Equinox Mission Logsby RLYoshiChapters1: Center of Attention2: Predator and Prey3: Can't Be Held4: Flawless Escape1: Center of AttentionPerspective: Winter Solstice "Cassa lo cez, fir tanko." I looked up from the pile of bricks I was using to entertain myself. When you wanted to make little houses and you lacked little wooden blocks and triangles, actual building material made for good... well, building material. I was somewhat proud of my small tower, though I probably would've been prouder if this wasn't the fourteenth time that day I had made it after tearing it down a few minutes prior. Not my fault there wasn't much to do here. Pony-made prisons aren't usually made as entertainment centers. Changeling-made ones attempted even less. As long as there were sturdy walls and doors, and food was eventually provided at least once a day, when it came to what the prisoners did, the guards couldn't give a crap if they were force fed laxatives. I was more used to being on the other side of these walls, but I had my reasons for being here, sitting in a corner on a surprisingly comfy spot of dirt in the main yard, playing with bricks that had fallen out of the walls over the decades. Wait, what was going on? "Cassa lo cez, fir tanko!" Oh, right. This guy. Being one of only three ponies in a primarily changeling-populated prison, in the changeling homelands at that, made me stand out. Even worse with my comparatively bright colors. Royal blue coat, yellow mane and tail with brown streaks, green eyes, gold shield cutie mark with a snowflake on it. Next to all these dark gray creatures in a prison made of dirt and cement, I probably looked like a rainbow, and that made me a target. I didn't like being made a target. I made sure they knew that. The changeling drone standing over me was... well, he looked like all the others, more or less. Does that make me racist if I can't tell the difference? Maybe I just didn't spend enough time researching them. Anyway, there was one somewhat outstanding feature about this guy. Well, two, actually. The first being a bruise on the left side of his face that looked suspiciously to be in the shape of my hoof. (Hey, in my defense, he threw the first six punches. I just threw the seventh.) The second being the five or six or twenty friends backing him up. "Cassa lo cez, fir tanko!" he said a third time. He spoke a bit fast for my brain to translate properly, but I gathered that he was combining an insult with an order to apologize. Rather than formulate a response in either my language or his, I just blinked blankly at him. He stared back, until he apparently seemed to get the idea. Growling, he turned to one of his friends, and the two of them exchanged words for a while, trying to figure out if any of their group spoke Equestrian. I held back a smirk as several others in the crowd started to wander off, apparently bored once they realized this pony supposedly didn't even understand them. The ones that stuck around either glared daggers at me or listened intently to their apparent leader, either way seemingly awaiting orders. I returned my attention to my bricks. It wouldn't be long before I was out of here; if all went well, it'd be only a few hours. Frankly, I didn't even belong here. I could've easily avoided getting caught in the first place if I wanted. But I needed something. Specifically, someone. And they were inside the walls, not outside. My name is Winter Solstice. I'm the captain of the Ponyville royal guard. Or rather, I was, until that little section was more or less disbanded and replaced with more common police. I'm not bitter, especially since the higher-ups decided neither I nor my fellow guards were useless. We had skills, and we had chemistry, and they wanted that. So they offered me a new leadership role as the head of a special military division. Equinox. We're a specialized force, in that we're specialized in everything. By this point, we've done it all. Infiltration, negotiation, stealth, strategy, assassination, electrical work. Available for weddings. We take jobs that the regular guards or police are too ill-equipped, busy, or incompetent to handle, which is a disturbingly large amount of them. We often have to travel for them, but rarely do we travel outside Equestria, like we have been for the last two weeks or so. Remember how I said there were three ponies in this prison? I was one, of course. The second was one of my fellow Equinox members, sent in to back me up (or for me to back her up, whichever was necessary). The third was Hoof Burns, a psychopath whose claims to fame included blowing up an apartment building and attempting to assassinate our own Princess Luna. As you can likely tell, he's near the top of our "seriously get him already" list. Changelings don't care much for Equestrian crimes. They had him locked up because he trespassed in their territory, but frankly there was no way he'd be stuck any longer than six months. Then he'd be back out in the wild again. By Equestrian law, he was to be killed or arrested, and if it was the latter he'd end up the former within days. Deciding to take our chance while we could, myself and my companion Chloroform got ourselves captured. It almost pained me to be so blatantly obvious with my trespassing rather than sneaking in quietly, but it worked. More or less. Of course, they searched us. We kept some stock items on us. Bits of food, a knife, a torn map of changeling territory that was horrendously outdated. Enough to make us easily pass for random wanderers thinking we could waltz right in on their home turf. Due to us both being unicorns, they stuck some standard issue magic deterrent rings on our horns, not that we had a problem with that. We didn't plan on needing magic, and even if we did, my horn had a unique curve and thickness that kept the ring from sliding on all the way. I could at least do minor things if necessary, not that they knew that. All that was left was to get just a few moments alone with Burns. He didn't seem to recognize us, nor did he want to socialize. He picked some fights, and the guards responded by breaking them up and tossing him in solitary confinement for a while. The rest of the time, he wandered around aimlessly. Occasionally into good areas to pick him off, but never when no one was watching. Chloroform had a plan, though. Oh, sorry, Chloe had a plan. She's pretty insistent about using that weird short version of her name rather than her full one, so sorry about that. Anyway, she came up with a plan, and had been working at it for a couple days. Partially thanks to being a not-bad-looking female in a prison otherwise consisting entirely of males - literally; don't ask how I know - she had made herself out as a decently friendly face from which these changelings could get a bit of a... "love meal". And hey, if it helps us reach our goal, I can't judge the methods. Next time Burns wandered into a good spot, she'd start advertising her services, the prisoners would come flocking, and next thing you know, I'd have a nice dark alley to finish him off in without any witnesses. Then it'd just be a matter of pulling off a pre-planned escape before his body's found. Simple enough, at least on paper. Of course, with these morons standing around staring me down, I doubted I'd be able to sneak off so easily when the time came. I needed to get away from them. I casually stood up and started to walk away, as though I didn't even think the group hanging around me even cared. Of course, three of them stepped in front of me to block me from leaving. I gave them a look, and they returned it, along with some words. "You're not going anywhere." Oh hey, one of them speaks Equestrian. I smiled at him in the least friendly way you can suitably imagine before giving my reply. "Unless you want to end up even worse off than your friend over there, yes, I am." He didn't like that. Suddenly my throat was being grabbed by a surprisingly strong hole-filled hoof, and I was being shoved up against the wall. "It won't be that easy this time." The pressure on my throat wasn't unfamiliar, but it wasn't welcome either. I felt my air being cut off, and quickly pushed down the frantic messages from my brain telling me to squirm and flail. Instead, I glanced over as the remaining crowd all started to watch, some grinning gleefully and others continuing to scowl. Yeah, figured none of them would be jumping in to help me. My hooves had instinctively gone to my throat, so as to push away his foreleg as much as I could to prevent total suffocation, and I didn't think moving them would give way to much progress at the moment. Deciding to finally give up my ace in the hole, I activated my magic. The base of my horn started glowing right up to the ring, and I slowly started lifting one of the bricks from my little house. Before any of them could catch on to what was happening, I flung the brick at the head of the changeling holding me by the neck. The collision had the desired result of knocking him to the side in a daze as he gave a yelp of surprise, managing to not send him sprawling to the ground. His foreleg released its grip on my throat, but I quickly grabbed it back now that my hooves weren't occupied anymore. Tugging him toward me, I quickly slammed my forehead into his. Not one of the most recommended close combat tactics, but it worked, finally sending him crumpling to the ground out cold and leaving me with just a small migraine. Unfortunately, me knocking out one of their own just so happened to be the signal for the rest of the crowd to start their own attack. I was worried for about half a second before remembering that these were prison thugs with little sense of organization. Somehow they found themselves unable to move the five feet over to me, due to pushing against each other and tripping over their own hooves. I even saw a few punches being thrown at one another, probably because all the shoving led to some touching and bumping they weren't fond of. Suddenly all the changelings who previously wanted my head on a plate were more focused on punching and pushing each other than the unicorn watching them with clear amusement. Mr. Bruised Face was the only one who managed to get out of the ensuing mess and run at me. I quickly held up a hoof to block the simple punch he threw, then ducked before he threw another one. Pretty much all standard jocks and thugs had the same opening attack pattern, like some sort of old video game. Before he could switch it up, I grabbed the side of his head with my hoof and slammed it against the wall. It didn't put him down, but it certainly dazed him, and hopefully would help him get the point. I threw him backwards into the group struggle, watched for a moment to make sure he wasn't coming back at me instantly, then turned and walked off. I had no problem letting the guards sort out that little scuffle when the dust settled, but I didn't plan on being right nearby when it happened. 