Chapter 1: The hunter and the hunted
Author's Note
Hello everyone this is my first fanfic, and i would like a lot of constructive criticism. It is rated m for gore, language, and sexual innuendo and possible future sexual content. With that said, enjoy.
italics= thought
Chapter 1: The hunter and the hunted
Dawn, the sky filled with orange, red, and yellow hues; the quiet of the still morning is unbroken. No one is on the streets except for one. A pegasus stallion with a green coat and a blue mane, with a pair of saddlebags over his cutie mark, walking down the thoroughfare of the small plaza near one of the many markets of baltimare , looking over his shoulder, the stallion didn't know to look up, if he did he would have seen a strange stallion looking through the scope of an even stranger object. The sun reflecting off the chitin-like hole filled material that made up his forelegs and the barrel of the strange weapon made them both shine in the early morning light . The stallion lay on his stomach on a roof over looking the plaza, weapon on a stand and lined up with his target. His partial disguise's black mane and coat looked different from most; his coat had strange chitin-like properties but was flexible like standard fur. His mane had a gossamer like texture and his back had plates, under which, a pair of insectoid wings quivered with excitement. Laid down next to him were a set of saddle bags which had the other supplies he could possibly need; food bandages, ammo, water, a knife, and his two swords made of a beautiful black colored metal that seemed to suck in all the light as well as a custom case to carry his main weapon, a weapon capable of launching metal projectiles using an explosive powder. Skarrob breathed deeply to calm himself, he adjusted the placement of the weapon before looking through the scope again, he saw the stallion was turning off the main street.
"Where are you headed you bastard? Oh, what's this?" The half-changeling moved to a crouching position, before crawling to a wall, taking his strange weapon and placing it leaning against the wall; he grabbed his bag before rummaging inside until, he pulled out a cylindrical canister, sliding it onto the bottom of his weapon, he pushed a button on the side, and a cable shot out, the hook on the other end, grabbing the ledge at the top of the wall. From this new vantage point he could see that his target was meeting another stallion, this one a unicorn with a white coat and a brown mane in a side ally off the main street.
The green stallion looked over his shoulder again and almost spotted Skarrob. Ducking low quickly, skarrob exhaled a breath. shit, that was too damn close. Need to be more careful. the unicorn looked over the green pegasus, before asking a simple question.
"how are you feeling my friend?" The pegasus looked around one last time before he replied.
"oh, unfortunately, i am feeling a bit green." The unicorn looked around again before replying.
"yes, i heard there's a bug going around."
At that both stallions were engulfed with green flame. Skarrob, was thrilled.This is perfect, the infiltrator and the handler in the same place at the same time, time to kill two birds with one stone. Skarrob adjusted his weapon, lining up the barrel with the changelings.
"report infiltrator clearshell." The elder changeling stated.
"yes sir, i have information about the guard stations, apparently the same key is used for the locks on all stations, if one were to steal the main key, or even one of the copies..."
"we would have access, to all the guard stations in this whole city, we could lock all the guards in this city inside their own stations. Good work clear shell, i'm putting you up for a commendation, this is an incredible dis-." The stallion never got to finish his statement, as Skarrob pulled the trigger on his weapon, and the quiet morning was shattered as a loud bang erupted throughout the entire plaza, not a half second after pulling the trigger, the enchanted blasting powder inside the weapon launching a metal slug across the plaza causing both changeling's skulls to explode in a shower of brain matter, green blood, and skull fragments. Putting away his rifle before dropping quickly to the ground Skarrob rushed over to the infiltrator's corpse and started looking through his saddlebags, finding documents detailing an attack plan against this city, Skarrob memorized the documents as quickly as he could, until he was interrupted by a patrolling unicorn guard on the other side of the alley, the guard looked down the alley, saw the bodies of the changelings, and the still observing Skarrob. The guard sprung into action his horn lighting up with blue energy.
