The Investigative Joint Task Force of the Fragrant Harbor city!by AlsvidChaptersWhere can we eat?What is our Purpose?What Are We Watching For?Where can we eat?May 12, 1984 Hong Kong Un Chau Street, Sham Sui Po, Sham Sui Po District 12:00 PM Cantonese Restaurants in Hong Kong are cheap, cheerful eateries where people from all walks of life – families, couples, singles, the elderly, not only gather to eat and drink, but to shoot the breeze with friends, sell wares to other patrons, or decompress on the way to work while reading a newspaper and enjoying one of the exquisite, soft, delicately prepared dumplings. In one of these, a pair of foreigners, young adults in their early 20’s, were eating – or, to be more precise, one of them was eating and looking at her laptop. Now, let me take you aside and clarify, dear reader: she was looking at a laptop, but not the sort of laptop you might be familiar with, with a Retina Display, USB, WI-FI, high-fidelity sound, and what have you. It looked like an outsized dark grey brick, with a floppy disk drive, an Intel 8088, and MS-DOS. The female foreigner’s fingers were fairly flying over the keyboard. She only took her hands off to push another absurdly tiny dumpling into her mouth (after soaking it liberally in soy sauce), or swallow some of her tea. The restaurant is one of the fancy new places that emphasizes eating healthy; consequently, the portions are barely large enough to satiate a slightly peckish ant. She is a tall, imposing-looking young woman with skin as black as ink; one would make a disastrous mistake thinking she is an ordinary black woman from the Earth, however, as her greenish-blue irises glow faintly, an eerie bio-luminescence, barely detectable except in low-light conditions. Her night-black hair is also strangely long and straight, pulled back from her head and tied in a severe ponytail. She is also marginally more muscular and athletic in build than one of her earth-bound compatriots, although the untrained observer might simply think she is an ordinary black woman who does gymnastics or aerobics instruction as a hobby. She has wide hips, thick thighs, long, powerful arms with slender hands and thin, delicate-looking fingers. She is heavily armed, although a casual observer might not think so. She is wearing a form-fitting Battle Skin, Mark VI. Manufactured by Flurry’s Armament Company, the blue, catsuit seems as if it’s simply made from some kind of shiny spandex, or perhaps vinyl. In fact, it is made of crystals. The outer layers are spun crystal fibers, impossibly light, impossibly strong. A .50 BMG bullet would plink off it like a paintball. Underneath, soft, refined crystal gel (touching it reminds one rather of silicone) absorbs the impact – along with punches, kicks, knives, spears, and whatever other weapons one might deploy against her. Beneath all this is a crystal polymer – in essence, a luxurious, delicate-feeling, synthetic fabric intended for contact against one’s skin. It is padded with extra gel in places where it would be beneficial to the user, such as around the woman’s knees, her elbows, and her wrists – so. The Battle Skin’s outer layers behave like a giant heat sink, bleeding off excess heat and keeping her from feeling even remotely warm enough to induce the slightest margin of discomfort, while an internal crystal-powered thermal regulator system ensures she feels comfy even in below-zero temperatures. The layer of refined crystal gel performs the role of thermal paste for this particular heatsink, facilitating maximum heat transfer from her body to the outer layers, where it is bled off harmlessly. A nano-sized, photonic crystal integrated circuit system gives her Battle Skin enough computing power to monitor her vital signs – core body temperature, pulse rate, blood pressure…even what chemicals are in her system. She can receive and transmit messages, information, and view them on a virtual screen projected upon her retinas, courtesy of a brain-computer interface linking her suit’s smart-systems to her nervous system. Her fingernails are short and unadorned – you can’t type with long, ostentatious ones, or strike someone with a closed fist, or pull a trigger with a set of the prohibitively expensive, intricately designed, inch-long monstrosities. What’s more, one can’t scrub one’s skin efficiently with long nails. And this woman is used to scrubbing things off her skin, especially blood. Her skin fairly glows from regular scrubbing; she has rubbed moisturizing lotion into her skin, as well, so she has that dark black wet-look sheen. She smells faintly of lavender perfume, soap, and coconut shampoo. There is a hint of cordite around her, as well. She does not appear to favor makeup, with exquisitely brushed, fluffy eyelashes, dark kohl eye shadow, a muted, earthy red rouge on her cheeks, and faint, barely-there red lipstick upon her large, full, vaguely pouty lips. Her breasts are astoundingly large, like cantaloupes thrust out before her chest proudly, drawing her blue Battle Skin taut. Her buttocks are similarly sized, round and firm. She is clearly a Zebra woman. More importantly, she is a Zebra woman called Alsvid. The male foreigner sitting across the table was smoking a vaporizer (one of the fancy, large modded types so popular in Equestria these days, with the rectangular body, the LCD display showing the temperature of the vapor, and the short mouthpiece), chugging the strong tea the restaurant offered, and reading a newspaper. He, too, appears to be lightly armed, until one notices the red gem half-sunk in the dead centre of his chest. He’s wearing a leather jacket filled with crystallized ceramic plates, enough armor for him to shrug off mere bullets, and heavy enough to immobilize all but a very strong man. Strength is certainly not something this man lacks. He has left his jacket open, exposing his broad, muscular chest, rigid with bulging pectorals like another layer of steel plating around his thoracic cavity. His prominent, iron-hard abdominal muscles jut out proudly along his slender belly, his wide shoulders and protruding neck muscles drawing his leather jacket taut, his sizeable biceps stretching the sleeves of the jacket to what looks like bursting point, powered with thick veins like a network of ropes beneath his smooth skin. His gigantic quads and enlarged calf muscles give the impression that a mere twitch of their owner’s body would tear his jeans to shreds. He has large, powerful-looking hands with leathery, resilient skin, capable of crushing someone’s windpipe effortlessly, or slaying a person with a single blow. He has the ephemeral V-shape to his torso considered the pinnacle of masculinity. His hard body seems to ooze pure, dizzying, intoxicating manliness. The air around him seems to be faintly warm, as well, though one cannot sense any heat around him. Yet, in spite of that, there’s a shimmer around him, like hot asphalt at the peak of July’s hottest day. His eyes are a bright red, like molten lava, glowing fiercely. His face is unlined, youthful, with an straight, pointed nose, black brows, and a mane of messy black hair. He has a swarthy, dark complexion, indicating Mexican heritage. His expression makes it absolutely clear that this is the sort of man one should cross only if they are armed with their own personal fireteam. There is a sense of barely controlled rage about him, like that of a ravening wolf collecting its energy to spring at its quarry and bury its teeth in its flesh. Hong Kong’s summers are hot, and in spite of his obvious affinity with fire, the male foreigner is sweating slightly. An occasional rivulet of perspiration rolls down the firm ridges of his muscular chest and belly. There is a scent of cologne, molten metal, and male musk around him. This foreigner is Leo, a male Earthling human, and he is the actual main character of this story. The rest of the Cantonese restaurant is filled with Asian people, mostly ethnic Chinese. So having foreigners in their space is quite unusual. Their mere presence causes something of a stir. Quite a few of the male waiters blush and start dropping things around Alsvid, especially when she flutters her eyelashes and grins (in a rather foolish way, or one might even say, a foalish way) at them. Some even do so when confronted with Leo’s molten-lava gaze and stern tones. The female waitresses turn a furious shade of red and are reduced to quaking jellies of arousal when Leo turns his attention upon them. The other patrons with clear sightlines of the two forego watching the television or perusing the newspapers to stare at the foreigners. Alsvid pays very little heed to all of this, thoroughly engrossed in her