, quite unfortunately, as far as he was concerned, that most of the rumors did not even come close to the true horrors of the Alicorn Inquisition. He briefly recalled the times he had witnessed mass summary executions and the unforgettable images of entire planets on fire. None of that mattered to him now, he had his duty to perform.

As the door raised past the level of his withers, Sen ducked his head and moved forward into the expansive landing bay. The vast space was normally able to accommodate a great number of spacecraft at the same time and seemed very underutilized with only a single Equila. The servitor ponies, which didn't require voidsuits to operate in hard vacuum, had already been active for a few minutes and had already attached the craft to a docking sled. As Sen approached they were in the process of attaching refueling lines

Sen approached the boarding ramp of the shuttle and noticed that Tar Mack had flown over to the servitors and had started barking out orders, interspersed with unintelligible yelling and profanity. Sen reached the base of the craft and the boarding ramp, which had already lowered. He saw that the shuttle's inner airlock was opening, which meant he would soon be making the small welcoming speech for the occupants. The speech never really changed in all the years he had been making it, the only difference being the title of whichever VIP he was greeting.

An uncomfortable amount of time passed before Sen spotted movement at the top of the ramp. Slowly walking down the boarding ramp towards him was a pony in a dark gray hooded cloak. The garment covered the figure completely enough that the only feature he could make out was the purple color of their hooves.

The mystery pony was flanked on the left by an earth pony completely encased in Equestrian Guard storm trooper armor. The body proportions suggested that they were a mare and their posture and bearing spoke of an intense training regimen. He noted, with a fair degree of consternation, that they were armed with a tartarus-gun. Guests with guns had always caused issues in the past, but he didn't think asking Inquisition agents to disarm was either wise or even possible, without dying at any rate.

Flanking the cloaked figure on the right was a tech-pony, wearing the signature red robes of the order. Sen took special note of the wings, those were rare. Most pegasi that heard the call of the marechine cult usually had to sacrifice their wings to reach the higher mysteries. Sen couldn't really make more of a mental assessment, the robes concealed everything except the tech-pony's face and metal hooves.

As the mystery pony reached the bottom of the ramp the entire group paused.

"Commander Sen Eschal?" Came a stallion's voice from the recesses of the cloak.

"Yes, Sir. I am Commander Eschal, Sir." Sen replied in a short, clipped tone.

A purple hoof reached up and drew the hood back, revealing - Sen was extremely mistrustful of unicorns. Of course the Inquisitor is a unicorn, figures. He thought. He did not lose his composure, he had decades of practice putting up with just about everything. He put up with the Accord's navigator, he could deal with a regular unicorn. Unless the cagey witch is reading your thoughts. Sen hushed his panicking mind. He could see, quite clearly, that the unicorn's horn was not alight.

"I am Interrogator Tracks." The unicorn said, revealing the Inquisitorial rosette that he had hanging around his neck. Sen expected the Interrogator to introduce his companions but, as the silence dragged on, he realized that no such introductions would be forthcoming. Speech time.

Sen cleared his throat and began. "Oh, grand agents of our Princesses' Most Holy -" He stopped when the Interrogator held up a hoof, a pained, perhaps exhausted look on his face.

"You may dispense with the pleasantries, Commander." The unicorn said, though a peculiar look crossed his face as he said it, as though those particular words were sacred or something. "We do not wish to take up more of your time than necessary. As soon as my companions and I have our luggage loaded onto your servitor dolly, you can show us to whatever rooms you have provided."

Sen was surprised. Pleasantly so. VIPs that didn't want the galaxy of him was a nice change of pace. Tar Mack came around with one of the servitors harnessed to a luggage dolly. The Interrogator and his ponies threw their luggage onto the small cart.

Two more ponies came down the ramp, a cyan pegasus in a flight suit, obviously the pilot. She had a chainsword strapped to her back... Wait. Why, for the love of Celestia, does their pilot have a chainblade? His mind demanded. He had tried, ages ago, to wield one of the accursed things. Almost took one of his own wings off.

Seeing the second pony, the black unicorn, dragged him violently from his reverie. It was the eyes, predatory and cat yellow. His motions were like those of the creatures Sen had seen on that space hulk he had helped clear in his youth. He actually had to stop himself from drawing his sidearm. The worst part was, he had seen it. Had seen Sen placing his hoof on his weapon. No, the worst part was the grin he had given Sen when he had seen. That grin silently spoke. "Try it."

I am an officer of the Equestrian Navy for Celestia's sake! I will not allow some group of freaks to make me lose my composure! He mentally reprimanded himself. He returned a look that said that the unicorn was not worth his time. The unicorn snorted in derision, but turned away to toss his pack on the dolly. Sen didn't think they would cause any trouble, but he sure as hay wasn't going to turn his back on that one.

Sen led the quintet of ponies and their luggage to their quarters. The purple one had put his hood back up and hadn't said anything since he had put the kibosh on Sen's speech. It was only a matter of a quarter hour to get everypony situated.

Instead of giving the Interrogator the comm frequency of the lieutenant who normally handled guests, he gave his own. It wasn't because he wanted to foal-sit the Inquisition party, he just didn't want to read a report about the liaison officer being found gutted, or jettisoned out of an airlock, or whatever. Good officers were hard to find, especially ones the likes of Lieutenant Fixer.

Sen trotted away from the guest quarters with something bordering on relief. With the Inquisition squared away, all that was left was for Sen to decide on what he would put in his report to the Captain.