Shadowbolt Harmony Division

by Rainium

Rating: teen
Tags: Violence, Princess Celestia, Crossover, My Little Pony: The Movie, Lightning Dust, Gore, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, The Division, Alternate Universe, Princess Luna, Original Character, Shadowbolts, Science Fiction, Profanity, Adventure
Length: 65421

Manehattan has fallen victim to a mysterious illness, and the city has descended into riots and violence as the abandoned citizens try to survive. A highly trained operative tries to restore peace, but rioters aren't the only enemies out to stop her.

When Princess Celestia was imprisoned upon Nightmare Moon's return, Equestria was left leaderless and afraid in the dark, resulting in widespread panic and looting across the nation. Although Celestia was quickly able to restore peace after her return, the situation troubled her greatly. In order to prevent something like this from happening again, she signed Directive 51 into law, establishing the Shadowbolt Harmony Division, an elite group of soldiers that operate independently in the most hostile of circumstances in order to eliminate threats and maintain order.

Years later, a mysterious illness of unknown origin ravaged the city of Manehattan, and the EUP guard were unable to control the mass of rioters. The city fell into chaos, and when the Princesses arrived to restore order, they became infected themselves. The Division was activated in response, sending in agents to reinforce the EUP soldiers in retaking the fallen city.

Originally designated as a second-wave reinforcement, Agent Rainy arrives in Manehattan to find that the first wave has disappeared, with rioters roaming free in the streets. Alone and against the odds, she must find a way to retake the city and find a cure... but rioters aren't the only enemies out to stop her.

Published 2018-04-16 15:30:07 UTC
Last updated 2024-06-05 00:23:49 UTC

Chapter 1

Canterlot, 1000 ANM.

The return and defeat of Nightmare Moon had done little to dampen Equestria’s enthusiasm for parties.

Ponies had filled the streets of Canterlot with rambunctious celebration and joyous relief, ecstatic to see the sun once more after a long, chaotic night. The parties celebrating Nightmare Moon’s defeat and Luna’s return had continued all throughout the day, and they showed no signs of slowing down. The sun had just begun to dip below the horizon, bringing on a fully natural evening this time.

There was one pony who wasn’t participating in the celebrations, however. Princess Celestia sat in her royal quarters instead, reading over the reports coming in from the major cities around Equestria.

"...Vandalism in Appleloosa... Looting in Baltimare... Protests and riots in Manehattan?" Celestia mumbled to herself as flipped through the papers. "I was only gone for a few hours... How could things have gotten so out of hoof so quickly?"

"Ponies do strange things when they are scared, sister."

Celestia's ears perked up at the voice speaking from behind her, and she turned to see a dark blue filly standing in her doorway, her cerulean mane frizzled with bed mane. However, her eyes did not look tired, instead glowing with curiosity as she spoke. "We know that better than anypony."

Celestia smiled. "Ah, my dear sister. Was your room not comfortable enough for you?"

"No, it was fine... We just needed to take a walk to clear our mind," Luna shook her head, searching for words. "Everything is just so... different to us. It is hard for us to adjust."

"A lot has changed in a thousand years," Celestia frowned. So much time, wasted... "Why don't I take you on a tour of Canterlot tomorrow so I can show you around?"

Luna sighed, then nodded. "We... I... would enjoy that. It will be nice to see just how much has changed. To get acquainted with this new world."

"You'll need to get accustomed with your kingdom if you are to rule it, sister," Celestia replied, smiling softly.

"Ah, yes. The tedious nightly rule of the monarchy. I think that is the one thing I didn't miss," Luna giggled, giving a visible effort to stop using the Royal Canterlot voice, as her sister had requested. "But once I feel well enough to serve my constituents, I will."

"Of course. There is no need to rush you." When the elements freed her sister from her Nightmarish prison, she lost most of her power with it, reverting her back to this filly-like state. The crown-appointed mage had assured her there would be no long-term side effects from the change, that she would recover quickly, but Celestia did not want to take any chances. "Do you need me to walk you back to your room?"

"No, thank you. I plan to continue my walk for just a bit longer. Goodnight, Tia."

Celestia stood up anyway, but only to give her sister a warm hug. "Goodnight, Luna. I love you."

Luna's lip trembled slightly as she returned the hug, like she wanted to say something, but in the end, she just released her older sister and trotted off in silence. Celestia watched her leave for a few seconds, her own mind swirling with unsaid thoughts, before retreating back into her room.

Celestia loved her sister. She also loved her kingdom, and the little ponies that inhabited it. And all of those things had been at risk when Nightmare Moon had captured her. Luna had been under the control of a horrible monster, and her nation had succumbed to anarchy. What would happen if she wasn't able to lead once again? What would happen to her dear sister, to the nation that she loved?

She couldn't let that happen again.

Celestia sat back down at her desk, pushing the status reports aside. Instead, she pulled out a blank piece of parchment and a quill, beginning to write.

"As the Ruler of Equestria, I hereby draft Directive 51 into law..."

Manehattan, 1008 ANM.

The streets of Hooflyn were empty, devoid of life. Abandoned carriages clogged the intersections, suitcases full of clothes spilled out over the sidewalks. A light dusting of snow covered everything, causing the borough to appear like it had been frozen in time, undisturbed by ponies. With nopony to move them, the clouds above the city remain in the same position as they were when the chaos started; overcast, gray, empty of their snow.

A lone pony sat on the bank of the East River, looking out over the water at the towering skyscrapers of Manehattan on the other side. A light breeze billowing across the surface of the water ruffled through her black mane, her orange bangs hanging down and partially obscuring the view through her goggles. The watch around her hoof pinged softly, glowing orange as her SPARC connected to an incoming call and piped it into her earpiece.

There was a brief second of silence before a mare’s voice filled the COMM. "Agent Rainy, are you in position?"

"Yes, command,” the white pegasus responded. “I’m at the river. Awaiting further instruction."

"Roger that. You are cleared to begin the next phase as soon as you're ready. We'll have new orders for you once you make it across. We'll continue radio silence until you call us confirming you're on the other side, we don't want the signal giving you away to that spellcaster."

"Understood. I’ll move out shortly."

As she ended the call, Rainy's eyes sought out the surface-to-air spellcaster, perched atop one of the skyscrapers and looming over the city ominously. Command had no idea where it came from or who controlled it, but the damn thing had shot down several resupply drops and reinforcement deliveries. That's why command had sent her and only her; as one of the few pegasus Division agents, she had the ability to bypass the sealed-off entryways by flying across the river, and a single pony was much harder to track than a squad.

Rainy rose to her hooves and flared out her wings. After checking once again to see if all her gear was secured, she pumped hard once with her feathery appendages, lifting her up into the air. She swooped low over the water, the tips of her forehooves brushing across the mirror-like surface. She carefully swooped around the floating chunks of ice, hoping they were throwing off the spellcaster's trackers.

After a few minutes of tense flying, Rainy finally landed on the other side of the river, quickly unholstering her rifle as she scanned the area. All clear. Her SPARC remained quiet, meaning that the spellcaster hadn't noticed her or locked on. Perfect.

"Command, this is Agent Rainy. I've landed in Manehattan, awaiting further orders."

"Acknowledged, hold on... make sure the area is secure and look for any signs of life while I get your next instructions."

Rainy silently acknowledged the order, switching off her mic and lowering her rifle as she looked around. Tall skyscrapers towered around her, dark silhouettes against the night sky. It was all eerily quiet... there weren't even pigeons chirping, or dogs barking. It really was like time had stopped, trapping the city in a permanent state of purgatory.

As she scanned the area, a billboard near the riverfront caught her eye. It looked like a typical ad board, with a government issued message on a white banner covering the original advertisement. In bold blue letters read the phrase Save your magic. Save lives. Fighting the virus requires all of our cooperation. Hoofwritten underneath in black spray paint, most likely graffiti, was "MAGIC KILLS". Magic kills? What did that mean? The plague was what was killing ponies, why was the crown warning against using magic?...

The chime of her SPARC interrupted her thoughts as Command reconnected. "...Agent, you still there?"

"Yeah, I'm here."

"Good. I've got your next assignment here when you're ready to receive it."

"I'm ready, patch it through."

After a brief moment, text began to scroll across her HUD, projected onto her goggles.

[1. RESTORE BASE OF OPERATIONS TO FUNCTIONAL CONDITION.]

[2. RECOVER TOP VIROLOGIST AGRIPPA GLIMMERSHINE. LOCATION: UNKNOWN.]

[3. DISABLE SURFACE-TO-AIR SPELLCASTER TO ALLOW FOR DELIVERY OF REINFORCEMENTS AND SUPPLIES.]

[4. ASSIST CIVILIANS AND EUP PERSONNEL AS ESSENTIAL, BUT DO NOT COMPROMISE MAIN OBJECTIVES.]

One of the orders in particular caught her eye. "...Command, what's the status of Dr. Glimmershine? You're not giving me much to work with."

"Her last known location was at the Base of Operations before everything went to hell. The Intelligence Spooks are working on her current location, we'll inform you when we learn anything new. Just continue with your other objectives for now."

"Roger that. Rainy out."

Rainy ended the call and raised her rifle, slowly making her way down the road in front of her.

Agrippa Glimmershine. Now that's a name she hadn't heard in a long, long time.

Chapter 2

As Rainy stalked down the wide city streets, she was struck by how empty the city was. Hooflyn was practically deserted, but that was because everyone smart had evacuated to get away from the sickness. Manehattan was under quarantine, so there should be at least some survivors, but there weren't even dead bodies. It was like the entire population had just disappeared. Where were the EUP guards that were supposed to be keeping order? Where were the rioters causing the unrest? Where were the Shadowbolts she was supposed to replace?

She shook her head. She had to focus on the task at hoof, worrying about questions she couldn't answer at the moment would only hinder her progress in finding the truth. Rainy continued on, following the directions to the Base of Operations given to her in her HUD. She was only a couple blocks out now.

Rainy flicked on her mic, her SPARC automatically connecting to command. "Command, I'm approaching the Maneway Station. Motion trackers have been quiet the entire walk here."

"Roger that. EUP pulled out of this area days ago, so not many ponies decided to stick around. Smart choice."

"Acknowledged. What made them fall back?"

"The EUP barely have enough ponies to secure a block, much less a neighborhood. Command recalled all their perimeter forces to better secure the Base of Operations."

"Looks like that didn't turn out too well..."

"It still took a spellcaster and a freak accident to take them down, Agent. We had a good hoofhold on this city, and we can still regain it... we just need hope again."

"I wouldn't call holding a single block in an entire city a hoofhold, command."

"It was better than nothing, Rainy... You should be coming up on it now."

Rainy looked up to see the Maneway Station in front of her, on the left side of the street. It was still an impressive sight, despite all the damage that had been done to it. The charred, twisted remains of a supply helicopter were still visible in the crumbled remains of the front right-side wall. Part of the main entrance had collapsed along with it, but there was still enough room for a pony to enter through.

"...Yeah, I see it."

"Acknowledged. Secure the site, we'll contact you again if we learn anything new."

"Roger that. Rainy out."

Rainy quickly took the front steps to the main entryway, stepping past the crumbling granite and twisted steel of the wreckage to make it inside the terminal. Inside, a once orderly living space was reduced to chaos. Cots and gurneys were knocked over, papers scattered across the floor. A circular information booth, which appeared to have been turned into a ration distribution area, sat in the middle of the concourse, the four-faced clock on the top cracked and unmoving.

The shops and ticket purchase booths along the outside had been repurposed as a quarantine area for the sick, with the anti-theft shutters pulled down in an attempt to lock the patients in. However, the entire station was empty. The vast domed roof was unharmed by the helicopter crash, most of the damage involving the front right corner. A limp. bloody hoof poked out of the rubble, causing Rainy to grimace and look away.

The lights were off, and the hum of the main generator was absent, meaning the place was without electricity. Enough light streamed through the stained-glass windows to provide adequate lighting, but this place would be pitch black once night fell. She needed to either fix the main generator or find the backup ones to make this place operational again. The utility rooms were usually held down below, by the train tracks.

Rainy headed that way, carefully stepping past abandoned desks and chairs, pinboards covered with maps and markings, and empty wheelchairs and spilled rations. She eventually made it to the steps which marked the descent down to the maneway tracks. The darkness below intimidated her slightly, so she pulled out her rifle as she hopped over the turnstiles and made her way down.

She could hear the squeaks and skittering of rats as she arrived at the first train platform, the only light being provided from the windows upstairs. This limited her visibility to just a few meters ahead, so she took in as much of the scene as she could. Through the darkness, she was able to make out a door in the wall between the two sets of tracks, a sign reading Maintenance next to it.

"Perfect."

Rainy slowly turned the doorknob and pushed open the door, poking her rifle through the opening as the inside was revealed to her. A single large generator sat in the middle of the small room, with a workbench against the wall and various other janitorial tools scattered around. The generator itself looked like it had been there for decades; it was a wonder that the bulky old thing had taken this long to malfunction. Near the base of the generator was a maintenance panel; three of the screws holding it in place were missing, and the one left was barely screwed in.

"Let's see here..." Rainy mumbled to herself as she crouched down, removing the panel from the generator with careful hooves. A mess of tangled, overheated parts greeted her. The old beast had been worked so heavily, it probably collapsed the second something went wrong; in their case, a giant helicopter caving in the roof. It would take someone beyond her expertise to return it to working order. There weren't any backup generators in this room either, they must be located in a different area.

She sighed and carefully replaced the panel, before a noise from behind her made her jolt up, spinning around and raising her rifle.

"Who's there?" Rainy called out.

Her motion tracker showed nothing, and the space in front of her was too dark to see more than a few meters in front of her. She remained wary, switching off the safety of her rifle as she stepped forward out of the maintenance room.

"I am a Shadowbolt Division Agent authorized by the Crown to use lethal force. Show yourself immediately."

Something clinked against her hoof, and she looked down to see a unicorn's horn, apparently severed from the owner, lying in a small pool of blood. She stared at it in confusion for a split second, and that's all it took for her guard to drop.

A blur of movement in the corner of her eye caused her to look back up, but it was too late. A flying silhouette zoomed into her field of view, smashing into her and knocking her onto the platform. Rainy cried out as she was hit before her air was knocked out of her, turning the cry into a gasp for air. Her gun was knocked out of her hooves and skidded away across the ground, just out of reach. Rainy squirmed, trying to scoot within reach of her rifle, before hooves planted themselves onto her chest, pinning her down.

A unicorn mare with a severed horn loomed over her, blood dripping from the nub in the center of her forehead onto Rainy. Her mane was matted and clumped with blood; its former color was barely recognizable. The unicorn panted as she stared down at Rainy, its mouth moving but no words coming out.

"Get off me!" Rainy grunted, pushing up at the pony with her forehooves.

The unicorn squealed as the force from the hard shove launched it off her, landing with a thud onto the platform next to her. The unicorn quickly rolled to its hooves, looking at Rainy with scared, crazed eyes as the pegasus scrambled to grab her gun. The pony glanced around before jumping down onto the train tracks, galloping towards the tunnel leading deep into the maneway system.

"Wait! Stop!" Rainy quickly jumped to her hooves and leveled her rifle, letting out a flurry of shots that whizzed past the disappearing tail of the unicorn, striking the side of the tunnel.

"Dammit!" Rainy jumped down onto the tracks as well and galloped to the beginning of the tunnel. A vast expanse of darkness greeted her, the tracks underneath her hooves continuing off into nothingness. There was no way she was gonna find the unicorn in there.

Rainy mumbled curses under her breath as her wings lifted her back onto the platform, stalking back over to the maintenance room. Her motion trackers still showed nothing, and she tapped her goggles with a hoof to try to get it working, but to no avail. Dammit. That little malfunction could have killed her. She lifted her hoof to order her SPARC to run diagnostics... but something on the ground caught her eye. It was the broken horn; the one that had distracted her long enough for the pony to ambush her. It was the same color as the fur of her hornless attacker, and it glistened with the same fresh blood. The horn hadn't been broken off; it had been removed with a clean cut, probably sawed off. Self-inflicted? Most likely.

Why would someone cut off their own horn?

Her mind flashed back to the billboard on the riverside. "Magic kills". Something was going on here, but she couldn't piece it together. She didn't have enough of the pieces.

But once again, her thoughts are interrupted by a voice, this time from behind her. "...A-Are they gone?"

Rainy spun around, her rifle aiming at a cowering stallion, hidden in the ticket booth. He cried out in panic and threw his bloody hooves up in the air. "Don't shoot! We're EUP!"

Rainy raised an eyebrow. "...We?"

He nodded, and three other ponies poked their heads out from behind the counter. "Are they gone?" he tried again. "The rioters?"

Rainy sighed and lowered her gun slightly, looking the four guards over. "Yes, there's no one left here now. At least, no one left upstairs."

The three new ponies sighed in relief, but the lead stallion looked up at her with curiosity. "Y-You're with the Division, right? Are you here to help us?"

"Yes. Where did everyone go? Why are you still here?"

"W-We were wounded in the helicopter crash. We weren't able to evacuate with the others when the rioters attacked..." The guard winced, rubbing at his bandaged hind leg.

"Where did they go?"

"To the Garden... down the street..."

Madisoat Mare Garden. Wrestling stadium, hoofball court, concert hall, the most famous venue in all of Equestria. The last thing she heard was that it was converted into a field hospital, using all that open space to stuff all the infected into and hope for the best.

Before she could respond to the guard, her SPARC chimed into her ear with a message from command. "Agent, drop what you're doing right now and get topside. Immediately."

"Yes ma'am." Rainy responded, clicking off her mic momentarily, directing her attention to the EUP guards. "Stay here. Don't move, don't draw attention to yourself. I'll be right back."

The lead stallion gave her a nervous nod, and she turned and galloped back to the entrance, turning her mic back on. "What's the situation?"

"We've located Dr. Glimmershine, she’s at the Madisoat Mare Garden.”

“Yeah, I’m slightly ahead of you there,” Rainy replied, slipping back through the ruined station entrance and back onto the street. “Some EUP survivors tell me that’s where everyone else retreated to.”

“Yep. And our target mare went with them, trying to treat the wounded they managed to take with them. But the rioters attacked there as well, reinforced with the weapons they took from the base. Drove the remaining EUP forces out, took the ones who couldn't escape hostage. She's inside being held prisoner, and we need you to get to her before those assholes decide to kill her. We need her alive, she's our best hope for beating this thing."

"Copy that. What are the rules of engagement?"

"You're a Shadowbolt, Agent Rainy. You have no rules."

"...Oh Goddesses... I don't want to die..."

"You're not gonna die," Agrippa replied reassuringly, carefully wrapping the EUP guard's head in gauze. Blood poured from a gouge where the guard’s right eye used to be; it stained her blue hooves as she worked, turning the fur into a matted purple. "At least, not from your wounds. I made sure of that."

"...It hurts so bad..."

"I bet it does, but those bastards took the rest of my morphine. Probably shooting it up now as we speak. But you know what they say: if it hurts–" Agrippa smiled and patted her on the shoulder. "–it means you're not dead."

The guard just whimpered, her good eye glistening with tears.

"Tough crowd," Agrippa sighed and tied off the dressing as she looked around.

She was locked into a small hoofball locker room by the rioters that stormed the place, with four other guards keeping her company. Each of them was dying of injuries that stopped them from escaping with the rest of the EUP when they had the chance; Agrippa had done her best to patch them up, but she was low on supplies and time. Not many ponies could work under these conditions, but she made do.

Agrippa leaned back to look over her work carefully before nodding in satisfaction. "Alright, I'm done. Just scoot over there with the others, okay?"

The EUP guard nodded and sniffled slightly as she stumbled over to her squad mates, thankfully remaining quiet. Agrippa sighed before leaning back, laying down on the floor. She had been working nonstop in the hours that she had been held here, either patching up the prisoners she was being held with, or the wounded rioters from the attack that she was forced to heal at gunpoint. And that didn't include the countless hours she stayed awake at the Maneway Station and here, working to heal the sick before the rioters attacked. Her vision had begun to blur slightly, and she closed her eyes, hoping for a few minutes of silence.

However, her respite was short lived, as the door swung open to reveal two rioters, both armed with swords.

"Doc, we need you to come with us."

Agrippa groaned, her eyes popping back open to look up at the two. "Look, I'm not on call right now. Can you come back later?"

The rioter snorted and stepped forward. "We're not askin'."

Agrippa yelped slightly as he grabbed her by her gold mane, pulling her up to her hooves. "Okay, okay! Gosh, I hope I'm getting paid overtime for this..."

"You get to stay alive, does that count?" the stallion retorted, shoving her forward out of the room, locking the door behind them. The other rioter, a mare, escorted her towards the main hospital area, located on the hoofball court.

"Usually, staying alive is not a reward, it's a given..."

"Well, we thought 'not being locked in a city and being left for dead by our government' was a given too, but that's apparently not the case," the rioter mare replied, poking her with the flat of her sword to keep Agrippa moving. "Times have changed."

Agrippa rolled her eyes, but otherwise remained quiet as the two exited the dressing room area onto the court, the grandstands towering up all around them. The main floor was covered in gurneys and stretchers, most of them covered in bloody covers and used morphine needles. Only one of them was still occupied; a young rioter stallion screamed in agony as his friend dropped him onto the stretcher. "Where's that goddamn doctor?"

"Right here!" the mare next to Agrippa called out, leading the doctor to the group of rioters gathered around the gurney.

"Out of the way, out of the way, let me see..." Agrippa called out, shooing the rioters away so she could get a look at her new patient. The stallion was cradling his stomach with blood-soaked hooves, letting out cries of pain as blood continued to drip down his belly and stain the gurney beneath him. "What happened to him?"

"One of the prisoners acted up," a rioter replied, "stole his weapon and shot him with it before I could stop him."

Huh. Good to see there was still some fight left in the troops. Not all hope was lost after all. Agrippa nodded silently at the pony who spoke up before turning her attention back to the injured stallion. He was indeed cradling a bullet wound in the stomach, and from a high caliber round too. Probably shredded his internal organs, causing internal bleeding along with the blood pouring out of his chest. He would be dead in a couple of hours, and there was nothing she could do about it, not with the lack of tools she had available. But she couldn't exactly tell the rioters that, or they'd just kill her on the spot for being useless to them. Instead, she got to work, feigning confidence as she worked to stop the bleeding by applying pressure to his abdomen.

While she worked, one of the observers turned to the pony who had spoken up. "What'd you do with the prisoner?"

"Don't worry, he won't be causing any more trouble," the stallion replied, letting out a soft chuckle that made Agrippa's hackles raise.

Oh Goddesses. These ponies were monsters... She hated wasting what precious few medical supplies she had left on a mortally wounded piece of shit, but she didn't have much of a choice.

Suddenly, a large blast rocked through the building, causing the wheeled gurney to roll away from her. Agrippa yelped as her patient slid away from her hooves, and she grabbed the stretcher to stop it from moving any further, causing his bleeding to resume again. Cursing, she worked to apply pressure once more as the rioters looked around in confusion.

"Shit! Someone blew down the barricade! The main doors are open!"

"Dammit! Come on, guys. Let's go see what idiot is trying to break in now."

There was a murmur of approval as the group readied their weapons.

"Steel! You stay with the Doc, make sure she doesn't do anything stupid."

A gray stallion next to Agrippa nodded, standing over her as the rest of the rioters galloped off to the main entrance. A few awkward seconds of silence followed, interrupted only by the low moans of the injured rioter. Agrippa spared a moment to glance around, her eye catching the stash of stolen morphine stored on an abandoned gurney. If she couldn't save this stallion, she could at least dull his pain.

Agrippa glanced over at her guard. "Can I have some morphine? Please?"

He blinked at her, almost dumbfounded as to why she would ask that question. "...Why?"

Agrippa sighed, struggling to keep her patience. "Y'know, to help dull your friend's pain? Use it the way it's intended?"

The stallion thought about it for a second. "...Nah. I'm saving my share for myself, and I'm sure the others won't let you use theirs either."

"But if he doesn't get some, he'll go into shock and die."

"Well, you'd better hope he doesn't, or we will get pretty angry..." He cocked the slide on his pistol for emphasis.

Agrippa took the hint and shut up, returning to 'healing' the stallion bleeding out in front of her.

She just hoped that explosion meant help. Competent help, preferably, but she'd take anything at this point. If not, she was dead.

She sighed. Still less stressful than medical school...

Chapter 3

Rainy was inside the building before the smoke had cleared, quickly stepping past what remained of the crude barricade the rioters had put up. That explosion likely alerted every pony in this building; she had to hurry to prepare a good defensive position before they arrived.

"SPARC, activate battle mode."

Her watch blinked, and her HUD was swept with changes. Health and ammo readouts appeared into the easily accessed parts of her vision, moving out to the side to open up her field of view without obstructing it. The weapon crosshair blinked to life on her HUD as well, following wherever she pointed her gun. Her motion tracker still showed nothing. Curious. If there were any ponies galloping to investigate the explosion, it would have detected them by now.

Rainy blinked at the comm icon on her goggles, opening up a secure channel with command. "Command, I'm inside the field hospital. Sensors are quiet."

"Copy that..." the voice on the other side replied. "Move in and search the area. I'll be trying to gain access into the security camera feed, hopefully I’ll be able to get you a fix on Dr. Glimmershine's location.”

"Roger that, Rainy out."

She ended the call and raised her rifle, moving into the stadium. Rainy stepped past the metal detectors and ticket booths, arriving in the main lobby. The area, once decorated with promotional material for the various sporting and entertainment events held here, was now covered in various government messages and warnings. Posters advertising the Garden as a Field Hospital covered hoofball advertisements and horse hockey scoreboards. Trash and soiled bandages covered the floor, along with spent shell casings and empty rifle magazines. The left side of the concourse was filled with abandoned shops and restaurants; to her right was the escalator leading up to court level. The left side was blocked off by virus scanning equipment and riot barricades, so she moved to the right.

After she had made it halfway to the escalator from the entrance, the faint sound of galloping hooves caused her ears to perk up.

"Spread out! Whoever's here, they've gotta be close."

She quickly ducked behind one of the crowd-control barriers as a group of rioters came into view on the second floor. They looked a rough bunch, most of them wearing ragged, blood-stained cold-weather gear. They smelled like they hadn't showered in weeks; Rainy crinkled her muzzle in disgust.

A few of them sported rifles and handguns, most likely looted from higher ranked EUP officers, but most of the rioters only held swords and knives, more easily obtained weapons. She hoped they didn't know how to use them...

The group slowly made their way down the broken escalator, casually talking among themselves. Rainy waited until they had reached the ground floor with her before rising up from behind her cover, raising her rifle.

"Halt!"

The group stopped as one, staring, surprised, at the pristine white mare in front of them. Rainy continued to speak while they remained silent, shifting her rifle's focus from pony to pony after a few seconds.

"I am a Shadowbolt Division Agent sent by Princess Celestia herself. Stand down now, or I will use lethal force."

A few tense seconds of silence followed, as the rioters contemplated the situation in front of them.

"...It's only one mare! We can take 'er!"

"Light 'er up!"

The stallions with rifles raised them to aim at Rainy as she let out a sigh.

"...Well, it was worth a try."

As the bullets began to fly, Rainy dove to the ground, sliding behind the barrier she had been hiding behind before. She poked her rifle around the edge of her cover, blindly firing, causing the rioters to scramble for cover as well, but the suppressive fire resumed after a few seconds.

Well, this should be easy... Rainy thought. Just wait for them to run out of bullets.

However, the sound of hoofsteps approaching her position put a hold to those thoughts. She had forgotten about the rioters with melee weapons.

She managed to straighten up and scoot back as a looter rounded the corner, swinging a knife at where she had been just moments before. Being careful not to expose any part of her body above her cover, she scooted back as he attacked again, blocking his second swipe with the stock of her rifle. She then jabbed the butt of her gun into his muzzle, causing him to stumble back, before sweeping the stallion's legs out from underneath him in one slick move.

Before she could finish him off, another pony grabbed her from behind. The shaft of his police baton pressed against her neck, pulling her to her hind hooves and out of cover. Rainy grunted as her windpipe was restricted, stumbling backward slightly as the stallion pulled her, wincing as bullets whizzed past the two of them.

"Hold your fire, dammit! You'll hit him too!"

As the shooting halted, Rainy jabbed a hoof into her attacker's ribs, driving the air out of his lungs and causing him to lose his grip on her. She used the opportunity to wriggle free and followed it up with a hind-leg-buck to the chin, sending him sprawling.

The first pony, now recovered, stumbled up to take a swing at her, which she slipped with ease before sending a counter jab into his side, causing him to wince and recoil slightly. However, as he stumbled away, a firing lane opened up once more, and ducked as more rounds flew overhead.

By this time, a third rioter had reached her position, vaulting over the barricade to whack at her with a fire ax in his mouth. Rainy rolled away from the blow and sprang back up to her hooves before backing away slowly, keeping the two stallions in front of her. The one with the knife moved in and jabbed at her throat; Rainy grabbed his hoof, holding the knife in place. The rioter with the fire ax swung at her head from the side, and she ducked, causing him to sink the blade into the other stallion's throat. Rainy then twisted the hoof with the knife to point at the ax pony's chest and jabbed it upwards, burying it hilt-deep inside him. Blood splattered over her as she stepped back, watching as the two looters collapsed, each still holding onto the murder weapon of the other.

"Oh goddesses, she killed them!"

"You're gonna pay for that, bitch!"

As the rioters raised their rifles once more, Rainy realized that she had moved too far away from cover during the hoof fight and was now completely exposed. Thinking quickly, she flared her wings and shot straight up as gunfire erupted below her.

She leveled out and quickly turned to zoom towards the rifle-wielding stallions, closing down the distance in seconds before they could shift their aim. Rainy plowed into one of them at full speed, knocking him down and causing him to slide back several meters. The pony next to her quickly shifted his aim to her, but before he could pull the trigger, Rainy pumped her wings once more, this time propelling her to the side and sliding her across the floor, sweeping the legs out from underneath him. She continued to slide to the other side of the stallion as he collapsed, where she quickly regained her footing and raised her rifle, firing off a three round burst that caught a shotgun-wielding rioter in the shoulder. Then, as the stallion at her hooves tried to recover, she unloaded a burst into him as well.

That left two more looters, both melee wielding stallions who hadn't moved up in the initial charge. With all their fire support now dead or incapacitated, the two tried to make a dash up the escalator, but Rainy calmly dropped them with a few well-placed bursts.

"Is that all of them?..." she wondered aloud as she glanced around the lobby. None of the downed rioters stirred. "...Perfect."

Rainy reloaded her rifle as she trotted up the stairs, heading deeper into the stadium.

She activated her comms through her goggles as she walked, scanning the abandoned food booths for any hiding enemies. "Hey, command, do you have a fix on Agrippa's location yet?"

"One second..." the voice replied, "...There. I'm in. Scanning security feed now... I have a probable match on Dr. Glimmershine. She's on the court, looks like at least one rioter is with her."

"Copy that," Rainy answered, then frowned slightly. "Only nine rioters total? Seems really short staffed."

"It's possible there could be more of them deeper into the stadium. I would proceed with caution. I'm getting no signal from the locker room cameras."

"Understood. I'll keep my eyes open," Rainy said, clicking off the comm feed before following the graffiti-covered signs to the bleachers.

As she approached the entrance to the court level, voices drifting through the doors caused her ears to perk up.

"What the hell are you doing? You're hurting him!" a stallion cried out.

"Listen up," a mare responded sternly, "I spent six years in medical school training for a situation like this. I don't give a shit what you saw on TV while you were watching soap operas in your mother's basement, but fixing a bullet wound in the gut isn't pretty. You want your buddy fixed? You stay out of my way."

"...Is that a threat?"

"I'm just telling you the truth."

Yep. That was definitely her. Rainy gently pressed a hoof against the door, swinging it open slowly, peeking through the widening slit. The grandstands towered up on either side of her, the usually packed bleachers eerily void of all signs of life. Gurneys, medical crates, and lights covered the court, the hardwood stained with blood. The huge multi-screen scoreboard that hung over the center of the court flickered with service announcements from the crown, instructing patients to wait in line for a doctor to treat them. At the free throw line of the basket nearest to Rainy, two ponies surrounded a gurney. One was a blue pegasus mare, who seemed to be treating an injured pony on the cot; the other was a gray unicorn stallion, who was watching the procedure over her shoulder. This had to be them.

Rainy carefully pushed the door open until she could slip through, quietly slinking up behind the two. Once she was close enough, Rainy raised her rifle and drove it into the back of the stallion’s head. The force of the blow knocked the rioter forward against the gurney before he fell to the floor, knocked out cold. Agrippa let out a squeak of surprise as the body scooted away from her hooves as the gurney moved from the impact, before looking over her shoulder to see Rainy standing over his limp body.

"...Oh..." Agrippa managed to get out as she saw the identity of her rescuer.

Rainy swallowed as she tried her best to remain professional, looking down at a pony she hadn't seen in years. "Doctor Glimmershine?"

Years of hurt flashed across Agrippa's eyes as she returned the stare. "...Rainy."

Rainy nodded, looking her over. "I'm here to rescue you."

"Fantastic."

The two mares stood in awkward silence, each refusing to break.

After a few more seconds, Rainy cracked first, "...Were you actually healing him?"

"...Oh, hell no, he was actually right. There's no way I'm healing this guy, I don't have the tools or the time. He went into hypovolemic shock a few minutes ago." Agrippa quickly grabbed a syringe of morphine from the now unowned stash and injected it into the injured pony. "There. Now at least his last moments will be less painful."

Rainy nodded, re-equipping her rifle and stepping towards the exit. "Alright. Just grab whatever you need and let's get out of here. Who knows how many more rioters will be on their way-"

"No."

Rainy paused, one hoof raised in the air as she looked back at Agrippa. "Excuse me?"

"There are EUP guards still alive here. I'm not leaving without them," Agrippa replied defiantly, standing firm.

Rainy blinked, taken aback. "...No. I can't risk losing you, you're too important."

"Well, then you better do a good job protecting me, huh?"

Rainy sighed, rubbing her forehead briefly. She didn't have time for this! "Look, I can drop you off at the base and come back for these ponies later, if you really think they're that important."

"To be quite honest, I can't trust you to keep your word on that," Agrippa retorted, the feelings of loss glinting in her pupils once more. "We're doing this now, Rainy."

Rainy opened her mouth to offer another compromise, but before she could, she caught a glimpse of silhouettes galloping onto the far side of the court. The whinnies of surprise, the metallic glint of raised rifles...

"Get down!" Rainy cried.

Her wings propelled her forward to tackle Agrippa, knocking them both to the ground behind the gurney as gunfire ripped through the air above them. The two collapsed with a thud, the stretcher briefly shielding them from the bullets. Rainy draped herself on top of the doctor to shield her in case any rounds pierced through their weak cover, before letting out a sigh of relief as the gunfire paused.

"...What the hell are you doing?!" Agrippa sputtered as Rainy remained on top of her, trying to push her off with her hooves.

"Trying to keep you alive, doctor," Rainy replied. "Keep your head down or lose it."

Her motion tracker still showed nothing. Damn thing was probably broken somehow. She minimized it to free a bit of her field of vision. Rainy rolled off of Agrippa and scooted to the end of the gurney to peek around the side. At least nine rioters, all armed with firearms. One of them sported a markspony rifle. That thing could pick her off in one shot if she wasn't careful. Quick cover-to-cover movement would be key.

Rainy grabbed her pistol out of the holster strapped on her hind leg and slid it across the floor to Agrippa. "Take this and stay down."

"You don't have to tell me twice," Agrippa replied, grabbing the gun and flicking off the safety.

Rainy nodded and peeked around the corner. "Alright, I'm gonna try to make it to that crate over there, draw the fire away from you. Once I'm there, I can try to pick them off, maybe take to the air to bombard them from above. Whatever happens, stay hidden, don't draw attention to yourself."

Her wings flared out as she prepared herself.

Agrippa blinked, "What? No! You can't!"

Rainy paused, looking back at her. "...Why not?"

"Didn't they tell you? The magic here kills!"