2: Predator and PreyPerspective: Winter Solstice Walking away from a fight that easily felt like something out of a cartoon, but at least it worked. I wandered back inside from the yard and made my way to the cafeteria. Obviously it wasn't open, but leaning against the wall by the door was where Chloe had decided to make her lookout point. The optimal place for us to grab Burns was just down the hall and around a corner, where he liked to sit every so often to get out of the sun. She had a good view in case he came by. As I turned the corner, sure enough, she was there. Burgundy coat, long golden mane and tail, cutie mark of a brown glass bottle, watching the empty corridor intently with green eyes that almost matched my own. Like I said before, she certainly wasn't bad looking, but days in a dirty prison weren't doing her many favors. Her mane and tail were full of clingy bits of dirt, and with the bags under her eyes you'd be forgiven for thinking she hadn't slept in days. Granted, I doubted I looked much better, but there weren't a lot of mirrors around to confirm that. I glanced around as I approached to make sure there weren't any guards or other prisoners within earshot. To my luck, none were even in sight. I sat down beside her with an exaggerated groan, as though I was tired from lots of walking. "Any luck?" "With the watching or the swiping?" she replied, not even looking my way. "Swiping. I'm curious to know if we're good to go, or if we'll be scrambling as soon as I'm done with him." She reached back into her mane, and from it withdrew a keyring with a single key on it. "Just got it half an hour ago." I chuckled. "Guess some guard wasn't paying attention." "Or maybe I'm just good at my job." She raised an eyebrow at me, but accompanied the movement with a smirk as she tossed me the key. "Here, you've got a thicker mane." "If you told me ten years ago I'd be using my hair as an emergency pocket, I'd have called you crazy." I tucked the key into my mane like she had done. "Just make sure to come running to me as soon as you see me give the signal. If the guards find his body, they'll gather the prisoners and all eyes will be on us. We need to get out in the few minutes we have where a distraction is possible." "Got any plans for that?" she asked. I shrugged. "I may have found a few guys who are easy to fool into punching each other. If they're far enough away from the gate, and we open the lock subtly enough, we can get a headstart before the guards notice us." She nodded. "So the only potential problem is you not killing Burns fast enough and he screams or something." "If I'm quick, that won't be an issue." I tilted my head left and right to crack my neck. "Wish we could've snuck in some weapons, though." "Boots was right in that they'd search us thoroughly and take absolutely everything we had, so even if we had something small and inconspicuous, we'd lose it anyway." She shook her head. "Besides, you're in a prison. Literally anything not nailed down can be used as a weapon." I thought back to my earlier use of the brick. "True enough. I'm sure I can grab something or other." She nodded, before her ears flicked. I looked over at the hall I had come from, and after a moment, one of the guards walked around the corner, presumably on patrol. He didn't even give us a second glance, but the two of us knew it was probably time to stop openly chatting about our plans. Not many of the prisoners spoke Equestrian, but most if not all of the guards at least knew the basics. It wouldn't go against our luck for one of them to know what "kill" and "escape" meant. I stood up, brushing my back and flanks off from the dirty wall and floor, and stepped around Chloe with just a nod as my goodbye. As the guard wandered off down the halls, I headed back out toward the yard. I had a brick tower to get back to. Even with my intense focus on my makeshift building blocks, I easily heard the changeling prisoners (and even some guards) start flocking to a corner of the yard. I glanced up in time to see Chloe disappear into the forming crowd. My curiosity as to what exactly went on in that mass of chitin was easily overwhelmed by my desire to finish this job and get out, so I waited a couple more minutes before standing up. Decently assured no more changelings were in the hallway Burns had wandered to, I casually walked back inside and down the path we had seen him take many times before. I kept my ears perked for any unexpected hoofsteps, but all I heard were my own. That, and a deep exhale from around the corner. Stepping around into the dead end, I saw him. Hoof Burns; the Psycho Pegasus, some of us had called him. Time on the road and in prison had covered his ostensibly red coat in brown and gray dirt, even worse than any other prisoner in this hole. His stark black mane and tail, both rather long due to lacking the luxury of a barber shop, looked a bit less dirty, but probably only because dirt didn't show up in it as well. His simple flame cutie mark made him stand out even more, and his bright purple eyes opened and closed as he puffed on a cigarette. Probably kicked the crap out of his cellmate for a pack of them. "Got a smoke?" I asked casually as I strolled up. I'd never smoked before and didn't plan on it now, but if I wanted him to let his guard down, I had to act at least a little friendly. He glanced at me, and the look in his eyes made me wonder if he was planning on complying, ignoring me, or pulling out a shiv and stabbing me in the side. Thankfully, he eventually went with the first option, pulling a second cigarette from under his wing. He lit a match on his hoof, touched it to the tip, and offered it to me. "Who are you?" "Algid. Probably in for the same reasons as you." I had already decided not to give him my real name, on the off chance he knew me from somewhere. I took the cigarette in my hoof. "Trespassing on parasite property?" He nodded and went back to his smoking. "Could be worse. I did a lot of crazy stuff before I hopped the border." "Like what? Punch a cop in the face?" I stuck the cigarette in my mouth, making sure to inhale strictly through my nose. "Pfft, think bigger, Al. Try 'almost killed the fake princess of the night'." He laughed, which quickly changed to coughing. "And that's just one thing." "And you're proud of this?" He shook his head. "Nah. If I succeeded, I'd be proud. As far as I'm concerned, what happened was about as big as just not winning a science fair in high school." It felt like my eye twitched. I had encountered many criminals in the past. Some felt remorse for their actions, some didn't. But very few thought of a failed assassination attempt as equivalent to just a bad day at school. "Is that so..." "It is." He smirked. "How about you? You do anything awesome that the cops tried to bust you on?" I removed the cigarette from my mouth so I could take a deep breath and let it out. "Well... I did track down a fellow prisoner and strangle him to death." "Really?" He tilted his head. "Sounds like he didn't fight back much, if you were able to do that. No offense." "I'm stronger than I look. As for him fighting back... he tried, but it didn't work well." I shrugged. "Gotcha. And when was this?" I bit my lip and thought. "I think it was... July fourteenth." He nodded, but slowly stopped. "...isn't that today? Is it your one year anniversary?" "...not quite. But you're close." I smirked. "Very close." I suddenly leapt at him, shoving him against the wall with my body weight and holding my hoof over his mouth to prevent any screams or yelps of surprise. He tried to bite me, but pony teeth are rarely tougher than pony hooves, so I just dealt with it as I pummeled him in the side of the face with my other foreleg. He tried to push me off with his forelegs, then his wings, but I kept my hind legs firmly in place and didn't give. "You've hurt a lot of ponies," I quietly growled at him. "Stallions, mares, seniors, foals. Some are still walking, some are traumatized, some are six feet underground. And you don't even care." I took my hoof off his mouth and quickly moved it to his throat, the other one soon joining, as I applied all possible pressure. "Remember when you blew up that apartment complex in Manehatten? Twelve fillies, sixteen colts, twenty-eight mares, thirty-one stallions. Consider yourself lucky we got them evacuated, because if even one of them died, I'd be making this a lot more painful for you." His eyes bulged a bit as he tried to keep pushing me, and now he was starting to make progress. Apparently the threat of impending death was giving his strength a huge boost. I glanced down briefly and noticed the two cigarettes we had dropped to the floor as the scuffle began. Grabbing the still-lit smokes in my magic, I jabbed the lit ends against his cheek, hearing a quiet sizzling and his struggles to scream in pain. His body tensed up more than it already had, and suddenly his attempts to push me off were a lot less fruitful. I kept my hooves right where they were, pushing as hard as I could, glaring right into his purple eyes as the life slowly left them. He gradually stopped pushing, his forelegs falling limply to the side. His unfolded wings began to droop. His mouth, previously set firmly with teeth grit, fell slackly open. I gave it another couple minutes before I lowered him to the ground, his chest unmoving and his eyes staring off at nothing. My glare remained for a minute or so as I stared at his body, making sure he wasn't faking it. Once I was convinced, I relaxed a bit and kneeled down, running my hoof over his eyes to close them. Sighing, I stepped away from his body, turning to head out of the corridor. I only gave his corpse one final glance just before I exited into the yard. The urge to mutter a dumb one-liner like "Smoking kills, buddy" was admittedly difficult to ignore. 