"Halt, in the name of the princesses of equestria!" Oh shit time to get outta here, operation GTFO initiated. After quickly stuffing the documents into his saddlebags, Skarrob took off running, he spread his back plates as a pair of pegasus guards arrived, his wings starting to buzz, lifting him off the ground and propelling him at a speed that would make most pegasus jealous, but it wasn't enough, the pegasus guards were slowly but surely catching up to him. Okay, time for plan B. Dropping into an alley, before quickly collapsing his rifle and stuffing it in his saddlebag. He erupted in black-purple fire and when they died down, a brown earth pony with blue eyes and a brown mane stood where the halfling was.
"Okay now to the train station to get the hell out of here. To the train station." Skarrob quickly but carefully made his way to the train station, boarded a random train, and sat down just in time for the train to leave just as the guard burst into the train station to lock it down. Setting his saddlebags on the seat next to him, Skarrob exhaled deeply and rubbed his head with a hoof, he then came to a sudden and important realization.
"where the actual hell am i going?"
Canterlot, the royal palace, throne room.
Princess Celestia of Equestria, sat on her throne, happy and content with the peace of the morning so far. She was about to call the kitchen servant to bring her some tea when a guard messenger burst into the throne room, surprising the alabaster alicorn. The guard dropped into a bow before speaking.
"Princess, i bring news from baltimare, the assassin has struck again." the princess frowned at this, as a head ache already started to form. She was going to need that tea more than ever. Collecting herself she addressed the messenger.
"rise and speak, who were the targets?" Celestia's voice was all business, not the calm gentle soothing voice the everyday pony attributed to her, but one filled with steel and determination. The messenger rose before pulling a file out of his saddlebag.
"Your Majesty, this file was made by the guard captain of baltimare and should answer any questions as it has all the info we have on the case. However one thing i can tell you for sure is that he boarded a train departing for a small town called ponyville." The guard stood at attention while the princess examined the file. Closing the file, Celestia dismissed the messenger. She turned to a guard, before addressing him.
"Major, go get Captain Shining Armor, tell him operation snare is officially active and that the target is headed for ponyville. I must go contact the elements of harmony." As the guard left with a bow, Celestia turned back to her throne and looked over the file again, before summoning a kitchen servant to bring her some tea. Always changelings, how does he find them and get to them before us, i wonder, could he be a rouge changeling, no, that's impossible, Chrysalis would never let that happen. I really hope the kitchen comes back with my tea soon, i'm going to need it.
The badlands: Changeling hive
"how the hell did this happen again, my brother is hunting my agents and none of you know where the hell he is?!!!" The assorted spies and handlers stayed silent and looked at their hooves, afraid of their Queen's rage. Queen Chrysalis inhaled deeply before speaking again.
" If this happens again, everyone in here will be lucky to be on a front-line suicide mission when we attack equestria. AM I CLEAR?!" the assorted changelings quickly replied with a chorus of 'yes, Your Majesty' before quickly scurrying off to try to find the rouge prince.
ponyville, Golden oaks library, second floor.
"twilight the Princess sent a letter for you." spike started down the stairs as twilight looked up from the book she was reading. Stretching, she stood up and trotted over before taking the letter from spike with her magic.
" Thanks Spike, i can always count on my number one assistant." Opening the letter, the lavender unicorn started to get more and more panicked as she read about the pony who was on his way to ponyville. She finished the letter just as a knock at her door made her jump. Opening the door revealed her friends accompanied by her older brother and a whole battalion of royal guard.
" Shining armor what's going on?" Twilight regarded her brother as her friends stood listening intently. All present were deeply interested. Shining armor took a deep breath, and adjusted his armor before replying.
" Twilight, have you heard of the rash of murders that have been going throughout all of equestria?" Twilight's face became a scene of confusion.
"Of course, who hasn't? It's been all over the news, someone, somehow, has been killing changelings before the guard can arrest them and the assassin leaves no trace of their presence. Some ponies are saying it's a rouge changeling, others say it's a black ops division of the guard and there are other rumors, what does that have to do with anything?"
" he's coming here."