laptop. She is actually looking at the information projected upon her retinas in concert with the information on the laptop screen. “So what did the Professor say?” Leo grunted, rustling his newspaper. Alsvid shook her head, her throat bobbing visibly as she swallowed a mouthful of dumpling. “Nothing yet,” she said, thickly, through another dumpling. “She’s still meeting with the Chief Executive.” “Who’s that again? Sorry, I’m terrible at keeping the names of these political figures in my head…” “You don’t like politics?” Alsvid quirked one of her delicately arched eyebrows, her full lips set in an amused smile. Leo growled, showing long, sharp white teeth. “I have my reasons.” “Say no more,” Alsvid said, with a knowing wink and a grin. “Anyway, to answer your question: the new Chief Executive, Anna Sung, was voted in last year on a liberal platform. She is on friendly terms with the Equestrian Government and the Princess Celestia. Pro-immigration, pro-equality, and she’s preparing various initiatives to reform the government, protect the environment, improve food safety…” Leo, who was just about to help himself to one of Alsvid’s dumplings, narrowed his eyes in a suspicious manner. “Food safety?” Alsvid waved a dismissive hand. “For food carts. You know they just let anyone run those things. You don’t have to worry about Mr. Tsang’s place.” She was referring to the Cantonese Restaurant they were currently dining in. “The old man’s a stickler for cleanliness – as he should be. You don’t get to run one of the most popular restaurants by hiring yokels who don’t wash their hands.” Leo, who until now had been giving the dumpling a very jaundiced look, cautiously dunked it in soy sauce and ate it. “Pass the vape, would you?” Alsvid held out her hand. Leo handed her the vaporizer, and she began puffing away happily. “Ahhhh...nothing like a little nicotine to stir up one’s digestion.” Leo’s mouth twitched, the ghost of a smile threatening to form. “You’ll need quite a bit more than a little.” “Are you implying I eat a lot?” Alsvid said, in mock-outrage. One of the sprightly young waitresses, who happened to be nearby - a Chinese girl in a white qipao, with her black hair tightly bound in twin-tails - burst into laughter. "Of course that's what he's implying. You're eating us out of house and home, Alsvid!" "Who asked you?" Alsvid shot back, cheerfully. "Anyway, I don't see you complaining about it, Zhou Wei!" "You're damn right I'm not complaining," Zhou Wei admitted. "You just keep forking over the tips and we'll keep shoveling it in! It's like feeding a furnace with you! I didn't know foreigners liked to eat so much!" "I'm much taller than you, sweet cheeks," Alsvid teased, running a hand over the shallow curve of her thigh. Zhou Wei crossed her arms over her chest, frowning. "Hmmm, quite. I'm surprised you could even get through the door!" "Yes, that's nice. Are you going to bring me another tea, or what?" "All right, all right. Keep your hair on." Zhou Wei sauntered off to the kitchen, disappearing between its double doors in a rush of steam and smoke. There was a toothsome smell of food cooking. Alsvid resumed her discussion with Leo. "We don’t really have a place in her new government, being as she promised to cut down on the use of special operations task forces like ours…” “Shush,” Leo said, warningly, as a young Chinese family, surrounded by tiny children of all genders, approaches their table. “Oh, sorry.” The patriarch of the family– a prim, clean-cut Chinese male in his early 30’s, slim and sharply dressed in a bespoke black suit – insinuates himself at the table, giving Alsvid and Leo an ingratiating smile. “Afternoon, you two. Enjoying your stay in Hong Kong?” His inflection and tonality suggests a highly intelligent white-collar worker of some sort. He clearly wishes to display his prestige, fearlessness, and influence by engaging these strange foreigners, with his family in close proximity, no less. Alsvid nods wordlessly around another dumpling in her mouth, eyeing the man’s wife; a round-faced, complacent looking Chinese woman who seemed deeply self-satisfied, surrounded by her tiny children. The children were all staring at Alsvid and Leo with wide eyes and open mouths, as if they could barely believe what they were seeing. Leo shrugs, raising his massive shoulders (bulwarks of flesh, blood, and bone; he looks as though he could dam a river simply by standing in it). “It’s all right. We’re from the government and we’re here to help, actually.” “Ah!” The Chinese man sat down at their table, an ingratiating smile on his face. “And are you here on a diplomatic mission, then? You are from Equestria, then? I love Equestria! It’s great!” “Just the thing,” Leo said, noncommittally. “I’m not from Equestria. I’m from North America, actually. She’s from Equestria.” He nodded at Alsvid. “Your wife?” the Chinese businessman asked. “Something like that,” Leo said, comfortably smoking his vaporizer. Alsvid had handed it back to him, and was crouched back over her laptop. Author's Note Are you excited for the Professor to show up? What is our Purpose?May 12, 1984 Hong Kong 2 Tim Mei Avenue, Tamar, Admiralty 10:00 AM Central Policy Unit, The West Wing “The target is a Refugee Shelter in Sham Sui Po. Our intelligence is thus: they own a Brain-Jack Device that is unlicensed and unregistered, which they use for their own nefarious purposes on the refugees collected there. We have been conducting surveillance operations on the target for approximately two months under your predecessor. Without your approval of the bill to finance and support our operations, Chief Executive Sung, we will be forced to suspend our operations and disband the Multinational Equestria-Hong Kong Joint Task Force indefinitely.” The Equestrian national, a Pegasus woman, popularly known as The Professor (Deborah Bowes-Stanford, PH. D is her name on file, if one can believe that) stopped, gave her audience a severe glare through her small, fashionable eyeglasses. As with all pony-humans from Equestria, she was taller and stronger in build than her Earthling counterparts, yet there was a slight softness to her build, implying a certain academic bent. She seems to be in her early 30’s, her body enticingly fertile – abundant, large, round breasts jutting out before her like the prow of a warship, thick, curvy buttocks, broad hips, and a narrow waist, with plump thighs. In spite of her inviting figure, her slow, smooth, catlike movements put one in mind of a large tigress stalking her prey. There is a veiled threat in even the minutest movements of her hands and legs. She appears to be quite flexible. She is wearing conservative, modest clothing – a white blouse with a small red tie, and a khaki, ankle-length dress. The dress only just reveals her leather boots, glossy black visions with spikey metal heels three inches high. Her silvery-gray hair is tied up in a severe bun at the back of her head. Her eyebrows are dark, severe arches, over bright, sparkling red eyes, as penetrating and sharp as twin laser beams. Traces of pink rouge and pink lipstick adorn her full lips (set in a stern, no-nonsense line) and her cheeks. She is holding a telescoping stainless steel presentation pointer. The way she wields it puts one rather in mind of a rapier; other times, it looks rather unsettlingly like a disciplinary cane. One can easily see her great strength in the way she bends the steel effortlessly in her delicate, ladylike fingers. Flanking The Professor on her left and right are human girls, all in their late teenage years. The fact that their heads barely reach up to The Professor’s cleavage indicates that they are definitely ordinary Earthlings. They are slim, delicate, yet their bodies are hard with muscle. They are wearing black, form-fitting Battle Skins (Mark VI’s, of course) that cling to the shallow curves of their breasts and buttocks, stretching around their slender biceps and plump thighs. They are covered in combat harnesses, bristling with pistols, assault rifles, sniper rifles, equipment packs, ammo packs, knives, and communications equipment. The comm antennas, which they wear on their heads, look rather unfortunately like the frills of an Akihabara Maid’s headdress. The fact that their battle harnesses are white only adds to this unfortunate resemblance. One could crack wise by saying that they look like combat maids, but this seems like an unfortunate way to get one’s self pummeled into jelly. The girls flanking The Professor are all of different Earth nationalities – one is a Han Chinese from Mainland China, one a Chinese from Hong Kong, one a South Korean, one Japanese. Chief Executive of Hong Kong, the Right