3: Can't Be HeldPerspective: Chloroform Winter gave me permission to not go into heavy detail about what, exactly, I was doing while he was off dealing with Hoof Burns. So, sorry to those of you who are into that sort of thing, but I'm gonna just skip right to when I saw him come out of the hallway. Through the masses of love-hungry parasites, it wasn't hard to see bright royal blue stepping out and trying to lock eyes with me. He rubbed the back of his neck before flicking his tail twice; the signal for a successful takedown. Since I was in between patrons, I stood back up, to the confusion and disappointment of many. "Sorry boys, gotta close early today," I told them. A quick chorus of translation from the few who spoke Equestrian later, and they were all groaning and sighing and heading off to do whatever they were doing ten minutes prior. A few stuck around desperately, but a couple kisses on the cheeks and some whispered sweet nothings (which they may or may not have understood) sent them happily on their ways as well. Winter walked up to me, an eyebrow raised. "I could've sworn you were our medic, not our seductress." "I'm multi-talented." I brushed myself off. "I couldn't even tell you were back there, let alone killing someone. Guess you got lucky." He snorted and nudged my side. "Or maybe I'm just good at my job." "Touché." I glanced at the gate keeping us in. Ten feet high, barbed wire up top. Only reason no changelings or pegasi tried to fly out was because that'd be way too obvious. But we had a stealthier route. We casually walked in the general direction of the gate, making sure not to head straight for the door. He glanced at my horn. "That ring's not bothering you too much, is it?" I raised an eyebrow. "Are you seriously asking if the inability to use my magic is a problem?" "Just want to make sure it's not urgent that we get it off. I don't think we'll have the tools for that until we're back at base." We walked close to the door, and he gave me a push. Getting the idea, I exaggeratedly fell to the side, falling to the ground right by the fence near the gate. It was mostly fake, but I definitely got some scrapes. "Hey, watch it!" Good, now we had an excuse to be so close to the way out. He rolled his eyes, stepping up beside me and standing conveniently in front of the lock on the gate. "Calm down, you're fine. Barely any bugs crawling on you now." "Had enough of those earlier." I sighed, standing back up and leaning against the fence. "At least they were just hungry and desperate, not trying to be dominant. They took whatever they got." "Yeah, you don't strike me as the submissive type." He lit his horn up and carefully took out the key, sliding it into the lock. "Don't act like you never enjoyed it, though." I rolled my eyes. "It definitely could've been worse, I'll give you that. But that's not saying much." Click! The lock popped open, and he slowly worked it off the door. "At least you've gained a few admirers." "Doubt I'd want to keep them." I swept my gaze around the yard. For at least a brief moment, no eyes whatsoever were on us, and I lowered my voice to a whisper. "Go, quickly." He opened the gate just enough for me to swiftly squeeze through, and he followed immediately behind, using his magic to click the lock back on after, leaving the key inside. "Not gonna need that anymore." We slowly started to stroll off, and a glance back revealed no followers. "How far until we break into a run?" I asked. We weren't even ten feet from the prison, and we weren't going much further at this walking speed. "Only if we hear them yelling. Other than that, we stick to a casual pace," he replied at a low volume as he glanced around. The area we were in was... to be honest, basically a desert. Granted, we were pretty far down south. "Alright, I'm fairly certain I remember the path... plus, Boots and Skirmish told me about a few landmarks, so we can follow them to the meetup point." I looked around. "What kind of landmarks?" "We'll know them when we see them." Oh, how I hated vague answers... "Hopefully by the time we get there, they'll have the teleporter ready to bring us back to base." Right... the teleporter. Whenever our missions took us far away, we had it charged up for use. Pretty self-explanatory; a magical portal that would warp us to a preset location, though it was far from convenient thanks to the amount of power it took - both electrically and magically. If we so much as had the microwave running when we turned it on, lights flickered all through the building. It also made me want to vomit every time we went through it. But that's really not big enough of a problem to consider hoofing it back across half a country. "Think they'll come after us?" I asked after another moment or two of silence. "They'll try, definitely. Once they find his body, they'll round up the prisoners, realize we're missing, and draw the obvious conclusion. But by that point, we'll be so far ahead that even if they knew the direction we went in, they wouldn't catch us." He smirked, but it fell when he saw my uncertain expression. "Oh, come on. This isn't even close to the first prison breakout I've done." I raised an eyebrow at him. "Well, it's my first one. I can't help having some concerns. I don't even know for sure if this is legal." "If any other pony was doing it, it probably wouldn't be." He shrugged. "But this is an official Equinox mission. We followed a plan that was unanimously approved by the higher-ups, we have licenses to kill, and the changelings are welcome to try and get us back into that prison for escaping. If they think they can find us without getting themselves arrested for trespassing." I shrugged, trying to keep a neutral look, but inside I felt a bit relieved that we weren't going to be locked up as soon as we reported back to base. Even if everything he just said was stuff I knew already, getting it confirmed was a good way to settle my nerves. "I'll take your word for it." "You'll find yourself doing that a lot in this line of work. There's a reason-" He suddenly stopped talking, freezing mid-step. I stopped walking and looked at him, seeing his ears perking up. I glanced around, but didn't see or hear anything out of the ordinary. "What is it?" "Someone followed us from the prison," he replied in a hushed whisper. "They're staying out of sight. Keep your eyes peeled." I quickly shut up, but my mind was racing. Who was following us? If it was a guard, why weren't they coming out and trying to arrest us again? And if it was a prisoner, why were they interested in following us? You'd think they'd be more focused on running far away instead of keeping pace with a pair who were just casually walking. He suddenly grabbed my shoulder. "Whatever happens, stay out of it, alright? Fight in self-defense if you need to, but otherwise, stay uninvolved. You have less combat experience." I raised an eyebrow. "What are you expecting to-" "Pony!" I whirled around, as did Winter. As he guessed, a changeling was approaching us. I tried, but I couldn't recognize him (if they even were a "him") from back in the prison. Must have been someone who stood back and passively absorbed the love from my sessions rather than lining up to accept my services more directly. However, he seemed to recognize Winter, who seemed to recognize... the big bruise on the left side of his face. My eyebrow had just been raised, and then I needed to raise it again. Changeling shows up with a bruise on his face, mad at Winter? Connecting the dots wasn't hard. At least my companion had the decency to offer me a sheepish grin, before turning back to the changeling with a stone cold expression. "Look, buddy... guy... you know what, I'll just call you Bruise. It makes sense." Winter took a couple steps toward the changeling. Bruise, I guess he was now called, didn't react much besides narrowing his eyes further. I got the impression he didn't understand a word Winter was saying. "We're in a hurry right now, so if I can take a rain check on you wanting to rip my foreleg off and beat me to death with it, that'd reeeeally help us out." Bruise, whether understanding him or not, gave a snort and a slew of unintelligible changeling dialect. If that didn't translate to "I don't plan on waiting", the fact that he ran forward and socked Winter in the side of the face sure did. A second punch was stopped when Winter quickly lifted his hoof, grabbing the changeling's, throwing him to the side before he turned to me. "Like I said, Chloe... stay out of this, alright? Keep an eye out and yell at me if someone's coming. My friend here has some anger issues he needs to sort out, and I'd like to assist with that." I slowly nodded. "Uh... sure. Go ahead." Did we seriously have time for this? I mean, I had been told numerous times to never question our team leader, but sometimes he made it really hard not to... An attempted tackle from behind by Bruise was quickly countered, as Winter's ears flicked at the sound of his incoming hoofsteps and suddenly crouched down low. The changeling went comically flying over him; I needed to dart out of the way myself to avoid getting hit. With his foe briefly vulnerable on the ground, Winter didn't pass up any opportunities, instead jumping on him and using his hoof to slam the changeling's already-bruised face into the ground. I backed up several feet to stay as far out of the impromptu battlefield as I could. Winter wasn't able to hold Bruise down for very long before he got shoved off, though he managed to back away before the changeling could throw a punch. Jumping up onto all fours, Bruise tried to sidestep around Winter, who turned to meet him and duck out of the way of the next couple of thrown hooves. Bruise yelled something I don't think either of us understood, and tried to tackle Winter. This time, he succeeded, but rather than shove him to the ground, he pushed him right up against a rock. One hoof kept Winter pinned by the neck, the other slammed into the side of his face. His first punch successful, he went for a second, but Winter turned his head enough to make him miss and slam into the rock instead. Bruise barely winced, but it was enough to loosen his grip, and Winter