As Agrippa spoke those words, Rainy's mind began racing. Her mind flashed back to the sign on the riverside. Save your magic. Save lives. The magic kills. The unicorn with no horn, who cut it off herself. The magic here kills. Everything suddenly clicked for her, causing her already white face to go pale.

She had flown into Manehattan. She had flown in a contaminated quarantine area. She was infected.

Agrippa noticed the look on Rainy's face and sighed. "...You've already used your wings, haven't you?"

Rainy blinked, then shook her head. "That's not important. Let's focus on getting you the hell out of here."

Agrippa just shook her head.

Rainy folded her wings against her sides as she prepared to sprint once more. After a pause in the suppressive fire as the rioters reloaded, Rainy burst from her hiding spot, galloping to her next form of cover before sliding behind it as a sniper bullet flew over her head. She let out a sigh of relief as she caught her breath and readied her rifle.

"Move up! I'll keep her suppressed!" the markspony yelled out, causing Rainy's ears to perk up. Perfect. Let them come to her.

As rifle fire zipped above the crate and the hoofsteps of rioters approached her position, Rainy grabbed a flashbang out of her bag and activated it, tossing it over the top of her cover once they got close.

"...Grenade! Get down!" one of them managed to cry out before a blinding and deafening flash erupted, causing several of the looters to stumble back.

Rainy jumped up and raised her rifle, several bursts of automatic fire dispatching most of the group before they had a chance to recover. As the markspony shifted his aim, Rainy shifted her aim over to him as well, letting out a flurry of lead that zoomed over his head, forcing him to duck down. She took the opportunity to slip out of cover, galloping into the midst of the recovering rioter group, the mass of stumbling bodies giving her cover from the sniper.

One of the stallions to recover first took a bleary, weak swing at her; she quickly dropped and slid on her back underneath the blow, coming to a stop underneath him. Rainy pressed her gun against his stomach and pulled the trigger, the recoil pulling the rifle upwards as the bullets ripped through him, filling him with bullets from stomach to throat. She rolled out from underneath him as he collapsed, recovering to a crouch to unload a burst into another rioter as he tried to track her.

By this time, the markspony had recovered, bracing the sniper rifle against the top of a gurney as he aimed down the sights. Rainy quickly moved once more while several high-caliber rounds whizzed past her, one accidentally striking a rioter as she slipped behind him. She caught his body as he collapsed, using him as a body shield, aiming around him and shooting at the markspony. She didn’t stop until a round caught him in the shoulder, a spray of red signifying his demise.

Rainy tossed the limp body aside, looking around for her next target. Her eyes focused on a rioter as he grabbed his downed friend's rifle, fumbling with it slightly as he pointed it at her. She raised her own rifle... CLICK. Her magazine was empty with no time to reload. Thinking fast, Rainy ejected the magazine and hurled it at the stallion, causing him to flinch and throw off his aim slightly, and the bullets buzzed past her head. She closed the distance before he recovered and tackled him onto the ground. She pulled her combat knife out of its sheath and plunged it into his throat as he squirmed underneath her, causing him to go limp.

That left one more. Rainy rolled off the body and scanned the area, looking for any sign of the last rioter, but seeing nothing. Did he run away? Did he go after Agrippa?

However, the sound of movement behind her interrupted her thoughts, and she spun around to see a large stallion looming over her, his rifle stock pointed at her face as he thrust it forward. Her wings flared instinctively to try to fly away from the blow, but she forced herself to not use them, instead taking the rifle butt to the muzzle. The force of the hit caused her to stumble back, her vision filling with stars. With some separation between the two, the stallion pointed his rifle at Rainy, but she was able to recover and stumble forward, grabbing the barrel and pushing it away from her as it fired. The two fought over control of the weapon, the rioter's strength forcing Rainy back as she wobbled slightly on her hind legs. His muzzle was only a few centimeters from her own, a vicious grin on his face as the barrel slowly moved to point at her.

He snarled. "You're dead, bitch."

Then, all of the sudden, the rioter's head exploded. Rainy flinched as blood and gray matter sprayed over her face, the body going limp in her hooves. She dropped the corpse and stumbled back, wiping at the blood in her eyes.

"W-What the..."

She glanced over to see Agrippa peeking out over the gurney, smoking pistol in her hooves.

"You okay?" Agrippa asked as she lowered the gun.

"Yeah..." Rainy replied, wiping the blood off her face. "...Thanks."

"Yeah, whatever," Agrippa shrugged and slipped the pistol into her coat pocket. "Let's free those guards and get out of here."

Chapter 4

Canterlot, 1005 ANM.

"She's ready for you, your Majesty."

Celestia looked up from her paperwork to thank the pony who notified her before standing up and stretching her white pinions. She was in the middle of the preliminary interviews for the first wave of Division candidates. Several ponies had come through, all of them mostly qualified for the position... but Celestia was looking for the best. The fate of her nation may depend on these soldiers, and she was determined to find the greatest she could.

She set her quill on her desk before making her way out of her office, walking down the hall towards the interview offices. Sunlight streamed through the stained-glass windows as pegasus ponies fluttered away on the other side, enjoying the early afternoon sunshine. Ponies of all kinds were out in the streets of Canterlot, making good use of their weekend off. However, the Crown never stopped working.

It had taken five long years filled with setbacks and obstructions, but her idea conceived at the Summer Sun Celebration was finally coming to fruition. The various obstacles, along with the several attacks on her country, only hardened her conviction and resolve that the Division was necessary.

Celestia made her way down the palace hallways to the briefing room area, where a guard greeted her and let her in. Inside the room was Princess Luna, looking into the room through a one-way mirror.

"Ah, hello Sister," Celestia said warmly, greeting her sister. "How is our newest candidate?"

"Promising," Luna replied. "She checks all the boxes. Strong flyer, skilled fighter, fiercely loyal to the Crown. I'll let her file speak for itself."

The night sister floated over the tan folder to Celestia, who accepted it and flipped it open, skimming through it.

"...Guard at the Friendship Castle... Wonderbolts Prospect... With how the previous interviews have gone, she may be overqualified for the position," Celestia remarked with a bit of dry humor, though she nodded slowly as she read through it. "But you are right, sister. Very promising."

She closed the folder and looked through the viewing window at the pony sitting inside, a pegasus mare with pure white fur and a jet-black mane. The only splashes of color were on her bangs, bright orange, and her eyes, deep blue. She sat in the chair with trained patience, hooves resting on the table in front of her as she glanced around the empty room. Only her gently twitching pinions gave away her unease and impatience.

"Well, let's not keep her waiting too long, eh?" Celestia said, patting her sister on the back before making her way into the interview room, a guard opening the door for her.

As Celestia entered, the pegasus quickly scrambled to her hooves, almost tripping over herself as she hastily snapped off a wing salute.

"Y-Your Majesty! My apologies, I wasn't informed you were-"

"At ease," Celestia replied, waving a hoof dismissively. "Have a seat."

The pegasus mare blinked, then nodded, fixing her chair before sitting back down. Celestia sat down across the table from her and set her case file down in front of her.

"Do you know why you're here?" Celestia began, looking the other mare over.

The pegasus nodded. "I was told that this was some sort of job interview for the Crown, but I'm not sure what it's for exactly."

"Yes, this is a job interview, but I can't tell you about it just yet. That information is still classified," Celestia leaned forward slightly. "For now, I just want to learn about you."

The pegasus nodded, and Celestia continued. "We are completely alone. Anything you say here will not be held against you. Feel free to speak as freely as you'd like."

The white mare nodded affirmation once more before responding. "My name is Rainium Skysoarer. I was born in Cloudsdale, my current residence is Ponyville. I work as a guard in Twilight's Castle."

"Any siblings? Spouse? Kids?" Celestia interjected.

"No siblings, no kids. I have a fiancée."

"Ah," the Princess replied, a slight frown tinging her face, almost unnoticeable. "How long have you been engaged?"

"A few months now. Her and I have been planning on getting married in October."

"I see. Congratulations, then." Celestia flipped open the case file, sifting through the papers for a few seconds. "You were offered a place in the Wonderbolts Academy."

"Yes," Rainium nodded.

"And you turned it down?"

"Yes. I know they were created for a purpose, but they're... they're useless now," Rainium shifted uncomfortably as she said this, glancing around the room, as if she was scared they would somehow hear her and take offense. "They're nothing more than showponies. I want to make a difference. That's why I joined the guard, so I could help ponies."

"Well, Rainium, I think we can offer you that chance." Celestia paused, contemplating her next words carefully. "I am looking to put together a... spec-ops unit of sorts. You would live a normal life, but once you're called to service, you would have to drop everything and report in. You would specialize in grave threats to national security and other situations beyond the capacity of the normal guard. Is this something that interests you?"

Rainium, whose eyes were widening as the Princess spoke, squeaked softly. "Wow, that sounds-... I-I would be honored to."

"Fantastic," Celestia replied, closing the file folder before leaning in once more. "Do you have any conflicts of interest, any emotional attachments, anything that could hinder you when you're called to duty?"

Rainium's eyes flashed with emotion, almost too fast for Celestia to catch, and she looked down away from the Princess's gaze. "...No."

Celestia tilted her head slightly. "...And if you did, you would take care of it?"

"Absolutely."

"Perfect," Celestia nodded, before leaning back slightly in her chair. "Well, Private Skysoarer, I still have some paperwork I need to sort out, but if Princess Twilight is fine with letting you go, consider yourself a member of the squad. You'll receive more information in the coming days about your new assignment, should you choose to accept it. You work for the Crown now."

Celestia rose from her chair and offered a hoof across the table, which Rainium promptly shook, a feeling of pride glowing on her face.

"Just one last thing, " Celestia added. "Do you have a preference for a code-name?"

"...My friends call me Rainy."

"Perfect. Just remember, everything we have just discussed is classified. I'm sure you're familiar with the punishment for leaking information."

"Of course."

"Very well," Celestia nodded, smiling reassuringly down at her. "You are dismissed."

Rainium nodded, standing up from her chair and snapping off a salute once more before stepping out of the room, where a guard let her out and escorted her to the exit. Celestia waited in her chair for several moments before following her out, where Luna was there to greet her.

"What do you think?" Celestia asked.

"I like her," Luna replied simply.

"Me too. There aren't many gifted fliers out there that aren't already snatched up by the Wonderbolts. And she's a guard as well, she already has combat training. She's as close to a perfect pegasus candidate as we can find."

"I agree. However, she stumbled on the attachments question... is this a potential weak point?"

Celestia frowned, then shook her head. "I don't think it will be a problem."

Manehattan, 1008 ANM.

"...Clear."

Rainy lowered her rifle and waved back to the entrance to the Madisoat Mare Garden, signaling to the other ponies to come out onto the street. Slowly, the group of wounded EUP soldiers stumbled out into the dimming daylight, led by a weary-looking Agrippa.

Agrippa offered a shoulder to a struggling guard, helping to steady him, before looking up at Rainy. "You're sure the base is safe?"

Rainy nodded. "I cleared it out before I came here. The tracks, I'm not sure about, but we can keep them locked up for the time being."

"We could always stay in the Garden..." Agrippa said, glancing back at the building they just exited.

"I don't like it. There’re too many ways in and out, too many places to defend. Maybe once we have more ponies, we can restore the Garden to operational status, but not now."

"If you say so. You're the expert," Agrippa replied with a hint of mocking sarcasm in her voice that Rainy chose to ignore.

Agent Rainy led the ragged group of ponies across the street, scanning the rooftops for any snipers, until they reached the towering front doors of the Maneway terminal. Rainy pushed them open with a grunt, holding them open to allow the injured soldiers to stream past her into the base. Agrippa was the last one to enter, staying back to help each pony up the short flight of stairs to the entrance. Once all the ponies were inside, Rainy slammed the doors shut, locking them as best as she could.

Agrippa helped the soldiers get settled before calling out to the group, "Does anyone require immediate medical attention?" Silence greeted her, as the EUP personnel appeared to already be bandaged up by the doctor. "...Good, because I need some sleep."

"Wait, I need to speak with you first." Rainy interrupted, stepping forward.

Agrippa glanced over at her before letting out a sigh. "Of course you do..."

"I'll make it quick; I promise. I have shit I need to take care of as well."

"Sure. Whatever." Agrippa waved a hoof dismissively. "Just let me get back to my lab first. I need to sit down."

"Fine," Rainy nodded, accepting the compromise.

Agrippa led Rainy to one of the shops lining the lobby of the station, which had been repurposed into a lab. A sad excuse for a lab, consisting of only a few gurneys, a couple run-down virus scanners, and a few other pieces of lab equipment that Rainy didn't recognize. Nothing in the room was on due to the power outage, leaving the room lifeless and quiet.

Agrippa sat back on one of the medical gurneys, which doubled as her bed, with a loud groan and a sigh. "What did you need from me?"

Rainy sat on the edge of one of the other cots across from her, a respectable distance away. "I just need to know exactly what happened here. Command didn't really give me very many specifics."

"From when?"

"Start from the helicopter crash. That's when the intel got fuzzy."

Agrippa waved a hoof. "First, take off those goggles. You look so goofy with them on."

"...Fine." Rainy slipped them off and set them next to her on the bed, rubbing at her eyes for a second before looking up at Agrippa. "There. Happy? Anything else I can do for ya?"

Agrippa smirked, taking a moment to look over Rainy’s unobstructed face before answering. "You could get me some coffee. Get some for yourself, as well. You look like you could use some."

"The coffee machine is offline, Agrippa." Rainy said matter-of-factly.

Agrippa blinked as her sleep-deprived brain registered what she had just said. "...Right. Whatever. I don't think we have any coffee beans left in this place, anyway..."

"Or hot water." Rainy smirked, but only for a second, as she quickly returned to being serious and focused on the matter at hoof. "Please tell me what happened, doctor."

Agrippa sighed before closing her eyes as she began to speak. "All I heard was a loud crack, coming from outside... I assume that was the sound of the spellcaster firing. Then I heard it slam into the supply helicopter that was about to land on the roof... The pilot tried to recover, but it was too damaged. It went into a death spiral, slammed into the corner of the building, causing it to cave in. The pilots were killed, the supplies destroyed, several ponies injured in the impact... It sent the place into chaos. The crash knocked out the electricity as well, and the whole place plunged into darkness... We had no defenses, no light, no leadership. We were easy targets."

"Targets for who?" Rainy interjected.

"The rioters... they moved in almost immediately. In all the confusion, we didn't have the time to set up an effective defense. We were overrun almost immediately. All the ponies still fit to move retreated out the back... we had to leave the rest behind."

Rainy nodded slowly as she absorbed the information. "So you retreated to the Garden after that?"

Agrippa nodded. "Yes. It was close by, and it was pretty secure. It was our best option, given the circumstances. But unfortunately, the rioters followed us there as well. We were prepared for them this time, so we put up a pretty good fight, but the rioters had been reinforced by the weapons they recovered from the Base. They busted through the defenses, and I wasn't able to make it out in time."

"Damn..." Rainy shook her head. "Did anyone make it out?"

"Yeah, a few EUP soldiers did. I have no idea where they are now though. I stayed behind to try and evacuate the wounded, but I wasn't fast enough. They could be anywhere in the city by now."

"Well, maybe if we get this place back operational, we can find them and get them to come back."

"That's a big if, Rainy."

"It's worth a shot."

Agrippa shrugged, conceding the point. "Now, I have a question to ask you."

"Go ahead."

"You're infected, aren't you?"

Rainy opened her mouth to answer, then closed it, making sure to choose her words carefully. "...I don't know. I might be, but Command doesn't know how the infection spreads, so I can't tell you for certain."

"Well, I can definitely tell you for certain. The disease is transferred via magic. Unicorn magic, pegasus magic, earth pony magic, MagiTech... doesn't matter. If you've flown in this city, there's a good chance you're infected."

"What?" Rainy blinked, disbelief filling her eyes, followed by terror. "No... No, they would've told me in the briefing..."

Agrippa rolled her eyes. "Of course they didn't. You had to fly across the river to get here, didn't you? They couldn't have you backing out if they told you the truth."

"But I still would've flown here if I knew! They knew that... they must've just not known..."

"Whatever you say, Rainy," Agrippa said, without much sympathy in her voice. "You're still infected either way, which means we need to get moving on a cure."

"Right. Right," Rainy let out a sigh, regaining her composure. "What do we need to do?"

"First, we need to get the power back online. Lights, heating, water purification, defenses, lab equipment, it's all down until we can get the generators back up. We can worry about a cure after that."

Rainy nodded. "I checked the main generator, that thing's fried. I don't have the parts or the know-how to get it running again."

Agrippa paused. "...I do know one pony who can."

Rainy tilted her head. "Who?"

"Her name's Aerion Featherquill. She's the CEO of a MagiTech startup, specializes in technology. She'll have the skills and the supplies to get it working again. Plus, her equipment will be super important with the cure research."

"Sweet, where is she?" Rainy asked.

Agrippa sighed. "That's the problem. She left to her headquarters a few hours before the helicopter crash, said she had to work on something. I haven't seen her since."

"Nothing can be easy, can it?" Rainy sighed as well. "What do you think happened? Think she's still alive?"

"Well, I think there's two scenarios. She could've seen the attack and retreated back to her HQ to lay low, or she was attacked by looters as well, either there or on the way. Either way, she's probably in danger."

Rainy frowned. "So, you want me to travel through a hostile city, find some random mare who may or may not be alive in her headquarters, all while I have more pressing matters at hoof?"

"This is important, Rainy," Agrippa insisted. "If she dies, we won't get the power back on, and we won't get the tech required for cure research. That not only means your death, but the deaths of millions, including the Princesses. You really want to be responsible for that?"

Rainy rubbed her temples with a sigh. "…Give me a minute, I'll run it past Command for you."

"Thank you," Agrippa said as she leaned back on her cot once more.

Rainy slipped her goggles back on, using them to open up a link with command. "Agent Rainy to Command, can you hear me?"

"...Ah, it's good to hear from you again, Agent. Was the mission a success?"

"Yes, I was able to rescue Dr. Glimmershine, along with a few EUP survivors. We're holed up in the Base of Operations for now."

"Perfect. Your next objective is to neutralize that spellcaster. The sooner we can send in reinforcements, the better."

“Copy. Wait one," Rainy glanced over at Agrippa, who gave her a nod. "...Command, Dr. Glimmershine tells me I need to find an 'Aerion Featherquill'. A MagiTech CEO. She says she's important for her cure research.”

There were a few seconds of silence from the other end. “...Negative, Agent, that is not your objective. That spellcaster is your top priority, we need it down so we can send in reinforcements and supplies.”

"It's urgent." Rainy insisted. "Agrippa says she's in danger, and she needs Aerion's help with the cure research. If she dies, we may never find a cure."

"Agent, we don’t have time for you to run around finding private sector CEOs. If you die, the city will fall. We can't risk it."

Rainy fell silent, a hoof raised to her goggles.

Command sensed her hesitation. "...Agent, don't even think about it—"

Rainy flicked off the commlink before turning back to Agrippa, pointing an accusatory hoof at her. "This better be worth it."

"Of course it is." Agrippa stated simply. "When have I ever been wrong?"

"Don't get me started," Rainy grumbled as she grabbed her rifle. "Get some rest, doctor. I'll be back soon."

Rainy trotted off to the front entrance, making her way outside once more as the sun began to set.

"Aerion Featherquill... here I come."

"Hour 31... still no contact from the Base of Operations."

Aerion sighed and sent her emergency signal through once more, but static greeted her again.

"They're either dealing with a severe power outage, or they're all dead. Either are real possibilities."

She turned away from her transmitter and trotted back to her workbench, where a small recording device sat on top along with some schematics.

"I would head back and find out what's wrong... but I've got my own problems here."

She glanced up at her security monitor, which was kept online by a small emergency generator rumbling in the corner of the room. In the security feed, she spotted a group of ponies making their way through the hallways of her headquarters, armed with guns and a variety of blunt weapons.

"Keep searching!" one of them called out to the others. "She's gotta be around here somewhere. The ransom money we can get from this bitch might let us buy our way off this island."

"...Great," Aerion sighed, glancing at the hidden entrance to the safe room she's hiding in. "Let's hope these assholes aren't the perceptive type, I'd hate to let all this work go to waste..."

She turned back to her work, glancing down at the recording device as it whirred softly on the table in front of her. "I hope you haven't forgotten about me, Agrippa, because I could really use some help right about now..."

Chapter 5

The sun was setting when Rainy pushed her way out of the station before closing the doors behind her to conceal the inhabitants inside from any wandering looters. The orange rays turned the overcast sky red and yellow, a pretty sight in an otherwise bleak environment. Small flecks of snow began to fall as she began her journey further into downtown Manehattan in search of the Aerion Technologies HQ building.

That CEO was the only lead they had at this point, and Rainy was determined to find her and keep her safe, even if Command objected to it. She was a Division Agent, given the freedom of autonomy while operating in the field. Why not use it? The spellcaster could wait, her mission had revealed more important objectives than her directive. She would apologize later.

As she walked along the quiet streets, avoiding broken carriages and strewn luggage, she took a moment to fiddle with her equipment. The glitch that had affected her motion sensor had spread to the other functions of her HUD as well. The crosshair lagged, and her health indicator occasionally labeled her as deceased. Rather than try to rely on faulty equipment, Rainy just minimized the entire HUD, leaving her totally in the dark. Maybe this "MagiTech CEO" could help repair it, or at least identify what was happening.

She felt vulnerable without any of her equipment, and with her newfound limitations regarding her wings, she was way more handicapped than she wanted. Add a severed link to command on top of that, and an already tough mission was seeming more and more daunting.

The road to the headquarters was devoid of any life, or death. Perfect. If Aerion managed to avoid confronting rioters in the streets and hole up inside the building, there was a much higher chance of her being alive. It also made her job a lot easier, as she was not in the mood for getting into more firefights than she needed to. A full day's worth of fighting had taken a toll on her, along with a few shocking revelations rattling her mentally; she hoped she had enough left in the tank to deal with any resistance.

The snowfall had thickened by the time Rainy reached the HQ, heavy flakes sticking in her black and orange mane as she read the sign in front of the futuristic-looking building.

AERION TECHNOLOGIES

Building a Better Future - With Magic

The text was splattered with blood and riddled with bullet holes, and all the carriages in the parking lot were either broken into or overturned by overzealous rioters. The outside of the building was covered in graffiti, all calling for the consumption of the ruling class in varying degrees of grammatical competence. The front doors seemed to have fared the best, the magically-reinforced glass protecting against most looters looking for food or weapons. Well, until someone drove a carriage through it. The vehicle had been restarted and pounded through the doors, recently by the looks of it. Maybe she'd see some action after all.

Rainy stepped through the car-sized hole punched through the entrance, careful to avoid the glass shards underhoof. The doorway leads her into a large waiting room, the secretary's desk destroyed by the runaway carriage, sitting there leaking magical smoke. Muddy hoofprints and blood splatters stained the carpet along with overturned chairs and broken coffee tables, the mess leading deeper into the facility. However, before she could step out of the waiting room, there was a crackle as the intercom speakers sparked to life.

"Hello, and welcome to Aerion Technologies," chimed a smooth female voice over the speakers, clearly an automated message triggered when she entered the building. "Please check in with the secretary and have a seat until your name is called-"

The message is interrupted by a mechanical screech, making Rainy flinch in discomfort.

"Goddamn, that thing is annoying..." a new pony said over the speaker, a mare's voice as well, but different from the automated one. "Listen up. You don't look like a rioter... maybe I can trust you. If you don't know what you're doing, just turn around and leave now. There's nothing useful here for you, and you'll just get yourself killed."

Rainy looked right at the security camera mounted on the wall and shook her head. "I'm looking for Aerion Featherquill. Is she here?"

Silence greeted her for a few moments before the mare behind the intercom clicked it back on. "...Right, the microphones must be busted... Couldn't hear a thing you just said. Looks like you've got a commlink though. Hold on, let me connect to it real quick..."

There was a crackle in her earpiece as the mystery mare connected to her commlink remotely, bypassing her secure encryption so easily that Rainy perked her ears up. This mare had to be Aerion, if she was hacking into her equipment so effortlessly. She didn't even have time to object before the mare's voice pumped into her earpiece this time.

"Hello? Can you hear me now?" the mare asked.

"Yeah," Rainy replied, adjusting the volume on her commlink. "I'm looking for Aerion Featherquill. Are you her?"

"Maybe. Who the hell are you?"

"Agent Rainy. I'm with the Division, ma'am."

There's a pause, followed by a sigh from Aerion. "Just my luck. Should've known, with all that equipment you've got. Are you here for me, or just my tech?"

"I'm here to get you out. Agrippa Glimmershine has vouched for you personally."

Another pause. "...Huh, I guess she didn't forget about me."

"It wasn't her fault. The Base of Operations was assaulted, and she was captured. We just now got it back under our control."

"That explains why I haven't gotten any answers to my calls. I've been stuck here... 32 hours now, with no radio contact from anyone. I figured the power must've finally gone down over there."

"It did. Everything's fried; no lights, no heating, no lab tech, nothing. Agrippa says you would be able to bring it back online. Can you help?"

"Yeah... I've been working on a little something since I got here, and as much as I'd love to get out of this place, I can't just abandon it now. Bad news is, this job is gonna require more hooves than I've got, and I'm stuck in my panic room right now. But if you're willing to help... I think we can make this work. You capable of following directions?"

"Of course."

"We'll see about that. Head down to the power relay room, I need you to flip some switches."

"Got it," Rainy replied, stepping out of the ruined waiting room into the building itself, the hallways deserted.

"Oh, also, I'd advise you to be careful. There seems to be some uninvited guests wandering the place looking for me as well, and they don't look the friendly type. Let's hope you know how to use that fancy gun you're holding..."

Rainy just rolled her eyes as the commlink went quiet, and she checked the map posted on the wall for the location of the power relay room before continuing deeper into the HQ. So that was the CEO she was looking for. She didn't seem thrilled to see that she was a Division Agent, which means she had experience or inside knowledge with the Shadowbolts. Hopefully that wouldn't sour their working relationship too much; one mare at the base hating her guts was enough.

Rainy took a shortcut through what looked like a small lab, with all the equipment trashed and overturned by the roaming rioters that had come through here. Almost nothing looked salvageable in the mess; the rioters were thorough in their destruction. However, while she carefully made her way through the room, a small device still laying on the table caught her eye, and she picked it up in a hoof to examine it. It looked like a cross between an epinephrine injector and a laser pointer, with a large red cross emblazoned on the front of it. She could make out an injection needle stored in the end of it, and two buttons near the top: Personal and Ranged. Something that looked like a status bar was green and full, signaling Ready for Use.

As she examined the device, her earpiece crackled to life as Aerion gained access once more. "Take that with you, you'll need it. I’m surprised one of them survived intact…”

Rainy nodded and clipped it into her utility belt before continuing. "What is it?"

"First aid device that cauterizes wounds and promotes healing. Effective against both external damage and internal trauma. Reusable, recharges over time. Options for personal and remote application. Hopefully you won’t have to use it, but it doesn’t hurt to be prepared, right?”

“Roger that. Does it work with the virus as well?”

“Pfft, I wish it were that easy. I wouldn’t be leaving the cure just laying around, would I?”

“Fair point, ma’am.”

She poked her rifle out of the open door frame, checking that both ends of the hallway were clear before stepping out and continuing. She was getting closer to the power relay room now, and as she got deeper and deeper into the facility, the destruction got less and less severe, as the rioters clearly lost interest in their mindless rampage by this point.

“Heads up," Aerion interrupted once more. "A lot of my cameras are offline, so I’m more blind here than I would like… but I think you’ve got a gang of intruders headed your way. Looks like they’ve got guns too.”

“Copy. Thanks for the warning.”

Rainy quickly ducked behind an open doorway as incoming hoofsteps confirmed Aerion’s warning. The pattern of the steps confirmed at least six combatants, and the clinking of guns against their sides was also audible.

“Chase, we’ve been searching this place for hours…” one of the ponies, a mare’s voice, started. “How do we know that she’s even still here?”

“She has to be,” a stallion responded. “Gray Heart saw her enter this place herself, and no one has left. We just haven’t found her hiding spot yet.”

“You think the other guys have had better luck?”

“I’m sure we would’ve heard something from them by now if they were… let’s just stay focused. That ransom money is the only thing getting us out of this hellhole…”

Rainy slid the magazine out of her rifle to verify it was full before pushing it back in and flicking off the safety. She waited until the hoofsteps echoed from just outside her hiding spot before spinning out of the door, bracing her rifle against the door frame as she aimed at the rioters.

Six ponies, most of them wielding pistols and rifles looted from fallen EUP soldiers, but two of them still carried hoof-to-hoof weaponry only. They froze in place and let out whinnies of surprise at the sudden sight of Rainy, but before they could react, she pulled the trigger, pumping two bursts into the two rioters nearest to her and blowing them back. The group recovered from the shock and raised their own weapons before she could shift her aim to a third target, forcing her to retreat into the room before they could fire back.

"W-What the fuck was that? Was that her?"

"No, it's probably just some overzealous do-gooder. Push up! She can't take all of us at once!"

Rainy waited patiently just to the side of the door frame for the looters to build up the courage to follow her. As soon as the first rioter stuck their rifle barrel through the threshold, she grabbed it with her hooves and yanked hard, pulling the off-balance pony forward to deliver a cracking headbutt to the forehead, dropping the stallion onto the ground. She quickly leveled her own rifle and unloaded a burst into the fallen rioter. Three down, three to go...

Suddenly, suppressive fire from the hallway drove her back into the room. The Shadowbolt stumbled back behind the desk to take cover as the two melee rioters swarmed into the room, emboldened by the covering fire of their surviving ally. Rainy poked her rifle out from the side of her cover and fired blind bursts, and a bullet caught one of the melee ponies and dropped them. However, she's forced to reposition as the second rioter bared down on her. He swung his fire ax where her head was just a second earlier, and the head sank into the desk. Rainy scrambled back and climbed to her hooves once more, her rifle firing into the advancing stallion. She didn’t stop until she heard a CLICK from her empty magazine, and the rioter was dead at her hooves. One more...

With no time to reload, Rainy quickly shouldered her empty rifle and spun towards the last rioter as he stepped through the door, reaching down to her thigh for the holstered pistol strapped there... only for her hoof to come up empty. A jolt of panic shot through her as she realized: she had left her pistol with Agrippa back at the base. She was left completely unarmed.

As the looter raised his own rifle to fire, Rainy quickly spun back towards the desk to dive into cover, but she wasn't fast enough. Searing pain ripped through her side as she slid behind the desk, unable to hold back the scream of agony. She felt blood quickly begin to soak into her flight suit, staining her white fur red. She scooted back further along the floor before unzipping her suit and tugging it open to see the damage. At least two entry points along her side, broken ribs and internal bleeding likely... but nothing immediately fatal. The immediate pain had faded into burning ache and a tingling loss of feeling, and her breath came in ragged gasps.

"Ha! Gotcha, bitch!" the rioter roared in triumph, snapping Rainy's pain-filled brain back into action. As she heard his hoofsteps approach to finish her off, she quickly grabbed for her last flashbang, activated it, and rolled it towards the end of the desk as the rioter rounded it.

"Shi-"

He was interrupted by a pop and a flash of light. The stallion cursed and stumbled back as his vision went all white. Rainy uncovered her eyes and quickly grabbed a fresh magazine, sliding it into her rifle and forcing herself back to her hooves. Bracing the gun against the top of the desk, she was able to shakily aim at the blinded rioter and fire, dropping him to the ground.

Once she was certain he was dead, Rainy slumped back down to the ground, the exertion of standing taking all the energy she had. She stared up at the ceiling with glazed eyes, the puddle of her own blood beginning to grow underneath her. The urge to close her heavy eyes was so tempting... but she was snapped back awake by the chime of her SPARC, and Aerion's voice filled her ears.

"The injector! Use it quick, you idiot!"

The injector. Rainy's muddled brain took a second to process this, but once she did, she quickly snagged the device off her belt. After a few failed attempts, she managed to press the personal button on the side before jamming the device against the outside of her thigh. The needle punching through her fur, and magical energy began pumping into her body. The burning sensation of pain dispersed almost immediately, drawing a sigh of relief from Rainy. And after she pulled back her uniform to look at the bullet holes once more, she could see the entry points being filled with some kind of biofoam, stitching her body back together in just a few seconds.

"...T-That's incredible..." Rainy gasped.

Aerion chuckled in response. "Impressive, huh? Thanks for being my guinea pig."

Rainy blinked. "You... didn't know if this thing was gonna work?"

"Well, it's worked in controlled tests, but that's the first time it's been utilized in the field. Congratulations, you're part of Aeri-Tech history."

"I'm honored..."

After checking to make sure her wounds were fully healed, Rainy zipped her suit back up and climbed to her hooves, stepping over the bodies of the fallen rioters on her way. She made her way out of the room into the hallway before taking a left and moving deeper into the facility. There was no lingering pain in her side; she felt as if she hadn't been shot at all. She took a glance down at the device - only 20% recharged - as she finally reached her destination.

Rainy activated her SPARC to reestablish contact with Aerion. "I've made it to the relay room, ma'am."

"Alright..." Aerion responded, a shuffle of papers audible. "There should be a switch right in front of you when you enter the room. Big, brightly colored, you can't miss it."

Rainy pushed open the door and stepped into the room, the space filled with consoles and relays, loose wires dangling from the ceiling. In the middle of the room sat a large generator shaped object, a yellow switch clearly visible on the side.

"Yeah, I see it," Rainy said as she moved over to examine it.

"Good. I need you to flip it so it's in the upward position, but I need to flip the switch on my end at the same time, so we have to be in sync for this," Aerion instructed.

"Got it. Just say the word," Rainy said, placing a hoof on the switch in preparation.

"On my mark. 3, 2, 1, mark."

"Mark," Rainy confirmed with a grunt as she pushed upwards on the heavy switch, flipping it into the active position.

As soon as she did, a rumbling noise started emanating from the generator, coupled with the roar of a similar generator somewhere underneath her, vibrating the floor beneath her hooves. The lights dimmed briefly before coming back online brighter than before, her goggles automatically dimming to accommodate for the excess light.

"Hm... that sounds promising..." Aerion hummed through the link. "Good work Agent, your switch-flipping skills are remarkable."

"Yeah, you're welcome," Rainy huffed, now becoming annoyed at the sarcasm dripping off Aerion's voice. "Is that all you needed?"

"Almost. I've got one more thing for you to do before we're done. Head down to the basement, that's where the main generator is located. And please hurry, the noise of this thing will bring any remaining rioters running, and being ponynapped is not on my to-do list today..."

"Yes ma'am. I've been on enough rescue missions today already."

Rainy re-equipped her rifle before stepping back out of the relay room into the hallway, where the maintenance stairway down to the basement was only a few meters away. The downstairs area was dimly lit by a few light bulbs swinging from the ceiling, the light revealing several large generators sitting ominously, only one of them rumbling with power. She stepped up to one of them, brushing a hoof across the surface, collecting the dust that had settled there.

"Alright, I'm here," Rainy said through the link. "What do you need me to do?"

"There should be another switch on the biggest generator in there," Aerion answered. "We'll have to sync our flips again, but it shouldn't be too difficult. Just make sure you're pulling the lever on the one that isn't already powered up and running."

"Got it. Inactive generator, big switch..." Rainy mumbled in response as she stepped into the middle of the room, quickly finding the right lever and placing her hoof on it. "Ready."

"Alright, same thing as before... 3, 2, 1, mark."

"Mark."

As she pushed up on the switch, the generators around her roared to life, much louder down here than up above. She stepped back from the machines and watched them fire up, the panels along the outside starting to glow as the magic inside began to work. These weren't the ancient, hulking generators in the maneway; these were sleek, modern machines, like something out of a science fiction book. After the initial loud startup, the generators quieted down to a rumble, efficiently working to pump power through the wires.

Her earpiece chimed, and Aerion's voice snapped her out of her thoughts. "Excellent work, Agent. You follow instructions better than I thought. I've got just a few more steps to finish in here, so hopefully we can slip out before the other rioters notice we're here-"

Before Aerion could finish talking, she was interrupted by the basement door being flung open, followed by a squad of rioters streaming out, drawn to the sound of the generators like moths to light. They quickly gathered in front of her with raised rifles and brandished swords, blocking her route to the exit. There were at least ten of them in the group, and by the looks of how they handled their weapons, they knew how to use them.