Honorable Anna Sung, sat before the Pegasus woman, flanked by her Cabinet Secretaries. A Chinese Hong Kong national, she is in her early 30’s, much like the Professor, and she has a lush, entrancing body to match, with her white business shirt unbuttoned just low enough to reveal the magnificent swells of her breasts, her black suit jacket left open in similar fashion. Her broad thighs are adorned in silky black stockings, her short black tube skirt barely extending past her hips. Her expression is that of tranquil indifference, but her dark brown eyes are watching The Professor intently, spoiling her assumed façade somewhat. Princess Celestia of Equestria was at her right, surrounded by her Cabinet Ministers, resplendent in her white court dress, the bodice visibly struggling to contain the orbs of her gigantic white breasts. Twilight Sparkle, Spike, and Rainbow Dash were accompanying her as well, instantly recognizable by their brightly colored hair. The young and effervescent Princess Flurry Heart sat at Chief Executive Anna’s left. Unlike the other Heads of State, Princess Flurry Heart was surrounded by scientists, computer engineers, and corporate executives. Two of the beings around her are visibly female humanoid-type robots, or Gynoids, with brushed metal alloy bodies and thin sensor slots for eyes, and long antenna giving them the appearance of being bunnygirls with fat thighs and round buttocks. In the centre of their chests, where a human’s heart would be, are round crystal spheres glowing a bright blue, studded with LED lights, intricately shot through with delicate gold wires. A thin, bony Unicorn woman (a grey horn thrusts up between her black hair and her pale white skin, from her forehead) with telephoto lenses for eyes and a metal claw for a right hand, dressed conservatively in a labcoat, a white shirt, white trousers, and black leather flats, was part of Princess Flurry Heart’s companions. She seemed to be intensely frustrated with something, her pert pink lips set in a severe line, her eyes narrowed, and she clutched a tablet computer firmly in her one good left hand. She was unconsciously opening and shutting her claw-like hand. Princess Flurry Heart, a 17-year old Alicorn woman, was rife with cybernetic implants of all kinds. Like most pony-human nationals from Equestria, she was marginally taller and stronger in build than an ordinary human from Earth, but, to an untrained observer, she might simply seem like a normal human of above-average size and strength, with milky white skin, large, liquid blue eyes, feathery black eyelashes, a small button nose, and full lips. She has a slim, athletic build, with firm, round breasts and buttocks, with a distinct muscle tone to her arms and legs – that is, her one regular arm and her two regular legs. Her left arm is a terrifying biomechanical construct, all hard, blueish-grey crystal alloy metal, light and flexible, with exposed crystal polymer ‘muscles’, and tubes of light-blue fluid, like exposed blood vessels, shooting through the length of her arm, coiling around the metallic ‘bone’, and plugged into the crystal polymer ‘muscles.’ There is a touchpad installed into the ‘forearm’ of Princess Flurry Heart’s biomechanical prosthetic. Her fingers and hand are brushed smooth, polished crystal alloy, with an array of sensors to allow her as fine a sense of touch as on her opposite, organic fingers. Low, gentle whirs and hums emanate from her biomechanical arm, and blue LED lights illuminate its elbow, wrist, and upper arm. Upon the upper arm’s crystal alloy ‘bone’ is a trademarked logo of a crystal enshrouded in wings, with the following text in fonts a half-millimeter tall: FLURRY’S ARMAMENT COMPANY (FAC) MCMLXXX [TEST TYPE: LEFT ARM] [MODEL NO: 01110100011] [SERIAL NO: 010010111010001] [VERIFICATION ID: 100001011011] [REGISTRATION ID: 1001100101011] [VR ID: 1001101110011] Princess Flurry Heart’s makeup is visually arresting and draws the eye to her instantly, with her choice of bright purple eyeshadow with bright silver sparkles, lush red rouge, and bright, fire-engine red lipstick. It is designed to inflame and arouse. One cannot help gazing at every movement of her pillowy lips, from the amused quirks, to the slight part displaying her even, white teeth and her long, pink tongue (which occasionally glides out to run over her lush lips seductively). Her purple-and-blue hair is done up in the classic Chinese Oxtail style, and she was wearing a short qipao, pink in color, with silver crystal motifs all over it, bordered in gold; it ended a hazardously short distance down her mid-thigh, showing off the Princess’s long, smooth, creamy white legs (she had, thoughtfully, crossed them in an elegant way). A racy open panel over her chest shows her cleavage. She wears sleek silver high-heels with the wet-look glisten to their exterior, with five-inch stiletto heels. A blue visor is attached to her skull, seeming to sprout from her smooth, milk-white skin. It was an Augmented Reality visor, or an AR visor, providing her with an information display replete with its own Operating System and crystal photonic circuit-powered System on a Chip (SoC) processor. It included its own microphones and cameras for absorbing information from Princess Flurry Heart’s environment. Even as The Professor spoke, Princess Flurry Heart’s AR visor was transcribing her words to text, then saving that text automatically to a .TXT file in her visor’s memory. Small, polymer-covered ports on the back of her neck gave her the capability of directly interfacing with computers. Princess Flurry Heart opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted by one of Chief Executive Anna’s cabinet secretaries – a great, fat, elderly Chinese man with almost no hair or neck, who surged to his feet like a large burp, shook off his young female assistants, and began sputtering in protest, breathing hard the entire time, as he fought to suck in enough air to support his dilapidated body. “I think it’s obvious why this has happened, ladies and gentlemen!” he spluttered, sounding like a tiny two-stroke engine. “You Equestrians, you come here from your strange Equestrian planet, and you let this…this…” He shook a fat finger at Princess Flurry Heart. The teenaged Princess raised an eyebrow with infuriating slowness, a tiny smile tugging at the corners of her lips, but she said nothing. “….Princess introduce all these crystal computers to Hong Kong, and now people are using them to get high, to commit crimes, to do all kinds of anti-social things! I demand that we halt the operations of her corporation in Hong Kong immediately.” Princess Flurry Heart cut in smoothly. She regarded the man coolly, reclining backwards in her chair, her fingers laced together in a contemplative fashion. Her large, liquid blue eyes seemed to drill into the man’s flesh, intensified by the AR Visor above them. “The ‘crystal computers’, as you refer to them, Justice Secretary, are actually photonic crystal circuits, hundreds, if not thousands of times as efficient as your silicon chips. We of the Crystal Empire have been using crystals to power our technology since time immemorial; upon learning of your Earthling methods of using silicone semiconductors, it took our Crystal Empire techs nearly no time at all to reverse-engineer a solution that uses optical methods via crystals.” Princess Flurry Heart effortlessly lifted herself from the chair and stood (without the slightest aid of her arms, underlining her athletic fitness), towering over the smaller Justice Secretary, who began to sweat nervously. She grinned wickedly, displaying her sharp white little teeth, and folded her arms under her breasts, bending down ever so slightly to bring her face closer to that of the elderly Justice Secretary. She continued: “Secondly, I, too, am a Head of State, Justice Secretary, although I dislike pulling rank. It behooves me to say that I am the ruler of the Flurry Principality of the Crystal Empire – the jewel in the Crystal Empire’s crown, so to speak. We contain hundreds of the Equestrian-Asian Treaty Alliance’s most powerful information technology firms, not to mention thousands more startup companies. We are the perfect hub and ecosystem for tech innovation and development.” Princess Flurry Heart straightened, swept the room with her large blue eyes, gazing around her, as she continued to speak in her sharp, clear tones. “There are limits to our growth, despite all these benefits in our favor. I had hoped that we would not only facilitate a corridor of trade between Equestria, the Crystal Empire, my Principality, and the East Asian Nations of Earth, but that we would enable your people, Justice