Redwood was stationed on guard duty at the castle, and while being in the royal guard paid well, it could get boring. She was guarding a filing room in the lower levels of the castle; one that stored old documents that nopony had looked at in years. Redwood was glad to be serving her nation, but she wished she could at least see a little action.
'At least a drink would be nice,' she thought to herself as she adjusted her black bandana which was tightly tied around her short, hay colored mane.
Redwood was built for action. She was an earth pony, and she was strong even for earth pony standards. Redwood could take a lot, and she could dish it out as well. Her brown coat somewhat muted her appearance, but her strong personality made up for it. Redwood was of Appleoosan descent as well, and she wasn't too fond of the prim and proper ways of Canterlot.
As she checked her gun for the tenth time that hour, Redwood heard the sound of something rustling around in the filing room. She flicked on her flashlight and poked her head around the corner, keeping her hoof near the trigger of her weapon.
"Anypony there?" She called out to the seemingly empty room.
The room was filled with cabinets overflowing with folders and papers, the shelves were stacked high with boxes of even more papers, and on the floor were a number of documents that had spilled over. Cobwebs were everywhere, and the old light bulbs hanging above were turned off, making it even harder to navigate.
Redwood continued into the room, squeezing between two filing cabinets towards the noise. Her progress was then further impeded by a shelf in the middle of her path, forcing her to take a left around it. After taking a few more twists and turns, she had only gotten herself lost in the maze that was the filing room.
As Redwood cursed to herself, she heard the rustling noise again. She snapped towards it, and saw movement between a shelf an a filing cabinet. She fit through with some difficulty, and saw a figure moving around on the ground.
"What're y'all doin' down here!?" She demanded, pointing her flashlight and gun at the figure.
The figure whipped around, and was revealed to be a unicorn with an blue coat and orange mane who was wearing a pair of large, square glasses.
"I-I can explain," he stammered out as he darted his hoof behind his back. "I, uh, was sent down here to get some, uh... zoning forms! Yeah, zoning forms."
Redwood didn't buy it for a minute, and it was clear he was holding something behind his back.
"Ah been guardin' th' door to here fer th' last two hours. How come ah didn't see y'all come in?" she asked.
"Well, I, um, uh..." was all the unicorn had to say before bolting off.
As Redwood gave chase, the unicorn pushed over a filing cabinet in her path, which she easily vaulted. He ran in a twisting path through the filing room in an attempt to throw Redwood off. Unfortunately for him, she was faster than he was. Redwood tackled him as he made a break for the door, pinning the unicorn easily and causing him to drop what he had stolen.
"You don't know what you're doing!" he shouted. "You don't know what's going on!"
"Ah know ah'm arrestin' y'all," Redwood retorted.
She proceeded to put a pair of handcuffs on the unicorn and a special magic dampener on his horn. As she got up, she couldn't help but notice a manila folder a few feet away. Redwood picked it up and turned it over, and on the other side was a logo that she wasn't familiar with. It was a black circle with thick black lines forming a cross inside of it. The symbol was simple, but the fact that she had never seen it and also how it was hidden away gave Redwood a bad feeling. She quickly checked some of the papers in the folder, and they all had the same symbol. She slipped one sheet from the folder into her armor out of sheer curiosity, even though she was breaking regulations.
Redwood's attention was drawn by the sound of steps. A squad of guards lead by Shining Armor himself was coming down the hall.
"Sir," Redwood said as she snapped off a quick salute. "Ah found him breakin' into th' filin' room."
"We'll take it from here," Shining ordered as the other guards took the intruder. He then noticed the folder that Redwood was holding and snatched it from her, "Good job, you're dismissed for the night."
"But sir, don't ah-"
"You're dismissed," Shining interrupted.
Redwood had no choice but to walk off. Guards weren't dismissed like that, which only furthered her suspicion. Whatever was in that folder was important enough for the captain of the royal guard to deal with it personally. Redwood's instincts were telling her to turn it in, but she was simply too curious.
***
As Redwood put away her armor and gun in the barracks, she made sure to keep the sheet she had taken close. Reading it at her bunk, or anywhere else in the open would be too risky. Redwood instead poked her head into the bathroom, making sure nopony was there. She then went into one of the stalls and clicked the lock shut, taking out the sheet as she did so.
"CONFIDENTIAL: DO NOT READ WITHOUT LEVEL 4 CLEARANCE," was stamped on the top.
'Why was something like this hidden down there?' Redwood thought to herself as she began to read.
"Subjects 302, 459, and 770 exhibit few signs of resistance; success is likely with them. Subjects 981 and 676 remain highly resistant and little progress has been made with them; I recommend immediate termination and reinsertion. Subject 211 was a resounding success. He has shown no resistance whatsoever, and has achieved better results than any subject was expected to have. So far, 211 is our only total success. The other subjects have had at least some degree of resistance, although the aforementioned 302, 459, and 770 are promising. 211 can be reinserted immediately, although deterioration may occur over long periods of time. This can be rectified with more treatment, although it may be risky to acquire him by the time he has deteriorated. The level of deterioration is entirely unpredictable; I do not recommend more treatment after 211 has been reinserted."
"What did ah find?," Redwood muttered, "What in th' name of Celestia is this?"
She sat for a moment, mulling over what she had just read. Resistance, deterioration, reinsertion, what could it all mean? This was something top secret, something important, something big. It was the kind of thing crazy ponies raved about, but this was real.