"Put the gun down now!" the looter in front demanded, his gun barrel pointed at her face.

Normally, she would have the speed and agility to take them all out, even while surrounded like this... but without her wings, she was handicapped. She slowly slipped her rifle off her shoulder and set it on the ground before straightening up, her eyes not leaving the lead rioter.

"...She's a little bit orange... Are you Aerion Featherquill?" he asked her, a little unsure of himself.

"No," Rainy replied simply.

"How do we know you're not lying?" a mare behind the lead rioter chimed in.

"I look nothing like her," the Shadowbolt retorted, rolling her eyes, hoping that was the truth. "I'm just here for supplies, same as you guys."

"We're not here for supplies. We're here to find a way out of this hellhole."

"Well, I'm sorry, but you're looking in the wrong place for that," Rainy shrugged. "Just let me go, and I promise I won't bother you."

The lead stallion didn't respond to her, tilting his head to address his squad instead. "What do you think we should do with her?"

One stallion chimed in immediately. "I say we kill 'er! She's probably gonna stab us in the back!"

"Why not just take her hostage as well?" a second pony asked, a mare. "Look at all that gear she has. She has to be worth something."

"I like that idea. Even if she isn't worth good ransom money, I'm sure we could find some other use for her..." another stallion added, a dangerous tone to his voice.

Rainy didn't like where this conversation was going. If they weren't going to let her go, she was gonna fight her way out. But she couldn't fight such a large group head-on in the open like this; she needed the element of surprise.

"Aerion..." Rainy whispered under her breath into her commlink, hoping she could hear her. "I need you to cut the lights."

"If you insist," Aerion answered. "One second."

There was a brief moment of silence as the faint whirring noise above them cut out, followed by the total shutoff of the lights, plunging the group into darkness. Rainy quickly grabbed her rifle and scrambled to cover, hiding behind one of the generators and out of sight of the attackers as they looked around in surprise.

"Who touched the light switch? Turn them back on!"

"T-That wasn't us!"

"Wait, where'd the mare go?"

"Shit, find her!"

Her goggles, previously dimmed from the bright florescent lights of the main floor, now brightened her vision, allowing her to see in the near-perfect darkness while the rioters floundered around helplessly. She slinked from shadow to shadow, occasionally raising her rifle to take out any looter that strayed too far from the main group, careful to keep moving so the ponies couldn't track her by her muzzle flashes.

"Fuck, she got Tundra!"

"She's gonna pick us off one by one!"

Rainy flinched behind her cover as a rioter blindly opened fire around him, accidentally hitting one of his friends in the process.

"Stop fucking shooting, you fucking idiots! You're gonna kill us before she has a chance to!"

"Take your flashlights out, everyone look for this bitch!"

Several streams of bright light filled the dark room as the rioters pulled their flashlights out, illuminating the hidden corners of the room as they swept for her hiding spot. She couldn't fire now; her muzzle flash would immediately give away her position, and she wouldn't be able to reposition fast enough before their searchlights locked onto her. She needed to go quiet.

Rainy slung her rifle over her shoulder and slid her combat knife out of its sheath, waiting for a rioter to get too close. When one unfortunate stallion poked his head around her hiding spot, she lurched forward, one hoof covering his mouth while the other jabbed the blade into his throat, tugging him back out of sight as he gurgled and went limp.

She tugged the knife out of the dead rioter and slipped out of her hiding spot, hidden in the darkness as long as she avoided the flashlights. Rainy slinked behind the nearest pony and jabbed the blood-soaked blade into the back of her hind leg, just above the hoof. When the mare gasped and fell back onto her flank as her leg gave out, Rainy tugged back on her mane and slit her exposed throat, tossing her to the ground.

The sound of the gasp from her victim attracted the attention of another looter, and the stallion turned to focus his flashlight on Rainy. But before he could raise the alarm, Rainy readjusted the grip on her knife and hurled it at the rioter, sinking it into his eye and dropping him. The beam of light skittered away from her as he collapsed to the ground.

With their numbers sufficiently thinned out, Rainy then raised her rifle and dropped the last three rioters with well-placed bursts, not giving them a chance to turn and return fire. She was left alone in the dark, panting softly as the adrenaline continued to course through her body. Blood soaked her hooves and dripped down her cheek, but it wasn't her own.

"...It's quiet in there..." Aerion said through the link, interrupting the silence. "You alright?"

Rainy nodded, even though Aerion couldn't see her do it. "Yeah. You can turn the lights back on now."

"Phew... all those bullets around my tech made me nervous. I'm opening my panic room now, come on in if you want to see me put on the finishing touches."

The lights in the room flickered back on, revealing the bodies surrounding her, with Rainy standing in the middle of them. A whirring noise from behind her made her turn, and she saw a hidden panel in the wall open up to reveal a hidden room. It was surprisingly large for a panic room. CCTV monitors lining the back wall showing video surveillance of the place, though a lot of the screens only showed static now. Control panels and radio equipment filled the rest of the room, with a work bench sitting in the middle, a lab coat and several MagiTech devices resting on it.

As Rainy carefully stepped past the entryway into the room, she was finally able to see the occupant in the corner. A light orange mare was fiddling with one of the control panels, her fur the color of peach fuzz. Her mane was a deep brown, with a bright orange stripe just above the eyes. She was a pegasus as well, but she had tied her wings against her torso with rope, perhaps to stop herself from using them and getting infected. And when she turned to look at Rainy as she entered, she was able to see that her eyes were a brilliant blue, shining brightly despite the dark rings underneath them. She was exceptionally young for a CEO; she looked like she still belonged in university.

"I guess all the stories about you agents are true... That was impressive." Aerion remarked, leaning against the wall as she looked Rainy over. "I'm just glad you're one of the nice ones."

"What can I say? We're the best of the best for a reason," Rainy said, tilting her head. "What do you mean, 'nice ones'?"

"The stories about your friends aren't exactly flattering, to say the least..." Aerion replied as she walked across the room to fiddle with more buttons on a different panel. "The first wave especially, what a mess that was..."

Rainy blinked. "Wait, you know what happened to the first wave?"

"No one knows what happened. The rumors aren't very flattering..." Aerion said cryptically as she worked. "But that's a story for later. I'm trying to finish this up and get out of here. I've been stuck in this room for too long."

Rainy grunted, desperately wanting to sate the curiosity gnawing away inside her, but she didn't want to press Aerion for information and break their fragile trust. "Sure. What are you doing?"

"I've been stuck down here for quite a while, but I've actually been pretty productive during that time. I was able to connect this building's generators into the city power lines. All that switch flipping you did powered them all back on, and all I need to do now is pump the power into the lines from here to the Base of Operations. That should hold us over until we get the city's main power source back online," Aerion explained as she jumped from control panel to control panel, adjusting dials.

"Is that why you left the Base to come here?" Rainy asked.

"Mmhm," Aerion flicked an ear in response as she worked. "The citywide generators had gone down already, and that dinosaur in the maneway was going to fall apart at any second, so I thought I'd go start on something to keep us running until more support arrived. I guess it's a good thing I left when I did, if what you said was true."

Rainy nodded. "Yeah, we're completely dark at the station... this will be a huge help."

"Alright, just give me a few seconds and I'll have power restored to the base."

Rainy tilted her head. "Really? It's that easy?"

"Of course it isn't,” Aerion snorted. “I've spent hours tinkering with this thing, you just decided to show up for the ending."

Aerion walked over to the main control panel and pressed a few buttons before activating it. After a few tense moments, status messages began to pop up on the screen, all of them green.

Rainy stepped forward. "Did it work?"

"Everything looks good on my end..." Aerion responded as she read through the status messages. "But we won't know for sure until we actually see the lights on at the base."

Rainy nodded, sliding her rifle off her shoulder. "Let's get going then."

Chapter 6

The sun had set completely by the time the two mares left the Aerion Technologies building, heading back to the Maneway Station triumphant. The streets were completely dark, as all the streetlights were powerless and idle, but the full moon peeking through the clouds above provided enough light for them to get by. Rainy took point with her rifle raised. Aerion following close behind while burdened down by saddlebags, filled to the brim with MagiTech devices she'd insisted on bringing.

"Calm down, Agent Awesome," Aerion said as Rainy kept her rifle raised and trained on the buildings towering over them. "There's no one around."

"There's nothing wrong with being careful, ma'am," Rainy replied simply, not taking her gaze off her sights as she scanned the dark windows above.

Aerion rolled her eyes. "Trust me, nopony in these parts is smart enough or brave enough to set up an ambush for a Division Agent. Don't have the firepower for it either. All that's left here is the occasional looter. Further midtown, though, that's a different story."

Rainy sighed and lowered her rifle, falling in beside Aerion as they walked. "How do you know so much about the Division? You seem very... opinionated about us."

Aerion gave her a glance before looking forward, responding softly, "My MagiTech company was in the running to be the equipment supplier for the Shadowbolts. The deal fell through."

"Really?" Rainy asked. "What happened?"

"I got outbid," Aerion replied with a huff, obviously still annoyed at the memory. "The crown always goes for the company that promises the most features for the lowest price. Well, guess what? You can't do more with less. Now you're stuck with shitty equipment that more than likely killed your first wave friends, and some big tech company is lining its pockets."

"And you weren't trying to line your pockets too?" Rainy retorted.

"Of course not," Aerion hissed, looking insulted at the accusation. "I'm a goddamn patriot. If they really insisted on making this thing a reality, they should have done everything they could to do it right. And they didn't, and now everything is going to hell."

"Hindsight is 20/20, ma'am," Rainy replied, glancing down at her rifle. "If you really do know your way around my tech... maybe you can tell me what's wrong with it."

Aerion just shrugged. "I could tell you a couple reasons right off the bat, but go ahead."

"Well, as soon as I got into the city, I started encountering glitches with my systems. My motion tracker stopped showing targets, my crosshairs lagged behind or moved in different directions entirely... It was like I was hacked or something."

Aerion nodded along as Rainy explained, before biting her lip. "I can't know for sure until I can look at it with all my equipment, but my best guess... your gear doesn't have a filter on the power supply."

"Oh yeah? What's that?"

"MagiTech, like the name suggests, is powered by magic. This type of equipment is charged by absorbing magic from the environment, much like how ponies absorb magic when they cast spells or fly. It allows for on-the-go recharge and reuse, rather than having to return to base for a resupply. So, just like with ponies, when a foreign virus is absorbed into the equipment with the magic, it can cause malfunctions. You need a special filter to block potential contagions like the virus from entering, and your supplier cheaped out on putting them in."

"Great..." sighed Rainy, running a hoof through her black and orange mane. "So this stuff is busted now?"

"Mmhm. Though, luckily for you, I grabbed some of my Division gear prototypes on the way out the door, so I can give you some working equipment with filters provided. HUD goggles and contacts, earpieces, commlinks, more equipment... You're the only one around who can use them, so I might as well give them to you."

Rainy blinked in surprise. "Well, if you're offering... thank you."

"Yep! Trust me, I wouldn't be lugging all this shit around if I didn't have a good reason to," Aerion said with a chuckle, tilting her head. "Looks like we're here."

The Base of Operations was indeed on the street in front of them, the lights now on inside, visible through the stained-glass windows. It still looked intact and secure, so it wasn't attacked while she was gone. Rainy tugged the heavy main doors open to let Aerion inside before stepping in as well, closing the doors and locking them tight.

Inside, the lights illuminating the place were stunning. The standard lighting combined with Hearths' Warming lights decorating the place gave the Maneway Station an impressive atmosphere. The audible whir of heaters from the basement below them actually made the air not completely freezing, a major improvement to the bone-chilling wind outside. Injured EUP soldiers loitered in the lobby, some of them trying to sleep, others engaging in idle chatter in small groups. When the two mares entered, all of them looked up to stare at the new arrivals, and Rainy raised her rifle above her head in response.

"Mission accomplished," Rainy said with a grin, gesturing to Aerion beside her.

A soft cheer went up among the soldiers, and they turned back to their conversations, at ease now with the Division Agent back.

"Hm. You're a hero already." Aerion remarked as she trotted down into the lobby, though Rainy couldn't tell if she was being sarcastic or not.

"Hey, we've gotten this far... a little hope never hurt," Rainy replied as she followed the other mare. "Let's find Agrippa, let her know you're here."

"Fine with me."

The two mares made their way over to Agrippa's medical area, where she was visible on her cot-turned-makeshift-bed, her jacket draped over her head to block out the light as she tried to sleep. Aerion immediately walked in and prodded Agrippa on the side, paying no mind to her obviously tired state.

"Urgh...five more minutes..." Agrippa groaned as she rolled over onto her side, the small gurney not giving her much room to escape to.

"Nope, I made it back in one piece, you owe me ten bits!" Aerion joked as she continued her incessant poking.

"...Aeri?" Agrippa said after a moment of realization, rolling back over to look at the two of them.

"In the flesh," Aerion responded with a grin.

Agrippa gasped and sat up to hug Aerion tightly, which made Rainy roll her eyes and look away. "I can't believe you survived, you crazy mare. I started getting all your emergency messages as soon as the power came back on. I was worried sick... How did you do it?"

Aerion chuckled and hugged Agrippa back. "Well, I did have the situation under control... but you can thank Agent Awesome here for helping me out."

Rainy shuffled in place as Agrippa looked over from Aerion to her, the doctor’s eyes instantly growing darker at the sight of the Shadowbolt. "Do you get some sleep, Doctor?" she asked awkwardly.

"I got a couple minutes in... until the lights came on and blinded me." Agrippa grumbled, rubbing her eyes with her hooves. "The heaters are nice though. Thanks for getting the power back on, you two."

Aerion chuckled. "Well, it was mostly me, but you can thank Rainy for the last few steps. And also for breaking me out. We should probably get started on that cure, huh?"

"Yeah, good idea... and luckily for us, we have a lab rat now." Agrippa responded, gesturing towards Rainy with the tilt of her head.

Aerion turned and looked at Rainy with a disappointed look. "You got yourself infected? I thought you were one of the smart ones, Agent."

"I didn't realize!" stammered Rainy, trying to salvage her reputation. "No one told me that flying infected you..."

Aerion huffed. "Huh, I would've thought that your commander would have told you. Maybe they didn't say anything on purpose."

"That's what I said," Agrippa interjected.

"Girls, I'm sure there's a good reason why they didn't say... " Rainy said, trailing off hesitantly.

"Whatever you say, Agent Awesome," Aerion said with a playful roll of her eyes. "C'mon, this way, let's run some tests on you."

Rainy blinked. "W-What? Tests? I'm not your guinea pig, I have work to do!"

Agrippa quickly stepped between the two ponies to mediate. "Rainy, you're the only recently-infected pony we have, seeing how the virus develops inside you in the early stages would be hugely beneficial. It won't take long, I promise."

Rainy sighed and looked down. "...Fine. Where is it?"

"Follow me." Agrippa responded, waving her to follow.

Agrippa and Aerion led Rainy to one of the adjacent stores in the lobby of the station, where the virus analysis equipment was stored. Now that there was power, the devices whirred and beeped intermittently as they stood idle, covered with flashing status lights and feedback screens. In the middle of the room was the largest piece of equipment, which Rainy immediately assumed was the scanner. It was shaped like an arch, or a semicircle sticking out of the ground, tall enough for her to walk under, the underside covered with strange cameras and scanning equipment. A large screen for controlling it was at one of the two bases, which Aerion immediately walked to in order to turn it on.

"Just step underneath the scanner and try to relax," Agrippa instructed as she moved to join Aerion. "Have you felt any symptoms, anything unusual?"

Rainy nodded and stepped underneath the arch, thinking before answering, "No, nothing. I've felt normal so far."

Agrippa nodded. "Alright, that's normal. Ponies don't usually report symptoms until a week after initial exposure. That's what makes it so dangerous, as asymptomatic ponies are still infectious. Spreads like wildfire."

Aerion pressed a few buttons on the control panel, and a soft whine emanated from the device. "Alright Agent, the scanner's going now, should only take a couple minutes. Just hang tight."

Rainy nodded, standing still for a few seconds before breaking the silence once again. "Can I ask you two some questions? About the virus?"

Aerion shrugged. "Sure, just don't move too much."

"What...is it?" Rainy asked.

"We don't know much about it," Aerion replied simply. "All we know is that it piggybacks onto naturally occurring magicka in order to infect the body. For us pegasi and for unicorns, it's easy to avoid getting infected, we just stop using magic. However, it's extremely dangerous to earth ponies, who passively absorb and release magic energy into the environment to power their connection to nature. And since the large majority of ponies living in Manehattan are earth ponies, it's a gigantic problem. We have no idea how it works, what it does, or where it originated."

Rainy processed the information for a second before asking, "Who do you think created the virus? Is it some sort of attack by a foreign nation?"

Aerion shook her head, "Not very likely. The griffons, dragons, yaks, they all aren't advanced enough to create something like this."

"Hey, that's racist!" Agrippa interrupted.

"It's true!" Aerion huffed. "Have you seen the state of Griffonstone? They're too busy fighting over bits in the street to bioengineer an illness this deadly."

"What about the nations to the south?" Rainy asked. "Klugetown? The Storm King's former territory? The Kirin?"

"Same reason. Klugetown's a dump. The Storm King's Kingdom is in disarray following his death. Kirin? Seriously? They're just now learning how to talk again," Aerion said with a roll of her eyes. "My guess? Some rogue pony scientist put it together."

"It just doesn't make any sense..." Rainy wondered aloud. "Why would anyone want to do something like this?"

"It doesn't have to make sense. There are crazy ponies in the world, Agent. It only takes one crazy pony with access to a lab to make something this deadly."

"Aren't you quite the pessimist, Miss Featherquill..." Rainy snarked.

Aerion glared. "I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist... Hey Agrippa, come look at these scans."

The two mares huddled together to examine the readings that popped up on the control screen, with the monitor turned away from Rainy. Rainy shuffled her wings impatiently as they talked in hushed tones, annoyed at being left out.

"...Well? What do they say?" Rainy finally asked.

Agrippa sighed before responding, "They look pretty standard to me. You do have the virus, but the flareups are small and concentrated around your wings, where it was able to enter your body. You shouldn't start feeling symptoms for about a week, and it won't get serious for about 2 to 3 weeks, depending on how your immune system reacts to it."

"Okay..." Rainy responded. "What's the fatality rate?"

Agrippa paused for a second. "We don't have an exact number... But it's not good. There's definitely more deaths that recoveries."

"So I guess we'll just have to find a cure then," Rainy said, determined.

"That's the spirit," Aerion chimed. "We're gonna need to take another scan to get a few different readings, and then we'll be done with you for now, Agent."

"Fine," Rainy consented. "While we wait this time... I wanna hear what you know about the first wave."

Aerion tilted her head. "The first wave? Didn't your overlords tell you about them?"

"They're not telling me a lot of things, apparently..." Rainy grumbled.

Aerion snorted at that before starting. "Well, when they first got here, everything was going well. Division Agents and EUP were working together, quelling riots, distributing supplies, generally doing a decent job. Then, one day, shit hits the fan. Huge movements of resistance downtown, and the Division can't hold them back. What does the Crown and the EUP do? They immediately walled off the entire neighborhood. Called it the Dark Zone. Trapped the Division Agents in there with whatever was attacking them. That's the last time anyone heard from them."

Rainy blinked. "They just... left them?"

"Mmhm. Fucked, isn't it? And the rumor is, some of the Agents managed to survive in there... and they're not too happy with the EUP for what they did. They went rogue, and they're wandering the Dark Zone looking for revenge."

"Wow..." Rainy trailed off, now lost in her thoughts as she absorbed the information.

"It just makes you think... would they do the same to you? To us? Are we all expendable to them?"

"Aeri, stop with the doom-and-gloom talk," Agrippa huffed. "Rainy, you can step out of the scanner now, we're done."

Rainy nodded and stepped out of the scanner, but her mind was racing. What if Aerion was right? Command had sent her into an infected city, more than likely knowing she would be compromised, and didn't say anything. Was she really expendable like that, after everything she'd done for them? She was a top-secret agent for Equestria, risk was always part of the deal... but not like this, not a blatant disregard for her well-being. If they were willing to lie like that, what else are they not telling her? Her confidence sank lower and lower as she thought about it, anxiety gripping her chest tightly like a vice. She needed answers.

"Rainy? Are you okay?" Agrippa asked when she noticed Shadowbolt’s thousand-yard stare.

Rainy shook her head to clear her thoughts before responding. "I need to report back to command."

"Go right ahead. Me and Aeri are gonna look these readings over a bit more, see if there's anything we missed."

Rainy just nodded and stepped out of the makeshift lab while the other two mares flipped through the scanner's findings. She found a quiet corner in the station before turning her commlink back on, using her SPARK to reestablish her severed link to command. Hopefully, it would still work; Aerion's warning about her malfunctioning equipment was worrying her more than she was willing to admit.

"Agent Rainy to Command," she started cautiously once her comms blinked green.

There was several moments of silence, followed by a soft crackling noise as command accepted her hail. "Agent. You're still alive."

"Yes. I've successfully retrieved high-value targets Agrippa Glimmershine and Aerion Featherquill, and they are working on continuing cure research while I am preparing to attack the spellcaster. It should be down before dawn."

"Very well. Know that once the spellcaster is disabled and we can send more Agents in, you will be pulled out and dismissed for desertion."

Rainy blinked. "Wha-... Desertion? Why? I'm reporting back to you right now!"

"You cut comms and ignored orders to go on a ridiculous, unnecessary side quest. We can't afford having agents taking such risks when so much is at stake."

"It wasn't unnecessary. Aerion was critical to the reestablishment of power to the base and the development of a cure. Besides, I'm a Shadowbolt! It's in the Directive that I can be fully autonomous!"

"You still disobeyed a direct order from command, which is grounds to label you as rogue. We've had enough problems with rogue agents already."

That made Rainy's ears perk up. "So the rumors about the first wave are true then, huh? You abandoned them, and now you're mad they're rogue?"

"Agent-"

"What about the virus, is that true too?" she continued, a biting edge to her words. "Did you really send me in here knowing I'd get infected in the process?"

Command fell silent, and that was all the confirmation that Rainy needed.

"You twisted motherfuckers, you knew!" Rainy yelled. "You fucking knew flying in would kill me, and you told me to do it anyway. You turned me into a dead mare walking!"

"We couldn't risk you backing out if we told you the truth," Command interrupted. "You’re a soldier. Think of it as a necessary sacrifice for the greater good."

"You lied to me!" Rainy spat with venom, the edges of her vision starting to turn red.

"Perhaps we were… economical with the truth, yes... But what choice did we have? What choice do you have now? This virus, this civil unrest, it will destroy all of Equestria if we don't stop it here. Your death, our deaths, it's all irrelevant now compared to what we will lose if we fail. This is bigger than you, Agent. We are all dead mares walking."

As Command spoke, Rainy's vision turned crimson. In a flurry of rage, she ripped the earpiece out of her ear and the commlink off her uniform, throwing them to the marbled floor. She smashed the devices underhoof, splintering the devices into shards of plastic and wiring and sending them skittering across the ground. She screamed, but she couldn't hear herself; her ears were ringing too much to register. She didn't stop until her equipment was reduced to tiny pieces below her, her only link to command severed for good.

As she stared at her trembling hooves, Agrippa and Aerion quickly galloped out of the lab over to her.

"Rainy? What happened?" Agrippa asked with a concerned look on her face.

Rainy took several deep breaths to calm her shaky voice before answering, "Command lied to me... They let me get infected on purpose. And now they say I'll be pulled and investigated for desertion..."

"See? I told you," Aerion added unhelpfully.

"Please don't," Rainy said, her eyes squeezing shut.

Agrippa shot a glare at Aerion before turning her attention back to Rainy. "Well... what are you gonna do now?"

Rainy sighed. "Well, I'm gonna have to take down the spellcaster so you guys can get supplies and help, but after that... I don't know."

"If you get pulled, we won't have any way to study the virus. Unless one of us gets infected as well. And you'll probably just die in containment..." Agrippa said with a frown.

"I'll figure something out. But right now, that spellcaster is our priority," Rainy said as she straightened up. "Aerion, I'm gonna need to borrow some of your tech... if that's okay."

Aerion nodded. "Right this way..."

"...The comm just went dead."

"For fuck's sake. Is everyone in this Division a hotheaded maniac?"

"She was one of the best we had... I don't know what went wrong."

"It doesn't matter what went wrong, what matters now is that we have yet another rogue agent running amok in downtown Manehattan, and we can't find one pony willing to stay loyal to us. It's a damn joke at this point."

"Ma'am, if I may-"

"Can it. Send someone else in, before we lose this city completely. And for Celestia's sake, make sure it's someone loyal this time! I'm getting really tired of these traitors."

"...Of course. Contacting potential agents now..."

Chapter 7

Rainy really hoped she had the physical and mental strength for yet another firefight. She had been running missions the entire day now, and here she was running off on another one.

Luckily, she had working gear now, all provided by Aerion before she left the station. Rainy glanced down at her equipment as she walked along the snow-covered streets. She had a new smart watch, a new SPARC brick, and HUD contact lenses to replace the bulky goggles she had previously. Her motion tracker pinged away in the corner of her vision, showing her that the road in front of her was clear. The weapon indicator showed a full stock of ammo for her rifle as well as more flashbangs, which she had collected before she left the Base of Operations. And she had her new piece of equipment, the biofoam injector, strapped to her tool belt. She felt like a brand-new mare with all her gear back online, even if her body felt tired and sluggish.

Her new target was a tall office building by the bank of the East River. It had a large spellcaster placed on the top, with an excellent vantage point of the river to stop any reinforcements or supplies coming in from Hooflyn. Command apparently had no idea how the weapon was brought into the city or who was operating it, but after the events of the past few hours, she was starting to doubt if that was really the case. She just needed to take it down and allow for more supplies to reach the ponies at the Maneway Station; whatever happened after that, she would deal with it as it came.

Along with all her restored HUD functions, her SPARC also picked up a new, unknown radio signal broadcasting from somewhere in the city. Strange... it was the only one still online. The whole city was in a blackout; where was this signal coming from? Rainy let curiosity get the better of her and tuned in to the broadcast as she walked along.

"...Hello, Manehattan, it's your favorite pony, Suri Polomare. You probably recognize me from Fashion Week a few years back, heh... a real breakout performance, I'd say. Unfortunately, the judges didn't see it that way... but I digress.

If you're hearing this, you're either one of the lucky pegasi or unicorns that happen to live in the city and can just hide from the virus, or you're one of the lucky earth ponies to have some kind of... genetic immunity to this disease, like myself. It's a real blessing, let me tell you... Watching all our friends and loved ones drop dead in the street from this invisible flu, if the ponies with guns in the streets didn't get to them first. I knew it was everypony for themselves in the big city, but I didn't think it would get this bad.

So, anyway, I was just sitting there, in my dark little apartment, gunfire echoing down in the street below, when I thought to myself: there's a lot of scared ponies out there. A lot. They're looking for information, for guidance, for reassurance. The EUP isn't giving it to us. The government isn't giving it to us. They've left us alone in the dark here and told us to hang tight. Good luck.

So I decided: why don't I be that voice in the darkness? That pony giving all you lovely folks hope, direction, information. I booted up this radio broadcaster, and after tinkering with it for a bit, I should be broadcasting to every borough in Manehattan, maybe beyond. I have a lot of sources around the city, and I'll get you the accurate facts as soon as I hear them.

I'm gonna call this thing.... Wouldn't You Know It, a... pirate radio broadcast. This is Suri Polomare, and you're gonna be hearing a lot more from me from now on, m'kay?"

The radio message was interrupted by an incoming call, helpfully called out by her SPARC. Rainy patched into the signal, severing her link to the strange broadcast.

"Hey Rainy," Agrippa said over the commlink. "We're just testing to see if the short-range communications on your new SPARC are working. Can you hear me okay?"

"Yeah, I hear you," was Rainy's curt reply, her attention now directed to the street in front of her as she got closer to the target.

"Perfect," Agrippa responded, followed by a moment of hesitant silence. "Are... you doing okay? I know it's been a long day for you, it's been a long day for all of us."

"I'm fine," Rainy replied simply.

"Okay... I'm pretty sure you're just saying that, but as the resident doctor at the base—and probably the only doctor still in the city—you can talk to me if you need anything, okay?"

"Noted. I'm coming up on the spellcaster now, gonna need to go radio-silent to stop them from locking on."

There's a disappointed sigh from the other end. "Got it. Stay safe."

Once the link was closed, Rainy let out a sigh of her own as she walked down the street, leaving hoofprints on the freshly fallen snow below. She regretted giving Agrippa the cold shoulder, especially given how rough their relationship was already, but she had other, more pressing matters on her mind. The main one being the giant spellcaster that towered above her, perched on top of a large office building.

The spellcaster was an impressive piece of magical engineering, developed for Equestria's Armed Forces overseas. Shaped like a large cannon with the cockpit nestled underneath the barrel, it used a spell maneframe to enlarge a combat spell before firing it through the barrel at the target, often grown large enough to destroy large vehicles and even buildings. It was used for flying targets, vehicular warfare, all-out fighting... not civilian crowd control in one of the largest Equestrian cities. What was it doing here?

As she approached the building, a pair of voices audible over the whistling wind made her pause. Rainy slipped behind an inert carriage and moved closer, eavesdropping on the conversation.

“Why does Dusk want us standing guard down here?” asked a stallion's voice.

“So no one tries to attack us, stupid,” a mare's voice replied with a snarky tone.

“No, I mean why here? Why aren’t we standing guard on top of the building? We’d have a better view of the area, and we’d be in a less vulnerable position."

“That’s because she already has guys standing guard up there.”

“Then why does she need us down here?”

“...Shut the hell up, dumbass.”

So these were the ponies operating and defending the spellcaster. Rainy took a peek around the carriage to catch a glimpse of the two voices she had heard. A stallion and a mare stood side by side in front of the front door of the office building, shifting uncomfortably as the snow fell heavier and heavier around them. They wore white jackets with a geometric design of a bird emblazoned on their sleeves. Dark bulletproof vests were visible underneath, and they carried rifles as high-tech as Rainy's own. These ponies weren't rioters; they were packing heat and meant business.

A speaker mounted somewhere on the outside of the building crackled to life with an unnatural, electronic squawking noise, making Rainy flinch.

"PLEASE COMPLY TO ALL REQUESTS FROM FREELANCER PERSONNEL. THE LIFE YOU SAVE, COULD BE YOUR OWN."

Freelancers... that sounded vaguely familiar. They might've been the subject of one of her monthly intel briefings, one she only paid half attention to. They were... a PMC of some sort, hired by the Crown to assist the royal guards overseas. That explained how they had a spellcaster. What were they doing in Manehattan, shooting down supply helicopters and imposing martial law?

Luckily, the thick snowfall had disguised her approach from the guards standing higher up on the building, as no alarm seemed to be raised. Given the fact that these were PMC ponies—trained soldiers—Rainy figured the front door would be the only available way in or out. She had to get past these two guards first.

Rainy straightened up to rest her rifle on the hood of the carriage she was hiding behind, aiming down the sights at the head of the stallion soldier. However, something gave her pause, and she was unable to pull the trigger. These may be mercenaries actively working to shoot down supply helicopters into the city, but they were still ponies. Like with the rioters from before, she still had to give them an option to surrender. Maybe this was just a misunderstanding of some sort.

Rainy lowered her rifle and stepped out from behind the carriage, walking towards the two guards while waving a hoof. "Hey! Don't shoot! I'm friendly!"

The two ponies jolted in shock before raising their own rifles, aiming them right at Rainy's chest as she approached.

"Stay back, civilian! This is a Freelancer-occupied base, vacate the area now!" the stallion called out as Rainy approached.

"Shit, look at her watch," the mare soldier said with a hiss. "She's with the Division!"

Whelp. That ruse was over as quickly as it started. It was worth a shot.

Rainy dove behind the nearby carriage pileup as gunshots rang out, impacting into the snow-covered ground and pinging off the carriages’ metal frames. She pressed up against one of the wheels and readied her own rifle once again, waiting for a pause in the gunfire before rolling off to fire some shots of her own. The Freelancers ducked away from the bullets and smartly took cover as well; they seemed way more disciplined than the rioters she had been fighting against.

The mare Freelancer activated her radio, betraying her position to Rainy when her voice rang out. "Emerald Two to Commander Dusk Fire, we have an armed hostile at the south entrance of the building, requesting immediate assistance. It's a Division agent."

Rainy's earpiece clicked to life, and her new SPARC chimed in her ear. [ALERT: INTERCEPTED TRANSMISSION. NOW PLAYING.]

"Confirmed, one armed Shadowbolt hostile at the south entrance," a new voice from what Rainy assumed was the Freelancer's radio said over the transmission; it was a mare's voice as well, with the tall vowels of a Braytish accent. "Deploying Sapphire Team to assist. ETA, 45 seconds."

45 seconds. She needed to take these two out and get inside fast, before the reinforcements arrived and the fight became near impossible. With rioters, she could deal with a numbers disadvantage; trained Freelancers, not so much. Especially in the tired state she was in.

Rainy pulled a flashbang off her tool belt and tossed it where her motion tracker told her the Freelancers were hiding. Once it erupted, she slipped out from behind cover and dashed forward to make her move. With both Freelancers stunned, she galloped to the closer pony's hiding spot and vaulted over the hood of the carriage, landing on the other side and firing point blank into the stallion. She then turned and fired at the mare.... just as the other Freelancer fired as well, both shots ringing out in the quiet Manehattan night. The Freelancer's bullet ripped through Rainy's upper shoulder, nicking bone before exiting out the other side; Rainy's bullet punched right through the other mare's forehead, causing her to crumple in a lifeless heap on the ground.

Rainy cried out in pain as she collapsed as well; her hoof clutched her shoulder and came away bloody. She fumbled with the first aid injector on her belt and slammed it into her thigh, the needle pumping healing magic into her body and patching up her shoulder in seconds. Soon, the pain faded away, and when she shrugged the shoulder, it felt like she hadn't been shot at all. This thing was a life saver... and if she was going to be fighting Freelancers all night, she was bound to take a couple more hits. She'd need it, a lot.

The only downside to the injector was that it had to recharge after each use, so if she was injured again while it wasn't ready, she was out of luck. Rainy clipped it back on her toolbelt before stepping past the two dead bodies towards the door... only after stopping and snagging one of their pistols to replace the one she gave to Agrippa. She wasn't going to be caught without her sidearm twice, not after what happened last time.

However, before she could make it to the door, her motion tracker lit up with contacts. Dark figures started to file down the flight of stairs inside the building's lobby, heading straight towards the entrance. That had to be the reinforcements. Rainy ducked away from the door and galloped off to the side of the building, slipping around the corner right as Sapphire Team made its way out into the snow.

Rainy's SPARC chimed again as it interrupted another Freelancer transmission.

"Sapphire Team, report," the Braytish voice from before ordered, who Rainy assumed was Commander Dusk Fire.

"Emerald One and Two are KIA. No sign of any hostiles," a stallion's voice responded, his words audible from her hiding spot as well. "We'll run a full sweep, but put the base on high alert, just in case."

On cue, the newly-arrived Freelancers split up and began searching through the thick-falling snow. Luckily, the new flakes had covered her hoofprints, concealing her location as they looked through the carriages. Rainy waited until they were out of sight before slinking back towards the entrance, pressing against the wall to stay out of sight until she could push her way inside the lobby.

"Look here. Blood, but no body," one of the Freelancers said over the hacked transmission link.

"A lot of it, too. But no blood trail anywhere," another stallion replied. "If they were injured that badly, they couldn't have made it far. Keep searching!"

Hopefully that would keep them busy for a while. Rainy closed the door behind her silently before slinging her rifle to the ready as she scanned the lobby. This was an office building, so there was a small, but fancy reception area in front of the elevators and stairwells. However, there was no one there to greet her, and the lack of power meant that the elevators were out of operation. The whole place was trashed, both by the panic following the initial infection and by Freelancers taking their boredom out on the equipment in the room; papers were strewn across the floor, the receptionist's computer was smashed and blown to bits, and the walls were marked with bullet holes.