pushed him away with his back legs. The two ran right at each other and got into a hoof-to-hoof scuffle, grabbing at one another and getting in whatever small hits they could. A sudden jab to the muzzle from Winter sent Bruise reeling for just a second, which was more than enough time for Winter to shove him to the ground, ending up on top of him for the second time that fight. This time, he focused on keeping the changeling down, not even bothering to get any hits in. "Chloe!" I jumped as I turned around. Getting snuck up on, I could handle, but getting snuck up on by someone who knew my name wasn't something I was experienced with. Luckily, the face I saw was that of a burgundy unicorn stallion with a short dark orange mane and tail, cutie mark of a broken dagger, crouched down low. I sighed in relief. "Skirmish!" He gestured for me to follow him. "Come on! The prison guards are spreading out; they'll find you any minute now!" I looked back at Winter, who was still pinning Bruise down to the ground. "What about them?" Skirmish followed my gaze, saw the situation, and gave two quick sharp whistles. "Winter! We gotta go!" Our leader glanced at us, then down at Bruise. Shrugging, he slammed his hoof against the right side of his face, leaving promises of a matching blemish in the hours to come. The changeling fell limp, and Winter trotted almost casually over to us. "Alright, ready." I gaped at him. "...you could have just knocked him out this whole time?!" As Skirmish turned to lead the way, Winter just gave me a shrug before following. "This was more fun!" I felt my eye twitch. 4: Flawless EscapePerspective: Skirmish Combat Boots, for all her relative paranoia, wasn't always wrong. She was second-in-command for a reason. The two of us had been waiting at our meetup spot for hours, making sure the teleporter stayed active while also keeping an eye out for anyone who came too close for comfort. It wasn't the most luxurious or most stable location; just the garden shed of an abandoned house in a very... "ghetto" part of town. That's the only word I can think of to describe it, sorry. Still, it was a place where no one would care enough to go searching on a whim. We were about two hours from the prison where Winter, Chloe, and Hoof Burns were being held. The teleporter had been set up and telepathically linked after they radioed in that there was a change of plans due to the arrest. Somehow, they figured out the schedule of the prisoners before getting arrested - I assume one of them knocked a guard out and rooted through their pockets or something - and through that, figured out the timeframes they would be able to escape after completing their job. Combat Boots tracked down this town on various maps and located the abandoned building closest to the prison. Five and a half miles away from it, sure, but still technically closest. We gave them directions, then while they got themselves arrested, we snuck to that building and set up shop in the garden shed. I understood the teleport mechanism the best out of anypony on the team, so naturally I had to come along. Boots, for her part, got it into her head I would somehow trip over a rock and break the teleporter. Keeping the two-hour walk in mind, we started going back and forth through the teleporter, waiting in the safety of our base during the off times with the teleporters deactivated, and hiding in the garden shed with our escape route open otherwise. It was just a matter of waiting; they had to ditch their radio before "getting caught", so we had lost our method of communication. Despite this, somehow, Boots knew when we needed to go find them instead. "Go get them," she told me suddenly one day when we arrived in the shed. I blinked at her, not just because the lack of light made it hard to see her. On the contrary, compared to the brown and gray of the shed, her deep purple coat and blood red mane and short tail were easy to spot. Her piercing red eyes and cutie mark of silver army boots, even more so. She smoothed out her wings before looking at me again, raising an eyebrow, as if asking why I hadn't left yet. "What did you ask?" I clarified. I heard her fine, but I wanted reasoning. "Go get them. Something must have gone wrong." She shook herself. "Take some bail money and your passport. Get them out and drag them back here. We'll wait for him to be released, then grab him." "Shouldn't we let them finish their job?" She gave me a look. "If they haven't done it yet, they won't get it done any quicker. Besides, we'll need them for other assignments." That was definitely a good point. I wasn't sure how many days had gone by, but we had received at least one mission calling since Winter and Chloe got themselves arrested. Luckily, it was a quick one, and our resident musclehead Brass Knuckles was able to take care of it by himself before I even knew the details. Of course, being able to take multiple tasks at once is why we have a group, but with four of us occupied, we'd be wearing thin sooner or later. After some mild arguing about why I had to be the one to go find them, I reluctantly exited the shed. I had already memorized the path they had to travel from the prison, so I just ran it backwards in my mind. Granted, it wasn't much harder than walking east and keeping an eye out for the few landmarks that would appear as I transitioned from town to desert. Using my magic, I adjusted the piece fitted inside my left ear. "Tussle? You there?" "Yo!" The chirpy voice of my sister buzzed back through the earpiece, far louder than I was prepared for. Apparently she heard my grunt, because the next words that came from her were at a more tolerable level. "What's going on?" "Nothing major, as far as I know." I shrugged even though she couldn't see me. "You're at the computers, right? And not playing Tetris on them again?" "...um... is it alright if only one of those is true?" I sighed. "Turn that off and get the radar running. You need to keep an eye on the prison, and let me know if there's any movement outside the walls, okay?" "Got it!" I heard the clacking of keys, followed by a pause. "...alright, got it running. But, um, I can multitask-" "No Tetris." "Aww..." With that, though, she turned off her microphone, going silent. I sighed in relief; putting Tussle in charge of mission control was typically a recipe for disaster. Or at least a recipe for aggravation. Shaking my head, I returned to my focus: walking and keeping my eyes open. My quiet two-hour walk was finally interrupted by a slight crackling in my ear. "Hey, uh, I think Winter and Chloe just left!" I blinked. "Really?" "Yeah, two ponies just walked away all casual-like, and they're the only ponies there, right?" "Supposedly, yeah." I started to question why I came out here if they were going to be fine anyway. The image of Boots's glare flashed through my head to remind me. "Well, I'm this far out... I'll see if I can meet them and make sure they don't get lost on the way back. Tussle, keep an eye out on the guards, and let me know if they head in the same direction Winter and Chloe went." "Kay-kay!" she replied cheerfully, flicking off her microphone. It wasn't long after when I heard sounds of a scuffle from up ahead. I picked up the pace, worried that the guards made it past Tussle and had caught Winter and Chloe in their escape. I was half-right; instead, I found a changeling prisoner wrestling with Winter - and losing - as Chloe watched, the slightest hints of a worried expression on her face. I would've been content to wait and see how it played out, only getting involved if things went pear-shaped, but Tussle suddenly crackled to life in my ear again. "The guards are heading west! Er... east, or... your way!" Biting my lip, I crouched down to stay at least partially out of sight, and stepped over to the pony who wasn't currently in the middle of a brawl. "Chloe!" She jumped and whirled around, but visibly relaxed when she saw me. "Skirmish!" I beckoned her. "Come on! The prison guards are spreading out; they'll find you any minute now!" Admittedly, I didn't know that for sure, but I somehow doubted I'd get the two of them moving if I just said they might stumble across us if they're lucky. Chloe glanced back at the fighting pair. "What about them?" I looked past her. Winter was currently on top of the changeling, holding him - her? Uh, them - down to the ground. I was curious how it'd go if I left it, but we had priorities. Whistling twice, I caught his attention. "Winter! We gotta go!" He glanced at us, then down at the changeling. Swiftly, he punched the downed prisoner in the face, and they fell limp, before he nonchalantly walked over. "Alright, ready." "You could have just knocked him out this whole time?!" I ignored their argument as I turned to walk. They'd follow me if they knew what was best. "Good job, guys!" Tussle was grinning at us and speaking before we'd even shaken off the teleporter's disorientation. "Flawless escape!" I groaned and tried to straighten my vision. No longer were we in the barren desert, or the half-abandoned town, or the wooden garden shed. Now we were in the office-like building we called our base, specifically in the small teleporter room. Already waiting for us was a lavender unicorn (we had a lot of unicorns on the team, huh?) with a combed burgundy mane and tail that matched my coat. Her orange eyes were wide with excitement, like a puppy whose master just came back from a vacation, and her tail almost seemed to wag - or maybe I was just that dizzy - above her hoof cuff cutie mark. Chloe rubbed her eyes. "Flawless? Really?" "Yeah! I'd give it an A-plus, easy!" Tussle smiled proudly. "Even though we got caught by an escaped prisoner?" She moved to rubbing her stomach. "Oh, thanks for reminding me! Winter kicked his flank! A-plus-plus!" With that, Tussle turned and practically skipped out of the room, leaving us to collect our spinning visions and turning stomachs. "She's your twin..." Boots grumbled to me. I glared at her. "Just stating a fact." Winter staggered to his hooves. "If anyone wants me, I'll be in my office, writing out the report..." He promptly sat back down, which slowly transitioned into lying on his side. "...in a minute..." "We really just need to... make this thing less painful," Chloe muttered as she tried to catch her breath. The rest of us proclaimed our agreements through grunts and raised hooves.