Secretary, to establish your own hubs and ecosystems for technology research and development. As such, I have no wish to force my nation’s will upon that of another sovereign state. Only declare that you wish for my Principality, and my corporation – my Armament Company, which, even now, supplies Hong Kong with gear manufactured and developed from factories and laboratories in my Principality within the Crystal Empire – to withdraw, and we shall do so. How many jobs will be lost, or what disadvantages this will pose to you, I cannot say.” “This is ridiculous! You are blackmailing us!” shouted the red-faced Justice Secretary. “Settle down, old-timer. Or are you so eager to test out one of our Crystal Hearts? Among artificial organs, they are quite unparalleled.” Princess Flurry Heart flashed her hell-raising grin again. Her eyes sparkled. “You’re no better than the British Tai-Pan who ravaged our country in the past decades! We don’t need your kind of help!” insisted the Justice Secretary. “You forget yourself, old man,” Princess Flurry Heart retorted, coolly. “We are Ponies from the Equestrian Alliance. We aren’t human like you and your old enemies. We have no motive or benefit to enforce our will upon you. Remember that you and your Chief Executive approached us first with the concept of signing a treaty, when we dispatched diplomatic envoys to your country.” Author's Note The Professor appears. Fibre-optic computing is a real thing, purportedly far superior to ordinary silicone computing. Hence, I have made the Crystal Empire develop a similar technology, except using crystals as diodes instead of fibre-optics. What Are We Watching For?May 12, 1984 Hong Kong 2 Tim Mei Avenue Tamar, Admiralty 10:30 AM Princess Flurry Heart and the Justice Secretary of Hong Kong continued to snipe at each other, each growing more heated in their exchange. "You...you and your freaks!" spluttered the Justice Secretary. Flurry Heart's doctor, the thin dark-haired, fair-skinned Unicorn lady in a white labcoat, looked almost comically dismayed at these words. She began to open and shut the steel claw she possessed in place of a right hand. "Ohhhh...Princess Flurry, did you hear what he called me? He called me a freak!" Princess Flurry Heart sneered. "Never mind, Dr. Mercury. Fine words from someone who can barely fit through a door! How many second breakfasts did you have today, Justice Secretary?" "At least I can eat, unlike you metal monsters! Why the Chief Executive ever agreed to let you awful automatons enter our fair country, I'll never know!" squealed the fat, elderly Justice Secretary, mopping sweat from his brow with a napkin. "Be silent!" Professor Deborah's voice snapped like a whip. She slapped her stainless steel presentation pointer against her thigh. "If the two of you were my students, I'd tan your rumpcheeks with my pointer until you begged for mercy!" The Justice Secretary flopped back into his chair, so aghast he could only mumble incoherently. Princess Flurry Heart leapt forward to confront the Professor, seething with sudden anger. "I am the Princess, do you hear me?! I am the Princess! No one spanks me!" Her facade of cool, detached calm fell away utterly; she was screaming at the Professor, spit flying from her mouth, her eyes staring madly. "Oh, be quiet," the Professor snapped. She folded her arms under her prodigious breasts and glared levelly at Princess Flurry Heart, who was nearly nose-to-nose with her. The young princess was breathing heavily, her cheeks a bright red, her mouth twisted with fury. Professor Deborah continued in a leisurely manner, as if she were lecturing her students. "Let me remind you, Princess Flurry Heart, that any monarch who must say "I am the Princess" is no monarch at all. Just a fool - or a foal, if you will - with a fancier hat than usual. Dr. Mercury gasped in shock. Princess Celestia smiled gently. Princess Flurry Heart turned away and slunk back to her seat, wilting visibly under the Professor's verbal thrust. Chief Executive Anna Sung laughed, a soft, bell-like sound. "Very good, Professor. In one stroke, you resolve my administrative difficulties and halt a war between Flurry's Principality and my poor little nation! I begin to see how you managed to forge the Equestrian-Asian Treaty Alliance." "I fervently hope I have, in fact, averted such a catastrophe," Professor Deborah said. "To return to my original point for a moment, if I may..." With a sharp glare at Princess Flurry and the indignant Justice Secretary, Professor Deborah continued her briefing. "We have conducted surveillance operations on the refugee shelter." WEEKS EARLIER..... April 2, 1984 1 Hoi Lai Street Sham Sui Po Hong Kong 12:00 AM In the well-reinforced inner sanctum of the refugee shelter, amongst a jumble of electronic devices all connected to the elaborate surveillance system observing the shelter and its surroundings, not to mention the comm systems linking them to their respective command posts, Rainbow Dash and two other specialists from the Wonderbolt Security Solutions PMC (Private Military Company) sat at a table with two members of the German GSG-9 Counter-Terrorist Agency, playing cards. Rainbow Dash placed her hand of cards on the table, face-down so that the others could not perceive what she was holding, and stared levelly at the two German counter-terrorist operators across the table from her. "It's time you two went on your rounds, yeah? You guys hop to it." Captain Genoveva Steiner, an Earthling female of the GSG-9 detachment, laughed silkily. "Who'd want to attack a garbage dump like this, I wonder? You Equestrian women are far too nervous and paranoid. I see no value in attacking refugees." Rainbow Dash, a tall, rangy-looking, muscular Pegasus woman with defined biceps, wind-burned, lightly tanned white skin, small, perky breasts, broad thighs, and rainbow colored hair (of course), planted her hands on her hips, glaring angrily at the German woman. "You'd be surprised. First off, with the American Empire and their North Atlantic Treaty Alliance - that's NATO - at odds with the Equestria-Asian Treaty Alliance - that's EATA (Rainbow Dash approximately pronounced this abbreviation as "Eater") - a lot of proxy wars between small developing nations, terrorist groups, militias, gangs, and other troublemakers have begun to crop up." Spitfire, a flame-haired Pegasus woman at Dash's right, snorted. "I'll wager the American CIA is behind half these people you're talking about, Dash." Captain Steiner ripped the top off a pack of Marlboro cigarettes, fished one out, and lit it, blowing thick clouds of smoke. "That's dangerous talk, Kamerad. Let me remind you, as part of the NATO Alliance, that we're not at odds with your Equestrian nation, or those nations under your policy's Aegis. Our respective heads of state have yet to formally approach each other with the necessary delegation to establish proper diplomatic ties." Captain Steiner leaned forward, resting her forearms on the table. A tall, middle-aged woman with a rich figure, huge, round breasts, pale, chalk-white skin, wide hips, a slender waist, sharp icy-blue eyes, and hair so violently blonde it seemed to shine in its cascade down her upper back, with an authoritarian attitude, she gazed at Rainbow Dash through half-lidded eyes, in a luxuriant, almost seductive manner. "Besides, my country has offered assistance with your counter-terrorism operations, foreign and domestic. I fail to see how we are 'at odds' with each other, as you say. Gott in Himmel! It's like the Cold War all over again. If the Russian Republic joins forces with you, that will complete the resemblance." "The Russians are too busy licking their wounds after the Collapse of the USSR, they don't want to talk to anyone right now," Rainbow Dash muttered. She folded her arms over her chest and strode over to the window behind their table, gazing out at the city street. A jumble of brightly lit neon signs, of all shapes and colors, partly in English, partly in the inscrutable pictograms of the local language, shone back at her through the window. Under the signs streamed a river of humans, cars, scooters, motorbikes and bicycles. "Besides, if I'm not mistaken, Princess Celestia, Flurry Heart, and the Imperator of the American Empire will be attending the EATA-NATO Summit in Geneva next year, yes?" Dash asked. Captain Steiner frowned. "Don't remind me. We'll probably be deployed there too. It'll be just as tedious as this operation." Spitfire nudged Soarin', who was sitting next to her. "You're awfully quiet." Author's Note I wanted to get a new update out quickly and banged this out in about an hr or so just to prove I'm actually still working on it. It's really a quarter of the size I wanted it to be. More to come later.