There were no signs of life, but with the building going on high alert, Rainy assumed it wouldn't be quiet for long. She raised her rifle and made her way towards the nearest staircase, making her way up as the intercom clicked to life.

"ALL FREELANCER PERSONNEL. POSSIBLE ARMED THREAT DETECTED. THREAT LEVEL: YELLOW. ALL GUARD POSITIONS SHOULD REMAIN ON HIGH ALERT, AND ALL OFF DUTY PONIES SHOULD BE PREPARED FOR ACTION."

They knew she was around, but they didn't know she was inside the building yet, so she still had some element of surprise. Rainy quickly made her way up the stairs, and the first few floors zoomed by without incident. However, she eventually ran into a roadblock; somepony, in the panic of the pandemic, had tried to bring their office desk with them as they evacuated. They had apparently failed, and the desk was now wedged fully across the width of the hallway, with its spilled contents and several popped-open suitcases filling in the gaps. Seriously?

Either this was a pony's shockingly clumsy error, or the Freelancers had done it on purpose to block off the stairwell. Either way, there was no way to continue going up on this staircase. Her only way forward was to exit the stairwell and look for an unblocked way up.

Rainy peered through the small window in the door to see an office space full of cubicles, with no ponies in sight. She pushed the bar down and swung the door open, entering rifle-first and checking her corners before making her way through the room. These Freelancers weren't as destructive as the rioters that had vandalized Aerion Technologies and Madison Mare Garden, but they had created a fair share of messes in this building; drawers were thrown open and computer monitors were slammed to the ground, while other cubicles appeared completely untouched. But rather than looking like mindless destruction like in the lobby downstairs, the messes created here almost seemed intentional... like the Freelancers were looking for something. Rifling through drawers for equipment and supplies, smashing computers open for electronics. What were they looking for?

As she rounded the corner, she quickly got her answer. Rainy gasped and slipped back behind the wall out of sight when she got a glimpse at what was on the other side: a group of Freelancers standing around a table, focusing on a pile of electronics stacked on top. Luckily, none of them were looking her way, so she remained undetected for now.

"What are you doing again, exactly?" a stallion's voice asked.

"Modifying this shit so it's actually useful," a mare responded, followed by the sound of a wrench tightening a bolt. "The plague messes with electronics too, puts all our scanners and equipment on the fritz. But if you fit 'em with a magic filtration system, it'll keep everything running smoothly."

"Oh yeah? Where'd you learn about that?"

"Commander Dusk herself. Apparently, she got the tip from our new friends in the city center. Took forever to find enough computers with filters in this place to salvage, but all our gear should be working again soon."

New friends? Rainy didn't know anything about that. But she knew about the city center; that's where Aerion told her the Dark Zone was located. A place of lawlessness and anarchy, filled with massive amounts of rioters… and whatever was left of the First Wave of Shadowbolts. It was very unlikely that a raggedy bunch of looters and opportunistic civilians would know about the magic filtration systems, so either there was another group in the dark zone, someone more dangerous... or the Freelancers were collaborating with a rogue agent.

The implications made her shiver, but Rainy pushed the thoughts out of her mind. If she ever came face to face with this Commander Dusk, she could ask her herself. But for now, she needed to focus on getting to that spellcaster.

The group of Freelancers around the corner didn't seem heavily armed, and some of them were without guns at all. They must have been the tech experts of the group, developing technology and staying away from the front lines. Not ponies worth shooting in cold blood.

Rainy stepped out around the corner, rifle raised this time and aiming right at the back of the nearest Freelancer. "Freeze. Hooves in the air, now."

The six ponies froze and turned their heads in unison to look at the newcomer.

"It's the intruder!" one of them hissed under their breath, slowly reaching for the pistol strapped to their waist.

"Correct. And if you don't put your weapons and radios on the table and put your hooves up, I will shoot all of you," Rainy threatened as she switched the aim of her rifle to the pony who had spoken.

It took a couple moments for the tech ponies to agree with her demands, and their hoof-held radios and guns joined the pieces of technology on the table before they put their hooves up. With a jerk of her rifle, Rainy silently ordered them to file into a nearby closet, the ponies shuffling inside without complaint.

"The Equestrian Government thanks you for your cooperation," Rainy snarked before shutting the door and locking it. It would take them a while to figure out how to break out, and by the time they did, she would be long gone.

With the Freelancers taken care of, Rainy turned her attention to the table of equipment they had been working on. Most of it was disassembled and in multiple pieces, but there were a few devices still intact. One of them caused her to pause, blood running cold.

The device looked like a briefcase of sorts, with a carrying handle on top and a folded-up tripod underneath. However, when she tugged on the handle, the device unfolded; it stood up on its three legs, and a barrel poking out of the front of the box along with a laser sight to scan for hostiles. Through a see-through panel on the side, Rainy could see that the inside was filled with bullets, ready to fire. A portable, automated turret.

This was Division Tech. Jury-rigged to work without the assistance of a SPARC, sure, but Division Tech nonetheless. Was it stolen from the bodies of fallen First Wave agents? Or was it gifted by the survivors? She didn't know which was worse.

Rainy pressed down on the handle once more, and the turret collapsed back to its portable briefcase-like form. She clipped it to her tool belt as well, right next to her first-aid injector. She would have to readjust it to work with her SPARC once again, but it was back in Division hooves.

With the room clear, Rainy was able to make her way through the maze of cubicles to the stairwell on the north side of the building, and she began ascending up the steps once again. She estimated that she was about halfway up the building when she had been forced to take a detour, so it would only take her a few more minutes to reach the top. Assuming the climb would be uninterrupted.

As she climbed, rifle raised to check her corners on each level, she let her mind wander a bit to brainstorm just how she was going to disable the spellcaster. None of the equipment she had would create a big enough explosion to put it out of operation, and she hadn't run into an armory to steal any explosives from yet. Hopefully the cockpit had a self-destruct button, but she doubted the engineers would be that stupid. If all else failed, she could fire the spellcaster at the building herself, bringing the whole thing down. Though, with her wings out of commission, the odds of her escaping such an explosion would be slim.

Sounds of gunfire snapped her out of her thought-process, reverberating through the building and echoing up and down the stairwell. They were quiet enough to tell her that the action wasn't near her... but what was it?

Her SPARC helpfully pinged her. [ALERT: INTERCEPTED TRANSMISSION.]

"Sapphire Four to Commander Dusk, we have an intruder in the building!" a panicked Freelancer yelled into the commlink while gunfire and pained screams rang out in the background.

"Already acknowledged, Sapphire Four," Commander Dusk replied coolly. "Benchley is preparing to deal with them now."

"No, there's another one! She's already taken out the rest of my squad, we can't stop her! Requesting immediate backup—Gah!..."

After Sapphire Four's death scream, the gunfire stopped. Only ominous silence filled the radio link, followed by faint hoofsteps and the clink of hooves on the brass of spent bullet casings.

"Sapphire Four? Sapphire Team? Respond," Commander Dusk called out, but there was no response. "...Dammit. All units, we have a second intruder in the building. Divert to the southern stairwell to intercept."

A second attacker. Rainy hoped that they would be an ally, but she had a tough time figuring out just who would be coming to her aid. At the very least, they were drawing Freelancer attention to the other end of the building, making her climb up the stairway eventless.

Soon, she reached the top of the stairwell, where she found the access door leading into the top level of the building. It didn’t lead her any higher than that; she would have to find a roof access spot somewhere on this floor. Rainy slowly pushed the door open, poking her rifle through the crack as she stepped out of the stairway and scanned the area.

The top of the building was a two-story restaurant, with the second floor consisting of a balcony ringing around the main floor. The walls were all roof-high windows, giving a panoramic view of the snow-covered city that was probably breathtaking before everything went to shit. But now, the night sky was filled with none of the bright lights, making the city look bleak and lifeless. Tables and chairs were scattered, tipped over, destroyed, the order of the room turned to chaos by the panic of the pandemic and the bored impulses of the Freelancers.

As Rainy took in the view, her SPARC intercepted another transmission and piped it through to her earpiece.

"Commander Dusk to Benchley. We have the first intruder on camera feed, she's nearing your location. What's your status?" Dusk's now-familiar voice asked, a tinge of worry poisoning her normally calm and collected tone.

"Almost ready, Commander. Just putting a few finishing touches on the equipment," a stallion replied.

"Perfect. Remember: she's here for the spellcaster, no doubt. You cannot let her get up to the roof. Understood?"

"Understood. Don't worry, she doesn't stand a chance. Benchley out."

The silence of the floor suddenly felt ominous and oppressive now that she knew she was being watched. And that she was seconds away from being attacked. Rainy froze, her eyes focusing on her motion tracker while her ears swiveled to catch any out-of-place noises. There was more gunfire in the floors below her, as the Freelancers struggled to contain the second intruder. The snow and the wind whistled outside the windows, the flakes coming down even thicker and faster and turning the dark night white. Finally, she noticed a muffled noise coming from behind the kitchen doors of the restaurant, and her head turned to focus on the sound.

"I need to be out there," the stallion from the transmission grumbled, his voice muffled from behind the door. "What's taking so damn long?"

"Sorry, had a problem with the tank straps. Should be all good now," a mare reassured him.

"About fuckin' time. Let's go, we've got a Shadowbolt bitch to burn."

Rainy's motion tracker lit up with two targets directly in front of her as heavy hoofsteps vibrated the ground underneath her, heading to the swinging kitchen doors directly in front of her. She dove behind an overturned table as the doors swung open, two new hostiles stepping in the room with her.

A few moments of agonizing silence felt like hours as she cowered behind the table, followed by the sound of heavy thuds of hooves on ground as who she assumed was Benchley made his way into the room. There was a huff as he sniffed the air like a dog, followed by a frustrated growl.

"We know you're in here... come out and play!"

Rainy took a deep breath and risked a peek around the side of the table... and quickly had to stuff a hoof in her mouth to stifle the shocked gasp that left her muzzle.

What she thought was a stallion... wasn't a stallion at all. It stood on two bull-like legs, its hands gripping a large weapon with flames licking out of the tip. Its body was covered in thick body armor, and it had a large fuel tank strapped to its back. Its head had two large horns, and it was fitted with a ballistic helmet and a gas mask, beady bovine eyes visible behind the protective glass as they scanned the room. Benchley was a minotaur. And a large one at that, more than twice the height of the Freelancer mare that was flanking him.

He was so tall that each step caused the ground to vibrate, though the heavy equipment he was carrying probably helped. Benchley looked up to sniff the air once again, a strange strategy considering the fact he was wearing a gas mask.

"Scared, huh?" the minotaur said finally. "Guess we'll have to drive you out the hard way then."

With that, he raised his large weapon and pressed the trigger. Fire leapt from the nozzle at the end, engulfing the wood chairs and tables in front of him in white-hot flame! The carpet and tablecloths ignited immediately, followed quickly by the chairs. Rainy's thick table gave some resistance as the flames washed around her, singing her hair and causing her jumpsuit to sizzle against her white fur. But soon, her cover burst into flame as well, forcing her to stumble away with a fit of coughs as black smoke started to fill her lungs.

Benchley's yellow eyes locked onto her immediately, his smirk hidden behind his mask. "There you are," was all Rainy heard before the air was filled with fire once more, this time with no cover to protect her.

Rainy yelped and leapt to the side, weaving through the carnage of furniture that acted as kindling for his pyromania. The minotaur followed her with his flamethrower, the flames licking at her flank as she struggled to keep ahead of the deadly wave of heat. Protecting your headquarters by burning it down. An interesting strategy.

Soon, the air was filled with bullets that Rainy had to avoid as well, as the mare that flanked Benchley started to open fire. The smoke filling the air was filling her lungs as she dove behind a pillar, providing a more secure protection from the heat and the bullets as she caught her breath. However, a tingling sensation on her hindlegs drew her attention, and she looked down to see that her tail had caught fire, more than half of it consumed and turned to ashes. Rainy hissed and smothered the fire with her hooves.

She needed a way to distract him long enough to find a weak spot in his armor without him burning her to a crisp... and after she finished extinguishing her tail and examining her rump for damage, her eyes moved to her toolbelt, where her new addition swayed against her cutie mark. Perfect.

"You can't run forever, coward! Come out and face me like a real Shadowbolt!" Benchley jeered, Rainy's motion tracker telling her that he was rapidly approaching her new hiding spot.

The Division agent unclipped the turret and unfolded it before hurling it as far as she could into the midst of the burning room. Its tripod legs locking onto a still-upright table as it sprang to action. Because Rainy hadn't synced the device to her SPARC yet, it wouldn't recognize her as a friendly, but she was hidden behind the pillar out of sight, so it only had two targets to aim at. Its laser focused on the back of the Freelancer mare as her and Benchley approached the pillar and opened fire. A hail of rapid-fire rounds slammed into the mare, the first few stopped by the bulletproof vest underneath her white Freelancer jacket, but it wasn't enough. She barely had time to react before several bullets sliced through her back and out her chest, dropping her to the ground with a gurgle of blood in her throat.

The turret quickly turned to fire on Benchley after its first target went down, just as the minotaur began to turn to face the new threat. The bullets thudded harmlessly against his heavy armor as he hissed in frustration, and he brought his flamethrower around to douse the device in flames. With his back turned, Rainy took the opportunity to scamper away from the pillar to find a better hiding spot, sliding behind one of the few tables not yet caught on fire. She flipped it over and rested her rifle on the edge, firing precise shots to try to find a weak spot in Benchley's armor, but each round just pinged off him. By now, the turret's shell was starting to melt from the heat of the flames enveloping it, and the minotaur stopped just long enough to lift one of his cloven hooves and drive it into the device, smashing it into several useless pieces.

Rainy cursed under her breath and fired again as Benchley turned to face her; the bullet smacked into the reinforced glass of his gas mask, and cracks started to form in the visor. She risked one more shot as he prepared to fire, but it only nicked the top of his shoulder, and the air was filled with fire once again. Rainy was too slow to duck behind her cover, and her shoulder and upper foreleg were doused in flame before she was fully protected by the table.

Searing pain shot up her arm, and when she looked down, she saw that her fur had caught fire this time, while the surrounding jumpsuit started to melt into her skin. Rainy—in her tired, battle-weary state—tried patting the flame out with her hoof to no avail, only succeeding in burning her hoof as well while her skin started to blister underneath her burning fur. Then, finally, she dropped to roll herself along the scorched ground to smother the flames underneath her body.

Her foreleg was in agony, and each movement sent even more searing jolts of pain through her body, but there was no time to recover. Rainy forced herself to her three good hooves and stumbled off as Benchley closed the distance between them, but she didn't make it far. A second burst of flame engulfed her hind legs, scorching her hindquarters and dropping her to the ground with a shriek. Her whole body screamed with pain as her fur was burnt away, and she thrashed around in a desperate attempt to extinguish herself once again. Somehow, she succeeded, but only after her hind legs were so injured that she couldn't feel them anymore; thankfully, her nerves had burnt away as well.

Rainy managed to roll herself over onto her back to see Benchley standing over her, a triumphant smirk visible behind his cracked. She snarled defiantly up at him, but she was in no shape to put up any more resistance.

"Looks like the Second Wave isn't any better than the First. Shame, I was hoping for a challenge," the minotaur gloated.

Then, he lifted a hind hoof, aiming to crush her skull like he had so easily crushed her turret.

With the last ounce of strength she had left, Rainy reached down to her tool belt and pulled the pin off one of her flashbangs. Moments felt like hours as she stared at the underside of his cloven hoof, silently praying to whatever Goddess was listening that she was fast enough. Then, just as he began to bring his foot down, there was an explosion on her waist, and her whole world went white.

Her ears rang, her head spun, her vision faded from white to the afterimage of the minotaur standing over her... but it gave way to the sight of Benchley stumbling away from her, clutching at his ears in tortured pain. It took a moment for her disoriented body to respond, but she slowly picked her rifle back up and aimed as best she could at the distracted enemy, firing as many rounds as she could. Most of them missed entirely or thudded against his armor, but one lucky shot nicked the valve of his fuel tank. Hissing gas ignited as it left the punctured hole, building up in pressure and intensity despite Benchley's desperate attempts to fix it, before culminating in a giant explosion that blew the minotaur into several fleshy chunks.

Rainy covered her face with her one healthy forehoof as she was splattered with minotaur blood, and Benchley's remains were incinerated by the fireball created by the explosion. Soon, all that was left was Rainy, and the raging fire engulfing the room around her.

She tried to stand, but found her legs didn't respond to her anymore. A quick glance down showed her lower half was burnt red and black, with blisters replacing her scorched fur in a grotesque sight. She looked away as pain washed over her once again, the adrenaline subsiding to give way to agony.

With a shaky hoof, she pulled out her first aid device and hoped it could work a miracle.

As soon as the needle punctured her skin, relief flooded through her, and her head fell back with a thankful groan. When she looked back down at her body, she was greeted with the sight of her flesh and fur growing back along her legs and arm, and the searing pain dulled down to a manageable ache. However, the syringe wasn't a miracle worker; her tail didn't grow back from its burn-shortened length, and her jumpsuit remained scorched and melting in several places. In some spots, the burns were so severe that even the magic healing couldn't restore her fully; the skin underneath her white fur still glowed red and ached like a bad sunburn along her flanks and parts of her hind legs. Maybe the spell could only heal so much damage at once; she would have to try it again once it finished recharging to see if it would finish the job.

"...Dammit. Benchley is KIA," Commander Dusk's voice sighed into her ear. "What's the status of the second intruder?"

"...W-We can't slow her down! She's too quick!" a panicked Freelancer responded. "We're still trying to contain her in the southern hallway, but—"

The soldier's transmission gave way to immediate static as the link was severed by the assailant. A reminder that Rainy needed to keep moving before she caught up to her. She groaned and wiggled to test all four limbs before climbing back to her hooves, stumbling her way through the inferno towards the kitchen: the only place spared from the flames. However, as she made her way past the dead body of the Freelancer that had accompanied Benchley, she was greeted to an unusual sight on the ground; the shattered pieces of her automated turret were slowly sliding across the ground towards each other, illuminated in a pale blue magic aura. Even as the fires raged around her, Rainy stopped and watched as the pieces slid together once more, and bright blue lights appeared along the cracks as they fused together. Soon, the turret was whole once again, and it folded back into its portable briefcase mode to be carried.

The turrets had an auto-repair feature as well? That was extremely helpful. It was much more convenient than carrying around several of the devices in case one was destroyed. Rainy picked it up and clipped the handle back on her toolbelt before continuing her way through the smoke and flames to the exit doors.

The kitchen was where Benchley had prepared to fight her, and the room definitely looked like a makeshift armory. Unused fuel tanks and flamethrowers filled one corner, while other parts were stacked high with firearms and magazines filled with ammunition. Rainy made sure to refill her tool belt with magazines compatible with her rifle as she stumbled past.

However, what really caught her attention was a pile of explosives, carefully kept away from the rest of the munitions. It was filled with frag grenades, flashbangs.... and moldable C4 with an explosive timer. Jackpot.

Rainy clipped several grenades and flashbangs to her toolbelt before tucking as much C4 as she could carry underneath her wing. She didn't know the sturdiness of the spellcaster directly overhead, but even if it proved to be invincible, this much explosive power would crumble the building underneath it and topple it anyway. She just needed to give herself enough time to take the stairs back down to the ground and escape before they went off.

In the back of the kitchen, Rainy found the access ladder up to the roof, and she slung her rifle over her shoulder before making her way up. When she pushed the hatch up, she was hit with a strong wind directly to the face, nearly knocking her off the ladder from the force. She grunted and gripped the rungs as she forced herself up through the hatch onto the roof, hooves finding friction on the ground so she could stand upright.

The snowstorm had picked up in intensity, the roof already covered in several inch of snow; the air was so thick with the heavy flakes that made it hard to see anything off the edge of the building. The large spellcaster took up much of the rooftop space, and thankfully created enough of a barrier against the wind so that she wouldn't be blown off the edge. She didn't see any of the lookout guards that the Freelancers at the main entrance had referred to; maybe they had retreated inside once the weather took a turn for the worst, or to reinforce the Freelancers trying to hold back the other intruder.

There was still radio-silence from the Freelancers on the status of the second attacker; if they had killed her, they definitely would have reported in to Dusk at this point. No, the intruder was still out there, and based on the number of troops sent to stop her, she was a very deadly enemy. What could it possibly be? None of the options that Rainy could come up with made any sense. Rioters only attacked in packs, the EUP were scattered and in no fighting shape, Agrippa and Aerion had no fighting experience. Another Division agent? Command wouldn't send in another agent, would they? If they were, she'd appreciate the help... but in the back of her mind, she doubted it.

Rainy flared her one free wing to help keep her balance as she made her way to the base of the spellcaster, careful to not flap it accidentally and absorb even more of the virus. She stopped by the ladder up to the cockpit in order to unfurl her other wing, letting the moldable C4 charges tucked underneath it fall to the floor. Quickly, she stuck the explosive components to the spellcaster's singular base leg, molding it to the circular curvature until she had used every ounce. This much power would blow even magically-reinforced steel in two.

However, as she placed the explosive timer onto the C4 and set it—five minutes, enough time for her to make it down with some time to spare—her SPARC intercepted another secure transmission. However, this one wasn't a Freelancer-to-Freelancer commlink; this one was to a private, external source. One that had scrambled its origin and identification code.

"—several Division agents are attacking the spellcaster, and they've nearly reached me," Commander Dusk's familiar voice spoke first, as Rainy's SPARC dropped her right in the middle of the conversation. "They're back on the island, and they're definitely not happy."

"We knew they would try again. We had time to prepare. Which makes it all the more humiliating that you weren't able to stop them," a new voice responded, scrambled slightly to give it an electronic tone, but still distinctly a mare.

Rainy was aware of the timer ticking down next to her, but her curiosity got the better of her. An unknown enemy, working with the Freelancers? This was way too important to ignore. She synced the C4 timer to her HUD to give her a countdown before she grabbed onto the ladder and climbed her way up towards the cockpit of the spellcaster.

"Using the spellcaster was your idea. And now the whole world is going to blame it on me. Bloody brilliant," Dusk continued, anger creeping into her normally even-keeled voice.

"It was necessary, Dusk," the mysterious voice insisted. "If we were ever going to keep a secure hoofhold on this city, we needed to stop the flow of supplies and reinforcements inside. And we succeeded, for a time. But now that they've broken through our defenses, that task becomes a whole lot harder."

"Yeah, tell me something I don't know."

Rainy reached the top of the ladder as the wind continued to whistle past her ears, black and orange mane billowing around her as white flecks of snow stuck in the strands. A small balcony connected the ladder to the door into the cockpit, and she re-equipped her rifle before pressing against the wall, slowly making her way to the entrance.

"Not everything is lost, Commander," the voice answered. "They don't have a cure, and they barely have a presence in the city. It will take them weeks to build up enough of a force to brave the Dark Zone. And we'll be ready to counter them at every turn. Eventually, they'll realize it's worthless to waste even more lives on a contaminated, uninhabitable city, and they'll leave it to us."

Dusk scoffed. "Sure, but that doesn't change the fact that they're coming to kill me right now."

"Why is that my problem? I assume you've created an escape plan for such a scenario—" the unknown caller suddenly paused. "—...hang on. I'm getting feedback on the link."

"We've been compromised?"

"Looks like. Cutting the link now."

"Wait, what about—" was all Dusk was able to get out before Rainy's SPARC lost the connection.

That was her cue to move. Rainy sprang through the open doorway into the cockpit, rifle raised as she took in the scene all at once. At the control dashboard stood a dark gray mare, presumably Commander Dusk Fire, looking at a screen with the dark silhouette of a pony staring back at her for a split-second before the video link was severed.

Flanking Dusk were two Freelancers, her bodyguards, one of them facing the door Rainy was currently barging through, the other facing the other door on the opposite side of the cockpit. The one facing her yelled out a warning as he raised his rifle, but he wasn't fast enough, as two shots rang out and punched into his chest. The other bodyguard tried to turn, but instead took four bullets to the back, both enemies dropping to the floor at Dusk's hooves.

Dusk Fire jumped back with a yelp at the sudden eruption of noise, and Rainy got her first good look at the Freelancer Commander. She was a pegasus, taller than Rainy, with dark gray fur that was almost black in the starlight. Her indigo-blue mane was done up in bangs with splotches of royal blue and bright orange adding color to the otherwise dark color palette. Her eyes were a dark navy, and her cutie mark was covered up by her Freelancer Commander uniform, white in color like all the others, with that geometric bird symbol on her breast pocket.

“Freeze! Commander Dusk Fire, isn’t it?” Rainy called out, rifle pointed directly at the other mare's chest.

Dusk promptly froze, her gaze scanning the space behind Rainy before looking her in the eyes. “Yes, you are correct. Though, I was expecting to see two of you.”

“Commander, you are under arrest for treason, hostile occupation of Equestrian territory, and the murder of Equestrian citizens by you and your troops," Rainy continued, ignoring Dusk's attempt at distraction. "As a Shadowbolt Division Agent, it is within my authority to detain you until conditions are sufficient to deport you to Canterlot to stand trial. The implementation of Directive 51 means the right to a speedy trial has been waived—”

“I know what my bloody rights are, Agent," Dusk interrupted with a barely contained snarl. "Spare me.”

“Very well," Rainy shrugged, rifle not moving an inch. "Who was on the commlink?”

Dusk said nothing, only glaring at Rainy with anger burning in her navy eyes, the blood from her fallen bodyguards pooling around her hooves and staining them.

“Who were you talking to? Tell me now!” Rainy tried again as she raised her gun threateningly, pointing the barrel right between Dusk's eyes.

Again, Dusk said nothing, calling Rainy's bluff; she had no intention of actually shooting the Commander, obviously. Killing her would make the Freelancers leaderless and scattered, yes, but the answers she could give them were much more valuable. She would have to press for more answers once they were at the Base of Operations... away from the spellcaster and the C4 that was minutes from exploding.

However, Dusk's eyes drifted off to focus on something just beyond Rainy's head, just as her motion tracker detected something immediately behind her. Before she could turn or react, the cold barrel of a pistol was pressed against the back of her head, nudging her forward slightly from the pressure.

“Put the gun down, Agent,” a familiar, feminine voice behind her ordered.

Rainy turned her head as much as she dared, catching a glimpse of the pony behind her in her peripheral vision. She saw a gold mane and cyan blue fur hidden behind a familiar purple and black jumpsuit; the same one that Rainy was wearing herself. Her wings were flared and dripping with blood from bullet nicks and knife gouges, and her golden eyes were practically staring daggers right into her. She was right; this mare was more than familiar.

“…Lightning?” Rainy choked out in disbelief. The second intruder was another Division Agent after all?

“That’s Agent Dust to you, traitor," Lightning responded coldly, applying more pressure against her skull with her pistol. "Put your weapon on the ground and put your hooves in the air.”

Oh no. They had sent another Agent... because they thought she had gone rogue. Because she had yelled, disobeyed, smashed her commlink, and never checked back in. Of course the new agent would go straight for the spellcaster to take it down. And of course, there would be a standing order to kill or capture her on sight. She had walked right into a trap of her own making.

And the new Agent was none other than Lightning Dust. A Wonderbolt reject turned Shadowbolt, obsessed with being the best no matter the cost. She had been recruited around the same time as Rainy, and Rainy’s impressive skills had guaranteed that their relationship was one of jealous hatred. And now, she was here to prove that she could do what Rainy couldn't, and Rainy could guarantee that Lightning wouldn't let that opportunity slip away.

“Lightning, listen. I’m on your side," Rainy started, her rifle not moving from its aim at Dusk's forehead. "Command, they lied to us—”

“Shut up!" Lightning interrupted with a bark. "You lost any leniency the second you decided to go rogue. Gun down, now. Don’t think I won’t hesitate to put a bullet in you if you make one wrong move.”

Rainy decided to placate the enraged Lightning and lowered the rifle barrel, though she didn't place it on the ground; she didn't trust the other agent to not just immediately shoot her once she did. "I'm not rogue, Lightning. There's been a misunderstanding. I'm here to destroy the spellcaster, same as you."

"Really? Because Command doesn't think so. And I trust their word a lot more than yours. For all I know, you're here trying to join up with her!" Lightning retorted, gesturing with her pistol towards Dusk before returning her aim to Rainy's head.

Rainy looked back over at the Freelancer Commander after Lightning referred to her, only to see her rear end disappear out of the far-side door of the cockpit, followed closely by her blue and orange tail. With the two agents distracted, she had taken the opportunity to slip away.

“No!” Rainy yelled in anguish as she galloped forward to give chase, to maybe snag a piece of her tail as it disappeared out of the doorframe... but before she could get there, she felt something slam into her back, slicing through her innards and out her stomach. A bullet.

Her body immediately went limp, and she fell to the ground with an unceremonious thud, her lower half burning with a stinging pain. Rainy reached down to her stomach, and her white hoof came away stained red with her own blood. As far as she could tell, the bullet had avoided her vital organs and her spine, but judging from where it came out, it had probably sliced through her intestines, maybe her kidney as well. She would bleed out right here on the spellcaster floor if she didn't heal herself soon.

“I told you to stay still, Rainy!" Lightning said with an annoyed snarl as she advanced forward to stand over her.

"Y-You let her get away," Rainy stated simply, quickly falling into shock as her blood pooled underneath her.

She didn't know if her first aid injector was charged yet, and even if it was, Lightning would probably just shoot her again if she reached for it. She would either expire here or spend the rest of her virus-shortened life in Division custody. It was over.

"Sorry, but a rogue Agent is a lot more important to me than some random bitch roleplaying as a military leader," Lightning retorted, raising her pistol once more. "I'm taking this city back, Rainy. And you're going to be rotting in a jail cell for the rest of your pathetic life. Was it worth it?"

However, she still had one hope. The timer on her HUD was steadily ticking down, now within ten seconds of detonation. A deadline that would've given her a comfortable amount of time to get clear was now moments away from exploding underneath her. That would provide a very big distraction, if it didn't immediately kill her from the force. She was about to find out.

"...Not yet," Rainy muttered in defiance, just before her world erupted into white.

A sudden explosion knocked Lightning off of her hooves, the whole spellcaster lurching underneath her as the viewing window shattered into a thousand pieces of glass. Her ears rang, and she felt blood begin to drip out of one of them down the side of her head. Dizzy and disoriented, Lightning tried to look around, only to see that Rainy had vanished. Her blood pool was still there on the smoldering wreckage of the cockpit, and a trail of red droplets led right to the open door that Dusk had slipped out of minutes before.

"Dammit!" She cursed out loud, the sound faded and distant in one of her ears. She tried to jump to her hooves to give chase, but another bout of dizziness knocked her right back down to the ground, groaning as her body ached and her head spun.

She huffed and tried again, this time managing to find her footing as the world spun around her. The explosion—whatever it was—had knocked her pistol away from her, and she had to look for a few seconds to find it amongst the wreckage and broken glass. But as she reached down to pick it up, it suddenly skittered away from her hoof, sliding across the ground to the back of the cockpit. Lightning swore at the inconvenience, but it took her a second to realize that it wasn't just her weapon; the whole spellcaster was starting to tip, leaning precariously over the edge of the building.

Lightning yelped in panic, the pistol immediately forgotten as the spellcaster started to fall faster and faster. She dashed up towards the far side door as glass shards and smaller debris started to slide past her, hooves having trouble finding traction on the increasing incline. Finally, she reached the threshold, and she looked out to see the rooftop tilting out of view as the spellcaster started to fall off the edge of the building. The explosion had completely severed the base of the weapon, and it was leaning off the edge of the roof like a seesaw with the base tilted up into the air.

Her head was still ringing, and her balance was shot, but using the base’s leg to get back to the rooftop was her best bet. By now, the spellcaster had tilted a full 90 degrees and was falling fast, allowing Lightning to pull herself through the door and onto the side of the cockpit like she was standing on flat ground. Then, she ran as fast as she dared to go without losing her balance, her steady pegasus hooves finding purchase on the scorched metal as the spellcaster started to slide off under its own weight. She finally reached the blow-apart end as it slipped off the edge as well, plummeting the spellcaster into the air down to the ground below. But just before the roof slipped out of reach, Lightning leapt.

She slammed into the office building roof and rolled with the impact to cushion her fall, her body throwing up snow as she slid for several meters. Then, after a couple seconds to catch her breath and check to see if anything was broken, she forced herself back to her hooves and stumbled back to the edge of the roof. Down below, the spellcaster had crumpled from the impact on the street below, punching through the concrete and crushing the bottleneck of abandoned carriages below it. And behind her, the explosion had blown a hole through the roof of the building as well, revealing the still-burning top floor underneath.

How did this happen? Maybe Dusk had used a self-destruct feature to cover her tracks, but it seemed odd that she would destroy her own weapon. Maybe Rainy had rigged the explosion to cover her own tracks, but why would a rogue agent want to destroy the only thing still keeping the Division and EUP troops out of the city? It had to have been Commander Dusk's doing. It was the only thing that made sense.

But no one else had to know that. This was her glory to claim. And with no one else with her, she didn't have to share the fame with anyone else.

Lightning tapped on her SPARC to open a secure link back to Shadowbolt HQ. "This is Agent Dust to Command."

"This is Command, go ahead," the familiar voice chimed immediately.

"The spellcaster has been neutralized. I repeat, the spellcaster has been neutralized," Lightning reported, a glow of pride swelling in her chest. "The Freelancer battalion defending it has been eliminated."

"Excellent work, Agent. With the skies clear once again, this will go a long way in re-establishing control of the city. Any sign of Commander Dusk Fire, or any rogue agents?"

A moment of silent hesitation from Lightning followed. My glory, no one else's. "...No, nothing."

"Understood," Command responded. "Link up with the EUP survivors stationed at the Maneway Station and await further orders. The first supply drop will arrive at dawn, once the storm lets up. This is the first in a long string of victories, Agent. Welcome back to the winning side."

"Thank you, Command. See you soon," Lightning replied before ending the call.

She stepped forward to the edge of the roof, the snow and the wind blowing through her mane as she looked out over the silent city. She was exhausted and beaten up from fighting her way through the entire Freelancer base, as well as from the explosion that had toppled the spellcaster. But she had emerged triumphant, and now she had time to recuperate and restore the Base of Operations back to working order before seeing what else the city would throw at her. Rioters, Freelancers, rogue agents... she would take them all down. And finally, she would get the respect and recognition she deserved.

I'm coming for you, Rainy...

Chapter 8

Shadowbolt Harmony Division Training Facility, 1005 ANM.

TWEET! The sharp blast of the drill sergeant's whistle was music to Rainy's ears.

"That's it for today, Shadowbolts! Cool down and report to barracks for lights out. Another early morning tomorrow, and I'll be expecting better results than today, so rest up! You'll need it."

Rainy obeyed the sergeant's commands and angled her wings to swoop to the ground, touching down with a tired groan. Her wings ached like they'd never ached before, the result of a full day's worth of flight exercises and endurance training; she lets the sore appendages dangle limply against her sides as she trots to the barracks in the distance. Behind her, the other recruits had fared even worse, with some of them on the verge of collapsing, wobbly making their descent. Only a turquoise and gold mare seemed to fare as well as Rainy; Lightning Dust huffed and stalked after the white pegasus, a scowl fixed on her face.

Rainy pushed her way into the barracks and quickly trotted to her cot, flopping onto the hard mattress with a relieved groan. She was sore beyond belief, sweaty, and probably stunk to high heaven, but she had survived another day. And based on the poor performances of the rest of the recruits, she was well on her way to graduating with high marks if she could keep this pace up. Her training to become a member of the guard had been tricky, and it had prepared her for something like this, sure... but this was unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Princess Celestia hadn't been lying when she said this unit would be for the best of the best.

Rainy relaxed on the cot for a while before daring to move again, body aching in protest once she did. By now, the rest of the recruits had filed their way inside the barracks as well, some stretching their tired muscles to avoid cramping while others socialized in the corner, none of them paying attention to her. She took the opportunity to secretly reach into her pillowcase and pull out a piece of illegal contraband; a small, grainy picture, smuggled into training hidden between the feathers of her wing. The Shadowbolt leaders had forbidden any personal belongings, but she hadn't been able to resist.