1: Center of AttentionPerspective: Winter Solstice "Cassa lo cez, fir tanko." I looked up from the pile of bricks I was using to entertain myself. When you wanted to make little houses and you lacked little wooden blocks and triangles, actual building material made for good... well, building material. I was somewhat proud of my small tower, though I probably would've been prouder if this wasn't the fourteenth time that day I had made it after tearing it down a few minutes prior. Not my fault there wasn't much to do here. Pony-made prisons aren't usually made as entertainment centers. Changeling-made ones attempted even less. As long as there were sturdy walls and doors, and food was eventually provided at least once a day, when it came to what the prisoners did, the guards couldn't give a crap if they were force fed laxatives. I was more used to being on the other side of these walls, but I had my reasons for being here, sitting in a corner on a surprisingly comfy spot of dirt in the main yard, playing with bricks that had fallen out of the walls over the decades. Wait, what was going on? "Cassa lo cez, fir tanko!" Oh, right. This guy. Being one of only three ponies in a primarily changeling-populated prison, in the changeling homelands at that, made me stand out. Even worse with my comparatively bright colors. Royal blue coat, yellow mane and tail with brown streaks, green eyes, gold shield cutie mark with a snowflake on it. Next to all these dark gray creatures in a prison made of dirt and cement, I probably looked like a rainbow, and that made me a target. I didn't like being made a target. I made sure they knew that. The changeling drone standing over me was... well, he looked like all the others, more or less. Does that make me racist if I can't tell the difference? Maybe I just didn't spend enough time researching them. Anyway, there was one somewhat outstanding feature about this guy. Well, two, actually. The first being a bruise on the left side of his face that looked suspiciously to be in the shape of my hoof. (Hey, in my defense, he threw the first six punches. I just threw the seventh.) The second being the five or six or twenty friends backing him up. "Cassa lo cez, fir tanko!" he said a third time. He spoke a bit fast for my brain to translate properly, but I gathered that he was combining an insult with an order to apologize. Rather than formulate a response in either my language or his, I just blinked blankly at him. He stared back, until he apparently seemed to get the idea. Growling, he turned to one of his friends, and the two of them exchanged words for a while, trying to figure out if any of their group spoke Equestrian. I held back a smirk as several others in the crowd started to wander off, apparently bored once they realized this pony supposedly didn't even understand them. The ones that stuck around either glared daggers at me or listened intently to their apparent leader, either way seemingly awaiting orders. I returned my attention to my bricks. It wouldn't be long before I was out of here; if all went well, it'd be only a few hours. Frankly, I didn't even belong here. I could've easily avoided getting caught in the first place if I wanted. But I needed something. Specifically, someone. And they were inside the walls, not outside. My name is Winter Solstice. I'm the captain of the Ponyville royal guard. Or rather, I was, until that little section was more or less disbanded and replaced with more common police. I'm not bitter, especially since the higher-ups decided neither I nor my fellow guards were useless. We had skills, and we had chemistry, and they wanted that. So they offered me a new leadership role as the head of a special military division. Equinox. We're a specialized force, in that we're specialized in everything. By this point, we've done it all. Infiltration, negotiation, stealth, strategy, assassination, electrical work. Available for weddings. We take jobs that the regular guards or police are too ill-equipped, busy, or incompetent to handle, which is a disturbingly large amount of them. We often have to travel for them, but rarely do we travel outside Equestria, like we have been for the last two weeks or so. Remember how I said there were three ponies in this prison? I was one, of course. The second was one of my fellow Equinox members, sent in to back me up (or for me to back her up, whichever was necessary). The third was Hoof Burns, a psychopath whose claims to fame included blowing up an apartment building and attempting to assassinate our own Princess Luna. As you can likely tell, he's near the top of our "seriously get him already" list. Changelings don't care much for Equestrian crimes. They had him locked up because he trespassed in their territory, but frankly there was no way he'd be stuck any longer than six months. Then he'd be back out in the wild again. By Equestrian law, he was to be killed or arrested, and if it was the latter he'd end up the former within days. Deciding to take our chance while we could, myself and my companion Chloroform got ourselves captured. It almost pained me to be so blatantly obvious with my trespassing rather than sneaking in quietly, but it worked. More or less. Of course, they searched us. We kept some stock items on us. Bits of food, a knife, a torn map of changeling territory that was horrendously outdated. Enough to make us easily pass for random wanderers thinking we could waltz right in on their home turf. Due to us both being unicorns, they stuck some standard issue magic deterrent rings on our horns, not that we had a problem with that. We didn't plan on needing magic, and even if we did, my horn had a unique curve and thickness that kept the ring from sliding on all the way. I could at least do minor things if necessary, not that they knew that. All that was left was to get just a few moments alone with Burns. He didn't seem to recognize us, nor did he want to socialize. He picked some fights, and the guards responded by breaking them up and tossing him in solitary confinement for a while. The rest of the time, he wandered around aimlessly. Occasionally into good areas to pick him off, but never when no one was watching. Chloroform had a plan, though. Oh, sorry, Chloe had a plan. She's pretty insistent about using that weird short version of her name rather than her full one, so sorry about that. Anyway, she came up with a plan, and had been working at it for a couple days. Partially thanks to being a not-bad-looking female in a prison otherwise consisting entirely of males - literally; don't ask how I know - she had made herself out as a decently friendly face from which these changelings could get a bit of a... "love meal". And hey, if it helps us reach our goal, I can't judge the methods. Next time Burns wandered into a good spot, she'd start advertising her services, the prisoners would come flocking, and next thing you know, I'd have a nice dark alley to finish him off in without any witnesses. Then it'd just be a matter of pulling off a pre-planned escape before his body's found. Simple enough, at least on paper. Of course, with these morons standing around staring me down, I doubted I'd be able to sneak off so easily when the time came. I needed to get away from them. I casually stood up and started to walk away, as though I didn't even think the group hanging around me even cared. Of course, three of them stepped in front of me to block me from leaving. I gave them a look, and they returned it, along with some words. "You're not going anywhere." Oh hey, one of them speaks Equestrian. I smiled at him in the least friendly way you can suitably imagine before giving my reply. "Unless you want to end up even worse off than your friend over there, yes, I am." He didn't like that. Suddenly my throat was being grabbed by a surprisingly strong hole-filled hoof, and I was being shoved up against the wall. "It won't be that easy this time." The pressure on my throat wasn't unfamiliar, but it wasn't welcome either. I felt my air being cut off, and quickly pushed down the frantic messages from my brain telling me to squirm and flail. Instead, I glanced over as the remaining crowd all started to watch, some grinning gleefully and others continuing to scowl. Yeah, figured none of them would be jumping in to help me. My hooves had instinctively gone to my throat, so as to push away his foreleg as much as I could to prevent total suffocation, and I didn't think moving them would give way to much progress at the moment. Deciding to finally give up my ace in the hole, I activated my magic. The base of my horn started glowing right up to the ring, and I slowly started lifting one of the bricks from my little house. Before any of them could catch on to what was happening, I flung the brick at the head of the changeling holding me by the neck. The collision had the desired result of knocking him to the side in a daze as he gave a yelp of surprise, managing to not send him sprawling to the ground. His foreleg released its grip on my throat, but I quickly grabbed it back now that my hooves weren't occupied anymore. Tugging him toward me, I quickly slammed my forehead into his. Not one of the most recommended close combat tactics, but it worked, finally sending him crumpling to the ground out cold and leaving me with just a small migraine. Unfortunately, me knocking out one of their own just so happened to be the signal for the rest of the crowd to start their own attack. I was worried for about half a second before remembering that these were prison thugs with little sense of organization. Somehow they found themselves unable to move the five feet over to me, due to pushing against each other and tripping over their own hooves. I even saw a few punches being thrown at one another, probably because all the shoving led to some touching and bumping they weren't fond of. Suddenly all the changelings who previously wanted my head on a plate were more focused on punching and pushing each other than the unicorn watching them with clear amusement. Mr. Bruised Face was the only one who managed to get out of the ensuing mess and run at me. I quickly held up a hoof to block the simple punch he threw, then ducked before he threw another one. Pretty much all standard jocks and thugs had the same opening attack pattern, like some sort of old video game. Before he could switch it up, I grabbed the side of his head with my hoof and slammed it against the wall. It didn't put him down, but it certainly dazed him, and hopefully would help him get the point. I threw him backwards into the group struggle, watched for a moment to make sure he wasn't coming back at me instantly, then turned and walked off. I had no problem letting the guards sort out that little scuffle when the dust settled, but I didn't plan on being right nearby when it happened.