Redwood then heard the bathroom door open. With nowhere else to put it, Redwood folded the paper, took off her bandana, placed the paper in the bandana, and put it back on. She quickly flushed the toilet and left the stall to wash her hooves.
Redwood wanted to get to the bottom of this. She thought of anyone she could ask without rousing suspicion, but nopony came to mind. She then thought back to the unicorn who tried to steal the folder. He was the only real lead Redwood had. She would have to go to him.
It took some time before Redwood had a plan to get the information she needed. After she had caught the thief in the filing room and found the folder, she noticed she was getting assigned to guard much more public places where she could be easily watched. To add to that, two guards were transferred to her barracks, and they were frequently put on guard duty with Redwood. There was no doubt that the higher ups were keeping an eye on her. Did they know she had stolen one of the documents? Redwood had squirreled it away before she had known she was being watched, so as long as they didn't find it, she was in the clear for now. After a few weeks though, the new guards seemed to be watching her less and less, and she was being assigned to guard fewer public places. The powers that be either thought that she knew nothing and wasn't a problem, or there was some grander scheme at work. Either way, it was time for Redwood to act.
***
One day when Redwood was off duty, she decided to take a look at the arrest record of the unicorn who had tried to steal the folder. Doing so might end up arousing suspicion, so she would have to be discreet.
As Redwood walked into the record room, she was greeted by an older Pegasus sitting at a desk with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He was known among the guards as Keeper, and he was in charge of keeping all official royal guard records.
"Redwood!" he said with a raspy voice. "I thought you were off duty today. What brings you to my neck of the woods?"
"Ah need an arrest record, from a few weeks ago." she said bluntly. "And ah don't want nopony to know ah needed it."
Keeper let out a coarse laugh, which turned into a coughing fit. "I heard somepony high up was keeping their eyes on you; still might be. You're up to something, I know it. It could come and bite me later on."
Redwood placed a bag of bits with a decent heft on the desk and asked, "This enough?"
"I dunno, I'm not sure what kind of risk I'm taking here," replied Keeper after looking at the bits for a few seconds.
Redwood produced a flask, opened it, and offered it to him. "Have a drink. Y'all'll feel better when ah leave."
Keeper chuckled again as he took the flask. He then went into the back and returned a few minutes later with the arrest record and a Redwood's flask, now a fourth empty.
"You got good taste in booze," he said, handing the flask and record to Redwood.
She took both and left without another word and made her way down to the mess hall. Redwood had purposefully come down at this time, as she knew it would be just about empty. It was three in the afternoon and most of the guards were on duty, and those who weren't tended to not hang around.
Redwood sat down and put the arrest record on the table. There was a mugshot of the unicorn, whose name was Paper Sheaf, his hoofprints, and all the usual identification. It said that he had been arrested for aggravated assault of a government official, and the arrest date was different from the date he had broken in. The details of his arrest didn't match up with what actually happened, and Redwood wasn't even mentioned. The one thing on the record that might have been true was that he was being held in the castle dungeon without bail.
Paper Sheaf's arrest record only further proved that Redwood was sticking her nose into something she wasn't supposed to. She could have very well been sealing her fate by investigating further, but this was too big to ignore.
As Redwood got up and left, she noticed a Pegasus guard who was out of uniform get up from across the mess hall and follow her from a distance. She continued back to the record room, acting as if she didn't realize he was following her. Redwood took a turn where she didn't need to, and began to take a much more roundabout route to see if she could shake him. The guard kept on following, so Redwood picked up her pace. The guard still followed, so Redwood began to walk even faster. Slowly but surely, he was closing in on her.
Redwood took a turn into a deserted hallway and looked behind her to see a glint of metal. She spun around and caught the guard holding a knife, ready to stab her in the back.
"Sunnuva-!" Redwood exclaimed as she shoved him back.
The guard quickly recovered and lunged at Redwood. She caught him while he was in motion and used his momentum to throw him against the wall, kicking him in the stomach after he had fallen for good measure. Before Redwood could deliver another blow, the guard shot back up and tackled her. He was on top of her now, with his knife just a few inches from her throat. Redwood pushed against the guard's arm, fighting to get it away from her neck. They were locked in a desperate stalemate, neither of them gaining any ground.
Redwood managed to knee the guard in the stomach, causing him to recoil in pain. She then slammed his head into the wall, slightly disorienting him. Redwood got back up and picked up the guard along with her, pinning him to the wall.
"Y'all tell me right now why y'all are tryin' to kill me, who y'all are, and who y'all're workin' for!" she demanded.
The guard headbutted Redwood, allowing him to escape producing a stream of red from her nose. He ran off down the hall, but Redwood was quick to pursue. As she had almost caught up with him, the guard leaped through a window at the end of the hall.
Redwood ran to the window and looked out, only to see something flying away in the distance. Now she knew for certain that somepony had it out for her. She couldn't trust anypony in the royal guard, maybe even the whole of Canterlot. What her next move should be wasn't clear.
Before she went back to the barracks, Redwood picked up the knife which the guard had dropped during the fight. It was sleek, incredibly sharp, and of higher quality than what was standard issue for the royal guard. What stood out most was the symbol on the handle, a black circle with a cross inside, the same as on the folder that had been taken.