Where can we eat?May 12, 1984 Hong Kong Un Chau Street, Sham Sui Po, Sham Sui Po District 12:00 PM Cantonese Restaurants in Hong Kong are cheap, cheerful eateries where people from all walks of life – families, couples, singles, the elderly, not only gather to eat and drink, but to shoot the breeze with friends, sell wares to other patrons, or decompress on the way to work while reading a newspaper and enjoying one of the exquisite, soft, delicately prepared dumplings. In one of these, a pair of foreigners, young adults in their early 20’s, were eating – or, to be more precise, one of them was eating and looking at her laptop. Now, let me take you aside and clarify, dear reader: she was looking at a laptop, but not the sort of laptop you might be familiar with, with a Retina Display, USB, WI-FI, high-fidelity sound, and what have you. It looked like an outsized dark grey brick, with a floppy disk drive, an Intel 8088, and MS-DOS. The female foreigner’s fingers were fairly flying over the keyboard. She only took her hands off to push another absurdly tiny dumpling into her mouth (after soaking it liberally in soy sauce), or swallow some of her tea. The restaurant is one of the fancy new places that emphasizes eating healthy; consequently, the portions are barely large enough to satiate a slightly peckish ant. She is a tall, imposing-looking young woman with skin as black as ink; one would make a disastrous mistake thinking she is an ordinary black woman from the Earth, however, as her greenish-blue irises glow faintly, an eerie bio-luminescence, barely detectable except in low-light conditions. Her night-black hair is also strangely long and straight, pulled back from her head and tied in a severe ponytail. She is also marginally more muscular and athletic in build than one of her earth-bound compatriots, although the untrained observer might simply think she is an ordinary black woman who does gymnastics or aerobics instruction as a hobby. She has wide hips, thick thighs, long, powerful arms with slender hands and thin, delicate-looking fingers. She is heavily armed, although a casual observer might not think so. She is wearing a form-fitting Battle Skin, Mark VI. Manufactured by Flurry’s Armament Company, the blue, catsuit seems as if it’s simply made from some kind of shiny spandex, or perhaps vinyl. In fact, it is made of crystals. The outer layers are spun crystal fibers, impossibly light, impossibly strong. A .50 BMG bullet would plink off it like a paintball. Underneath, soft, refined crystal gel (touching it reminds one rather of silicone) absorbs the impact – along with punches, kicks, knives, spears, and whatever other weapons one might deploy against her. Beneath all this is a crystal polymer – in essence, a luxurious, delicate-feeling, synthetic fabric intended for contact against one’s skin. It is padded with extra gel in places where it would be beneficial to the user, such as around the woman’s knees, her elbows, and her wrists – so. The Battle Skin’s outer layers behave like a giant heat sink, bleeding off excess heat and keeping her from feeling even remotely warm enough to induce the slightest margin of discomfort, while an internal crystal-powered thermal regulator system ensures she feels comfy even in below-zero temperatures. The layer of refined crystal gel performs the role of thermal paste for this particular heatsink, facilitating maximum heat transfer from her body to the outer layers, where it is bled off harmlessly. A nano-sized, photonic crystal integrated circuit system gives her Battle Skin enough computing power to monitor her vital signs – core body temperature, pulse rate, blood pressure…even what chemicals are in her system. She can receive and transmit messages, information, and view them on a virtual screen projected upon her retinas, courtesy of a brain-computer interface linking her suit’s smart-systems to her nervous system. Her fingernails are short and unadorned – you can’t type with long, ostentatious ones, or strike someone with a closed fist, or pull a trigger with a set of the prohibitively expensive, intricately designed, inch-long monstrosities. What’s more, one can’t scrub one’s skin efficiently with long nails. And this woman is used to scrubbing things off her skin, especially blood. Her skin fairly glows from regular scrubbing; she has rubbed moisturizing lotion into her skin, as well, so she has that dark black wet-look sheen. She smells faintly of lavender perfume, soap, and coconut shampoo. There is a hint of cordite around her, as well. She does not appear to favor makeup, with exquisitely brushed, fluffy eyelashes, dark kohl eye shadow, a muted, earthy red rouge on her cheeks, and faint, barely-there red lipstick upon her large, full, vaguely pouty lips. Her breasts are astoundingly large, like cantaloupes thrust out before her chest proudly, drawing her blue Battle Skin taut. Her buttocks are similarly sized, round and firm. She is clearly a Zebra woman. More importantly, she is a Zebra woman called Alsvid. The male foreigner sitting across the table was smoking a vaporizer (one of the fancy, large modded types so popular in Equestria these days, with the rectangular body, the LCD display showing the temperature of the vapor, and the short mouthpiece), chugging the strong tea the restaurant offered, and reading a newspaper. He, too, appears to be lightly armed, until one notices the red gem half-sunk in the dead centre of his chest. He’s wearing a leather jacket filled with crystallized ceramic plates, enough armor for him to shrug off mere bullets, and heavy enough to immobilize all but a very strong man. Strength is certainly not something this man lacks. He has left his jacket open, exposing his broad, muscular chest, rigid with bulging pectorals like another layer of steel plating around his thoracic cavity. His prominent, iron-hard abdominal muscles jut out proudly along his slender belly, his wide shoulders and protruding neck muscles drawing his leather jacket taut, his sizeable biceps stretching the sleeves of the jacket to what looks like bursting point, powered with thick veins like a network of ropes beneath his smooth skin. His gigantic quads and enlarged calf muscles give the impression that a mere twitch of their owner’s body would tear his jeans to shreds. He has large, powerful-looking hands with leathery, resilient skin, capable of crushing someone’s windpipe effortlessly, or slaying a person with a single blow. He has the ephemeral V-shape to his torso considered the pinnacle of masculinity. His hard body seems to ooze pure, dizzying, intoxicating manliness. The air around him seems to be faintly warm, as well, though one cannot sense any heat around him. Yet, in spite of that, there’s a shimmer around him, like hot asphalt at the peak of July’s hottest day. His eyes are a bright red, like molten lava, glowing fiercely. His face is unlined, youthful, with an straight, pointed nose, black brows, and a mane of messy black hair. He has a swarthy, dark complexion, indicating Mexican heritage. His expression makes it absolutely clear that this is the sort of man one should cross only if they are armed with their own personal fireteam. There is a sense of barely controlled rage about him, like that of a ravening wolf collecting its energy to spring at its quarry and bury its teeth in its flesh. Hong Kong’s summers are hot, and in spite of his obvious affinity with fire, the male foreigner is sweating slightly. An occasional rivulet of perspiration rolls down the firm ridges of his muscular chest and belly. There is a scent of cologne, molten metal, and male musk around him. This foreigner is Leo, a male Earthling human, and he is the actual main character of this story. The rest of the Cantonese restaurant is filled with Asian people, mostly ethnic Chinese. So having foreigners in their space is quite unusual. Their mere presence causes something of a stir. Quite a few of the male waiters blush and start dropping things around Alsvid, especially when she flutters her eyelashes and grins (in a rather foolish way, or one might even say, a foalish way) at them. Some even do so when confronted with Leo’s molten-lava gaze and stern tones. The female waitresses turn a furious shade of red and are reduced to quaking jellies of arousal when Leo turns his attention upon them. The other patrons with clear sightlines of the two forego watching the television or perusing the newspapers to stare at the foreigners. Alsvid pays very little heed to all of this, thoroughly engrossed in her laptop. She is actually looking at the information projected upon her