2: Predator and PreyPerspective: Winter Solstice Walking away from a fight that easily felt like something out of a cartoon, but at least it worked. I wandered back inside from the yard and made my way to the cafeteria. Obviously it wasn't open, but leaning against the wall by the door was where Chloe had decided to make her lookout point. The optimal place for us to grab Burns was just down the hall and around a corner, where he liked to sit every so often to get out of the sun. She had a good view in case he came by. As I turned the corner, sure enough, she was there. Burgundy coat, long golden mane and tail, cutie mark of a brown glass bottle, watching the empty corridor intently with green eyes that almost matched my own. Like I said before, she certainly wasn't bad looking, but days in a dirty prison weren't doing her many favors. Her mane and tail were full of clingy bits of dirt, and with the bags under her eyes you'd be forgiven for thinking she hadn't slept in days. Granted, I doubted I looked much better, but there weren't a lot of mirrors around to confirm that. I glanced around as I approached to make sure there weren't any guards or other prisoners within earshot. To my luck, none were even in sight. I sat down beside her with an exaggerated groan, as though I was tired from lots of walking. "Any luck?" "With the watching or the swiping?" she replied, not even looking my way. "Swiping. I'm curious to know if we're good to go, or if we'll be scrambling as soon as I'm done with him." She reached back into her mane, and from it withdrew a keyring with a single key on it. "Just got it half an hour ago." I chuckled. "Guess some guard wasn't paying attention." "Or maybe I'm just good at my job." She raised an eyebrow at me, but accompanied the movement with a smirk as she tossed me the key. "Here, you've got a thicker mane." "If you told me ten years ago I'd be using my hair as an emergency pocket, I'd have called you crazy." I tucked the key into my mane like she had done. "Just make sure to come running to me as soon as you see me give the signal. If the guards find his body, they'll gather the prisoners and all eyes will be on us. We need to get out in the few minutes we have where a distraction is possible." "Got any plans for that?" she asked. I shrugged. "I may have found a few guys who are easy to fool into punching each other. If they're far enough away from the gate, and we open the lock subtly enough, we can get a headstart before the guards notice us." She nodded. "So the only potential problem is you not killing Burns fast enough and he screams or something." "If I'm quick, that won't be an issue." I tilted my head left and right to crack my neck. "Wish we could've snuck in some weapons, though." "Boots was right in that they'd search us thoroughly and take absolutely everything we had, so even if we had something small and inconspicuous, we'd lose it anyway." She shook her head. "Besides, you're in a prison. Literally anything not nailed down can be used as a weapon." I thought back to my earlier use of the brick. "True enough. I'm sure I can grab something or other." She nodded, before her ears flicked. I looked over at the hall I had come from, and after a moment, one of the guards walked around the corner, presumably on patrol. He didn't even give us a second glance, but the two of us knew it was probably time to stop openly chatting about our plans. Not many of the prisoners spoke Equestrian, but most if not all of the guards at least knew the basics. It wouldn't go against our luck for one of them to know what "kill" and "escape" meant. I stood up, brushing my back and flanks off from the dirty wall and floor, and stepped around Chloe with just a nod as my goodbye. As the guard wandered off down the halls, I headed back out toward the yard. I had a brick tower to get back to. Even with my intense focus on my makeshift building blocks, I easily heard the changeling prisoners (and even some guards) start flocking to a corner of the yard. I glanced up in time to see Chloe disappear into the forming crowd. My curiosity as to what exactly went on in that mass of chitin was easily overwhelmed by my desire to finish this job and get out, so I waited a couple more minutes before standing up. Decently assured no more changelings were in the hallway Burns had wandered to, I casually walked back inside and down the path we had seen him take many times before. I kept my ears perked for any unexpected hoofsteps, but all I heard were my own. That, and a deep exhale from around the corner. Stepping around into the dead end, I saw him. Hoof Burns; the Psycho Pegasus, some of us had called him. Time on the road and in prison had covered his ostensibly red coat in brown and gray dirt, even worse than any other prisoner in this hole. His stark black mane and tail, both rather long due to lacking the luxury of a barber shop, looked a bit less dirty, but probably only because dirt didn't show up in it as well. His simple flame cutie mark made him stand out even more, and his bright purple eyes opened and closed as he puffed on a cigarette. Probably kicked the crap out of his cellmate for a pack of them. "Got a smoke?" I asked casually as I strolled up. I'd never smoked before and didn't plan on it now, but if I wanted him to let his guard down, I had to act at least a little friendly. He glanced at me, and the look in his eyes made me wonder if he was planning on complying, ignoring me, or pulling out a shiv and stabbing me in the side. Thankfully, he eventually went with the first option, pulling a second cigarette from under his wing. He lit a match on his hoof, touched it to the tip, and offered it to me. "Who are you?" "Algid. Probably in for the same reasons as you." I had already decided not to give him my real name, on the off chance he knew me from somewhere. I took the cigarette in my hoof. "Trespassing on parasite property?" He nodded and went back to his smoking. "Could be worse. I did a lot of crazy stuff before I hopped the border." "Like what? Punch a cop in the face?" I stuck the cigarette in my mouth, making sure to inhale strictly through my nose. "Pfft, think bigger, Al. Try 'almost killed the fake princess of the night'." He laughed, which quickly changed to coughing. "And that's just one thing." "And you're proud of this?" He shook his head. "Nah. If I succeeded, I'd be proud. As far as I'm concerned, what happened was about as big as just not winning a science fair in high school." It felt like my eye twitched. I had encountered many criminals in the past. Some felt remorse for their actions, some didn't. But very few thought of a failed assassination attempt as equivalent to just a bad day at school. "Is that so..." "It is." He smirked. "How about you? You do anything awesome that the cops tried to bust you on?" I removed the cigarette from my mouth so I could take a deep breath and let it out. "Well... I did track down a fellow prisoner and strangle him to death." "Really?" He tilted his head. "Sounds like he didn't fight back much, if you were able to do that. No offense." "I'm stronger than I look. As for him fighting back... he tried, but it didn't work well." I shrugged. "Gotcha. And when was this?" I bit my lip and thought. "I think it was... July fourteenth." He nodded, but slowly stopped. "...isn't that today? Is it your one year anniversary?" "...not quite. But you're close." I smirked. "Very close." I suddenly leapt at him, shoving him against the wall with my body weight and holding my hoof over his mouth to prevent any screams or yelps of surprise. He tried to bite me, but pony teeth are rarely tougher than pony hooves, so I just dealt with it as I pummeled him in the side of the face with my other foreleg. He tried to push me off with his forelegs, then his wings, but I kept my hind legs firmly in place and didn't give. "You've hurt a lot of ponies," I quietly growled at him. "Stallions, mares, seniors, foals. Some are still walking, some are traumatized, some are six feet underground. And you don't even care." I took my hoof off his mouth and quickly moved it to his throat, the other one soon joining, as I applied all possible pressure. "Remember when you blew up that apartment complex in Manehatten? Twelve fillies, sixteen colts, twenty-eight mares, thirty-one stallions. Consider yourself lucky we got them evacuated, because if even one of them died, I'd be making this a lot more painful for you." His eyes bulged a bit as he tried to keep pushing me, and now he was starting to make progress. Apparently the threat of impending death was giving his strength a huge boost. I glanced down briefly and noticed the two cigarettes we had dropped to the floor as the scuffle began. Grabbing the still-lit smokes in my magic, I jabbed the lit ends against his cheek, hearing a quiet sizzling and his struggles to scream in pain. His body tensed up more than it already had, and suddenly his attempts to push me off were a lot less fruitful. I kept my hooves right where they were, pushing as hard as I could, glaring right into his purple eyes as the life slowly left them. He gradually stopped pushing, his forelegs falling limply to the side. His unfolded wings began to droop. His mouth, previously set firmly with teeth grit, fell slackly open. I gave it another couple minutes before I lowered him to the ground, his chest unmoving and his eyes staring off at nothing. My glare remained for a minute or so as I stared at his body, making sure he wasn't faking it. Once I was convinced, I relaxed a bit and kneeled down, running my hoof over his eyes to close them. Sighing, I stepped away from his body, turning to head out of the corridor. I only gave his corpse one final glance just before I exited into the yard. The urge to mutter a dumb one-liner like "Smoking kills, buddy" was admittedly difficult to ignore.