The picture in question was a portrait of a mare, with blue fur and a yellow-gold mane, adorned in a doctor's white lab coat and her hair pulled back in a ponytail. Her navy eyes were hidden behind a cute pair of reading glasses, and she beamed at the camera with joyous enthusiasm. Around her neck was a necklace with a ring looped through it, along with a stark white feather that stood out in stark contrast to her blue chest fur. A white feather much like Rainy's own.

To my favorite guardpony, the hoofwritten text reads in the bottom corner. Can't wait to see you again~ Dr. Glimmershine.

Rainy sighed and stared at the picture for what felt like hours to her tired mind, though it must've only been a few seconds to everyone else in the room. However, before she could safely tuck it back into her pillowcase, a turquoise hoof reached in and snagged it with a snigger.

"Oh?~ What's this, Cadet Sky?" Lightning Dust jeered with a scornful glare. "Personal belongings? You know we're not supposed to have any of those, right?~"

Shit. Rainy groaned and sat up in her cot, watching the other pegasus look the picture over. "Hey, cut it out, Lightning."

"Nah, I don't think I will," Dust replied in a taunting, singsongy voice. "Why's it fair that you get to have something like this, but not me? I'm sure the C.O. will be very appreciative if I reported this..."

Rainy quickly rolled off the bed onto her tired hooves at that, closing the distance between her and the other pegasus in a second. "Can't beat me fair and square on the track, so you're trying to get me disciplined instead, huh? No wonder you couldn't make it onto the Wonderbolts. You can't accomplish anything without strong-arming your way to the top."

Lightning's eyes widened, taken aback at the sudden shift in Rainy's tone, before they narrowed in anger. "At least I was invited! I had the skills to be one of the best. You didn't even make it onto the Wonderbolts' radar."

"I'd rather not be invited to the academy at all, than be invited and completely embarrassed like you were. Now give me the picture, and we won't have any problems," Rainy responded coolly, eyes staring into Dust's own without blinking once.

Lightning, not one to back down so easily, took a step back with a snarl. "You want it so bad? Come and get it yourself."

"With pleasure," Rainy growled back, and the white mare suddenly leapt into action.

With a pump of her wings, Rainy propelled herself forward, launching right at Lightning in a blur of speed. Lightning--even as tired as she was--didn't flinch, holding her ground to meet the assault head on. The two collided, and all hell broke loose in the barracks.

The two Shadowbolts were nothing more than a blue and white blur as they wrestled and tangled with one another, hooves and wings landing blow after counterblow as each mare tried to get the upper hoof. Some of the other cadets had to quickly scramble out of the way to avoid being hit themselves; others gathered around the scene with whoops of excitement, just happy to be spectators to the dustup.

The two pegasi were evenly matched, and even though they were both exhausted, they both found a second wind when it came to finally getting the better of their rival; days of built-up tension and competitiveness were being released with each blow, and they weren't holding anything back. Blood and spittle flew across the room in droplets, sometimes spraying over the observers as they stomped their hooves.

However, the commotion was immediately halted by the sound of a familiar voice that filled everyone present with immediate dread.

"WOAH, WOAH, WOAH!"

All the spectators immediately turned and stiffened to attention at the drill sergeant's voice, with Rainy and Lightning joining them a few seconds later after untangling from each other’s grasp. Rainy sported a black eye that was quickly swelling up, and was grabbing at her injured ribs, wincing with each breath; Lightning's muzzle was crooked and dripping blood, and she spat a couple of her own teeth out onto the floor.

"Now what in Nightmare Moon's great blue hell is going on in here?" the drill sergeant asked.

The picture that had started the whole thing was on the ground between the two Shadowbolt cadets, and Rainy quickly covered it with one of her forehooves before the drill sergeant could notice.

"Just a disagreement, sir," was Rainy's measured response; thankfully—and curiously—Lightning said nothing further.

"Just a disagreement, my ass!" the drill sergeant exclaimed, stepping up to be face-to-face with the two injured mares. "It looked like a Celestia-damned fight club to me! And from two of my best recruits, no less.”

The uneasy silence continued as the stallion leaned in until he was mere inches from Rainy's muzzle, eyes sporting a dangerous glint as his gaze bored right into her own.

"And you know what? I love it."

What? Rainy's eyes widened in surprise, but she was able to keep the rest of her body at stiff attention; some of the spectating recruits, however, weren't able to hold back their shocked, uncomfortable murmurs, which quickly died out as the drill sergeant turned his attention back to them.

"What do you ponies think this is? A daycare? A therapist's office? A support group? Hell no! You are a collection of some of the best ponies our country has to offer, so you better start acting like it!"

The drill sergeant started pacing back and forth in front of the collection of cadets, his accusatory stare sweeping over all of them.

"You think that when the government collapses, and the princesses are killed or worse, the enemies you'll be fighting against will be lining up to shake your hoof? Of course not! There will be no more of this friendship shit, no more of this harmony shit; the world will be completely turned upside down, and you ponies have to be the ones that pull it all back together again! So get mean. Get competitive. Might as well get used to it now. There's no room in the Shadowbolts for weak links."

The drill sergeant let his words sink in before turning and stalking his way out of the barracks just as fast as he had arrived, the cadets giving each other uncomfortable glances before turning and returning to their cots. Soon, all that remained in the middle of the room were Rainy and Lightning, both of them still catching their breaths without looking at the other.

"See you tomorrow, Cadet Sky," Lightning broke the silence with a threatening snarl before turning and stalking off, pushing her way out of the barracks to take a visit to the medical tent; the unicorn medics there would be able to restore her teeth and broken muzzle before training tomorrow.

Rather than join her, Rainy stood alone, each breath sending sharp bursts of pain through her body from her cracked ribs. She slowly moved her forehoof to reveal the picture that had been hiding beneath it... all this trouble for so small a thing. The paper had not escaped the fight unscathed either; it had begun to tear slightly, separating the mare's head into two, and it was splattered in someone's blood... whose it was was anyone's guess.

Rainy takes one last long look at the pony before finishing the job, ripping it apart along the tear before doing it several more times, leaving the scraps of paper littering the barracks floor as she limped off.

No point in playing pretend anymore.

Manehattan, 1008 ANM.

Rainy knew that she wasn’t supposed to use her wings.

But when you’re plummeting off the roof of a skyscraper with the ground rapidly approaching, you’re not left with much of a choice.

Her wings snapped open, and her free fall slowed immediately with a jolt as the cold winter air was caught under the feathered appendages. Rather than flapping them and using even more magical energy, Rainy opted to taper off into a glide, and she flew towards the ground in a low, swooping arc in an attempt to absorb as little of the virus as she could. Then, before she knew it, the injured pegasus crash-landed onto the Manehattan street, the layer of fresh snow cushioning her fall as she rolled several meters before coming to a halt.

Rainy laid there for a few seconds, motionless, just feeling the cold biting chill of the snow underneath her. It was a stark reminder that yes, she was still alive, despite the fact that her hindquarters were hot and scarred from her burn wounds, and her stomach was ruptured and bleeding over the fresh white snowfall. The Shadowbolt resisted the urge to close her eyes and forced herself to roll over onto her back with a groan, every movement causing fresh waves of agony to shoot through her. Her hoof snagged the first aid injector off her tool belt and held it up; the indicator told her that it was 98% charged. Rainy watched the last few percentage points charge up as her body shuddered and ached, each second feeling like an eternity. Then, finally, the indicator flashed green, and she jabbed the needle into her thigh, relief flooding through her almost immediately.

She watched as the hole in her stomach sealed itself up, her skin and fur growing back until there was no trace of an injury there at all. Rainy could feel her insides reforming and rearranging, a rather uncomfortable sensation. And the burns on her rump were fully healed now with a second dosage. Her tail was still scorched, her Shadowbolt flight suit had several bullet holes and was melting in some places, but she was still alive and healthy enough to move. She took another couple seconds to catch her breath, just laying on her back and looking up at the cloudy night sky as snow continued to fall around her in an ever-thickening haze.

However, a large explosion and a tremor through the ground below her from what she assumed was the spellcaster hitting the ground on the other side of the office building reminded her that she needed to keep moving. Lightning Dust was somehow in Manehattan, somehow at the spellcaster, and she would no doubt be coming after her once again. She needed to move, get distance between them before the other pegasus could catch up. But where? She had nowhere to go in a hostile city with no supplies. She could only go back to the Base of Operations and hope that Agrippa and Aerion could help her.

Rainy took the pain and the aching sensations flooding through her body and shoved them to the side, focusing only on regaining her footing, one hoof at a time. She rolled over onto her stomach and pushed herself up onto all fours, wings flared to steady herself. Then, she limped off down the street, trudging through shin-deep snow on her way back to the Base of Operations. It would be a slow, painful journey, but she needed to get there before Lightning did. That's all that mattered.

"Manehattan, Manehattan! It's me again, Suri Polomare, with an emergency episode for you lovely ponies tonight. Yes, I know it's in the middle of the night, but something BIG just went down in the city, and the aftermath is making it hard to fall asleep. So listen closely, ladies and gentlecolts.

“Everyone's heard of the EUP, right? The Earth-Unicorn-Pegasus Guard, the Protective Pony Platoons sent in to reinforce the Manehattan police in maintaining order? Well, they've done the best job that they could, but there just isn't enough of them to go around. And whenever there's a power vacuum left in this city, you can be damn sure that someone's chomping at the bit to fill the void. That's how we get to the subjects of today's special edition of Wouldn't You Know It.

“You ever noticed strange ponies in bright white jackets wandering around? Or hear the most annoying broadcasts over speakers in certain areas of the city? Ponies, turns out that these heavily armed newcomers call themselves Freelancers, led by one Commander Dusk Fire. They've got all the markings of a PMC, all the equipment to back it up, and they seem very keen on pushing ponies around and getting their way, no matter the cost.

“I had to do some digging just to find out what the hell these ponies are... luckily, I'm trapped in my apartment with nothing to do, so it's not like I'm lacking in free time. From what I've been able to find out, these Freelancers were active overseas in places like Griffonstone and Klugetown, helping spread the Equestrian ideals of 'peace' and 'harmony' to our latest satellite states. Apparently, it was by force as well, considering how heavily-armed these ponies are. Then, once everything started going to shit here, the Freelancers were recalled back to the Equestrian mainland to assist relief efforts... only to be abandoned and trapped here once the quarantine went into place.

“And lemme tell ya folks, trapping dangerous, highly-trained operatives in a city with no power structure and no hope is never a good idea. These Freelancers have started carving out pieces of the city for themselves, enforcing martial law on any ponies in the area, using lethal force if they have to. And with no E.U.P. to keep them in check, they've had free reign to do whatever the fuck they want.

“'Why is Suri talking about this?', you may be asking yourself. Well, I'll tell you why. Anyone out there notice a shudder rumble through their houses a couple of hours ago? That was no earthquake, ponies. A source close to the scene tells me that the cause of the shuddering was the Freelancer HQ itself. You know that giant cannon they had strapped on top of the building? The one that was shooting down all the supply helicopters and leaving us completely isolated here? Well, it's no longer. Something, or someone, blew it right off the roof, and now the whole building is burning down!

“Given that the fire department is nowhere to be seen, I hope that it doesn't start to spread through the borough... but it looks like the Freelancers have been given a massive blow to their dreams of citywide domination. And with the spellcaster out of commission, that should mean that supply shipments will start up again soon... if they haven't forgotten about us here, that is. And to whoever blew that thing up: thank you.

“This is Suri Polomare, signing off. I need to get some sleep. You should too! Stay safe out there."

The trip back to the base of operations was indeed slow-going, with the exhausted Rainy having to stay at a slower pace than usual to avoid pockets of riled-up rioters and squads of Freelancers retreating from their burning HQ deeper into the city. The white pegasus had neither the energy nor the health to start picking unnecessary fights, especially when she was hard-pressed for time already. She needed help from Agrippa and Aerion before Lightning found her again, and she wasn't going to risk calling them and allow Lightning the opportunity to hack into the connection.

The snowstorm had started to die down, and the sun was poking up over the cloudy horizon by the time Rainy reached Maneway station once again. The Shadowbolt quickly pushed her way through the large doors before shutting them behind her, turning her attention to the large atrium that housed the remainder of the EUP. All the guards looked up in alarm at the sound of the door opening, but they quickly returned to their activities at the sight of the familiar Division agent.

The first pony to trot over to greet her was Aerion, of all ponies, and the usually hostile pegasus had a grin on her peach-colored muzzle.

"Agent! You're back-" she started, but she paused when she was able to see the severity of Rainy's injuries. "...aaaaand you look like shit. Perfect."

"Aerion, I..." Rainy started, before taking a deep breath to find her thoughts. "I fucked up. Badly."

Aerion tilted her head in confusion. "Fucked up? What are you talking about? We heard the spellcaster's explosion from here. The Freelancers are on the run and supply deliveries are going to resume-"

"No, not that,” Rainy cut her off with a wave of her hoof. “The Shadowbolts, I-... They’re coming, and we need to get out of here as fast as we can or we’re all going to die-”

Now it was Aerion’s turn to cut her off. "Woah, woah, you need to slow down and elaborate, Rainy. C'mon, let's go find Agrippa so she can have a look at you."

Rainy wasn’t in any state to argue, so she just nodded softly and limped off after Aerion to the medic’s temporary quarters. The two crossed the lobby of the station to the shop that had been converted into a medical station, where Dr. Glimmershine was digging through the supply boxes to take inventory.

“Not enough pain meds, not enough bandages, not enough antibiotics…” Agrippa muttered under her breath, before the approaching clip of hooves alerted her to the presence of guests. “Oh, hey Aeri. Rainy. Here to use up all my medical supplies again?”

“Agrippa,” Aerion greeted her in turn before gesturing over to Rainy with a hoof. “Agent Orange here says that her mission was successful, but now she’s talking gibberish, can’t figure out a word she’s saying. Might be all the injuries making her delirious or something-”

Rainy shook her head and stepped forward. “No, no, I’m serious. This is serious. We’re all in danger right now and we need to hurry.”

Aerion and Agrippa made eye contact for a second before Agrippa leaned back onto her haunches with a sigh. “...Alright, spill it then.”

“The Division, they’re here. In the city. Now,” Rainy started.

“Already?” Aerion exclaimed.

“Isn’t that a good thing? More reinforcements, more help?” Agrippa asked in a more level-headed manner.

Rainy shook her head. “No, no it isn’t. It’s Lightning Dust.”

That name drew zero reaction from the other two mares.

“...Who?” Aerion finally asked to break the silence.

Rainy sighed. “Lightning Dust. She’s a Wonderbolt dropout, and my main rival in training camp. Command sent her into the city because… they thought I went rogue, and they needed her to finish the job.”

“The spellcaster?” Agrippa deduced with a frown.

“Mmhm… We ran into each other at the Freelancer HQ. And she put a bullet in my back,” Rainy winced at the memory.

Aerion whistled under her breath. “Damn… I always thought you Division types were cold-hearted, but that’s just crazy.”

“Aeri, not helping,” Agrippa scolded, before turning her attention back to the Shadowbolt. “So she’s hunting you now, Rainy?”

“As far as I can tell… yes,” Rainy replied with a nod. “She sees me as a rogue agent, and that means I’m someone she needs to put down. And our rivalry means that she’s extra devoted to finishing the job.”

“Well, this is obviously just a misunderstanding then. When she gets here, we can talk it over with her, and we can smooth this all over,” Agrippa said with an air of optimism.

Rainy shook her head. “I don’t know if she’ll be convinced… and I’m not really willing to stick around and take that chance.”

“So what are you going to do now?” Agrippa asked.

“Run… somewhere, I don’t know,” Rainy admitted with an exhale. “Deeper into the city. Find somewhere to lay low until this all blows over.”

“So you’re going to fight the allegations that you’ve gone rogue… by actually going rogue? Not seeing the logic here,” Aerion mused.

“I’d rather be rogue than dead,” Rainy retorted. “I’m not sure Lightning is going to give me much of a choice on that front. Her hatred of me is that deep.”

“You do that, you won’t be alive for very long anyway… you’re infected, remember? You’re already on limited time,” Aerion pointed out.

“And running away means we’ll lose our only test subject… which means we’ll lose our best chance at finding a cure. And saving your life,” Agrippa added with a frown.

“But if Lightning kills me here, you’ll lose your test subject too. And she might kill you too for standing with me,” Rainy explained. “She’s fucking crazy, you two. She won’t stop until she leaves her mark on this city, I can promise you that.”

“Sounds like a typical Shadowbolt to me. All the power, none of the accountability,” Aerion said snidely as she stood up to stretch her legs. “And if she’s as bad as you say, that means that I’ll be in danger if I stay… which means I have to come with you.”

“...What?” Rainy asked in disbelief.

“If you leave and we stay behind, then we lose all our progress on the cure. So we go on the run with you and continue our tests. It’s the only logical course of action,” Aerion explained with an eye roll, as if it was the most obvious thing in the universe.

Rainy blinked, then shook her head. “No, it’s way too dangerous out there. I can barely keep myself alive.”

“Aerion’s right, Rainy,” Agrippa stepped forward as well, compounding Rainy’s shock. “As much as I hate to admit it. It’ll hurt me to abandon all these injured EUP soldiers, but… we need you. Our research on your virus progression could save millions of lives, and that’s not something we can give up on. I’m coming too.”

Rainy looked back and forth between the other two ponies, trying to think of some reason to reject their proposals, before lowering her head with a defeated sigh. “But… I don’t know where to go. We’ll be lost, scrounging up scraps to barely survive. And we’ll be leaving behind your virus testing equipment…”

“I might have a solution for that,” Aerion said, drawing the attention of the other two mares. “My condo is downtown, near Gramarecy Park. It’s not the biggest, but it has MagiTech equipment we can repurpose for testing, as well as some stored food and water to survive on for a couple weeks… as long as it hasn’t been looted while I’ve been gone. We can easily hide out there.”

Rainy and Agrippa made eye contact, but neither of them had any inkling of a better course of action.

“It’s the only plan we’ve got, so we’ll go with it,” Rainy said finally. “How do we get there?”

“Well, obviously the streets aren’t safe to travel on, with all the rioters and freelancers roaming around… not to mention the crazy Division Agent that will be looking for us. So I propose we take the Maneway tunnels all the way,” Aerion explained, pointing in the direction of the steps down to the train platforms. “There’s a stop within a block of my condo. Keeps us nice and hidden the whole way there.”

Rainy nodded. “Alright. You have three minutes. Pack all your necessities and meet me at the steps down to the tunnels. I’m sure Lightning will be here any minute.”

As the other two mares sprang to action to grab their stuff, Rainy stood up and slowly walked into the lobby of the Maneway Station; she had everything she needed on her body already. She felt completely, utterly lost, even though Aerion’s plan had dulled her fears a little. She was abandoning her mission, her purpose for being here, because one of her squad mates wanted to see her dead based on a lie… and she had a virus eating away at her from the inside, putting her on limited time. What was she even meant to do now? Spend her last days hiding away in a small condo, hoping that a miracle breakthrough in the cure could save her? It terrified her to no end.

However, Rainy’s inner musings were interrupted by the sound of approaching hoofsteps.

“Agent?”

Rainy blinked and turned to see that a couple of the EUP guards had approached, standing nervously in front of her.

“Yeah?” Rainy replied.

“Me and a couple other guards couldn’t help but overhear your conversation, and we just wanted to say… we believe you,” the lead guard explained, her one good eye shining at Rainy while the other was covered in a blood-soaked bandage. “You showed up when all hope was lost, and you saved us. We will never forget that.”

“Thank you. It was the least I could do, after all.”

“No, it wasn’t. After command abandoned us, we were scared, desperate, hopeless… we thought that the government had cut their losses and left the city behind. And that we were going to be left here for good. We know low-level grunts like us aren’t very high on the list of priorities, and you could’ve ignored us completely when you arrived to focus on the important shit… but you came and saved us. A rogue agent wouldn’t have done that. You’re one of the good ones, Agent.”

Rainy tried to take a breath, but it was quickly caught in her throat. “That’s why I signed up for this job, soldier. To help ponies in need. And that’s what I’m here to do, damn what anyone else has to say.”

“And we respect you for that, agent. We’ll do our best to make sure this other Shadowbolt doesn’t come after you when she makes it here. Just get Equestria that cure when you finish it.”

Rainy stepped forward and placed a thankful hoof on the guard’s shoulder before turning to leave. However, before she could make it to the waiting Aerion and Agrippa, an idea flashed through her mind; she quickly jumped up onto the information desk surrounding the broken clock and called out to all the EUP guards in the terminal.

“Listen up, all of you! I know things seem very grim right now. We’re stuck in a city that’s hostile to us in every conceivable way, from the inhabitants to the invaders to the very air we breathe in… I know you’ve been fighting for a long time. I know you’ve lost a lot of good friends and good squad mates. But they didn’t bring you here because it would be easy. They brought you here because you were the best ponies for the job. I believe that wholeheartedly. Taking this city back isn’t just going to come through force, or the barrel of a rifle. It’s going to come by good ponies restoring the hope in every inhabitant of this town. And we’re gonna do that, one block at a time, one heart at a time. Be the good example, the good change this town needs. I believe that all of you can do that. Repay the hope that I’ve given you.”

There was no sudden commotion of stomping hooves or whooping voices when Rainy finished her impromptu speech, but she could see in the eyes of the EUP soldiers that it had meant something to them. She had only been in the city for a short while, but she had made a significant impact on it already; that was all she could ask for. She just hoped that her words and her actions would have enough impact to see the city through its darkest hour and allow it to rise triumphant at the end.

Rainy jumped down off the desk and trotted her way over to Aerion and Agrippa, who were waiting for her atop the steps down to the train tracks with full saddlebags on their flanks.

“Wow, agent. Didn’t realize you had a flair for the dramatic,” Aerion sneered in her usual jesting manner, but Rainy could detect a tone of respect behind the biting sarcasm this time.

“Just a spur of the moment thing,” Rainy replied with a shrug as she started to make her way down to the Maneway platforms. “Which way?”

“We need to head south, sooo… green line. That way,” Aerion pointed a hoof down one of the tunnels as they arrived at the tracks.

Rainy nodded and unholstered her rifle. “Got it, let’s move. Move quickly, but safely. Be prepared for anything.”

“You really think there’s anyone down here?” Agrippa asked.

Rainy looked down at the platform under her hooves, and noticed a familiar sight; there, covered in dried blood, was a severed horn… the same one that had distracted her long enough to be attacked in her first trip down into these dark depths. A reminder of the unexplained horrors that still awaited her in this city.

“I’m sure.”

Lightning Dust stalked through the streets, pistol at the ready as she weaved through a maze of broken-down carriages. The explosion of the spellcaster and the fire ravaging the Freelancers’ former HQ had thrown this portion of the town into disarray; there were crowds of Freelancers, rioters, and civilians all freeing from the scene of the chaos, and pockets of infighting often broke out, which Lightning took care to steer clear from. She had a job to do, and a criminal to catch.

However, her job was made a lot harder by the sudden malfunctioning of her equipment. Every time she tried to see if the intersection in front of her was clear of hostile ponies, her motion tracker flickered and displayed phantom dots, moving back and forth at impossible speeds. Either some suicidal maniac was using teleportation magic, or something was broken in her SPARC.

“My motion tracker’s on the fritz. You seeing this?” Lightning said over her commlink.

“Acknowledged. We’ve got someone looking into it. If it keeps malfunctioning, you’ll have to go blind for now,” Command replied.

Weird. Could it be due to a signal jammer nearby? Or maybe some part of the virus was interfering with her SPARC’s systems. Either way, it made her nervous. No scanner meant she didn’t know what was around her… and Rainy could be setting up an ambush at any point along the route. She needed to be careful.

Lightning shut off her HUD and raised her pistol to a ready position as she stalked down the sidewalk, taking care to scan the windows and rooftops of the skyscrapers towering over her, but there was no sign of the rogue agent she was looking for. At this point, she could be anywhere in the city, in any of the thousands of buildings, on any of the hundreds of floors in each of them… without working equipment, there was no chance to find her until she showed her face again.

Soon, the imposing Maneway station came into view through the few flecks of snow that still continued to fall, one of its corners collapsed due to the helicopter crash on the roof. Despite the damage, it surprisingly still had electricity running through it, and she could see the interior lights shining through the cracks of the front door.

“Command, I’m approaching the Maneway Station now. Lights are on.”

“Be advised, the rogue agent Rainy Sky may be inside along with an unknown number of EUP survivors. Proceed with caution.”

Lightning slowly stepped up to the door and pressed her ear to the wood; she could hear the muffled murmurs of pony voices inside, but nothing alarmed or panicked, nothing to suggest that Rainy was here setting up an ambush. However, she wasn’t going to take any chances.

Rather than quietly pushing her way inside, Lightning turned her back and reared up on her forehooves, driving her back hooves into the door and bucking it open. She rushed in with her pistol raised, scanning the interior to see…

Bloodied, injured EUP guards, sitting in groups across the terminal and huddled in the abandoned shops lining the exterior, completely unaware of the possibility of her arrival. When they heard the slam of the door opening, they quickly scrambled for their weapons, most of them with simple swords or daggers, as they turned to the source of the commotion. However, their momentary alarm was quickly dispelled when they saw that the newcomer wasn’t a looter or freelancer.

Lightning lowered her weapon and looked around the room at the sad state of affairs. “Who’s in charge here?”

The crowd of ponies glanced around at each other in confusion at the question. Wow, they were in worse shape than she expected.

Finally, a mare stood up and made her way forward, a blood-stained bandage covering one of her eyes. “I… guess I am. Sergeant Copper Top, Manehattan Police Department.”

“Only a sergeant? Where’s the rest of your chain of command?” Lightning asked.

“Dead. Or missing.” Copper replied. “A sizable group were able to flee deeper into the city after the initial attack on this station, but we haven’t heard from them since. Everyone else was killed at the Garden…”

“You’ll have to do, sergeant,” Lightning said while holstering her pistol. “I’m Agent Lightning Dust. I’m assuming command of the rest of the EUP forces in this city, so you and all your guards answer to me now.”

“Yes, ma’am. We’re beat up, but we’ll do what needs to be done.”

“I’m sure you will. Now, I’ve heard that another Shadowbolt stopped by this place yesterday. Agent Rainy. Have you seen her recently?”

Copper’s one good eye glazed over as she went into deep thought. “Uh, yeah, she did stop by, actually. Looked like she was in a hurry. But she left, and she took Dr. Glimmershine with her. Seemed urgent.”

“She did? And you didn’t stop her? What the fuck were you thinking?” Lightning exclaimed.

Copper tilted her head in confusion. “Why? Was I supposed to? What did she do wrong?”

“Celestia-dammit,” Lightning cursed as she stomped a hoof in frustration. “Which way did she go?”

“Out the front door, I didn’t see which direction they took after though. It’s been at least 20 minutes since they left.”

By this point, Lightning Dust was trembling with anger. She’d had Rainy within her grasp twice, and both times she had managed to slip away underneath her nose. And now she was let loose on the city to continue to wreak havoc, while Lightning was left in her shadow. Again. The thought made her blood boil and her face flush, and she quickly turned away from Sergeant Copper to activate her commlink.

“Command, we’ve got a situation. Rainy was here, but she’s gone now, and she took the doctor with her.”

“Dammit. Should’ve guessed that she wouldn’t give up her last hope for survival…”

“Permission to pursue her, command? She couldn’t have made it far, especially if she’s taken an uncooperative hostage.”

“Denied. She could be anywhere at this point. Besides, a cure isn’t our highest priority at the moment. Getting this city under control is our most pressing matter, we can worry about the virus once the populace isn’t revolting against us. Get the station and the surrounding streets cleared, agent. Supply drops start again tomorrow, and we don’t want our helicopter pilots flying into gunfire again.”

“Acknowledged. I’ll get it done.”

Lightning severed the link and turned back to Copper, gesturing to the gathered guards with a hoof. “Get their attention, sergeant.”

Copper did as she was ordered, and soon every eye in the station was focused on Lightning as she stood atop the steps to the main entrance, towering over the injured guards. She let the silence drag along for a few more seconds before opening her mouth to speak.

“Our power has always come from our strength. The strength of our bonds between our fellow ponies, the strength of the magic in our horns, the strength of our wings, the strength in our earth pony hooves… and this power has allowed us ponies to create the greatest nation in the world. But now our nation is under attack, and they’ve tried to take our strengths away from us. They’ve taken our horns, our wings, and bad ponies have tried to take advantage of the chaos, but we have to show them our power still remains. We are still a force to be reckoned with, and we have to remind them of that fact in every single opportunity we have. Only through power and control will we bring this city back to heel… and we will succeed. I believe it.”

Lightning was met with silence once her speech was concluded, but she relished in the feeling. Fear was the best motivator, and she could practically feel the terror dripping off the guards surrounding her. But beneath that fear was also a feeling of belief, and a renewed sense of purpose… and as long as they feared her more than they feared the enemy, they had a chance to succeed.

“...Now, you’ve been sitting around for long enough. I want this block secured right now, and there need to be patrols sweeping the front of the station every hour. Supply deliveries are starting back up, and I don’t want rioters to even think about coming around here again.

“Look alive, ponies! We’ve got a city to take back.”

Chapter 10

“Hey, is anypony else’s motion tracker acting up?” Lemon Zest asked.

“Yes,” Sugarcoat replied.

“Mine too,” Sour Sweet chimed in. “Unfortunately.”

Lightning glanced down at her HUD. Her motion tracker was playing the same tricks from her trek to the Base of Operations; phantom dots and graphical glitches rendered it untrustworthy and unusable. Time hadn’t made the error mellow out. If anything, the problem had only grown more severe to the point of annoyance.

“Mine’s been glitching for hours now,” Lightning said. “There must be something in the city scrambling the frequency. I’ll check back in with command to see if they’ve figured anything out.”

A quick tap of her orange watch switched her commlink’s connection from her squad to Command. “Agent Lightning to Command. My motion tracker is still inoperable, and my squadmates are now reporting the same problem as well. Any progress on a solution up there?”

“As of now, nothing yet, Agent. The helicopter pilots reported nothing unusual with their guidance systems during the supply run, so it must be an issue with your equipment. We’re still looking into it. We’ll let you know when we find something.”

“Acknowledged, Command. Keep me posted.”

“Will do. What’s your status?”

"We received a distress call from Captain Armor at the EUP staging grounds. They're under attack by rioters with a serious threat of being overrun, and they have two immobile VIPs preventing them from abandoning the position. We're en route to assist."

"Copy that… We need those two VIPs alive and in our possession, Agent. If anything happens to them, there will be a nationwide panic that will make Manehattan look like a training exercise. Captain Armor and the EUPs… either way. But the two VIPs are your highest priority."

“We’ll handle it. Lightning, out.”

Lightning ended the call and focused her attention on the road ahead. They were headed towards Battery Park, located where the long bridge connected the Equestrian mainland to Manehattan itself. Before the bridge was destroyed to quarantine the city, the Park was the first point of delivery for any supplies and medicine into Manehattan, and though deliveries had shifted to the Base of Operations, it still acted as the EUP's main point of control in the city. After the fall of the Base, it became their last point of control. Now, it was in danger of being destroyed entirely.

“So, Dust… Your aim improved at all?” Sour asked to break the silence as she rested her markspony rifle over her shoulder. “Or are you still as bad a shot as you were in the academy?”

“It’s too bad that marksponyship isn’t the only part of being a good soldier. Because it was always the only thing you were ever good at,” Lightning retorted.

“Better to be the best at one thing than average at everything, in my opinion,” Sour said. “And my opinion is better than yours!”

Lightning rolled her eyes. “Well, maybe if you weren’t below average at everything else, you wouldn’t be taking orders from me. Now knock it off.”

“I mean, we are all here because we bring a unique aspect to the team,” Sugarcoat intoned. “I’m having a hard time seeing what you provide.”

“I’m the leader! Somepony has to give orders,” Lightning said.

“Do they? I feel like I can do pretty well on my own!” Lemon said. “Current objective: Save the world! Why do I need to be micromanaged?”

“The First Wave tried that. Look where that got them,” Lightning said.

“What did it get them, actually? Command didn’t seem very enthused about giving us many details.” Lemon asked.

"They all disavowed the Shadowbolts in the Dark Zone after being locked inside," Sugarcoat answered.

“Well, yeah, everypony knows that. But what exactly went down in there? Everypony can’t have gone rogue at once, so where did all the other Agents go?” Lemon asked.

Lightning rolled her eyes. “Why do you even care? They’re all traitors no matter what, how they got to that point is moot.”

“I had two friends deploy in the First Wave. Remember Sunny Flare and Indigo Zap?” Lemon asked.

Sour and Sugarcoat both nodded. Lightning and Gridlock just blinked.

“Sour, Sugarcoat, Sunny, Indigo, and I were all originally in the same cell,” Lemon explained. “Assigned to the Crystal Empire area. We trained together, went to intel briefings together, deployed together… but Command split us up when we got to Manehattan. They got to go in with the first wave, and us three had to stay behind in quarantine. I was so damn jealous, heh… I thought they were the lucky ones for being chosen, but I guess we were the lucky ones after all.”

“And you’re wondering where they ended up,” Lightning deduced.

Lemon looked down at her hooves. “I guess, yeah. I know the odds are that they’re probably dead, either from the virus or the rioters or the rogue agents… or maybe they went rogue themselves, who knows. But it’d be nice if they were still alive, y’know?”

“No point in worrying about that now. We’ll make our way into the Dark Zone eventually, I’m sure of it. We can take care of any remaining agents when we get there. But right now, we’ve got other things to worry about, so keep your head straight,” Lightning replied.

Only Gridlock had kept quiet during the team’s verbal sparring. He silently plodded along next to them, prompting Lemon to nudge him with an elbow.

“You’re awfully quiet, big guy. What’s up?” Lemon asked.

“Your conversation is frivolous and annoying. I see no reason to contribute,” Gridlock replied.

Lemon pursed her lips. “Ah.”

“You all could learn a thing or two from him,” Lightning grumbled. “Quit cluttering up the commlink, we’re almost there.”

As they approached the camp, the sound of gunfire became audible over the wind. Then came the bellowing of orders and the screams of pain and death. Then, the team of Shadowbolts rounded the corner, and the camp came into view.

What had once been a staging area had been turned into a refugee camp. Beyond the chain-link fence and barbed wire surrounding the perimeter were tents upon tents upon tents, ubiquitous and uniform in appearance. Food scraps and trash fluttered around in the wind, covered in snow and fresh blood. The front gates had been blown open, and the path into the heart of the camp was littered with bullet casings and dead bodies.

Rioters and EUP guards were lying motionless… but there were no civilian casualties. There were no living ones in sight either. Where'd they all go?

The entrance to the camp also doubled as a virus scanning station; it used a long hallway full of UV lights and equipment to scan newcomers for any signs of infection. However, the rioters had stripped the tent bare, taking all the scanning equipment with them.

Odd. What use would rioters have for that kind of tech?

“It’s a ghost town,” Sugarcoat whispered.

“Fight’s been raging for hours, by the looks of it. Everypony’s moved on,” Lightning responded as she nudged a stiff body with a hoof. “They’ve no doubt made it to the HQ building by this point. Let's move, but be careful. Rioters could be hiding anywhere in this maze.”

Before Lightning could start off into the camp, Sour Sweet veered off towards one of the guard towers flanking the entrance. She slung her rifle over her shoulder and grabbed onto the ladder.

“I’ll provide overwatch and fire support from here,” Sour called out. “Someone needs to make sure you all don’t die immediately.”

“Sour, that’s a negative. We move as a team,” Lightning said.

Sour stared at her incredulously. “I’m a sniper, Lightning. What good will I be down here with all this close cover?”

“I’m the one giving orders here, Sour. Not you,” Lightning insisted.

“I mean, Sour does have a point. She’d be a lot more useful back here,” Lemon chimed in.

“She won’t be useful once we’re at the HQ building and she can’t see anything,” Lightning countered. “And all these tents provide too much cover for her to provide effective overwatch. We move together, and I don’t want to hear any more about it. Unless you want to be on the first flight back out to quarantine.”