retinas in concert with the information on the laptop screen. “So what did the Professor say?” Leo grunted, rustling his newspaper. Alsvid shook her head, her throat bobbing visibly as she swallowed a mouthful of dumpling. “Nothing yet,” she said, thickly, through another dumpling. “She’s still meeting with the Chief Executive.” “Who’s that again? Sorry, I’m terrible at keeping the names of these political figures in my head…” “You don’t like politics?” Alsvid quirked one of her delicately arched eyebrows, her full lips set in an amused smile. Leo growled, showing long, sharp white teeth. “I have my reasons.” “Say no more,” Alsvid said, with a knowing wink and a grin. “Anyway, to answer your question: the new Chief Executive, Anna Sung, was voted in last year on a liberal platform. She is on friendly terms with the Equestrian Government and the Princess Celestia. Pro-immigration, pro-equality, and she’s preparing various initiatives to reform the government, protect the environment, improve food safety…” Leo, who was just about to help himself to one of Alsvid’s dumplings, narrowed his eyes in a suspicious manner. “Food safety?” Alsvid waved a dismissive hand. “For food carts. You know they just let anyone run those things. You don’t have to worry about Mr. Tsang’s place.” She was referring to the Cantonese Restaurant they were currently dining in. “The old man’s a stickler for cleanliness – as he should be. You don’t get to run one of the most popular restaurants by hiring yokels who don’t wash their hands.” Leo, who until now had been giving the dumpling a very jaundiced look, cautiously dunked it in soy sauce and ate it. “Pass the vape, would you?” Alsvid held out her hand. Leo handed her the vaporizer, and she began puffing away happily. “Ahhhh...nothing like a little nicotine to stir up one’s digestion.” Leo’s mouth twitched, the ghost of a smile threatening to form. “You’ll need quite a bit more than a little.” “Are you implying I eat a lot?” Alsvid said, in mock-outrage. One of the sprightly young waitresses, who happened to be nearby - a Chinese girl in a white qipao, with her black hair tightly bound in twin-tails - burst into laughter. "Of course that's what he's implying. You're eating us out of house and home, Alsvid!" "Who asked you?" Alsvid shot back, cheerfully. "Anyway, I don't see you complaining about it, Zhou Wei!" "You're damn right I'm not complaining," Zhou Wei admitted. "You just keep forking over the tips and we'll keep shoveling it in! It's like feeding a furnace with you! I didn't know foreigners liked to eat so much!" "I'm much taller than you, sweet cheeks," Alsvid teased, running a hand over the shallow curve of her thigh. Zhou Wei crossed her arms over her chest, frowning. "Hmmm, quite. I'm surprised you could even get through the door!" "Yes, that's nice. Are you going to bring me another tea, or what?" "All right, all right. Keep your hair on." Zhou Wei sauntered off to the kitchen, disappearing between its double doors in a rush of steam and smoke. There was a toothsome smell of food cooking. Alsvid resumed her discussion with Leo. "We don’t really have a place in her new government, being as she promised to cut down on the use of special operations task forces like ours…” “Shush,” Leo said, warningly, as a young Chinese family, surrounded by tiny children of all genders, approaches their table. “Oh, sorry.” The patriarch of the family– a prim, clean-cut Chinese male in his early 30’s, slim and sharply dressed in a bespoke black suit – insinuates himself at the table, giving Alsvid and Leo an ingratiating smile. “Afternoon, you two. Enjoying your stay in Hong Kong?” His inflection and tonality suggests a highly intelligent white-collar worker of some sort. He clearly wishes to display his prestige, fearlessness, and influence by engaging these strange foreigners, with his family in close proximity, no less. Alsvid nods wordlessly around another dumpling in her mouth, eyeing the man’s wife; a round-faced, complacent looking Chinese woman who seemed deeply self-satisfied, surrounded by her tiny children. The children were all staring at Alsvid and Leo with wide eyes and open mouths, as if they could barely believe what they were seeing. Leo shrugs, raising his massive shoulders (bulwarks of flesh, blood, and bone; he looks as though he could dam a river simply by standing in it). “It’s all right. We’re from the government and we’re here to help, actually.” “Ah!” The Chinese man sat down at their table, an ingratiating smile on his face. “And are you here on a diplomatic mission, then? You are from Equestria, then? I love Equestria! It’s great!” “Just the thing,” Leo said, noncommittally. “I’m not from Equestria. I’m from North America, actually. She’s from Equestria.” He nodded at Alsvid. “Your wife?” the Chinese businessman asked. “Something like that,” Leo said, comfortably smoking his vaporizer. Alsvid had handed it back to him, and was crouched back over her laptop. Author's Note Are you excited for the Professor to show up?
What is our Purpose?May 12, 1984 Hong Kong 2 Tim Mei Avenue, Tamar, Admiralty 10:00 AM Central Policy Unit, The West Wing “The target is a Refugee Shelter in Sham Sui Po. Our intelligence is thus: they own a Brain-Jack Device that is unlicensed and unregistered, which they use for their own nefarious purposes on the refugees collected there. We have been conducting surveillance operations on the target for approximately two months under your predecessor. Without your approval of the bill to finance and support our operations, Chief Executive Sung, we will be forced to suspend our operations and disband the Multinational Equestria-Hong Kong Joint Task Force indefinitely.” The Equestrian national, a Pegasus woman, popularly known as The Professor (Deborah Bowes-Stanford, PH. D is her name on file, if one can believe that) stopped, gave her audience a severe glare through her small, fashionable eyeglasses. As with all pony-humans from Equestria, she was taller and stronger in build than her Earthling counterparts, yet there was a slight softness to her build, implying a certain academic bent. She seems to be in her early 30’s, her body enticingly fertile – abundant, large, round breasts jutting out before her like the prow of a warship, thick, curvy buttocks, broad hips, and a narrow waist, with plump thighs. In spite of her inviting figure, her slow, smooth, catlike movements put one in mind of a large tigress stalking her prey. There is a veiled threat in even the minutest movements of her hands and legs. She appears to be quite flexible. She is wearing conservative, modest clothing – a white blouse with a small red tie, and a khaki, ankle-length dress. The dress only just reveals her leather boots, glossy black visions with spikey metal heels three inches high. Her silvery-gray hair is tied up in a severe bun at the back of her head. Her eyebrows are dark, severe arches, over bright, sparkling red eyes, as penetrating and sharp as twin laser beams. Traces of pink rouge and pink lipstick adorn her full lips (set in a stern, no-nonsense line) and her cheeks. She is holding a telescoping stainless steel presentation pointer. The way she wields it puts one rather in mind of a rapier; other times, it looks rather unsettlingly like a disciplinary cane. One can easily see her great strength in the way she bends the steel effortlessly in her delicate, ladylike fingers. Flanking The Professor on her left and right are human girls, all in their late teenage years. The fact that their heads barely reach up to The Professor’s cleavage indicates that they are definitely ordinary Earthlings. They are slim, delicate, yet their bodies are hard with muscle. They are wearing black, form-fitting Battle Skins (Mark VI’s, of course) that cling to the shallow curves of their breasts and buttocks, stretching around their slender biceps and plump thighs. They are covered in combat harnesses, bristling with pistols, assault rifles, sniper rifles, equipment packs, ammo packs, knives, and communications equipment. The comm antennas, which they wear on their heads, look rather unfortunately like the frills of an Akihabara Maid’s headdress. The fact that their battle harnesses are white only adds to this unfortunate resemblance. One could crack wise by saying that they look like combat maids, but this seems like an unfortunate way to get one’s self pummeled into jelly. The girls flanking The Professor are all of different Earth nationalities – one is a Han Chinese from Mainland China, one a Chinese from Hong Kong, one a South Korean, one Japanese. Chief Executive of Hong Kong, the Right Honorable Anna Sung, sat before the Pegasus woman, flanked by her Cabinet