3: Can't Be HeldPerspective: Chloroform Winter gave me permission to not go into heavy detail about what, exactly, I was doing while he was off dealing with Hoof Burns. So, sorry to those of you who are into that sort of thing, but I'm gonna just skip right to when I saw him come out of the hallway. Through the masses of love-hungry parasites, it wasn't hard to see bright royal blue stepping out and trying to lock eyes with me. He rubbed the back of his neck before flicking his tail twice; the signal for a successful takedown. Since I was in between patrons, I stood back up, to the confusion and disappointment of many. "Sorry boys, gotta close early today," I told them. A quick chorus of translation from the few who spoke Equestrian later, and they were all groaning and sighing and heading off to do whatever they were doing ten minutes prior. A few stuck around desperately, but a couple kisses on the cheeks and some whispered sweet nothings (which they may or may not have understood) sent them happily on their ways as well. Winter walked up to me, an eyebrow raised. "I could've sworn you were our medic, not our seductress." "I'm multi-talented." I brushed myself off. "I couldn't even tell you were back there, let alone killing someone. Guess you got lucky." He snorted and nudged my side. "Or maybe I'm just good at my job." "Touché." I glanced at the gate keeping us in. Ten feet high, barbed wire up top. Only reason no changelings or pegasi tried to fly out was because that'd be way too obvious. But we had a stealthier route. We casually walked in the general direction of the gate, making sure not to head straight for the door. He glanced at my horn. "That ring's not bothering you too much, is it?" I raised an eyebrow. "Are you seriously asking if the inability to use my magic is a problem?" "Just want to make sure it's not urgent that we get it off. I don't think we'll have the tools for that until we're back at base." We walked close to the door, and he gave me a push. Getting the idea, I exaggeratedly fell to the side, falling to the ground right by the fence near the gate. It was mostly fake, but I definitely got some scrapes. "Hey, watch it!" Good, now we had an excuse to be so close to the way out. He rolled his eyes, stepping up beside me and standing conveniently in front of the lock on the gate. "Calm down, you're fine. Barely any bugs crawling on you now." "Had enough of those earlier." I sighed, standing back up and leaning against the fence. "At least they were just hungry and desperate, not trying to be dominant. They took whatever they got." "Yeah, you don't strike me as the submissive type." He lit his horn up and carefully took out the key, sliding it into the lock. "Don't act like you never enjoyed it, though." I rolled my eyes. "It definitely could've been worse, I'll give you that. But that's not saying much." Click! The lock popped open, and he slowly worked it off the door. "At least you've gained a few admirers." "Doubt I'd want to keep them." I swept my gaze around the yard. For at least a brief moment, no eyes whatsoever were on us, and I lowered my voice to a whisper. "Go, quickly." He opened the gate just enough for me to swiftly squeeze through, and he followed immediately behind, using his magic to click the lock back on after, leaving the key inside. "Not gonna need that anymore." We slowly started to stroll off, and a glance back revealed no followers. "How far until we break into a run?" I asked. We weren't even ten feet from the prison, and we weren't going much further at this walking speed. "Only if we hear them yelling. Other than that, we stick to a casual pace," he replied at a low volume as he glanced around. The area we were in was... to be honest, basically a desert. Granted, we were pretty far down south. "Alright, I'm fairly certain I remember the path... plus, Boots and Skirmish told me about a few landmarks, so we can follow them to the meetup point." I looked around. "What kind of landmarks?" "We'll know them when we see them." Oh, how I hated vague answers... "Hopefully by the time we get there, they'll have the teleporter ready to bring us back to base." Right... the teleporter. Whenever our missions took us far away, we had it charged up for use. Pretty self-explanatory; a magical portal that would warp us to a preset location, though it was far from convenient thanks to the amount of power it took - both electrically and magically. If we so much as had the microwave running when we turned it on, lights flickered all through the building. It also made me want to vomit every time we went through it. But that's really not big enough of a problem to consider hoofing it back across half a country. "Think they'll come after us?" I asked after another moment or two of silence. "They'll try, definitely. Once they find his body, they'll round up the prisoners, realize we're missing, and draw the obvious conclusion. But by that point, we'll be so far ahead that even if they knew the direction we went in, they wouldn't catch us." He smirked, but it fell when he saw my uncertain expression. "Oh, come on. This isn't even close to the first prison breakout I've done." I raised an eyebrow at him. "Well, it's my first one. I can't help having some concerns. I don't even know for sure if this is legal." "If any other pony was doing it, it probably wouldn't be." He shrugged. "But this is an official Equinox mission. We followed a plan that was unanimously approved by the higher-ups, we have licenses to kill, and the changelings are welcome to try and get us back into that prison for escaping. If they think they can find us without getting themselves arrested for trespassing." I shrugged, trying to keep a neutral look, but inside I felt a bit relieved that we weren't going to be locked up as soon as we reported back to base. Even if everything he just said was stuff I knew already, getting it confirmed was a good way to settle my nerves. "I'll take your word for it." "You'll find yourself doing that a lot in this line of work. There's a reason-" He suddenly stopped talking, freezing mid-step. I stopped walking and looked at him, seeing his ears perking up. I glanced around, but didn't see or hear anything out of the ordinary. "What is it?" "Someone followed us from the prison," he replied in a hushed whisper. "They're staying out of sight. Keep your eyes peeled." I quickly shut up, but my mind was racing. Who was following us? If it was a guard, why weren't they coming out and trying to arrest us again? And if it was a prisoner, why were they interested in following us? You'd think they'd be more focused on running far away instead of keeping pace with a pair who were just casually walking. He suddenly grabbed my shoulder. "Whatever happens, stay out of it, alright? Fight in self-defense if you need to, but otherwise, stay uninvolved. You have less combat experience." I raised an eyebrow. "What are you expecting to-" "Pony!" I whirled around, as did Winter. As he guessed, a changeling was approaching us. I tried, but I couldn't recognize him (if they even were a "him") from back in the prison. Must have been someone who stood back and passively absorbed the love from my sessions rather than lining up to accept my services more directly. However, he seemed to recognize Winter, who seemed to recognize... the big bruise on the left side of his face. My eyebrow had just been raised, and then I needed to raise it again. Changeling shows up with a bruise on his face, mad at Winter? Connecting the dots wasn't hard. At least my companion had the decency to offer me a sheepish grin, before turning back to the changeling with a stone cold expression. "Look, buddy... guy... you know what, I'll just call you Bruise. It makes sense." Winter took a couple steps toward the changeling. Bruise, I guess he was now called, didn't react much besides narrowing his eyes further. I got the impression he didn't understand a word Winter was saying. "We're in a hurry right now, so if I can take a rain check on you wanting to rip my foreleg off and beat me to death with it, that'd reeeeally help us out." Bruise, whether understanding him or not, gave a snort and a slew of unintelligible changeling dialect. If that didn't translate to "I don't plan on waiting", the fact that he ran forward and socked Winter in the side of the face sure did. A second punch was stopped when Winter quickly lifted his hoof, grabbing the changeling's, throwing him to the side before he turned to me. "Like I said, Chloe... stay out of this, alright? Keep an eye out and yell at me if someone's coming. My friend here has some anger issues he needs to sort out, and I'd like to assist with that." I slowly nodded. "Uh... sure. Go ahead." Did we seriously have time for this? I mean, I had been told numerous times to never question our team leader, but sometimes he made it really hard not to... An attempted tackle from behind by Bruise was quickly countered, as Winter's ears flicked at the sound of his incoming hoofsteps and suddenly crouched down low. The changeling went comically flying over him; I needed to dart out of the way myself to avoid getting hit. With his foe briefly vulnerable on the ground, Winter didn't pass up any opportunities, instead jumping on him and using his hoof to slam the changeling's already-bruised face into the ground. I backed up several feet to stay as far out of the impromptu battlefield as I could. Winter wasn't able to hold Bruise down for very long before he got shoved off, though he managed to back away before the changeling could throw a punch. Jumping up onto all fours, Bruise tried to sidestep around Winter, who turned to meet him and duck out of the way of the next couple of thrown hooves. Bruise yelled something I don't think either of us understood, and tried to tackle Winter. This time, he succeeded, but rather than shove him to the ground, he pushed him right up against a rock. One hoof kept Winter pinned by the neck, the other slammed into the side of his face. His first punch successful, he went for a second, but Winter turned his head enough to make him miss and slam into the rock instead. Bruise barely winced, but it was enough to loosen his grip, and Winter pushed him away with his back legs. The two ran right at each other and got into a hoof-to-hoof scuffle, grabbing at one another and getting in whatever small hits they could. A sudden jab to the muzzle from Winter sent Bruise reeling for just a second, which was more than enough time for Winter to shove him to the ground, ending up on top of him for the second time that fight. This time, he focused on keeping the changeling down, not even bothering to get any hits in. "Chloe!" I jumped as I turned around. Getting snuck up on, I could handle, but getting snuck up on by someone who knew my name wasn't something I was experienced with. Luckily, the face I saw was that of a burgundy unicorn stallion with a short dark orange mane and tail, cutie mark of a broken dagger, crouched down low. I sighed in relief. "Skirmish!" He gestured for me to follow him. "Come on! The prison guards are spreading out; they'll find you any minute now!" I looked back at Winter, who was still pinning Bruise down to the ground. "What about them?" Skirmish followed my gaze, saw the situation, and gave two quick sharp whistles. "Winter! We gotta go!" Our leader glanced at us, then down at Bruise. Shrugging, he slammed his hoof against the right side of his face, leaving promises of a matching blemish in the hours to come. The changeling fell limp, and Winter trotted almost casually over to us. "Alright, ready." I gaped at him. "...you could have just knocked him out this whole time?!" As Skirmish turned to lead the way, Winter just gave me a shrug before following. "This was more fun!" I felt my eye twitch.