Lightning was met with nothing but silence and a roll of the eyes from Sour as she rejoined the group.

“That’s better. Spread out, but stay close enough that we can support each other if needed. We don’t want to walk into an ambush and have no room to maneuver. After me,” Lightning said.

With that, the cell of Shadowbolts fanned out in a wide line and made their way through the city of tents. The area they were walking through had a similar dearth of life to the entrance, though the dead bodies of EUP and rioters still littered the ground. The air smelled of gunpowder and wet snow.

This amount of dedication and organization from the rioters was the most surprising thing to Lightning. In her intel briefing before deployment, the rioters were described as scared ponies taking advantage of the chaos to steal food and supplies. However, their actions in the past week suggested that they had moved beyond simply fighting for food.

When the supply helicopter had been shot down over the Base of Operations, the rioters swarmed in to take advantage of the chaos almost immediately. When the EUP fled to the Madisoat Mare Garden, they staged an elaborate assault to take it as well. Now, they were here, conducting a large-scale invasion of the EUP’s last stronghold in the city with almost fanatical dedication.

Wouldn’t rioters simply want to secure resources for themselves and scurry away once their lives were threatened? Why would they work to remove the EUP from the island with methodical efficiency? Something wasn’t adding up.

“I would say that my motion tracker is clean…” Lemon said over the commlink, snapping Lightning out of her thoughts. “...but I don’t think it’s very trustworthy at the moment.”

“Motion trackers would have been very useful in this environment.” Sugarcoat lamented. “There’s a lot of blind spots.”

“We wouldn’t have to be walking blind if we had someone providing overwatch,” Sour snidely remarked. “Too bad someone thought that was a bad idea.”

“Just keep your eyes and ears open,” Lightning grumbled. “The old-fashioned way. I’m sure you all can handle that much, right?”

“Quiet,” Gridlock suddenly grunted over the commlink, and the conversation cut off.

Lightning glanced over to the big batpony to see him swiveling his large, tufted ears left and right, homing in on a sound that only his thestral senses could pick up.

“Contact. Voices. One o’clock,” Gridlock called out after conducting his silent search.

A few seconds after the alert, the noise reached Lightning’s ears as well.

“Tell the boss that I’ve got another live one here,” a stallion’s voice said, followed by a grunt of exertion.

The boss? Lightning wasn't aware of the rioters having any leaders or a central command structure. Who could this be? She gestured to the other agents to stay quiet before slinking forward to use a tent as cover to observe the scene.

In front of her, a male rioter was dragging a mare by the mane out of one of the tents, despite her best efforts to squirm free. Her yelps and pleas rang out in the otherwise quiet camp, but they didn’t dissuade her captor one bit. Soon, she was dumped into an unceremonious heap in the open area.

“P-Please don’t hurt me. I’m no threat to you, I just want to survive,” the mare whimpered as she covered her head in her hooves.

“So do I. Which means I need your help. Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you if you don’t give me a reason to,” the stallion cryptically replied before pulling a tool off his belt. “Are you infected?”

“No, no, no, I swear I’m not. I’ve gotten all my tests and they’re all clean.”

"Good! That's good for both of us. Hold still for me, please…"

Lightning motioned to the members of her team to stay put before slowly making her way toward the two with her combat knife gripped between her teeth. In front of her, the stallion was aiming the tool up and down the trembling mare's body, and it made the occasional whirring noise as it bathed her in blue light. A virus scanner?

A beep and a green light satisfied the stallion. “So, you were telling the truth. I appreciate that. But that means you’re going to have to come with me now. On your hooves.”

“W-What?” the mare gasped.

The stallion grabbed the mare by the mane and yanked her up, despite her best efforts to free herself from the grip of his hoof. However, before he could drag her off once again, Lightning grabbed him from behind. One hoof wrapped around his horn to hold his head in place, and the other held her knife just above his exposed throat.

“Let her go,” Lightning commanded.

The stallion blinked in surprise, but his hoof remained in the mare’s mane. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. Uninfected ponies are too rare of a commodity around here. Unless you’d rather take her place?”

“I don’t think I made myself clear,” Lightning hissed. “Let her go, or I’ll cut your throat.”

“Oh well. Get cutting then, I suppose,” the stallion said with a shrug.

Now it was Lightning's turn to blink. What kind of pony would act so nonchalantly and recklessly in the face of death? Was he doubting her nerve? Well, if he was, he was sorely mistaken.

Lightning drove the knife tip down into the stallion's throat after her moment of hesitation. The blade slid through his neck like butter—too easily. No blood splashed out, and after a few inches, the tip suddenly slammed into something hard and solid, stopping her in her tracks. No matter how hard she pressed and ground the blade inside, she couldn't penetrate further into his neck. Meanwhile, the stallion reacted with only blasé indifference, as if only mildly inconvenienced by such an act.

"What the fuck?" Lightning stammered as she lifted the knife out to see that no mark had been left on his skin.

The stallion sighed as his patience ran out. “Right. My turn.”

The air around her exploded. Lighting was lifted off her hooves and blown away from the stallion in a rush of energy. She yelped in panic as she tumbled head over hooves through the air before landing hard on her back, driving the air out of her lungs with a pitiful squeak. Her knife skittered across the bloody snow and out of reach. Her limbs refused to respond to her brain’s commands to move, and she was left staring up at the overcast sky.

“H-How?...” was all Lightning was able to mutter.

Meanwhile, the stallion’s grip on the cowering mare’s mane had kept her in place. With an annoyed grunt, he yanked her up and pressed his nose to hers, staring right into her eyes. His horn began to glow with a sickly green hue, and soon his eyes changed to match that same color.

“Go to the others. Tell them I sent you. Refuse to go anywhere with anyone else,” the stallion firmly commanded.

The mare’s eyes changed to a mosaic of expanding circles, and her struggling body went limp with only a simple nod to respond to his words. When he released her, she climbed to her hooves and trotted off deeper into the camp without a word.

The stallion watched her go while his eyes changed back to their normal color. Then, he sighed in annoyance as he turned back to the stunned Lightning.

“Another orange watch…” the stallion said as he gently nudged the watch on Lightning's foreleg. “I’ve seen a couple of them around the city. Never had the chance to meet the owners face to face, however. Who are you, exactly?”

“Go fuck yourself,” Lightning growled as feeling slowly began to return to her limbs—too slowly.

The stallion scoffed. “Such hostility. I only want to survive, the same as you. You can’t fault me for that, can you?”

“You have no idea what I want,” Lightning hissed. “What the hell are you?”

“If I told you, I’d have to kill you,” the stallion said with a smirk. “Now, on your hooves—”

His hoof reached down to grab her by the mane, but before he could, a loud chorus of gunfire rang out. Bullets slammed into his side, knocking him away from Lightning with a pained gasp. Lightning rolled away from the rioter and back onto her hooves as the rest of the Shadowbolts moved up on either side of her; the barrel of Gridlock’s LMG was smoking.

“Took you long enough to step in. What were you doing over there?” Lightning asked.

“Debating whether or not to let him kill you,” Sour replied with only a hint of detectable sarcasm.

“Good to see you still care for me somewhat,” Lightning snorted.

In front of her, the stallion had been thrown back into a heap on the ground, groaning softly. The fact that he was still breathing at all was surprising to Lightning, but he wouldn’t be for long; nothing could survive a flurry of body shots like that.

“Should’ve listened to me when you had the chance,” Lightning gloated. “You really thought you could take on the Division?”

However, the smug expression on her face quickly turned to horror as the stallion began to move once again. He slowly, deliberately pushed himself back up onto his hooves to reveal that his body was spotless: no bullet hole, no blood, no damage whatsoever. He just stretched his neck from side to side with a wince, as if he had simply taken an uncomfortable fall.

“And you really thought that was enough to take me down?” the stallion asked with a laugh.

Impossible.

“What in Celestia’s name are you?” Lemon wondered aloud next to Lightning.

The stallion ignored her as he slowly walked towards the group of Shadowbolts. “Ponies. So foolish and arrogant. No wonder we’ve been able to operate under your noses for all this time.”

“Stay the fuck away!” Lightning ordered as she raised her pistol and fired.

Three bullets struck the stallion in the chest, but his skin simply absorbed the rounds without even leaving a mark, though the force caused him to stumble back with a chuckle of equal parts pain and amusement. In her shock, Lightning forgot to fire again; the rest of her squadmates followed suit.

“You can’t fathom the idea that you could be deceived,” the stallion said as he continued his slow walk forward. “Can’t imagine that someone like me could get inside your house, walk your floors, spit in your food, take your love… We moved in the shadows while you were blinded by the sunlight. And in the silence, we’ve only grown stronger.”

As soon as he finished his sentence, the air exploded with energy once again. The Shadowbolts all stumbled back from the force, and once they did, his horn’s aura grabbed hold of their guns and pulled. Sugarcoat and Lemon were promptly disarmed, and their weapons flew over the stallion’s head to sink into the muddy snow; Lightning, Gridlock, and Sour were barely able to keep hold of their own weapons. However, the force of the magic on her pistol slowly dragged Lightning across the ground towards the stallion, despite her best efforts to dig her hooves into the ground and stop herself. She fired off shots blindly, but his grip forced the barrel to the side, and they whizzed harmlessly past him. Then, she was face to face with him once again, and she was forced to stare directly into his hypnotizing eyes.

“Freeze,” the stallion ordered with a burst of magic.

Lightning’s body went stiff, and no effort could make her move or resist. The stallion casually flung her away into the snow as well, and she landed on her side with a thud.

The larger, heavier Gridlock was successfully able to resist the stallion’s magic pull, and once Lightning was clear, he fired off a flurry of machine gun fire that knocked the stallion back with a hiss. This broke his concentration, and the spell ended, allowing Gridlock and Sour to move and aim once again. Sour lined up a shot with her long markspony rifle, but she was too close to effectively aim; the stallion closed the distance in seconds instead, and a swat of his hoof knocked the gun out of the way. Sour fired a second too late, and the bullet sent up a spray of snow as it slammed into the ground. He tried to force eye contact once again, but Sour twisted herself away, and he settled with delivering a buck to her ribs to send her sprawling away with a groan.

As soon as Sour fell away, the line of fire opened for Gridlock, and he raised his gun to fire on the now-exposed stallion. However, before he could, Sugarcoat suddenly leaped in the way with a yell. Her rifle remained in the snow out of reach, but she instead drove her forehoof into the stallion's snout with a well-placed punch. The impact barely phased the stallion, and he easily blocked the second blow before counterattacking with his own series of kicks and jabs. He moved with such speed and ferocity that Sugarcoat couldn't keep up, and he targeted the areas that would cause the most amount of pain without killing her, soon knocking her back onto the ground with a cry.

The line of fire opened again, and this time Gridlock was able to let off a flurry of shots, slamming into the stallion’s side and knocking him back with a pained groan. However, before Gridlock could move in for the kill, several grenades suddenly bounced across the ground towards the prone stallion, forcing Gridlock to hastily scamper away. Lemon was reaching into her saddlebags and pulling out grenade after grenade with barely restrained glee.

“Try shaking this off!” Lemon yelled before the grenades exploded.

The explosion was large enough to make Lightning’s ears ring. In her still-frozen state, she was unable to take cover as shrapnel flew through the air, and several hot metal shards sank into her body. A few audible cries of pain told her that several of her squadmates had also been hit. The smoke from the explosion completely obscured where the stallion had been. The area descended into an eerie silence.

Lightning tried to move and found that she was still frozen in place. That meant either the magic worked for a set amount of time… or the stallion was still alive to keep the spell going.

The smoke began to clear, and a silhouette was slowly revealed. It was the stallion, miraculously still alive… but he had changed. His horn was curved, and two translucent wings fluttered at his sides as he slowly pushed himself back up to his hooves. His legs had holes peppered through them, but it wasn't due to damage from the explosion; his body was naturally deformed and grotesque. Instead of skin and fur, his body was covered in a black chitinous carapace; the hard exoskeleton was dented and cracked in several places from bullet impacts, and the explosion had torn chunks of it off, causing him to drip green blood down onto the snow.

Changeling, Lightning thought to herself once her lips refused to move once again.

The changeling’s horn flashed green, and his form flickered briefly, but he was unable to change back into the stallion. He just groaned and relented, spitting bloody spittle onto the ground.

“Damn. Guess the secret’s out,” he mumbled under his breath.

“You’re a changeling,” Sugarcoat said as she rubbed at her chest with a wince.

“Took you long enough to figure that out,” the changeling responded.

Gridlock tilted his head. “I thought all the changelings converted.”

“Not all of us,” the changeling said. “Some of us chose to stay loyal to our Queen. Loyalty is a trait you ponies admire, isn’t it? One of your beloved Elements… Yet here we are, in a city the government has sealed off and abandoned. Loyalty? They deserted you. So, in a way, us ‘evil’ changelings are more harmonious than you are. That must sting.”

“We haven’t given up on this city. We’re here to take it back,” Lemon growled. “What are you here for?”

“We? I’ve watched all sorts of groups try to regain control of this city. Police, militia, the royal guard, the EUP… They were all abandoned by Equestria in time once the city became too much for them. You think this… Division you claim to be a part of will fare any different? Your government will discard anyone if it’s convenient. They’ll use anyone if it’s convenient. Us changelings found that out the hard way, and soon you’ll learn too—”

A loud bang interrupted the changeling’s speech, and a bullet ripped through a gap in his exoskeleton, punching right through his head and out the other side. His body crumbled to the ground, and a pool of green blood began to stain the snow underneath his horn. As soon as he did, Lightning was freed from the hypnotization, and she scrambled up to her hooves with a gasp.

Sour Sweet lowered her smoking markspony rifle with a scoff. “Sorry, I’m sure he was getting to the good part. But I got tired of hearing him talk.”

Lightning turned to Sour with a frown. “Why did you do that? We could've gotten more intel from him. He was in a talkative mood; we could’ve coaxed out their plans.”

“Well, excuse me, but I don’t know how much intel you could possibly get out of that. All I heard was self-righteous bragging,” Sour said.

Lightning rolled her eyes. “I’m sure you’re the expert on that subject.”

Sour narrowed her own eyes with a growl. “At least I did something! You spent the entire fight on the ground watching! You have no right to tell me what I should’ve done when you couldn’t do anything helpful.”

“From my vantage point, it didn’t look like anypony was doing anything helpful. We’re lucky to be walking away from this,” Lightning said.

“Excuse you! I was the one who finally stopped that thing,” Lemon chimed. “You’re welcome, by the way. Overwhelming firepower saves the day once again.”

“And I was able to fight it long enough to stop it from disabling Sour. Allowing her to finish it off,” Sugarcoat added.

“But you two got in my line of fire by doing so. I had clear shots until you interfered,” Gridlock said as he stepped forward. “You’re both lucky I was able to stop myself in time.”

Lemon and Sugarcoat made eye contact with each other before looking down at the ground with a hint of shame. When they did, Lightning noticed the shrapnel that had slashed through their flight suits, leaking blood down their exposed fur and down onto the snow below. Every pony in the squad had been hit by at least one fragment from Lemon’s grenades, and the metal was still embedded in some of them.

“And have you looked around, Lemon? I think you did as much damage to us as you did to it,” Lightning added.

“And now every rioter in this place knows we’re coming,” Sour pointed out.

“Well, I personally prefer some shrapnel wounds to death,” Lemon said.

Sour rolled her eyes. “Next time, we might not be so lucky to escape with only a few wounds. Ever heard of making sure the AOE is clear? Communicating that you’re shooting explosives beforehoof?”

“Stop,” Gridlock grunted under the commotion.

“Of course I know! Do you think I’m stupid?” Lemon asked, unabated.

“Well, you didn’t do either of those things, so maybe you are,” Sour responded.

Lemon growled under her breath. "Oh, that's rich coming from the markspony who engaged with a sniper rifle at point-blank range!"

“Well, that’s because someone didn’t let me provide overwatch from a distance. Y’know, where I’m actually useful? But no, that would’ve made too much sense for our boss over here,” Sour said.

“STOP!” Gridlock bellowed.

The second interjection finally brought the argument to a halt. The team of Shadowbolts fell into awkward silence while refusing to meet everypony else's gaze. Only Gridlock stood tall in the center, slitted eyes narrowed as he looked around.

“We don’t know how to fight as a team. That much is clear. There’s no point in fighting over it and making it worse,” Gridlock said.

I can’t let a thestral take over my leadership duties... Lightning scolded herself as she stepped forward to stand next to him. “Gridlock is right. This will be a learning curve for all of us. There will be some learning pains. But we need to work through them, together. Understand?”

There were several silent nods of agreement, but Sour whinnied in annoyance. “Including you, right? Boss?”

Lightning shot Sour a warning glare but didn’t say a word, instead turning her attention to Sugarcoat. “Got anything to patch us up before we move on? If we’re gonna be fighting more of these things, I’d rather us be at full strength when we do.”

Sugarcoat nodded. “I have a few medkits. Hold tight, I’ll get to everypony.”

The team settled in as the medic began to tend to the injuries sustained in the fight. They formed a rough circle to keep watch as Sugarcoat patched them up one at a time with bandages and numbing spray. Only Lemon strayed from the group; she gingerly made her way over to the dead changeling and nudged his exoskeleton with a hoof. The body didn’t move.

“What is a changeling doing here?” Lemon wondered aloud.

“Could’ve been a deep-cover drone who got caught in the quarantine,” Lightning suggested.

Lemon glanced over at Lightning with a frown before looking back down. “He was using magic. Was he suicidal?”

“Maybe. You heard him, changelings are fiercely loyal to Chrysalis. They’re a hivemind; the drones don’t matter, only the will of the Queen.”

“And to be honest… He could have killed us at any time. Why didn’t he?”

“He didn’t kill that civilian either. Maybe he intended to bring us with him.”

“To turn us into changeling food? No thanks.”

“My thoughts exactly.”

Lightning’s attention was drawn away by a sharp, brief pain in her side. She winced and glanced over to see that Sugarcoat had begun pulling the pieces of shrapnel out of her skin, then sealing the cuts with gauze. They were painful, but she was a Shadowbolt; she’d survived worse.

"Using this many medical supplies this early into our mission is concerning," Sugarcoat commented in her usual blunt tone. "Try not to get hurt again."

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep trying,” Lightning replied.

Sour chuckled. “The most impressive thing of all is that you managed to get hurt while being paralyzed most of the fight. Unprecedented.”

“That only means I wasn’t able to move out of the blast radius of the grenades,” Lightning said. “What’s your excuse? Too slow?”

“Too preoccupied with trying to stop the threat, mainly. Maybe I should’ve left the changeling alive after all. Leave you frozen like a statue,” Sour said.

“I disagree,” Gridlock chimed in. “I appreciate not having to carry her around.”

“Thanks for the support, Gridlock,” Lightning grumbled.

Before she could be insulted any further, Lightning’s commlink lit up with an incoming call. She answered it and turned away from her teammates to focus.

“This is Captain Shining Armor,” the caller started. “Where are you? We’re running low on ammunition and supplies, soon we’ll be fighting with our hooves over here!”

“We ran into some trouble on the way, but we’re still on our way to you,” Lightning responded, before pausing briefly to gather her thoughts. “Captain, were you aware that there were changeling drones embedded in the rioter forces?”

“What? Changelings? What are you talking about?”

“We ran into one on our way to you. It was disguised as a rioter, and it was one tough son-of-a-bitch. Tell your troops to keep an eye out.”

“Won’t have any troops to tell it to if you don’t hurry, Agent!”

“I get the point. Hold tight, Captain.”

After closing the commlink, Lightning shrugged Sugarcoat away and stood. “Alright, we’ve wasted enough time. Those EUP guards are counting on us, let’s move.”

The five Division agents resumed their trek deeper into the refugee camp, moving deeper into the maze of tents. They headed towards the harbor at the southern tip of Manehattan, the very end of Battery Park and where the EUP headquarters had been set up. It was in a large building on the waterfront, which had been home to a ferry company before the outbreak. It acted as one of the main routes to and from the Equestrian mainland, ferrying thousands of ponies every day… but now, the waters were blockaded and quarantined. The building was visible and growing bigger by the minute, but the popping of gunfire grew loud as well.

Eventually, the Shadowbolts reached the edge of the tents, and the park opened into an empty area between them and the HQ’s entrance. In between was chaos. Next to the front doors, the EUP had set up an array of barricades and were hunkering down for dear life. They were being swarmed by a large group of rioters, who attacked and moved without much experience or cohesion; their numbers simply made the fight a losing one for the guards. Motionless bodies littered the clearing, and the snow was painted red with blood. Bullet casings and discarded melee weapons littered the ground like fallen leaves. Captain Armor was nowhere to be seen.

“What’s the plan this time?” Lemon asked over the commlink.

“Spread out so we don’t get in each other’s way,” Lightning responded. “We’ll all open fire at once. If one of the rioters is taking too many shots without going down, relay it over the SPARC and we’ll focus fire on them. Got it?”

She was answered by a chorus of affirmative nods, and the team got to work. As the rest of her team scrambled off into position, Lightning stayed put, crouching down behind one of the tents and bracing her rifle against the snow-covered ground. The rioters all had their backs to her; it was almost like shooting fish in a barrel.

“Fire when ready,” Lightning ordered.

The rear flank erupted with gunfire, and suddenly the rioters were trapped on both sides. Gridlock’s LMG scythed through the looters like an invisible hand swiping them aside, and they fell without time to even scream in surprise. Lemon’s grenade launcher thumped, and a second later, the heart of the rioter’s position erupted, throwing bodies everywhere as ponies scrambled for cover. One of the rioters managed to reach the EUP barricade, but one shot from Sour’s markspony rifle put an end to his plans.

Confusion and panic swept through the horde of rioters unsure of which threat to face first, and the indecision resulted in dozens being cut down in seconds. Then, that panic turned into an impromptu retreat, with ponies scrambling over themselves to escape the gunfire and make for the entrance to the park.

“Changeling. Mare, green fur, yellow mane. My three o’clock,” Gridlock reported.

Lightning shifted her aim in the direction indicated. A mare matching Gridlock’s description was waving the rioters towards the gate, taking the lead in encouraging the hasty withdrawal.

“Retreat! Retreat! We’ve got what we came for, get out of here!” she yelled as bullets slammed into her, but she didn’t even flinch.

Then, the mare disappeared into the crowd, and soon the main attacking force had completely abandoned the HQ, leaving only a few stragglers that were easily cleaned up. The area fell into silence.

Lightning reloaded her rifle before rising and waving a hoof at the EUP survivors. “Hold your fire! We’re friendlies!”

The EUP guards waved a hoof back in response, and as the Shadowbolts made their way across the corpse-strewn ground, a white and blue unicorn stallion rose from behind the barricade to meet them.

“You must be Agent Lightning Dust,” the stallion said, his voice filled with weariness. “I’m Shining Armor. You showed up just in time.”

“We’ve got a knack for that,” Lightning responded. “Is everyone alright?”

“We lost a lot of good ponies. But we’re still standing, so that means we’ve still got a chance,” Shining said.

Lightning smirked. “I’d say we’ve got more than just a chance now. The Shadowbolts are regaining their presence in the city. We’ve reclaimed the Base of Operations at the Maneway Station, and supply drops have resumed. Moving your guards there to help secure the position would be greatly beneficial.”

“Trust me, I’d love to, but the VIPs here have kept us locked to this position,” Shining said with a nod of his head towards the HQ. “We can’t move them, and we can’t abandon them, so we’re stuck here for the foreseeable future.”

Lightning frowned. “Staying stretched this thin is risky, Captain.”

“I know. But we have no choice.”

Meanwhile, Lemon poked away at one of the dead rioters, deep in thought. “The rioters said they ‘got what they came here for.’ What did they mean by that?”

Shining’s eyes narrowed, but then his face turned pale. “The princesses.”

Shining turned and galloped through the front doors of the headquarters, practically throwing them open in his haste. After a moment’s hesitation, the Shadowbolts bolted after him, leaving the group of confused EUP guards to watch the entrance.

The door opened to the main ticketing area of the ferry station, with the far wall lined with cashier stations protected by glass and the floor strewn with stanchions. A giant banner hung across where the prices would be displayed: "QUARANTINE IS IN EFFECT. ALL FERRIES CANCELED." The room was covered with discarded personal belongings and supplies from ponies that had long since abandoned the doomed HQ.

Shining pushed his way through the gates and towards the docks, but instead of heading to the waterfront, he forced open an employee-only door and took the stairs down to the lower levels. He moved with such panicked speed that even the Shadowbolts had trouble keeping up, with only Lightning able to stay on his heels.

The maintenance staircase opened into a small hallway leading to various storage closets. One of the doorways was guarded by two EUP guards, who jumped in surprise at the sudden arrival of the group. Their guns raised in alarm, but quickly lowered once they recognized the sight of their captain.

“Caramel! Scarlet! Have you noticed anything?” Shining called out as he approached.

“No one’s come down here, Captain. We heard some gunfire and some explosions, but we assumed it was from the fighting upstairs,” one of the guards responded.

Shining and Lightning exchanged a look as the rest of the Shadowbolts caught up.

“Did you think to check on the VIPs after it happened?” Shining asked.

The two guards grimaced. “No sir. We didn’t want to divert our attention away from the entrance. Besides, how would anyone get in behind us? The room is secured.”

Lightning stepped forward. “Out of the way then. We’ll check it ourselves.”

The guards hesitantly nodded before scrambling off to the side, allowing Shining and the Division agents to stack up on the door. Lightning teased the handle of the door to find that it was unlocked, allowing the door to open a smidge.

“This door is supposed to be locked…” Shining whispered under his breath.

“Someone’s been in here,” Sugarcoat deduced for them.

“We’ve gotta get in there then,” Lightning said before throwing the double doors wide open.

Once the entrance was open, the six ponies flooded inside, rifles raised to scour every corner of the room. It was a maintenance room underneath the ferry dock, holding tools and equipment for servicing the large passenger ships. However, one of the side walls had been blown open by an explosive, revealing a side hallway that led to a quieter, less secured part of the HQ. In the middle of the room were two large boxes, covered in both glass and reinforced steel, with medical monitoring equipment attached to them. The glass panes on both had been blown open as well, leaving a pony-sized hole large enough to remove anyone that was inside.

As Lightning stepped closer to the quarantine boxes, a sight inside made her gasp; instead of the VIPs inside, there were now two bloodied corpses. Two mares in EUP uniforms… the same mane and fur colors as the two that had been guarding the door. How could there be two of the same pony?...

“Changelings!” Lightning yelled in alarm as she turned herself back to the entrance.

The two guards stood in the door frame with smirks on their faces, unbothered as Lightning raised her rifle to fire. Two bullets harmlessly struck their chests, tearing through their uniforms but leaving no mark on their skin. One of them raised a small device in her hoof and tilted her head.

“Too slow,” she giggled before pressing the button and slamming the door shut.

Before Lightning could fire again, a rapid beeping noise from behind made her turn. The back wall of the room was shrouded in shadow, but several blinking lights now covered the concrete, pulsing faster and faster as their red light bathed the back of the room. The light revealed what now covered the center of the wall: C-4. And before she could react, it exploded in an instant.

Heat and energy erupted from the blast, knocking Lightning onto her back. The quarantine cubes protected her from the fireball and the shrapnel, but her head rang as she tried to force herself back onto her hooves. The explosion left a hole in the thick concrete wall, revealing the base of one of the bright orange ferries that were docked at the terminal… as well as the dark blue water that it was floating in. And that water immediately flooded in through the breach, sweeping the Shadowbolts away.

The wave slammed into Lightning like a wall and knocked her rifle out of her grasp. The impact knocked her breath out of her lungs, and she gasped for air, only for saltwater to fill her muzzle and leave her gasping and sputtering. She was swept away and slammed against the door, pinned there as wave after wave slammed into her. She floundered in panic, thrashing hooves, legs, and wings, but nothing could free her as more and more water filled the small room.

She felt another body slam next to her, and she managed to catch a glimpse of Shining Armor out of the corner of her eye. Rather than fight the crashing waves at the surface, he dove down underneath the water, prompting Lightning to do the same. The room was three-quarters full now, and the force of the flow through the hole made swimming out that way impossible. She tugged on the handle of the door, but it was locked. The changelings had trapped them.

As Lightning desperately tugged and pounded on the doors, Shining instead reached down and pulled his keyring out of his uniform pocket. With almost unnatural calm and poise, the stallion flipped through to find the correct key and slip it into the hole, allowing the doors to swing open after another punch from Lightning. The water spilled through the new opening as well, sweeping the two ponies out with it. Lightning slammed back against the far wall of the maintenance hallway with a groan, and her burning lungs forced her to swim to the surface with a gasp for air.

The water current flowed further down the hallway away from the exit, but her flight suit had snagged on a loose panel, locking her in place. To her left, she could see Shining grab hold of the emergency exit’s door handle to pull himself into the stairwell; to her right, she could see one of her teammates, Sour Sweet, floating out of the room as well, desperately fighting to swim but failing.

“Agent! Grab my hoof!” Shining called out to Lightning from the stairwell.

“Lightning! Help me!” Sour screamed as the current carried her away down the hallway, rapidly flowing out of reach.

Lightning hesitated. Then she grabbed Shining’s hoof, and Sour disappeared under the water.

Shining’s strong grasp pulled her out of the current and into the safety of the stairwell, where Lightning was able to cough all the salt water out of her lungs. Shining continued to pull Shadowbolts out of the water one at a time as each managed to swim out of the quarantine room until almost all of them were clinging to the railing in exhaustion.

The last one out of the water was Gridlock, who looked around in confusion. “Where’s Sour?”

“Gone,” Lightning stammered. “Down the hallway.”

Gridlock turned and jumped back into the water without a second thought, despite Shining’s best efforts to stop him. A tense silence washed over the group as they waited, shivering from the freezing water. The water level steadily rose inch by inch, soon threatening to fill the hallway up to the ceiling.

Then, after several minutes, Gridlock reappeared with a gasp, carrying a limp Sour atop his back. His large, skin-covered bat wings propelled him through the water better than a pegasus’s wings could, and his stallion strength allowed him to swim up the current and make it into the stairwell, where he dumped the unconscious Sour onto the nearest dry spot.

“Sugarcoat!” Gridlock bellowed once they were both out of the water.

The medic bolted over to Sour’s side while the rest of the group hovered anxiously. Sugarcoat pressed down on her chest over and over, pausing only to blow air into her waterlogged muzzle before continuing. Then, after a few more repetitions, Sour erupted into a coughing fit that sprayed water and bile all over herself.

Sugarcoat breathed a sigh of relief as she rolled Sour onto her side, letting her empty her lungs of salt water while the rest of the Shadowbolts finally relaxed. Lightning sat down against the wall and curled herself up to preserve body heat, the combination of cold air and cold water causing her to shiver uncontrollably. None of the other ponies were faring any better.

“Did anyone see where the changelings went?” Shining asked.

He was met with silence.

Shining sighed. “Hopefully, they just left to meet up with the rioters…”

“Or they rejoined the rest of your guards with new disguises,” Gridlock mumbled.

“We have no way of telling if they’re a pony or a changeling, so I really hope not,” Shining grimaced.

“Why were they here?” Lemon asked.

“To take the princesses. And they succeeded. To where and why, I have no idea,” Shining said.

“What are the princesses even doing here? Shouldn’t they have been in a secure location off the island?” Lightning asked.

Shining shook his head. “They can’t leave the quarantine zone. They’re infected.”

Lemon blinked. “Infected? How did that happen?”

Shining opened his mouth to respond, but before he could, he was interrupted by a commotion behind him. Sour was forcing herself up onto her hooves, despite Sugarcoat's pleading for her to stay down to recover. The soaked pegasus stumbled her way over to Lightning… and delivered a backhanded slap across her muzzle.

“What the fuck is your problem?” Sour yelled as the rest of the Division agents stepped between them to hold her back. “You left me to fucking drown! Are you serious?”

Shining turned to her. “Lightning? Is that true?”

Lightning wiped her muzzle with a hoof, and it came back bloody. “If I tried to help you, we would have both been sucked away. I wouldn't have been able to stage a rescue if we were both drowning.”

“Stage a rescue?” Sour scoffed. “You didn’t do shit! Gridlock was the one who saved me, you just sat here like a coward!”

“Do you really think he could have carried both of us through that current? He barely made it with just you. It was for the best.”

“You couldn’t have known that in the moment. You just decided to be selfish. That’s all it is.”

“And you’re not being selfish by insisting that I should’ve put your safety over the team’s?”

“Teammates are supposed to help each other! Y’know, you do have a habit of confusing what’s good for you with the good of the team. Or do you do it intentionally?”

“Okay, that’s enough!” Shining crowed. “Both of you. It’s over. We’re safe. And we’ve got bigger things to worry about than each other.”

The group fell silent, but the rage and anger didn’t leave Sour’s eyes as she glared at Lightning. Lightning matched her stare for a few more seconds before looking away.

Shining nodded. “That’s better. First, we’ve gotta get dry. Then, we need to figure out where those princesses went. Let’s go.”

“Hello again, Manehattan. It’s Suri Polomare, back with another episode of Wouldn’t You Know It.

“Now, I’m sure most of you are in the same situation as me right about now: stuck in our apartments with nothing to do and nowhere to go… unless we fancy getting shot, or stabbed, or mugged, or infected, or any other of the unattractive outcomes our dear city offers at the moment. Well, let me tell you something about being stuck in the same room for weeks: you notice everything. I’ve found cracks, stains, loose floorboards, creaking noises, and other shit I didn’t know existed. I’ve counted the number of carriages clogging up the streets below me multiple times… 128, if you were wondering. Anything changes, anything out of the ordinary happens, I notice it.

“And something out of the ordinary has happened, fillies and gentlecolts. Strap yourselves in.

“Early this morning, the first supply helicopter landed in town after a long absence. You can thank the destruction of the Spellcaster for that. And luckily, I was able to get a good view of it from my window, so I was able to see the whole delivery go down. Sure, there were boxes and boxes of non-perishable food and supplies, but that wasn’t the main point of the delivery. They brought in ponies as well. Who flies more ponies into an active quarantine zone?

“And that wasn’t all. These weren’t normal ponies. These weren’t doctors or virus specialists either. Each of them had the same combat suit on, and they were sporting weapons that looked like they were pulled out of a science fiction novel. Equestrian special forces. At least, I hope they’re Equestrian.

“Now, I’m not the biggest expert on the Equestrian government, but I like to consider myself well-informed. And I was unaware that we even have special forces in the country. You can tell me, ‘That’s the whole point of Special Forces, Suri, you’re not supposed to expect them,’ but doesn’t it seem a little odd to you that there’s been no news, no rumors, nothing? Not one pony let it slip that there was a secret regiment of soldiers after a long night at the bar?

“It’s like these ponies just appeared in the streets of Manehattan. Like the virus created them or something. If they’re this top secret, it makes one wonder what else they’re hiding from us.

“And the fact that they exist isn’t the only thing that concerns me. What are they doing here? Obviously, things are not going well in this city, I won’t deny that, but how can you fight a virus with special forces? And doesn’t reinforcing the EUP with literal agents of death seem a little overkill?

“All this is telling me one thing: things are worse than we know. Worse than we realize. I mean, when was the last time we heard from the Princesses? Who’s running the country? Are we really the only city infected by this thing? Or has Equestria gone up in flames?

“There’s a very real chance that things may never go back to normal if we’re resorting to these measures. And the sooner we wake up to that fact, the better.

“I’m gonna do some digging. You ponies stay safe until next time, m’kay?”

Rainy awoke to the smell of coffee in the air.

She groggily opened her eyes to see that she had wrapped herself up in her own wings during the night to keep herself warm. She slowly untangled herself and rolled off the couch to stretch all six limbs with a yawn. From the view outside the window, she had slept through the rest of the day and most of the night; the sky above was dark and covered in gray clouds, with daybreak still to come.

Aerion’s voice interrupted her stretching. “Welcome back to the waking world, Agent.”