Secretaries. A Chinese Hong Kong national, she is in her early 30’s, much like the Professor, and she has a lush, entrancing body to match, with her white business shirt unbuttoned just low enough to reveal the magnificent swells of her breasts, her black suit jacket left open in similar fashion. Her broad thighs are adorned in silky black stockings, her short black tube skirt barely extending past her hips. Her expression is that of tranquil indifference, but her dark brown eyes are watching The Professor intently, spoiling her assumed façade somewhat. Princess Celestia of Equestria was at her right, surrounded by her Cabinet Ministers, resplendent in her white court dress, the bodice visibly struggling to contain the orbs of her gigantic white breasts. Twilight Sparkle, Spike, and Rainbow Dash were accompanying her as well, instantly recognizable by their brightly colored hair. The young and effervescent Princess Flurry Heart sat at Chief Executive Anna’s left. Unlike the other Heads of State, Princess Flurry Heart was surrounded by scientists, computer engineers, and corporate executives. Two of the beings around her are visibly female humanoid-type robots, or Gynoids, with brushed metal alloy bodies and thin sensor slots for eyes, and long antenna giving them the appearance of being bunnygirls with fat thighs and round buttocks. In the centre of their chests, where a human’s heart would be, are round crystal spheres glowing a bright blue, studded with LED lights, intricately shot through with delicate gold wires. A thin, bony Unicorn woman (a grey horn thrusts up between her black hair and her pale white skin, from her forehead) with telephoto lenses for eyes and a metal claw for a right hand, dressed conservatively in a labcoat, a white shirt, white trousers, and black leather flats, was part of Princess Flurry Heart’s companions. She seemed to be intensely frustrated with something, her pert pink lips set in a severe line, her eyes narrowed, and she clutched a tablet computer firmly in her one good left hand. She was unconsciously opening and shutting her claw-like hand. Princess Flurry Heart, a 17-year old Alicorn woman, was rife with cybernetic implants of all kinds. Like most pony-human nationals from Equestria, she was marginally taller and stronger in build than an ordinary human from Earth, but, to an untrained observer, she might simply seem like a normal human of above-average size and strength, with milky white skin, large, liquid blue eyes, feathery black eyelashes, a small button nose, and full lips. She has a slim, athletic build, with firm, round breasts and buttocks, with a distinct muscle tone to her arms and legs – that is, her one regular arm and her two regular legs. Her left arm is a terrifying biomechanical construct, all hard, blueish-grey crystal alloy metal, light and flexible, with exposed crystal polymer ‘muscles’, and tubes of light-blue fluid, like exposed blood vessels, shooting through the length of her arm, coiling around the metallic ‘bone’, and plugged into the crystal polymer ‘muscles.’ There is a touchpad installed into the ‘forearm’ of Princess Flurry Heart’s biomechanical prosthetic. Her fingers and hand are brushed smooth, polished crystal alloy, with an array of sensors to allow her as fine a sense of touch as on her opposite, organic fingers. Low, gentle whirs and hums emanate from her biomechanical arm, and blue LED lights illuminate its elbow, wrist, and upper arm. Upon the upper arm’s crystal alloy ‘bone’ is a trademarked logo of a crystal enshrouded in wings, with the following text in fonts a half-millimeter tall: FLURRY’S ARMAMENT COMPANY (FAC) MCMLXXX [TEST TYPE: LEFT ARM] [MODEL NO: 01110100011] [SERIAL NO: 010010111010001] [VERIFICATION ID: 100001011011] [REGISTRATION ID: 1001100101011] [VR ID: 1001101110011] Princess Flurry Heart’s makeup is visually arresting and draws the eye to her instantly, with her choice of bright purple eyeshadow with bright silver sparkles, lush red rouge, and bright, fire-engine red lipstick. It is designed to inflame and arouse. One cannot help gazing at every movement of her pillowy lips, from the amused quirks, to the slight part displaying her even, white teeth and her long, pink tongue (which occasionally glides out to run over her lush lips seductively). Her purple-and-blue hair is done up in the classic Chinese Oxtail style, and she was wearing a short qipao, pink in color, with silver crystal motifs all over it, bordered in gold; it ended a hazardously short distance down her mid-thigh, showing off the Princess’s long, smooth, creamy white legs (she had, thoughtfully, crossed them in an elegant way). A racy open panel over her chest shows her cleavage. She wears sleek silver high-heels with the wet-look glisten to their exterior, with five-inch stiletto heels. A blue visor is attached to her skull, seeming to sprout from her smooth, milk-white skin. It was an Augmented Reality visor, or an AR visor, providing her with an information display replete with its own Operating System and crystal photonic circuit-powered System on a Chip (SoC) processor. It included its own microphones and cameras for absorbing information from Princess Flurry Heart’s environment. Even as The Professor spoke, Princess Flurry Heart’s AR visor was transcribing her words to text, then saving that text automatically to a .TXT file in her visor’s memory. Small, polymer-covered ports on the back of her neck gave her the capability of directly interfacing with computers. Princess Flurry Heart opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted by one of Chief Executive Anna’s cabinet secretaries – a great, fat, elderly Chinese man with almost no hair or neck, who surged to his feet like a large burp, shook off his young female assistants, and began sputtering in protest, breathing hard the entire time, as he fought to suck in enough air to support his dilapidated body. “I think it’s obvious why this has happened, ladies and gentlemen!” he spluttered, sounding like a tiny two-stroke engine. “You Equestrians, you come here from your strange Equestrian planet, and you let this…this…” He shook a fat finger at Princess Flurry Heart. The teenaged Princess raised an eyebrow with infuriating slowness, a tiny smile tugging at the corners of her lips, but she said nothing. “….Princess introduce all these crystal computers to Hong Kong, and now people are using them to get high, to commit crimes, to do all kinds of anti-social things! I demand that we halt the operations of her corporation in Hong Kong immediately.” Princess Flurry Heart cut in smoothly. She regarded the man coolly, reclining backwards in her chair, her fingers laced together in a contemplative fashion. Her large, liquid blue eyes seemed to drill into the man’s flesh, intensified by the AR Visor above them. “The ‘crystal computers’, as you refer to them, Justice Secretary, are actually photonic crystal circuits, hundreds, if not thousands of times as efficient as your silicon chips. We of the Crystal Empire have been using crystals to power our technology since time immemorial; upon learning of your Earthling methods of using silicone semiconductors, it took our Crystal Empire techs nearly no time at all to reverse-engineer a solution that uses optical methods via crystals.” Princess Flurry Heart effortlessly lifted herself from the chair and stood (without the slightest aid of her arms, underlining her athletic fitness), towering over the smaller Justice Secretary, who began to sweat nervously. She grinned wickedly, displaying her sharp white little teeth, and folded her arms under her breasts, bending down ever so slightly to bring her face closer to that of the elderly Justice Secretary. She continued: “Secondly, I, too, am a Head of State, Justice Secretary, although I dislike pulling rank. It behooves me to say that I am the ruler of the Flurry Principality of the Crystal Empire – the jewel in the Crystal Empire’s crown, so to speak. We contain hundreds of the Equestrian-Asian Treaty Alliance’s most powerful information technology firms, not to mention thousands more startup companies. We are the perfect hub and ecosystem for tech innovation and development.” Princess Flurry Heart straightened, swept the room with her large blue eyes, gazing around her, as she continued to speak in her sharp, clear tones. “There are limits to our growth, despite all these benefits in our favor. I had hoped that we would not only facilitate a corridor of trade between Equestria, the Crystal Empire, my Principality, and the East Asian Nations of Earth, but that we would enable your people, Justice Secretary, to establish your own hubs and ecosystems for technology research