4: Flawless EscapePerspective: Skirmish Combat Boots, for all her relative paranoia, wasn't always wrong. She was second-in-command for a reason. The two of us had been waiting at our meetup spot for hours, making sure the teleporter stayed active while also keeping an eye out for anyone who came too close for comfort. It wasn't the most luxurious or most stable location; just the garden shed of an abandoned house in a very... "ghetto" part of town. That's the only word I can think of to describe it, sorry. Still, it was a place where no one would care enough to go searching on a whim. We were about two hours from the prison where Winter, Chloe, and Hoof Burns were being held. The teleporter had been set up and telepathically linked after they radioed in that there was a change of plans due to the arrest. Somehow, they figured out the schedule of the prisoners before getting arrested - I assume one of them knocked a guard out and rooted through their pockets or something - and through that, figured out the timeframes they would be able to escape after completing their job. Combat Boots tracked down this town on various maps and located the abandoned building closest to the prison. Five and a half miles away from it, sure, but still technically closest. We gave them directions, then while they got themselves arrested, we snuck to that building and set up shop in the garden shed. I understood the teleport mechanism the best out of anypony on the team, so naturally I had to come along. Boots, for her part, got it into her head I would somehow trip over a rock and break the teleporter. Keeping the two-hour walk in mind, we started going back and forth through the teleporter, waiting in the safety of our base during the off times with the teleporters deactivated, and hiding in the garden shed with our escape route open otherwise. It was just a matter of waiting; they had to ditch their radio before "getting caught", so we had lost our method of communication. Despite this, somehow, Boots knew when we needed to go find them instead. "Go get them," she told me suddenly one day when we arrived in the shed. I blinked at her, not just because the lack of light made it hard to see her. On the contrary, compared to the brown and gray of the shed, her deep purple coat and blood red mane and short tail were easy to spot. Her piercing red eyes and cutie mark of silver army boots, even more so. She smoothed out her wings before looking at me again, raising an eyebrow, as if asking why I hadn't left yet. "What did you ask?" I clarified. I heard her fine, but I wanted reasoning. "Go get them. Something must have gone wrong." She shook herself. "Take some bail money and your passport. Get them out and drag them back here. We'll wait for him to be released, then grab him." "Shouldn't we let them finish their job?" She gave me a look. "If they haven't done it yet, they won't get it done any quicker. Besides, we'll need them for other assignments." That was definitely a good point. I wasn't sure how many days had gone by, but we had received at least one mission calling since Winter and Chloe got themselves arrested. Luckily, it was a quick one, and our resident musclehead Brass Knuckles was able to take care of it by himself before I even knew the details. Of course, being able to take multiple tasks at once is why we have a group, but with four of us occupied, we'd be wearing thin sooner or later. After some mild arguing about why I had to be the one to go find them, I reluctantly exited the shed. I had already memorized the path they had to travel from the prison, so I just ran it backwards in my mind. Granted, it wasn't much harder than walking east and keeping an eye out for the few landmarks that would appear as I transitioned from town to desert. Using my magic, I adjusted the piece fitted inside my left ear. "Tussle? You there?" "Yo!" The chirpy voice of my sister buzzed back through the earpiece, far louder than I was prepared for. Apparently she heard my grunt, because the next words that came from her were at a more tolerable level. "What's going on?" "Nothing major, as far as I know." I shrugged even though she couldn't see me. "You're at the computers, right? And not playing Tetris on them again?" "...um... is it alright if only one of those is true?" I sighed. "Turn that off and get the radar running. You need to keep an eye on the prison, and let me know if there's any movement outside the walls, okay?" "Got it!" I heard the clacking of keys, followed by a pause. "...alright, got it running. But, um, I can multitask-" "No Tetris." "Aww..." With that, though, she turned off her microphone, going silent. I sighed in relief; putting Tussle in charge of mission control was typically a recipe for disaster. Or at least a recipe for aggravation. Shaking my head, I returned to my focus: walking and keeping my eyes open. My quiet two-hour walk was finally interrupted by a slight crackling in my ear. "Hey, uh, I think Winter and Chloe just left!" I blinked. "Really?" "Yeah, two ponies just walked away all casual-like, and they're the only ponies there, right?" "Supposedly, yeah." I started to question why I came out here if they were going to be fine anyway. The image of Boots's glare flashed through my head to remind me. "Well, I'm this far out... I'll see if I can meet them and make sure they don't get lost on the way back. Tussle, keep an eye out on the guards, and let me know if they head in the same direction Winter and Chloe went." "Kay-kay!" she replied cheerfully, flicking off her microphone. It wasn't long after when I heard sounds of a scuffle from up ahead. I picked up the pace, worried that the guards made it past Tussle and had caught Winter and Chloe in their escape. I was half-right; instead, I found a changeling prisoner wrestling with Winter - and losing - as Chloe watched, the slightest hints of a worried expression on her face. I would've been content to wait and see how it played out, only getting involved if things went pear-shaped, but Tussle suddenly crackled to life in my ear again. "The guards are heading west! Er... east, or... your way!" Biting my lip, I crouched down to stay at least partially out of sight, and stepped over to the pony who wasn't currently in the middle of a brawl. "Chloe!" She jumped and whirled around, but visibly relaxed when she saw me. "Skirmish!" I beckoned her. "Come on! The prison guards are spreading out; they'll find you any minute now!" Admittedly, I didn't know that for sure, but I somehow doubted I'd get the two of them moving if I just said they might stumble across us if they're lucky. Chloe glanced back at the fighting pair. "What about them?" I looked past her. Winter was currently on top of the changeling, holding him - her? Uh, them - down to the ground. I was curious how it'd go if I left it, but we had priorities. Whistling twice, I caught his attention. "Winter! We gotta go!" He glanced at us, then down at the changeling. Swiftly, he punched the downed prisoner in the face, and they fell limp, before he nonchalantly walked over. "Alright, ready." "You could have just knocked him out this whole time?!" I ignored their argument as I turned to walk. They'd follow me if they knew what was best. "Good job, guys!" Tussle was grinning at us and speaking before we'd even shaken off the teleporter's disorientation. "Flawless escape!" I groaned and tried to straighten my vision. No longer were we in the barren desert, or the half-abandoned town, or the wooden garden shed. Now we were in the office-like building we called our base, specifically in the small teleporter room. Already waiting for us was a lavender unicorn (we had a lot of unicorns on the team, huh?) with a combed burgundy mane and tail that matched my coat. Her orange eyes were wide with excitement, like a puppy whose master just came back from a vacation, and her tail almost seemed to wag - or maybe I was just that dizzy - above her hoof cuff cutie mark. Chloe rubbed her eyes. "Flawless? Really?" "Yeah! I'd give it an A-plus, easy!" Tussle smiled proudly. "Even though we got caught by an escaped prisoner?" She moved to rubbing her stomach. "Oh, thanks for reminding me! Winter kicked his flank! A-plus-plus!" With that, Tussle turned and practically skipped out of the room, leaving us to collect our spinning visions and turning stomachs. "She's your twin..." Boots grumbled to me. I glared at her. "Just stating a fact." Winter staggered to his hooves. "If anyone wants me, I'll be in my office, writing out the report..." He promptly sat back down, which slowly transitioned into lying on his side. "...in a minute..." "We really just need to... make this thing less painful," Chloe muttered as she tried to catch her breath. The rest of us proclaimed our agreements through grunts and raised hooves.