Rainy paused and turned to face her. Aerion was sitting next to the kitchen counter, watching a coffee pot boil atop a peculiar piece of technology. It shared the same angular design as the rest of Aerion’s MagiTech equipment, and its hodgepodge construction suggested that she had cobbled it together from pieces she had scattered around the apartment. It glowed with a warm blue light, emanating heat that caused steam to whistle out of the top of the pot.

Agrippa stood next to Aerion with a mug cupped in her hooves. She took greedy sips from it as she stared at Rainy from over the rim; sleep hadn’t cured the black bags hanging under her eyes.

“Power is out, gas is out, both for obvious reasons. But luckily for us, we don’t need any of that when we have MagiTech,” Aerion said with a gesture to the pot. “Want some?”

Rainy shook her head. "I don't drink coffee. Your body becomes over-reliant on it, and it makes waking up even harder to do."

Agrippa rolled her eyes and took another sip. “Heard that one a lot back in the day. Rainy was always the idealist, and she made sure you knew about it.”

“And yet I was right, wasn’t I? Coffee and medical school turned you into a zombie,” Rainy said.

“Better to be a zombie than a cadaver. You’re lucky I didn’t start using anything stronger.”

“Oh, so I should be thankful that you didn’t hook yourself on Poison Joke? Like you were doing me a favor?”

“Well, I wasn’t doing it for myself, that’s for sure. It would’ve made the whole experience a whole lot more bearable. But nope, I was just stuck with coffee and you. What a nightmare.”

Rainy caught a biting retort on the tip of her tongue and refused to speak it into existence. The conversation fell into an awkward silence.

Aerion was the first to break it. “Look. I can tell this is a sore subject… but I feel that if I’m going to be working with you two, I deserve to know what the hell is going on between you.”

Rainy and Agrippa looked from Aerion to each other, then found different corners of the room to stare at. The drawn-out silence was only interrupted by the bubbling of the coffee pot.

“We were engaged,” Rainy said finally.

Aerion’s eyes widened. “What?”

“We met in Ponyville, back when I was a guard and she was a medical student. Lived together for years,” Rainy said.

“I mean, all the bickering and cold shoulders made me think there was some sort of relationship, but I didn’t think it was that serious. What happened?” Aerion asked.

“I received an offer to join the Division, and one of the criteria was that I had to create distance from any attachments. Anything that could compromise me or affect my enthusiasm to serve when my number was called,” Rainy explained.

“And Rainy, being the stickler she is, immediately cut off all contact,” Agrippa interjected with a snarl. “Barely even said goodbye. Left me high and dry just a month out from the wedding.”

Rainy sighed. “I had to, Agrippa. I had no choice.”

"Like hell, you didn't. Do you think every single other Shadowbolt disappeared on their friends? Their spouses? Their children? No, you’re just so straightlaced and desperate to impress that you took it above and beyond. Always dedicated to following every rule to the letter. Where has that gotten you, hm, Agent?”

"Where has it gotten me? It was your insistence that I disobey orders and break the rules that I'm even in this position to begin with! A treasonous rogue agent, stuck with two mares that hate me and what I stand for, just so I can be your guinea pig. Do you think I wanted this? All I ever wanted to do is the right thing, and you hate me for it.”

"The right thing? How can you sit there and tell me with a straight face that what you've done is the right thing? Your moral compass must be screwed on backward, Rainy. Or did they train that compass out of you?"

“I’m a Shadowbolt. A Division Agent. We were all chosen because we’re able and willing to make the tough decisions no one else can make. So maybe they did, but it’s all for the betterment of Equestria! Everything that Command does is for the good of everypony, even if it means some ponies have to get hurt in the process!”

“THEY SENT YOU TO DIE, RAINY!”

Rainy’s ears folded back against her head. Agrippa’s mug was shattered against the ground, and coffee flowed between the kitchen tiles. Rainy’s intended words disappeared in her muzzle as the outburst left her in shock. Agrippa trembled with adrenaline and rage as her own bottled-up emotions finally uncorked themselves.

“They knew this place would kill you, and they didn’t say a word,” Agrippa said, voice no higher than a whisper, but the anger and rage still dripped off every word. “Even after you sucked up to them as much as you could. Where’s the loyalty in that?”

“It was for the greater good. Sacrifices need to be made to ensure the nation’s safety. Guards understand that. Soldiers understand that,” Rainy said softly.

Agrippa scoffed. “Bullshit. Good leaders don’t throw their ponies’ lives away like pawns. Especially when there’s a better way of doing things. Do you know what we Equestrians call leaders that don’t care about their subjects? Evil.”

Evil. That word reverberated through Rainy’s core, echoing in her brain. How could something created by the Princesses be evil? How could something meant to preserve Equestria from foreign threats be evil? Sure, they had thrown her into the metaphorical fire, but it was done for the betterment of Equestria; it had been done because they cared about their subjects, and the Division was there to protect and save them. Right?

But Chrysalis was considered evil, and all she wanted to do was secure the well-being of her hive. Her subjects. What made her different? The fact that she manipulated innocent ponies to gain what she wanted. The fact that she saw her subjects as nothing more than drones to serve her every command. How was that any different from what the Shadowbolts were doing? At what point did the ends justify the means?

Rainy had no answers. She stared down at her hooves, watching the puddle of coffee grow closer and closer to her.

“Something that evil doesn’t deserve to be followed. Rules that strict don’t deserve to be obeyed,” Agrippa continued. “And if this can’t make you see that… nothing will.”

Agrippa’s hoofsteps echoed through the kitchen as she stormed her way back into her bedroom. The coffee touched the tip of Rainy’s hoof and sizzled against her fur. She didn’t notice. She had stopped paying attention.

Chapter 11

Ponyville, 1006 ANM.

Once she was in the relative privacy of a side room in Twilight’s castle, Celestia stretched out her pinions with a long, held-out groan. She might have had thousands of years of experience with public events, but the relief of stepping out of view and unwinding never dulled.

Following her inside was Twilight’s protégé: Starlight Glimmer. She still wore her Pink Heart of Courage around her neck, the award she had just received for her efforts in repelling the changeling invasion. Celestia had spent the entire invasion in a goo pod, and her back was still stiff from the experience.

“I would like to once again congratulate you, as well as personally thank you for saving Equestria, Starlight,” Celestia started.

“It’s nothing, Princess,” Starlight replied bashfully. “I just did what any other pony would have done.”

“Yes, but no other pony could have succeeded. You displayed unparalleled amounts of adaptability and intuition in a seemingly hopeless situation, and you were able to almost single-hoofedly save Equestria from complete changeling dominance. This may be cliché to say, but you were literally our last hope, and you pulled through. We all owe you our gratitude.”

Starlight bowed her head. “I appreciate the compliments, Princess, but I’ve been showered with enough praise tonight. Something tells me this meeting is about something more.”

“Perceptive, too,” Celestia chuckled. “Well, Starlight, I also had a lengthy conversation with your mentor about your future. I won’t go into specifics, but Twilight felt that your studies had come to an end. She was prepared to ship you off to the ends of Equestria and beyond to let you become your own mare, follow your own adventures, further your own studies. However, I was able to coax her into leaving that decision up to you, and you have chosen to stay.”

“Yes. I may have graduated from Twilight’s friendship lessons, but I’m not ready to leave her just yet. I still feel like there is so much for me to learn here in Ponyville and Equestria, and I feel like I have a long way to go before I feel comfortable to head out on my own.”

“I wholeheartedly support your decision. And if you’re going to be sticking around, then I plan to utilize your talents for good. Which is why I’ve asked to speak with you privately like this. I have a job offer for you.”

Starlight tilted her head. “I’m listening.”

“For the past few years, I’ve been putting together a covert ops team. This is highly classified information. Not even Twilight knows that this exists. Whether you accept or deny, this conversation never leaves this room, understand?”

“Covert ops? For what?”

“For the experience you just went through, Starlight. To me, it feels like our kingdom is being invaded twice a year now, and it feels like I’m incapacitated for over a half of them. One of these times, our luck is going to run out. This team will ensure that continuity of government prevails in these times of crisis. You, if you accept, and the rest of the team will be embedded in Equestrian society, only activated in times of great distress. The team will emphasize adaptability, tenacity, creativity, and the ability to operate independently without a central command. All traits that you have demonstrated. I think you’d be a perfect fit for this operation.”

“Continuing with my studies, while also helping to serve the nation that gave me a second chance?” Starlight replied with a smile. “Sounds like a perfect deal to me.”

Celestia smiled back. “It is a perfect deal. And you’re the perfect mare for the job.”

Manehattan, 1008 ANM.

“Have a seat, soldier,” Shining said.

The EUP guard nervously sat himself in the chair across the table from Shining Armor. He was flanked by Lightning Dust and Sugarcoat on either side; Lightning brandished her pistol in a ready position, while Sugarcoat held a sterilized needle. Outside of Shining’s office, Lemon Zest and Gridlock kept careful watch over the rest of the EUP survivors as they waited for their turn. The only Shadowbolt not involved in crowd control was Sour Sweet. Instead, she fiddled with a control tablet, and somewhere outside, a recon drone was flying slow circles around the staging area, each lap further out than the last.

Sugarcoat stepped up to the seated guard. “Give me your hoof.”

The guard offered it after only a moment’s hesitation, and Sugarcoat gently pricked the frog with the end of the needle before pulling it out just as fast as it went in. The end gleamed red with blood, and it bubbled up slightly from the small entry wound.

“He’s a pony,” Sugarcoat confirmed audibly, and Lightning relaxed her stance.

“Thank you,” Shining said to both Sugarcoat and the guard. “You may go now.”

The confused guard blinked, but stood and saluted all the same before leaving out the back door and into the ferry station. Lightning gestured for Gridlock to bring in the next guard while Sugarcoat sterilized the needle.

“You really think the changelings stuck around?” Shining asked as he rubbed both eyes with a hoof each.

“They’ve proven that they can take your guards’ forms,” Lightning said. “And if they did it once, why wouldn't they stick around and try to sabotage even more? Better safe than sorry.”

“Better safe than sorry,” Shining echoed in agreement. “But for how long can we assume we’re in the clear after this? We can’t exactly go through this whole routine every single day to know who to trust.”

Lightning’s mouth became a thin line. “We’ll figure it out.”

Shining just sighed and closed his eyes.

Lightning glanced over at her team’s markspony. “How’s it going over there, Sour?”

“No princesses yet,” Sour replied as her eyes remained glued to the video screen on her tablet. “Whatever the glitching is on our motion trackers is also causing the drone to act up too. It’s making this a lot slower than it should be.”

“Keep looking. They can’t have gone far, especially if they’re infected like Shining says.”

“I was planning on it,” Sour replied with a roll of her eyes.

Lightning turned her attention to the new guard entering the office, and her pistol raised to the ready position. The guard, a mare this time, shifted her eyes suspiciously between Lightning and Sugarcoat before settling on Shining.

“We’re working with these assholes now?” she asked Shining, as if the Shadowbolts weren’t there.

“Yes, we are,” was Shining’s measured response. “They showed up to save our asses, and we’re on the same side. That’s good enough for me. Have a seat, soldier.”

The guard sat down and offered her hoof to Sugarcoat. “We’re on the same side now, but how long will that last? If they’re anything like the ones in the Dark Zone, it won’t be long before they’re throwing us under the carriage.”

“That’s enough, soldier,” Shining ordered firmly, and the mare clamped her muzzle shut and looked away. “Sugarcoat, do it.”

Sugarcoat pricked the underside of the guard’s hoof, though she purposefully stabbed it deeper and longer than she had for the other stallion. When she pulled it out, it glistened red and dripped blood down onto her fur.

“Pony,” Sugarcoat said.

Shining nodded. “Thank you. You may go.”

The guard stood and saluted, but didn’t as much as look in Lightning or Sugarcoat’s direction as she took her leave.

Shining leaned back in his chair and sighed. “My apologies. She’s been serving in the EUP since the first days of the outbreak. Given how rough it’s been these past few weeks, she’s… understandably jaded. She doesn’t mean it.”

“She worked with the First Wave?” Lightning asked.

Shining nodded. “So did I. Feels so long ago now.”

Lightning chewed her bottom lip as she chose her next words carefully. “What went wrong?”

“Just about everything. There were just too many sick, too much unrest for us to handle. We were stretched much too thin. Then the Princesses went down, and any hope we had of containing it evaporated into thin air.”

“How did it happen?” Lightning asked.

Shining’s eyes glazed over. “We thought the mere presence of the Princesses would be enough to bring some calm and order to the city. Let them know that they weren’t forgotten, that we were working on solutions. But it almost made the situation worse. Seeing the Princesses and realizing that this virus was even beyond their capacity to fix… it made the reality set in for a lot of ponies.

“A few days after they arrived, they planned to give a speech on Bridleway and pass out relief supplies. Standard media op. Up on the stage were the two sisters, myself, and the de facto leader of the First Wave: Starlight Glimmer.”

Lightning tilted her head. “Glimmer? You mean Princess Twilight’s pet project?”

“Her student, yes. Must’ve been hard for Starlight. All that magical prowess in a city that would kill her if she used it. But she did as valiant a job as anyone could’ve in the situation. It was just too much for anyone to handle, really.

“But when we were up there, and the princesses were giving that speech, the crowd suddenly turned violent. They surged forward, overwhelming the guard rails and the EUP trying to hold them back. The Princesses had to use their magic to stop us from being trampled to death. They’d realized their mistake the moment their horns began to glow, but it was either infection or death by mob. That’s when I gave the order to pull out and sealed off anyone left behind. Starlight had disappeared in the chaos, and I don’t think she made it out. She could be dead, for all I know.”

“And now the First Wave hates you for leaving them behind,” Lightning said.

Shining grimaced. “We had no choice. The Shadowbolts thought they had it under control, that they were almost on the precipice of turning this thing around. Well, having a mob of ponies try to trample their rulers is about as out of control as you can possibly get. There was no saving the Dark Zone.”

Lightning wanted to find some fault in that, but as she ran the situation through her mind, she couldn’t do anything but agree with Shining. Shadowbolts weren’t supposed to leave ponies behind, but this city was beyond anything anyone had ever seen before. The rules of engagement flew completely out the window. You couldn’t risk the safety of your squad members by leaving the Dark Zone open just because a bunch of traitors didn’t want to see the truth. The truth that they’d failed. If she was in Shining’s horseshoes, she would have sealed them off too.

Lightning frowned, but before she could continue the conversation, the next guard stepped inside. His eyes scanned the room as he sat down in the chair as ordered, before focusing right in on Shining’s eyes with unblinking attention.

“Hoof, please,” Sugarcoat said.

He lifted his forehoof, but his eyes never left Shining. The captain fidgeted in his chair uncomfortably.

“What’s your name, soldier?” Shining asked to break the tension.

“Shouldn’t a captain know the names and faces of the soldiers under his command?” the guard answered cryptically.

Lightning’s grip on the trigger of her pistol tightened.

Shining’s eyes narrowed. “You’re right. I should. That’s why I’m trying to learn.”

“There’s nothing to learn,” the guard laughed. “I’m just one of the countless faceless guards you use as pawns. You’ll just order me around, let me die, and forget I even existed. A happy little drone, ready to serve my purpose and nothing more. And here I thought ponies lived such better lives.”

Sugarcoat’s needle pricked the guard’s hoof. Instead of breaking the skin, the needle slipped right past the frog, soon meeting something hard and solid with a little clink. When she pulled it back, there was no blood and no entry wound.

The guard moved in a blur. Before Lightning could blink, his offered hoof drove itself into Sugarcoat’s jaw, snapping her head back and dropping her to the floor. He pulled his service weapon from under his jacket and aimed it right at Shining’s face. Time froze for a brief moment as the captain stared down the barrel.

The bang of the gun coincided with the blue-yellow blur of Lightning Dust slamming into the guard’s side. Shining flinched as the bullet narrowly whizzed past his ear and punched a hole in the wall. On the floor, Lightning and the guard wrestled for control of his sidearm next to a dazed Sugarcoat. She slammed the hoof holding it into the ground once, twice… and on the third time, he relented his grip, and the gun skittered away. A sudden surge of strength through the guard caught Lightning off guard, and he threw her several hooflengths into the air to send her crashing against the wall.

Outside in the waiting room, one of the guards in line bolted off as quickly as his legs could take him, blowing past Lemon and outside into the open air. Lemon and Gridlock wasted precious seconds internally debating between helping Lightning and chasing the new threat, but the two soon galloped out of the room after them while the remaining guards cowered in confusion.

Lightning coughed as she forced herself to her hooves as quickly as she could. The guard was also rising onto all fours with a snarl. He crouched down to prepare to bolt; towards her, towards Shining, towards the door, she couldn’t tell. But he didn’t get the chance to before half of his head exploded.

The report from Sour Sweet’s markspony rifle accompanied the spray of green hemolymph and black exoskeleton as the guard collapsed to the floor. His form flickered as he gave up the ghost, and his body changed from the unicorn stallion to a familiar black insectoid creature. Changeling.

Lightning half expected him to just get back up again — with how much punishment she’s seen them take, she wouldn’t even be surprised — but his body remained unnaturally still. Deathly still.

Sour Sweet scoffed as she lowered her rifle. “You’re welcome. Again.”

Lightning let out a half-laugh that didn’t originate from any sense of humor. “You’re lucky you’ve got the only gun that can punch through their armor. Don’t lose that thing.”

“Maybe I’ll start sleeping with it from now on,” Sour said.

Meanwhile, Shining shakily stood up from behind his desk to examine the changeling’s body. “You saved my life, Agent. Thank you.”

Lightning shrugged. “Consider us even now. At least we flushed out our changelings.”

A dazed Sugarcoat climbed back up to her hooves as well, idly rubbing at the sore spot under her chin. “What was his end goal? He couldn’t possibly think he could take on all of us and escape.”

“Kill Shining. Create a distraction so his partner could escape,” Sour mused. “They probably planned this out together before he came in.”

“Well, let’s hope Lemon and Gridlock manage to bring back the other one,” Lightning said.

A few minutes later, the other two Shadowbolts returned to the room with grim looks on their faces.

“It got away,” Gridlock reported. “We couldn’t keep up.”

Lightning blinked. “What do you mean, you couldn’t keep up? You’re Shadowbolts, for Celestia’s sake.”

“Well, it’s kinda hard to keep pace when it sprouts wings and takes off into the damn sky,” Lemon retorted. “Nothing we could do but take a few potshots and watch it go.”

“Well, did you at least manage to see which way it was heading?” Lightning asked.

“Northeast. Towards the financial district. Swerved through a few of the taller buildings, looked like it might’ve been descending when I lost visual.” Gridlock said.

Lightning tapped a hoof on the floor as her mind raced. “Right, we can work with that. Sour, you haven’t found the Princesses yet, have you?”

“No, I have not. Thank you for reminding me,” Sour grumbled.

“Divert your drone. Start canvassing the financial district for any signs of that runaway changeling. It’s the best lead we have.”

“On it, give me a second,” Sour responded as she grabbed her tablet and started manipulating the controls.

The Shadowbolts sat in silence as Sour circled skyscrapers in search of the loose bug, with only a few clicks and beeps from the tablet filling the air. Then, she shot up with a jolt, quickly prodding buttons and settings.

“Got ‘em. Intersection of Pine and Bridleway, moving east on hoof.”

“Jackpot,” Lightning grinned. “Keep a target lock on that changeling, I want to know exactly where it is at all times. Everyone else, pack up and move out. Hopefully, that bug will take us straight to where they’re keeping the princesses.”

“I’ll come with you,” Shining said. “Bring a squad of EUP. Overwhelm whatever’s there with numbers.”

Lightning shook her head. “No. We need speed to catch up to that changeling, and too many ponies will slow us down. And, no offense Captain, but I don’t know if I trust your troops in a firefight just yet.”

Shining frowned. “They’re raw, but they can still hold their own.”

“Sure, but they’re not Shadowbolts,” Lightning said. “Evacuate your troops and take them to the Maneway Station instead. There are civilians and injured EUP guards there that need your help more than we do. If we find the princesses, we’ll bring them there.”

Shining hesitated, then nodded. “Understood. See you soon, Agent.”

“Stay safe,” Lightning replied before turning her attention to her fellow agents. “Squad, let’s move out! We’ve got bugs to squash and princesses to save.”

Rainy was used to long periods of doing nothing.

As a former guardpony, she had spent several hours on end standing in one position and staring straight ahead. She had learned to grow comfortable with nothing but her own thoughts. However, she still found herself antsy as she sat on Aerion’s couch. Maybe it was the fact that she knew she was slowly burning up from the inside, and that she was working on borrowed time from here on out. Maybe it was the fact that she was seen as a rogue agent, and that there were probably many, many ponies in the city looking for her right now. But whatever the reason, she could no longer spend her time sitting and staring at nothing.

Next to her charred, shredded Shadowbolt flight suit on the coffee table rested her rifle, her first aid syringe, and her newly-acquired deployable turret. Rainy pulled the turret closer to her and pressed the unfold button, causing it to spring open from its casing and scan the room in front of her with its red targeting laser. The Freelancer engineers at the Spellcaster had jury-rigged the Division tech to work without a SPARC, which meant that anyone could use it. However, that also meant that it wouldn’t recognize her as a friendly target anymore. She had to un-jury-rig it so that she wouldn’t be shot at every time she used it.

This task kept her busy for the next few hours while the sun poked through small holes in the cloud cover up above. She only took breaks to rummage through Aerion’s kitchen for food to snack on while she worked. As she gnawed on a granola bar, she put the finishing touches on the control board and synced the connection with her SPARC watch. The watch flashed blue to signify the pairing was successful before returning to its ambient orange lightning, matching the orange streak in her mane.

“ALERT. NEW DEVICE DETECTED. ADDING CONTROLS TO HUD,” the SPARC chimed in her earpiece.

Her contact lenses booted up into combat mode automatically as the turret sprung to life out of its casing. As its targeting laser swept the empty room, a new row of icons appeared in the corner of Rainy’s vision. Controls for turning it on and off, setting the maximum distance at which to engage… as well as the ability to set priority targets. This thing would be a massive help in the field, and the regenerating ability meant she’d never be without it for long.

However, as it automatically scanned the area, one of the bedroom doors opened to reveal Aerion carrying a piece of MagiTech in her hoof.

“Hey, Agent, I was looking at—”

Before Aerion could finish, the turret suddenly locked in on her center of mass with a chirping noise. The message [TARGET ACQUIRED] flashed across Rainy’s HUD.

“Shit!” Aerion yelped as she dove behind the nearest couch.

The turret clicked as it chambered a round—then suddenly shut off before it could fire it. It obediently folded back up into its casing until it looked like a briefcase once again, and the room fell into silence.

“Phew,” Rainy exhaled as she watched the shutdown sequence finish. “Sorry, Aerion.”

Aerion poked her head out from behind the couch, and her face was as white as a ghost. “That thing almost fucking shot me. Of course it did.”

“I don’t know how that would happen,” Rainy said. “You’re not hostile. We’re lucky I was able to hit the off switch in time. Maybe I messed something up when I was connecting it to my SPARC…”

Aerion sighed. “Ah. There’s the problem. It’s one of the many flaws of the manufacturer that made this Division junk.”

“Another manufacturing issue? You sure you’re not just still mad you lost out on the contract?” Rainy scoffed.

“No, I’m serious,” Aerion said as she sat across from Rainy. “I’ve already proven to you that they’ve been cutting costs everywhere on this tech. They neglected to put in filters to protect against magical contamination. And now they’ve cut corners on target identification.”

“Elaborate, please.”

“Well, I can’t speak specifics on how the whole process went down, considering I wasn’t there… but it probably went something like this. The Division couldn’t figure out the best way for their turret AI to target enemies. Target openly hostile ponies? Too difficult to determine and code. Target armed ponies? Then it’ll target friendly soldiers as well. So, instead of thinking of more creative solutions, they chose the simplest one: attack anyone without a SPARC. That way, it’s guaranteed to leave Division targets alone.”

“But it will attack anyone else.”

“Exactly. Civilians? EUP guards? Surrendering rioters? Doesn’t matter, it’ll open fire on all of them if they don’t have a SPARC. Yet another avoidable oversight with very fatal flaws because they were concerned about cost. Despicable, if you ask me.”

“Long story short: I need to be careful when using this thing.”

“Succinctly put, Agent. Well done.”

Rainy sighed as she looked down at her orange watch. “You seem very invested in this Division contract you missed out on.”

“Yeah, it’s a bit of a sore spot for me. Feels like a bad ex I had almost managed to forget about… but now here I am, surrounded by them, constantly reminded of what happened.”

Rainy chuckled dryly. “I know how that feels. We’re more alike than you first thought.”

“Sorry Agent, I didn’t mean it like that.”

Rainy waved her off with a hoof. “It’s fine. Agrippa and I already vented on you this morning. But if you need to do the same, I’m here to listen. Got nothing else to do.”

Aerion leaned back with a sigh, and a hoof rubbed at her chin. “The offer came at a very unstable time in my life. I just graduated from magic university, had next to nothing to my name, looking for any opportunity to jumpstart my business. Suddenly, the crown came calling. MagiTech R&D for a spec ops unit. Multi-year contract, tons of pay, tons of stability. It was a dream offer for someone like me, and I came in swinging with my best offer. You’ve got a few of the prototypes in front of you.”

Rainy glanced down at the equipment resting on the coffee table in front of her: the first aid syringe, the SPARC uplink, the HUD contact lenses. “It’s been pretty reliable for me so far, yeah.”

“Mmhm. I put everything I had into them. But, of course, a bigger MagiTech company came in, promising to do more for less, and I lost out. I was able to recover and I’m doing well now, sure, but that missed opportunity almost bankrupted me. And yeah, maybe I’m still mad about it.”

“Maybe?” Rainy grinned.

“Screw you,” Aerion scoffed playfully. “Don’t insult one of the two ponies trying to keep you alive.”

Just then, the door to Aerion’s guest room swung open, and Agrippa stepped out into the living room. She had clearly been crying; she had done her best to rub the tear lines out of her cheek fur, but her eyes remained puffy and red. She had a determined look on her face, however, and she stepped right up to the couches where the other two mares were sitting.

“Time’s up. No more feeling sorry for ourselves. We need to get moving on virus research again if we want to save Rainy’s life,” Agrippa said.

Rainy sprang up onto all fours and stretched out her neck with a groan. “Great, I’m more than ready. What’s first?”

“First up is virus sample collection. And I’m coming with you.”

Rainy paused. “...Excuse me?”

“You won’t know what the hell you’re looking for down there, Rainy. I’m coming.”

“Agrippa—... Doctor, this city isn’t safe. You can’t just wander around out there and expect to make it back alive.”

“Good thing I won’t just be wandering around out there alone, huh? I’ll have my very own super soldier running security.”

Rainy sighed. “I’m not talking you out of this, am I?”

“Nope, so save your breath,” Agrippa said as she made her way to the front door. “We’ve got a ways to go, so let’s get moving so we’re back before daybreak.”

Rainy grabbed her equipment from the coffee table and hurried to follow. “Where are we headed?”

“Saddle Row. Ground zero.”

The artificial canyons of the Financial District were almost completely abandoned.

The sparse amounts of apartments compared to the rest of the city meant it wasn’t that bustling outside of working hours to begin with, but since the rich financiers were the first to abandon ship once virus cases started spreading, there weren’t even survivors lingering around. Just enormous, glittering skyscrapers towering over narrow streets, making Lightning feel like a bug crawling through the crevices of the Badlands.

The five Shadowbolts traveled alone through the carriage-ridden streets as they followed the trail of their runaway changeling. Lightning led the way, with Gridlock and Lemon watching the sides and Sugarcoat bringing up the rear. Rather than walking, Sour rode atop Gridlock’s back, keeping her forehooves free to steer her drone in pursuit of the changeling. The batpony stallion plodded along like she wasn’t even there.

“It just turned into an office building two blocks ahead,” Sour called out.

“Alright, put the drone on a holding pattern around that building, make sure it doesn’t leave through a door or window,” Lightning said. “Everyone else, double time it. We can’t lose him in there, there’s too many floors for us to sweep.”

The Shadowbolts broke into a quick trot. The fresh snow dusting the ground from last night made following the changeling’s fresh tracks easy, and soon the team was in front of the target building’s lobby. Its condition was relatively pristine compared to the rest of the city; there was still some evidence of looters picking around, but there wasn’t much in terms of useful supplies present. Plus, its isolated position on the south of the island meant it was separated from the riots around the Dark Zone.

Sour slid off Gridlock’s back and readied her markspony’s rifle. “Drone scanner says the lobby's clear. Other than that, it's hard to tell. Too much brick and not enough open windows to see.”

Lightning stepped inside the lobby and scanned the interior with her eyes before glancing down. Wet hoofprints from freshly melted snow tracked across the fancy tile, from the front door all the way to the main stairwell.

“Follow the hoofprints. Take care not to scuff them up,” Lightning said before moving deeper.

The team hastily followed the prints up the stairway, hurrying to find their owner before the tracks dried up. Up and up the switchbacks they went, sweeping their corners with their rifles with methodical efficiency.

“This is entirely too easy,” Gridlock mused under his breath. “Do you think it wants to be followed?”

“The only reason Equestria is still around is because of villain stupidity most of the time,” Lemon muttered back. “Don’t look a gift pony in the mouth.”

“A what?” Gridlock asked. “You Equestrians gift other ponies to each other?”

“...Forget I said anything,” Lemon said.

“Quiet back there. We don’t want them knowing we’re following them,” Lightning hissed.

The hoofprints stopped about halfway up the building. Instead, they diverted right into the closed door of the stairwell access before disappearing beyond. Lightning signaled for the team to pause before pressing her ear to the cold steel. Inside, she could hear the murmuring of a conversation, and she pressed harder against the door to listen in.

“What do you mean, they’re infected?” a voice echoed faintly through the door.

“I mean that they’re infected,” a second one responded. “Scanner lit up with all sorts of nasty numbers. The blue one’s so sick, she can’t even see. Why they even bothered to put them in decontamination cubes, I have no idea.”

“So the whole plan’s a bust then.”

“Yep. Absorbing any love from them would be one hell of a last meal, though.”

“The Queen’s not gonna be happy to hear that…”

Lightning pulled away from the door and motioned to the squad. “They’re here. And I think they’ve got the princesses in there with them.”

“Well, let’s bust down the door and kill ‘em then,” Lemon responded.

“We’ve got to do this carefully though. No explosives and no full auto, we don’t want to accidentally hit the princesses if they’re in there. If they are, try to draw fire and attention away from their location so the bugs don’t hit them either.”

The Agents nodded, and Lightning continued. “Sugarcoat, you’re on the door. Everyone else, stack up. I’ll go first. Sour, you take up the rear.”

“The back?” Sour scoffed. “But I’m the only one that can actually kill those things.”

“Exactly. If you go through first and immediately get killed, we’re shit out of luck. We all go through, draw their attention, you come in last and pick them off. Got it?”

Sour nodded. “Good plan, Agent.”

The Shadowbolt lined up along the wall next to the door, and Sugarcoat stood with her hoof on the handle. Once Lightning nodded, Sugarcoat softly pulled down and yanked the door open a few inches, giving Lightning enough room to uncork a flash grenade and toss it into the room before yanking it back closed.

“Grenade!” someone shouted from inside before there was a loud pop and a flash of white light through the door frame.

Sugarcoat immediately flung the door open, and Lightning slid inside. All her CQC training came to her instinctively, making every movement second nature. She flowed through the doorframe like water, raising her pistol to aim down the sights, eyes taking in the scene in front of her…

She was face to face with herself.

Chapter 12

Lightning stared into her own eyes. And her reflection smiled back.

No. Not her reflection. Herself. A copy. A clone. A whole different version of herself.

Lightning hesitated. And that’s all the opening that faux-Lightning needed to shove her pistol aside and tackle her to the ground.

Lightning hit the ground with a gasp as the air was driven out of her lungs, and two strong hooves pinned her shoulders down as faux-Lightning grinned down at her.

“I’ve never seen a pony more eager to run head-first into traps. You’d think you would’ve learned your lesson the first time!” faux-Lightning crowed triumphantly. “We can smell you Division agents coming from a mile away. Your emotions are rancid: pride, ego, selfishness. Not good for eating in the slightest, but perfect for figuring out exactly where you are.”

Lightning only growled in response as she tried to squirm out of the pin, but her clone was just as strong as she was. She delivered a kick right up into faux-Lightning’s stomach, but instead of meeting soft flesh, she thumped against hard changeling carapace to no avail. She tried again, harder this time, but all she accomplished was bringing a laugh out of the clone above her.

In her periphery, she could see or hear each of her teammates being taken down by their own copies as they came through the apartment door. There were a few shouts and a few gunshots that bounced harmlessly off chitin as they all struggled for control. Sour Sweet’s markspony rifle was the only hope they had of killing these things… but how was she supposed to do that when she couldn’t tell friend from foe?

First things first, she needed to get the changeling off her. Faux-Lightning’s eyes changed from gold to green as she opened her mouth to cast a freezing spell over Lightning, but Lightning was anticipating it this time. She averted her own gaze while delivering an uppercut to her clone’s chin to stop the incantation, and faux-Lightning winced with a hiss. While the changeling was stunned, Lightning grabbed her second flashbang from her tool belt and hastily stuffed the grenade into her clone’s open muzzle, taking her by surprise and making her stumble back with a yelp. Then, it exploded before Lightning had a chance to look away, and her whole world was filled with nothing but whiteness.

Lightning groaned and stumbled back as best she could in her blind state. She couldn’t hear anything but the ringing in her ears. If any of the bugs had avoided being hit by the flash, there was nothing she could do to fight back. She was a goner.

But the end didn’t come. Her vision slowly came back into focus, the ringing slowly faded away, and Lightning forced herself up onto all fours with a gasp. Around her, the other occupants of the room were doing the same, rubbing their eyes and looking around in sharp pain. However, Lightning was still seeing double, and it wasn’t due to the aftereffects of the flash. There were two of each of the Shadowbolts in her team in the room, all looking around in confusion.

“Woah…” one of the Sugarcoats said aloud. “This is weird.”

“Way to state the obvious,” one of the Lemons replied with a groan.

Lightning stayed quiet as her eyes scanned the group of ponies. There had to be a way of telling the real ponies from the changelings. Some flaw in the disguise, some oversight… but the harder she looked, the more confused she became. The changelings had even managed to duplicate their Shadowbolt flight suits and their orange watches, along with the HUD goggles across their eyes. They could replicate clothing, but what was something they couldn’t replicate?

Her thoughts were interrupted by one of the Sour Sweet’s voices. “Well, I know I’m the real thing, so…”

Sour 1 immediately turned and raised her markspony rifle, blowing a hole through Sour 2’s head and releasing green residue out the other side. Sour 2 collapsed without a sound, and her form flickered briefly before fading back to the black exoskeleton of a changeling.

All hell broke loose once again. Lightning felt faux-Lightning slam into her side and drive her to the ground once again. This time, her clone tried to press an immobilizing taser to her neck, and Lightning blocked the jab by grabbing hold of her wrist. The weapon crackled with dangerous electricity inches from her fur as the two mares struggled for control.

The weapon… It wasn’t Lightning’s pistol. That was something the changeling hadn’t been able to replicate. Lightning spared a glance away at the rest of the group as they all wrestled for control. Only one Lemon had a submachine gun, only one Gridlock had an LMG, only one Sugarcoat had an assault rifle… and there was only one Sour left standing, of course.

“And to be honest… He could have killed us at any time. Why didn’t he?”

“He didn’t kill that civilian either. Maybe he intended to bring us with him.”

“To turn us into changeling food? No thanks.”

It all clicked in her head at once.

“Sour!” Lightning cried out over the commlink. “The changelings only have non-lethals!”

Faux-Lightning’s head jerked up in shock and fear as she overheard the message and realized her mistake. She then tried to quickly steal the pistol out of Lightning’s grasp, but before she could, a markspony bullet slammed into her side and knocked her off Lightning with a yelp. Once the green blood splashing from her entry wound was visible, a second bullet finished her off with a shot between the eyes.

Lightning climbed back to her hooves and looked around to see Sour had hidden herself in the corner of the apartment amidst all the chaos. She now aimed down the scope at the other three Shadowbolts as they wrestled with their clones, waiting for a clean shot.