and development. As such, I have no wish to force my nation’s will upon that of another sovereign state. Only declare that you wish for my Principality, and my corporation – my Armament Company, which, even now, supplies Hong Kong with gear manufactured and developed from factories and laboratories in my Principality within the Crystal Empire – to withdraw, and we shall do so. How many jobs will be lost, or what disadvantages this will pose to you, I cannot say.” “This is ridiculous! You are blackmailing us!” shouted the red-faced Justice Secretary. “Settle down, old-timer. Or are you so eager to test out one of our Crystal Hearts? Among artificial organs, they are quite unparalleled.” Princess Flurry Heart flashed her hell-raising grin again. Her eyes sparkled. “You’re no better than the British Tai-Pan who ravaged our country in the past decades! We don’t need your kind of help!” insisted the Justice Secretary. “You forget yourself, old man,” Princess Flurry Heart retorted, coolly. “We are Ponies from the Equestrian Alliance. We aren’t human like you and your old enemies. We have no motive or benefit to enforce our will upon you. Remember that you and your Chief Executive approached us first with the concept of signing a treaty, when we dispatched diplomatic envoys to your country.” Author's Note The Professor appears. Fibre-optic computing is a real thing, purportedly far superior to ordinary silicone computing. Hence, I have made the Crystal Empire develop a similar technology, except using crystals as diodes instead of fibre-optics.
What Are We Watching For?May 12, 1984 Hong Kong 2 Tim Mei Avenue Tamar, Admiralty 10:30 AM Princess Flurry Heart and the Justice Secretary of Hong Kong continued to snipe at each other, each growing more heated in their exchange. "You...you and your freaks!" spluttered the Justice Secretary. Flurry Heart's doctor, the thin dark-haired, fair-skinned Unicorn lady in a white labcoat, looked almost comically dismayed at these words. She began to open and shut the steel claw she possessed in place of a right hand. "Ohhhh...Princess Flurry, did you hear what he called me? He called me a freak!" Princess Flurry Heart sneered. "Never mind, Dr. Mercury. Fine words from someone who can barely fit through a door! How many second breakfasts did you have today, Justice Secretary?" "At least I can eat, unlike you metal monsters! Why the Chief Executive ever agreed to let you awful automatons enter our fair country, I'll never know!" squealed the fat, elderly Justice Secretary, mopping sweat from his brow with a napkin. "Be silent!" Professor Deborah's voice snapped like a whip. She slapped her stainless steel presentation pointer against her thigh. "If the two of you were my students, I'd tan your rumpcheeks with my pointer until you begged for mercy!" The Justice Secretary flopped back into his chair, so aghast he could only mumble incoherently. Princess Flurry Heart leapt forward to confront the Professor, seething with sudden anger. "I am the Princess, do you hear me?! I am the Princess! No one spanks me!" Her facade of cool, detached calm fell away utterly; she was screaming at the Professor, spit flying from her mouth, her eyes staring madly. "Oh, be quiet," the Professor snapped. She folded her arms under her prodigious breasts and glared levelly at Princess Flurry Heart, who was nearly nose-to-nose with her. The young princess was breathing heavily, her cheeks a bright red, her mouth twisted with fury. Professor Deborah continued in a leisurely manner, as if she were lecturing her students. "Let me remind you, Princess Flurry Heart, that any monarch who must say "I am the Princess" is no monarch at all. Just a fool - or a foal, if you will - with a fancier hat than usual. Dr. Mercury gasped in shock. Princess Celestia smiled gently. Princess Flurry Heart turned away and slunk back to her seat, wilting visibly under the Professor's verbal thrust. Chief Executive Anna Sung laughed, a soft, bell-like sound. "Very good, Professor. In one stroke, you resolve my administrative difficulties and halt a war between Flurry's Principality and my poor little nation! I begin to see how you managed to forge the Equestrian-Asian Treaty Alliance." "I fervently hope I have, in fact, averted such a catastrophe," Professor Deborah said. "To return to my original point for a moment, if I may..." With a sharp glare at Princess Flurry and the indignant Justice Secretary, Professor Deborah continued her briefing. "We have conducted surveillance operations on the refugee shelter." WEEKS EARLIER..... April 2, 1984 1 Hoi Lai Street Sham Sui Po Hong Kong 12:00 AM In the well-reinforced inner sanctum of the refugee shelter, amongst a jumble of electronic devices all connected to the elaborate surveillance system observing the shelter and its surroundings, not to mention the comm systems linking them to their respective command posts, Rainbow Dash and two other specialists from the Wonderbolt Security Solutions PMC (Private Military Company) sat at a table with two members of the German GSG-9 Counter-Terrorist Agency, playing cards. Rainbow Dash placed her hand of cards on the table, face-down so that the others could not perceive what she was holding, and stared levelly at the two German counter-terrorist operators across the table from her. "It's time you two went on your rounds, yeah? You guys hop to it." Captain Genoveva Steiner, an Earthling female of the GSG-9 detachment, laughed silkily. "Who'd want to attack a garbage dump like this, I wonder? You Equestrian women are far too nervous and paranoid. I see no value in attacking refugees." Rainbow Dash, a tall, rangy-looking, muscular Pegasus woman with defined biceps, wind-burned, lightly tanned white skin, small, perky breasts, broad thighs, and rainbow colored hair (of course), planted her hands on her hips, glaring angrily at the German woman. "You'd be surprised. First off, with the American Empire and their North Atlantic Treaty Alliance - that's NATO - at odds with the Equestria-Asian Treaty Alliance - that's EATA (Rainbow Dash approximately pronounced this abbreviation as "Eater") - a lot of proxy wars between small developing nations, terrorist groups, militias, gangs, and other troublemakers have begun to crop up." Spitfire, a flame-haired Pegasus woman at Dash's right, snorted. "I'll wager the American CIA is behind half these people you're talking about, Dash." Captain Steiner ripped the top off a pack of Marlboro cigarettes, fished one out, and lit it, blowing thick clouds of smoke. "That's dangerous talk, Kamerad. Let me remind you, as part of the NATO Alliance, that we're not at odds with your Equestrian nation, or those nations under your policy's Aegis. Our respective heads of state have yet to formally approach each other with the necessary delegation to establish proper diplomatic ties." Captain Steiner leaned forward, resting her forearms on the table. A tall, middle-aged woman with a rich figure, huge, round breasts, pale, chalk-white skin, wide hips, a slender waist, sharp icy-blue eyes, and hair so violently blonde it seemed to shine in its cascade down her upper back, with an authoritarian attitude, she gazed at Rainbow Dash through half-lidded eyes, in a luxuriant, almost seductive manner. "Besides, my country has offered assistance with your counter-terrorism operations, foreign and domestic. I fail to see how we are 'at odds' with each other, as you say. Gott in Himmel! It's like the Cold War all over again. If the Russian Republic joins forces with you, that will complete the resemblance." "The Russians are too busy licking their wounds after the Collapse of the USSR, they don't want to talk to anyone right now," Rainbow Dash muttered. She folded her arms over her chest and strode over to the window behind their table, gazing out at the city street. A jumble of brightly lit neon signs, of all shapes and colors, partly in English, partly in the inscrutable pictograms of the local language, shone back at her through the window. Under the signs streamed a river of humans, cars, scooters, motorbikes and bicycles. "Besides, if I'm not mistaken, Princess Celestia, Flurry Heart, and the Imperator of the American Empire will be attending the EATA-NATO Summit in Geneva next year, yes?" Dash asked. Captain Steiner frowned. "Don't remind me. We'll probably be deployed there too. It'll be just as tedious as this operation." Spitfire nudged Soarin', who was sitting next to her. "You're awfully quiet." Author's Note I wanted to get a new update out quickly and banged this out in about an hr or so just to prove I'm actually still working on it. It's really a quarter of the size I wanted it to be. More to come later.