“Good call, Lightning,” Sour said.

Lightning nodded. “Good shots. Keep it to body shots until it’s confirmed that it’s a changeling. Let’s not accidentally decapitate one of our squadmates.”

Seemingly realizing their strategy was no longer working, the changelings switched tactics. Moving in unison as if they were communicating telepathically, the three remaining clones threw their counterparts off in a feat of raw strength that slammed them against the far wall of the apartment with a thud. Faux-Lemon and faux-Sugarcoat then turned and activated their horns with a sickly green hue, and Sour’s rifle was suddenly yanked out of her grasp.

“Shit!” Sour cried out as she leapt after it, grabbing hold before it flew out of reach. She held on with all her might to prevent the rifle from being stolen, and her body slowly slid across the apartment floor from the combined strength of two magic auras. Lightning quickly jumped in to help, and the four played tug-of-war with the markspony rifle in the middle of the room.

“Do not let go. We cannot fight these things without this gun,” Lightning hissed.

“Wasn’t… planning on it!...” Sour growled under her breath.

Sour struggled to squeeze the trigger while pulling with all her might, and finally managed to fire a shot off blindly at the two changelings. The clones flinched as the bullet whizzed by, weakening their grip and allowing Sour and Lightning to yank it back completely. Lightning then leapt at the two clones before they could reestablish the magical grasp. She gave faux-Lemon a big right hook to the horn, slamming into the curved changeling horn underneath the disguise and driving her back with a hiss. Faux-Sugarcoat jumped onto her back from behind before she could pivot, and Lightning began bucking like a bronco in an attempt to throw her off.

The sharp report of Sour’s rifle followed the whizzing of a bullet over Lightning’s head, and she glanced over to see that faux-Lemon had closed the gap on Sour before she could get off a clean shot. The two now wrestled for control over the weapon, and Sour was struggling against the changeling’s strength. The distraction caught Lightning’s attention long enough for faux-Sugarcoat to gain control atop her back, and the changeling grappled her down to the ground to pin her helplessly. Lightning squirmed and yelped as her muzzle was ground into the hardwood floor, and she felt the changelings steal her pistol out of its holster before flashing green.

The hoof on her head relented, and Lightning turned partially to see that the faux-Sugarcoat had changed into a copy of Lightning, only this time with her gun equipped instead of a non-lethal. Lightning flinched as she anticipated the bullet she thought would come… but her fake counterpart didn’t fire. Instead, Lightning watched as the disguised changeling galloped over to Sour and helped throw faux-Lemon off her.

As the new faux-Lightning pretended to pin faux-Lemon to the floor, she gestured over to the real Lightning with her confiscated pistol. “Take her out, quick! Before she changes again!”

Lightning froze as she watched Sour shift the aim of her rifle towards her. She stared down the barrel for a moment that stretched on forever as she desperately thought of something to do, something to say, that would convince her not to fire. Nothing came to her.

“D-Don’t shoot!” Lightning stammered as she threw up her hooves. “I’m the real Light—”

A markspony bullet tore through her foreleg and nicked against bone before ripping through the other side, leaving a hole through her limb in its wake.

Lightning collapsed with a scream as her world turned red. Her crimson blood splashed against the floor, and that was enough to deter Sour from firing the finishing shot. Instead, she spun to aim at the two changelings, but faux-Lightning had closed the sentence in a split second. Wings churning, the changeling barreled into Sour and bowled her over. Sour somehow kept hold of her rifle, but soon faux-Lemon joined faux-Lightning in pinning her down.

Lightning tried putting weight on her shattered foreleg, but the pain immediately made her crash back down with another scream. She’d been injured many times in basic training, she knew how to manage pain… but a markspony bullet wound was a whole different beast. She could use her wings to get around and fight without her foreleg, but that meant infection, so that was out of the picture. Instead, her watery eyes turned to the other three Shadowbolts, who had the last changeling surrounded. The changeling had Gridlock’s form, however, and its larger frame was enough to keep the three ponies at arm’s length as they looked for a way to break through its exoskeleton.

“Lemon! Sugarcoat! Gridlock!” Lightning gasped over the commlink. “Sour needs help!”

“Go. I can keep this one at bay myself,” Gridlock told the other two.

As Gridlock faced off against his counterpart, Lemon and Sugarcoat disengaged and galloped to Sour’s aid. Sugarcoat raised her assault rifle and fired a few accurate shots into the changelings’ sides, and the impact dislodged them from Sour slightly as they hissed from the blow. Lemon then galloped in with a lowered shoulder and plowed into the two changelings like a hoofball player, knocking herself and the clones away from Sour. Once freed from their grasp, Sour rolled away and scrambled back to her hooves, quickly putting a bullet through faux-Lightning’s head as she tried to recover.

However, the two Lemons had become entangled as they fell away from Sour, and they were now indistinguishable as they wrestled for control over her submachine gun. Sour kept her rifle trained on the two mares as they rolled over and over each other, waiting for an opening.

“Can anyone tell which is which?” Sour asked over the commlink.

Lightning squinted through her blurry eyes at the intertwined mares. Like the other changelings, it had faithfully copied the jumpsuit, the watch, the goggles… it even recreated Lemon’s explosive saddlebags. But they hadn’t been able to recreate weapons. And as she looked closer, she noticed that only one of the saddlebags swayed with apparent weight. The other was empty, and only for show.

“Only one has explosives,” Lightning deduced.

Sour nodded and took aim, and the next time the changeling had rolled on top, she sent a bullet into its hind leg and made it crumple backwards with a yelp. It desperately tried to scramble away on three limbs, but the leaking hemolymph sealed her fate with a bullet to the back of the head.

One more. Lightning winced in pain and shifted her attention over to Gridlock, only to see that the changeling had won the battle. Faux-Gridlock now held Gridlock as a pony shield, and the two large batponies stumbled backwards on their hind hooves towards the hallway leading further into the apartment.

“Stay back,” faux-Gridlock snarled as he pressed a taser close to Gridlock’s exposed neck.

“Not the best plan, threatening him with a nonlethal weapon,” Lemon remarked snidely as the three mobile Shadowbolts crept closer.

“Perhaps. Until I shock him so long his heart stops. Or I snap his neck once he goes limp,” faux-Gridlock retorted.

Sour aimed down her sights as she tried to find a good angle, but the changeling smartly kept its head hidden behind Gridlock to prevent a clean shot. The narrow hallway it backed itself up in also negated their numbers advantage and any opportunity for flanking.

“You’re dead the second you do that. You know that, right?” Lemon said back. “Let him go and come quietly. We’ll take you into custody, but we’ll let you live.”

“Custody?” faux-Gridlock laughed. “I would starve to death in a week under your control. There’s certainly no love or any filling emotion to be found amongst you. I’d rather take my chances.”

“You’ve got no chance, buddy. Surrender,” Lemon insisted.

Lightning once again tried to stand, but any movement sent fresh pain shooting through her that made her collapse back down with a whimper. Once her vision refocused, she saw that the changeling was backing up closer and closer to the hallway window… potentially an escape route. The Shadowbolts crept closer while maintaining a safe distance, but if the changeling made it outside, there was no following it.

Suddenly, Gridlock’s voice whispered into the commlink, low enough for only them to hear. “Shoot through me.”

Sour’s eyes widened, but Gridlock gave her a small nod of insistence. Sour then aimed and pulled the trigger, sending a bullet through the side of his gut and into the changeling behind him.

Both batpony stallions let out simultaneous groans that were eerie in their similarity. Gridlock doubled over and collapsed to the ground as faux-Gridlock lost his grip, leaving his whole body exposed as he clutched at his side. Sour wasted no time sending a final bullet into his forehead.

The apartment fell into eerie silence for a few moments as the Shadowbolts caught their breaths. Five changeling corpses littered the living room floor, and green hemolymph mixed with red blood as it passively coalesced across the tiled floor.

Then, Sugarcoat leapt into action. “Bring Gridlock over to Lightning so I can treat them both. Hurry.”

Lemon and Sour both grabbed hold of Gridlock and dragged the stallion across the floor to where Lightning was lying prone. He made a few pained noises, but he kept his outbursts mostly suppressed.

Sugarcoat examined Gridlock first, looking over the bullet hole punched through the area just above his hip. “Looks like it went through the adipose tissue only. No internal organ damage. Hell of a shot, Sour.”

Sour nodded. “He was brave as hell to take that bullet. I couldn’t put it somewhere that would hurt too bad.”

“It… needed to… be done,” Gridlock gasped out.

“Save your breath,” Sugarcoat insisted. “Can you walk or move with your injury?”

Gridlock shifted his body, but his face contorted with pain immediately. “No pain-free range of motion… in the hip.”

Sugarcoat frowned. “We might have to bring out the big guns, then. Hold tight.”

Sugarcoat then shifted her attention to Lightning, and she winced at the sight of her mangled foreleg. “That’s a nasty one, Lightning. I might need to pull out the Support Station for both you and Gridlock.”

“I can deal with the cancer from the regrowth after we save the city,” Lightning winced. “Do it.”

Sugarcoat nodded before grabbing a small white box from her tool belt and setting it on the ground between Lightning and Gridlock. Pressing a small button on the top made it rapidly unfold and expand into a larger device, cubical in shape and humming with a soft green light. Pulses of green energy filled the immediate perimeter surrounding it, washing over both Lightning and Gridlock and prompting their internal magic to speed up the natural healing process. Lightning watched through the bullet hole as her shattered bone rearranged and regrew the splintered portions, then as the muscle and flesh grew back in to slowly fill in the hole.

“You couldn’t have given me the same courtesy that you gave Gridlock, Sour?” Lightning grumbled under her breath.

Sour shrugged as she casually reloaded her rifle. “Didn’t have the time to line up a clean shot. Consider us even for you leaving me to die in the flood.”

“So that’s what that was? Revenge?” Lightning asked.

“If it was really revenge, I would’ve put it through your skull and taken my chances that you were a changeling. Really, I showed a lot of restraint,” Sour said.

Lightning laughed. “Restraint? You sound like you want us to pat you on the back for not killing your own squadmates. Like you deserve an award for it.”

“As if throwing your squadmates under the wagon to save your own ass is any better,” Sour retorted.

“Cut it out,” Gridlock groaned. “I’m in too much pain to deal with your bickering.”

Lightning and Sour glared at each other, but the argument stopped there. Instead, the group of Shadowbolts went back to looking over the chaos and destruction from the fight,

“That was insane…” Lemon reflected with a whistle. “Five drones KIA without a single friendly death. Unheard of numbers. Do you know how many book deals we’ll be able to get after this? We’ll be national celebrities!”

“We need to bring the princesses back safely for that to happen,” Sugarcoat pointed out.

Lemon froze and her eyes widened. “Right. The princesses.”

She sprang up and trotted down the hallway, past the dead changeling, to search the other rooms beyond. The other Shadowbolts waited in silence with bated breaths.

“They have to be here. Right?” Sour said.

“If they aren’t, they’re probably gone for good,” Lightning replied.

However, Lemon’s voice quickly assuaged those fears. “Here! In the bedroom!”

Lightning forced herself up onto her three good legs and hobbled herself down the hallway. The hole in her foreleg hadn’t filled in all the way, and it was still ugly and red, but the pain was moderate enough to move and that was good enough for her. “Sugarcoat. Sour. Come with me.”

With the other two Shadowbolts in tow, Lightning reached the apartment’s bedroom and slid next to Lemon. There, sitting on the bed, were the two biggest ponies Lightning had ever seen. Taller than even Gridlock. They both had both horns and wings, and their manes flowed like water. One was white and the color of light refracting through water; the other was blue and held the constellations in her hair.

Celestia and Luna. Lightning hadn’t seen the two princesses in a very long time. Not since she had been recruited to the Division in the first place.

“Sister? Who is it?” Luna asked, her eyes unseeing.

Celestia blinked, as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. “It’s… the Shadowbolts, Luna. They’re here to rescue us.”

However, Lightning wasn’t ready for the reunion to get sentimental just yet. “Give them the test, Sugarcoat. Sour, keep an eye on them.”

As Celestia recoiled in confusion, Sugarcoat fetched a needle from a medkit and advanced slowly under the watch of Sour’s rifle barrel.

“Your hooves, please,” Sugarcoat ordered.

“What’s this for?” Celestia asked.

“Do as she says,” Lightning insisted.

Celestia hesitated before holding out a forehoof. Luna did the same, though her lack of vision meant her hoof was pointed off to the side. Celestia reached over and moved her sister’s hoof over tenderly next to hers before offering the underside. Sugarcoat gently pricked the frogs with the tip of the needle, and after a tense second, blood started to bubble up from the pierced flesh.

“They’re real,” Sugarcoat confirmed.

Lightning exhaled a sigh of relief before turning on her commlink. “Agent Lightning to Command. The VIPs are secured.”

“Manehattan, Manehattan. It’s your host, Suri Polomare. Welcome back to another episode of Wouldn’t You Know It.

“I know that I promised last time that I would do some more digging on these new, strange soldiers walking through our streets. And I have, trust me. But while I was doing that, I uncovered something else big, and I feel like I need to break this to all of you first. So, strap yourselves in, my loyal listeners.

“Now, like I said, I’m sure this communication blackout is getting everyone antsy, me included. We have no idea what the world is like on the other side of the river. Who even knows if the world is still turning? Well, I don’t want to brag, but I have a few ‘contacts’ in the EUP. I was able to prod them for some outside information, and I’m transmitting this information to all of you as a public service. I know, you’re welcome. And to think someone told me generosity wasn’t my greatest trait!

“I’m sure everyone’s heard of Tartarus. The prison that holds the worst, most dangerous creatures Equestria has to offer. The one guarded by a three-headed dog. The one with security issues that have allowed creatures like Tirek to escape over the years. Well, I’m hearing rumors from the outside that this has happened again. The government is trying to keep this quiet because they don’t want any more panic… but someone’s broken out. And they believe they’ve somehow made their way into Manehattan.

“Immediately, that brings to mind several pressing questions. Who escaped? My first thought is Tirek again, but why would he come to Manehattan? He feeds on magic, and the magic is contaminated here. It would be a death sentence for him. So, we can cross him off the list. The miscellaneous non-sentient creatures wouldn’t care or have the ability to slip through the quarantine. But the newest prisoner? A certain queen with the ability to change forms that could help her slip through checkpoints undetected? Now that’s a real possibility. And she’s most likely got a few drones with her to really help her do some damage.

“Another question is why this escapee would want to come to Manehattan. The air is contaminated, the city is closed off. Why would you leave one prison to go to another? Now, I’m not crazy, so I can’t speak for what a crazy creature would or would not do. But you’d have to be extremely batshit insane to willingly come here while all this is going on. But maybe they’re looking for something. Looking for someone. Maybe they want to claim Manehattan for themselves, form the Independent City-State of Manehattan. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll ask when I see them.

“But I think the most important question is this: if some dangerous creature can so easily infiltrate their way through quarantine into the city… How effective is this quarantine, really? How do we know that there aren’t infected ponies slipping out every single day to infect the rest of Equestria? And if that’s the case, are we rotting our lives away in this doomed city for no reason? Now that’s something to think about, fillies and gentlecolts. Think about that for me.

“The bottom line is this: there’s a new faction in town. They’re dangerous, and they’re looking for new victims. Everyone listening needs to keep an eye out and keep themselves safe. Now more than ever.

“Be smart, everypony. Be smart.”

Saddle Row: the cultural center of Manehattan. The city’s main exports were fashion and art, and Saddle Row was where all of it originated. A street lined with the most fashionable boutiques in Equestria, drawing thousands of visitors every week to see the best of what the city had to offer. Of course, that same street was where the first cases began to pop up, and that much travel ensured the virus spread like wildfire. Ground Zero was where they were headed now.

Rainy and Agrippa didn’t know the maneway tunnels as well as Aerion, so they made the journey above ground instead. Agrippa still held the pistol that Rainy gave her in Madisoat Mare Garden, but Rainy did most of the work in making sure they didn’t run into any enemies. Her rifle swept the tall buildings surrounding them before glancing over to the quiet blue mare next to her.

“So… Ground Zero. What are we looking for there?” Rainy asked to break the silence.

“What, you can’t walk in silence, Rainy?” Agrippa asked back.

Rainy winced. “I just want to know the game plan, doctor.”

Agrippa calmed herself with a sigh. “Well, if Saddle Row is the release point for the virus, then the area will have samples of the virus in its original form. If we can find out what the unmutated pathogen looked like and compare it to its current form, we can better see what it’s made of. How it works. How it’s evolving. And if we can figure that out, we can figure out how to cure it. Make sense?”

“Makes sense,” Rainy echoed. “How exactly are we gonna find these unmutated strains?”

“If it was spread in boutiques, then it was most likely spread using the most effective vector of transmission. What gets passed around in a store more than anything, Agent?” Agrippa asked.

Rainy pondered for a brief second. “...Bits.”

“Exactly,” Agrippa said. “Throw a few contaminated coins in the circulation, and half the city has been exposed to it before you know it. We’ll start by scanning every single bit register in the neighborhood and seeing if any of the originals are still around.”

“That sounds like a plan,” Rainy said.

“Glad I have your seal of approval, Rainy,” Agrippa snorted.

The conversation died down as the echoes of faint voices reached them. Rainy and Agrippa glanced at each other before quickly hurrying to press against the wall of the nearest skyscraper for cover. On the street over, hoofsteps and idle conversation continued to grow closer and closer… before beginning to fade off as they continued further on. Rainy couldn’t tell if they were rioters, Freelancers, Shadowbolts, or simply a group of civilians. Or even changelings, if Suri Polomare was to be believed. At this point, it didn’t really matter. Everyone in the city was out to get her at this point; she had no allies to feel safe around besides Agrippa and Aerion.

At least she was a bit harder to recognize without her Shadowbolt flight suit on. Her white fur blended in nicely with the snow, and from a distance one might mistake her for being a random pegasus just going about her day. She felt naked without it on, but she had to admit it was for the best.

As they continued their journey, something flashed into Rainy’s mind. “You say ‘release’ and ‘spread’ like this wasn’t a natural occurrence.”

“That’s because it wasn’t,” Agrippa replied. “You think viruses randomly pop up on bits in the middle of the busiest shopping corridor in Equestria? During the busiest shopping period of the year? No, this was purposeful. Someone wanted to spread this.”

“Why? Why would someone do that?” Rainy asked.

Agrippa shrugged her shoulders. “Because they wanted to kill a bunch of ponies, maybe. I don’t know. Have you been living under a rock or something, Rainy? First you don’t know that the virus is transmitted by magic, and now you’re telling me you didn’t know this was purposefully spread? We had both those things figured out weeks ago.”

“Basically, yeah. When the Shadowbolts activated me, they stuck all the agents not chosen for the first wave in quarantine. I was basically locked in a room with no contact with anyone for weeks. Couldn’t have us getting sick before we deployed,” Rainy said.

Agrippa blinked. “Wow. They didn’t even let you read the newspaper?”

“That’s the thing. They did. There was barely any mention of anything going on in Manehattan. And there definitely wasn’t anything about magic,” Rainy said.

“What? Are you serious?” Agrippa exclaimed. “Why would they do that? Do they not know how many lives they’d save if they got the word out to the rest of Equestria?”

“Well, the virus isn’t in the rest of Equestria. They probably don’t want there to be any nationwide panic if it’s not necessary,” Rainy said.

“Well, then they’re more foolish than I thought. It’s only a matter of time until quarantine is broken, I can promise you that. This isn’t sustainable. And wouldn’t you want your population to be prepared for the inevitable?”

“Or you put the word out, and the country burns itself down in fear before the virus even reaches them. It’s not that simple, Agrippa.”

“And here I thought we’re gone rogue. Yet you’re still defending them!”

“I’m not rogue. I’m just… on my own side.”

Agrippa rolled her eyes. “If that’s how you want to put it.”

“It is,” Rainy insisted.

She didn’t know how to put it, but even after all that happened, she still didn’t feel “rogue.” She was no longer a loyal member of the Shadowbolts, that was for sure. But at the same time, she wasn’t a member of the First Wave rogue agents. They were both abandoned by their superiors, sure, but Rainy wasn’t out for revenge like they were. She simply wanted to find a cure for this virus and do some good for the city. She hadn’t completely turned her back on Equestria like the First Wave.

She was on her own team. And that suited her just fine. Shadowbolts were trained to work independently, after all.

“Y’know, I never got the story of how you ended up becoming the top virologist in Manehattan,” Rainy said.

“Well, after you gave me your ring back and left me, I couldn’t live in Ponyville any longer. Too many painful memories. I ended up bouncing between cities, between hospitals, for a few years,” Agrippa started.

Rainy winced. “I’m sorry, Agrippa—”

“Save it,” Agrippa hissed. “I ended up here in Manehattan, at a prestigious virology clinic. We were treating and researching cures for pony pox, feather flu, poison joke, swamp fever, you name it. But nothing compared to when the Bit Flu came around. A few days after onset, we were already overwhelmed with patients. By the end of the week, we had dying ponies lining the hallways and the sidewalk outside, desperate for a sickbed. My colleagues and I worked ourselves ragged… and then my colleagues started falling ill too. All the unicorns had been using healing magic all week, all the pegasi had been flying around to treat patients faster, all the earth ponies just fell sick for being who they are… Half the hospital staff was dead by the end of the month. Only by sheer dumb fucking luck did I avoid using my wings and not get infected myself. I still feel guilty about it now.”

“I’m so sorry,” Rainy whispered solemnly.

“Then the EUP came, and I was the best virologist still alive in the city, so I got assigned the job of saving ponykind. No pressure, right?” Agrippa said with an exasperated, joyless laugh. “That’s a lot of weight on a mare’s shoulders.”

“They picked the best mare for the job. I know that much,” Rainy reassured.

“Don’t pretend you still know me, Rainy. Time has turned us into two different ponies. You know it’s not the same as it was,” Agrippa replied.

Rainy frowned as the response stumped her. Agrippa looked, sounded, felt like the same mare she always knew. The mare she used to love. If she closed her eyes, she could imagine that they were on one of their morning walks in Ponyville together. Were things really so different?

But then she opened her eyes, and reality struck her in the face. Agrippa may look the same, but the look in her dark blue eyes showed that she had changed. From the passage of time, from the hurt of Rainy’s betrayal, from all the life experiences she had lived without her. There was a different mare behind those eyes, and the affection had changed to pain and disgust.

“You’re right. Sorry,” Rainy said softly.

Agrippa sighed. “You’re fine. Just keep helping me with this research and we’ll find out if you’re right.”

One more thought popped into Rainy’s head. “If you’re the top virologist, and you ran off with me… aren’t you scared that the Crown will charge you with treason as well? And shouldn’t getting you back be their top priority?”

“Oh, absolutely,” Agrippa replied. “Unless they try to replace me. But if they find us, I’m definitely telling them that you foalnapped me against my will. Just a head’s up.”

“Fair enough,” Rainy said.

By that point, Saddle Row was in view. Well, the perimeter of it, at least. Ground zero was a quarantine zone, so it had been barricaded off by concrete blockades and wedged-together carriages to dissuade ponies from entering. Much like a mini Dark Zone. Except those walls were meant to keep ponies trapped inside, not stop them from entering.

Spray painted onto the carriages was a simple message: TURN BACK OR YOU’LL BE NEXT.

“Any way through?” Rainy asked.

“Not that I know of,” Agrippa answered. “We’ll have to climb over.”

Agrippa tucked her pistol into the pocket of her lab coat and trotted closer, with Rainy close behind. The spaces between and underneath the carriages had been filled in to prevent anyone from squeezing past them, so the only way through was up. The smaller blue mare frowned at the top of the carriage just out of reach.

“Little help?” Agrippa asked.

Rainy tilted her head in thought before trotting to the side of the carriage. She crouched down at the base to form a step stool, and Agrippa climbed onto her back before hoisting herself on top of the carriage proper. She then offered a hoof down to Rainy to help pull her on top with her. The two caught their breath for a moment at the top before Rainy slid down the other side, hooves clopping on the pavement when she landed.

In front of them, Saddle Row itself opened up in all its glory. The buildings were all much smaller than the towering skyscrapers that surrounded them, so the street felt like a meadow of tall grass in the middle of a redwood forest. The street itself was lined with store after store, each plastered with billboards and signs and displays desperate to attract customers. The sight would be even more impressive if the giant neon signage atop each store was active, but the city’s power remained off. There weren’t as many carriages littering the street as the rest of Manehattan; maybe they had been towed to use in the barricades. However, there was a surplus of medical and scientific equipment scattered around, along with medical wagons.

Agrippa pulled out her virus scanner and winced at the number that popped up on the display. “Yep, we’re at ground zero, alright…”

“Should we have brought PPE? Masks?” Rainy asked.

Agrippa shook her head. “No, this isn’t a virus you can contract through traditional means. Touch infected surfaces, breathe it in, lick it if you want to. The only way it’ll infect you is if it gets into your magic stream, and the only way to do that is use magic.”

“That makes things easy,” Rainy said as she held her rifle at the ready. “Where to first?”

“Well, the first store on our end sounds like a good start. Then we’ll go all the way down the block if we need to. We’re not leaving here without usable samples—”

Rainy stuck out a hoof to cut Agrippa off as another voice caught her ear. A faint one on the wind, but a voice nonetheless. She flicked her ear and angled it around to find the source of the noise, and her search directed her further down the street. The ping of contacts on her motion sensor confirmed her suspicions.

“There’s someone else here,” Rainy whispered.

“How? Who’s stupid enough to hang out in a quarantine zone?” Agrippa hissed back.

Rainy simply motioned for her to stay low, and she slowly crept up behind the nearest medical wagon to get closer to the noise. Now that her and Agrippa were quiet, the other voices were audible enough to be discernible. However, it quickly became clear that these were not from idle conversation; these were cries of panic.

“Let us go! Stop! We’re just scavenging for food!” a mare screamed between grunts of exertion.

“In a quarantine zone? Nice try,” a gruff stallion replied.

“It was my idea for us to look here, not hers,” a second stallion pleaded. “You can take me if you need to, but let her go. Please.”

The first stallion grunted. “No chance. Both of you need to be purified for the good of the city.”

Purified? Rainy exchanged a wordless glance with Agrippa before she slowly peeked out from behind the large wagon wheel she hid behind. Further down the snow-covered street, a tall, bulky stallion dragged an earth pony mare and a unicorn stallion along by their tails as they clawed at the pavement with their hooves. He was taking them to a group of about two dozen ponies waiting patiently for him outside one of the stores.

At first glance, Rainy could’ve dismissed them as simple looters. However, closer inspection revealed that they were more organized than a rioter gang. All of them wore matching clothing, or a crude attempt at a uniform, the same crimson red color as blood. Instead of guns or blunt weapons wielded by rioters, these ponies all held blades, from knives to machetes to hacksaws. Oddly enough, there were no wings or horns present on any of them; they were all earth ponies. It was a rare sight to see an earth pony in the city these days, given their predisposition to the virus. How could there be this many still alive in one spot, all working together? Were they all immune?

“Rainy, what are you waiting for?” Agrippa whispered. “We need to help them!”

“There’s too many to fight. Especially with you here. I’m not going to put you in unnecessary danger,” Rainy hissed back.

The large stallion tossed the two ponies onto the ground before the group. “Found these two snooping around in the shops, Firecracker.”

A green and orange mare Rainy assumed was Firecracker stepped forward to regard the two captured ponies. She wore the same crimson garb as the rest of the group, but the way she carried herself and the way the others backed off to give her the spotlight showed that she was undoubtedly in charge. Strapped to her foreleg was some kind of kitchen knife that looked like it was stolen straight out of a restaurant, and droplets of dried blood clung to the steel blade. Her cutie mark was a burning flame.

Firecracker looked over the two captured ponies with a little tut of disapproval. “Scavenging for food in a retail district. Either you’re stupid, or you’re lying. Which is it?”

“W-Well, every store and restaurant in the city has been picked clean several times over already,” the captured unicorn stallion explained. “So, I thought that we should try looking where ponies haven’t looked. Break room food, hidden storage, vending machines, anything. That was my idea. Honest.”

“Stupidity it is,” Firecracker said. “Better than malicious intent, but not by much. Coming into a virus hotspot like this is not only suicidal to yourself, but carelessly putting your fellow ponies at risk. Accidentally cast one spell out of habit, and you’re bringing a concentrated amount of the poison out to the rest of the city and spreading it wherever you go. Not to mention bringing your earth pony friend with you, who will soak up the disease like a sponge. Because of selfish ponies like you two, the city becomes more uninhabitable by the day as the virus grows more numerous. It’s up to us to stop the progression.”

“You’re all here too, aren’t you? How’s that for hypocrisy?” the earth pony mare snarled.

Firecracker tilted her head. “We all already ensured that we would never contract the virus. And we’re going to make sure that you can’t as well.”

Rainy recoiled in confusion. Ensured they would never contract the virus? What is she talking about? The only way to become infected is to use magic, right? And if they’re all earth ponies, then—

Rainy blinked and took a closer look. Where she had previously seen an absence of horns and wings, she now saw irregularities. Firecracker’s mane flowed strangely around the middle of her forehead, as if something underneath her bangs was interrupting its growth. Several of her followers had the same irregular mane pattern… right where a horn would sprout out on the head. The others had strange bumps in their clothing along their back, right where a pegasus’s wings would attach to their body.

They weren’t earth ponies. They were all unicorns and pegasi that had removed their ability to use magic. They had cut off their own limbs.

“W-What are you saying?” the unicorn stallion stammered.

“We are the Purifiers. We are the ones that will stop the progression. And we will do it by making sure no one contracts the virus again,” Firecracker said with a cold stare before turning to the spectators. “Kill the earth pony. Purify the unicorn.”

The two ponies’ words of stunned protest quickly turned to yelps of terror as the crowd descended on them, slamming them to the snow-covered street and holding them there helplessly. As Firecracker watched on, one of the Purifiers advanced forward with an unsheathed knife.

“I’m immune! I swear I’m immune! I’m not infected! Test me, please!” the mare screamed as she was squirmed under several strong hooves.

“The idea of ‘immunity’ is bogus,” Firecracker scoffed. “A fairy tale sold to you by the EUP to keep you hopeful of a way out. All earth ponies are ticking time bombs when it comes to the virus. All it means is that you haven’t been infected yet, and that’s not a chance we can take.”

“Let her go!” the stallion yelled. “Celestia-dammit, please, don’t do this! She was just following me! Kill me instead!”

None of their struggles or words dissuaded the mob or delayed their fate. The knife-wielding purifier took a hoof full of the mare’s mane and forced her head to tilt back, exposing her throat. He then sliced through it with one fluid cut. Her blood spilled across the snow as her eyes widened in shock and pain, and she choked on her own blood briefly before she fell back against the pavement, limp.

The stallion was sobbing by this point, but Firecracker regarded him with emotionless eyes. “Consider yourself lucky. Count your blessings that you were born with a horn. The virus affects us differently, and you only need to lose it to survive… not your life.”

“W-Wha…” the stallion blubbered out in shock, but he quickly snapped back to reality when a hacksaw pressed to the base of his horn.

The stallion’s horrific screams of pain filled the air along with the rough back-and-forth sawing of the serrated blade on keratin. Agrippa curled up against the wagon with her hooves on her ears, whimpering under her breath, but Rainy couldn’t look away. Instead, all she could think about was the mare in the subway tunnel with the severed horn, and the massacred settlement of murdered earth ponies and amputated appendages. Was that the Purifiers’ handiwork too? How many innocent ponies had they mangled and murdered already?

At long last, the severed horn fell to the ground, glinting with crimson blood the same color as the Purifiers’ clothes. They released the mutilated stallion and rose up, but he was too catatonic to move. He curled up and whimpered, too deep in shock to even cry.

Firecracker walked over to stand over him. “I’m sorry this had to happen to you. Maybe one day you’ll understand why I had to do it. Perhaps you’ll even join us once you see the wisdom of what we’re doing, like so many of my followers have.”

She then turned to the Purifiers. “Keep searching. Bring any survivors to me. The future of this city depends on us. Spare no one.”

The group of ponies dispersed and moved on, leaving only the crippled, whimpering stallion behind, holding the slaughtered mare’s body in his hooves in a pool of blood.

Chapter 9

Beams of light swept through the dark tunnel as the three mares trekked along the maneway tracks. Rainy led the way, her flashlight mounted to the underbarrel of her rifle to illuminate the journey as best she could. Agrippa followed close behind while gripping Rainy’s pistol close. Aerion brought up the rear with nothing but a baseball bat.

It had been over an hour since they left the Base of Operations, and they were still trapped underground in the seemingly endless labyrinth of tunnels. They were without a map, so any time they came across a fork in the path, they relied on Aerion’s memory to choose which way to follow. Luckily, the signs posted at each station told them they were still on the right path.

They were headed south, further away from the center of the city, where all the chaos and violence were said to be located. The center was where the Dark Zone was, where all the filth and seditionists chose to rest their heads. It was also where the Division was beginning to regain control; the same Division that now wanted her dead. Instead, they were now heading towards Gramarecy Park, Aerion’s place of residence.

Rainy had been no expert on Manhattan's boroughs and neighborhoods before all this. As a Ponyville resident, she’d spent most of her life in small towns, away from much of the political power of the country. However, before she’d deployed into Manehattan as part of the second wave, she’d taken the time to do her research on where she’d be stationed. Gramarecy Park was a small, quaint community near the southern portion of the city, absent the towering skyscrapers of the center. It was most famous for its namesake park, which was sealed off from outsiders. Legend said that Celestia herself had blessed the park at the city’s founding, causing the plants to never wilt and die. It wasn’t nearly as big or famous as Central Park, but it was certainly prestigious.

If Aerion had managed to get a place there, she was certainly a lot more well-off than she let on. It seems the failed Shadowbolt equipment deal didn’t affect her business too much.

“How much further?” Rainy called back.

“A few more stops. I think. This journey goes by a lot quicker in a train, believe it or not…” Aerion said.

“We haven’t seen anyone in hours, Rainy. Do we really need to be so uptight?” Agrippa asked.

“I’ve been attacked down here before. We can’t let our guard down, especially if Lightning is still following us,” Rainy responded.

The three continued on in silence; their voices echoed and carried through the enclosed space, and they didn’t want anyone following them to be able to hone in through sound. They occasionally walked past a spent bullet casing or a trail of hoofprints where the gathering dirt became denser, but there were no other signs of life. Her motion tracker was likewise silent. Rainy would’ve assumed that the maneway tunnels would be a popular refuge for the city’s inhabitants; it would be safer from rioters than up above, and staying underground would keep them slightly warmer. Why wasn’t anyone living down here?

Up ahead, an inert maneway train carriage blocked their way forward. Through the windows streamed beams of fluorescent light, much brighter and stronger than the sparse light bulbs along the depths of the tunnel.

“Up ahead. Lights. Looks like another station,” Rainy said.

Agrippa sighed in relief. “Good! We can finally get our bearings again.”

The trains that traversed these maneway tunnels were built so wide that they were inches from brushing against the side walls, so squeezing past it was not an option. Rainy shouldered her rifle and jumped up onto the platform of the train, then used her hooves to pry the access doors open. The sliding door gave way with the uncooperative screech of metal on metal, revealing the interior of the carriage to them. The narrow walkway was strewn with abandoned suitcases, briefcases, and other belongings from the early panic of the infection, but there were no other signs of life.

“Clear,” Rainy said to the other two mares before turning to help them up.

However, as she took Aerion’s hoof to pull her up, a thud made her pause. The sound came from… above her, and the resulting vibrations sent soft vibrations rushing through the rest of the train car, the metal vibrating under her hooves. Something was on top of the train.

Rainy slowly raised a hoof and pressed it to her lips. “Shhhhh…”

Aerion and Agrippa did as they were told, and Rainy pulled her rifle back out, aiming down the iron sights at the other end of the train. She took a step forward, then another. The noises had stopped at the other end. There had been no blur of movement in the windows, no blip in her motion tracker, so it must still be up there. She took another step. Her feather tensed against the trigger. She exhaled, and her breath fogged up briefly before disappearing into the air. All her attention was focused on the door at the other end.

The panel above her exploded.

Rainy flinched, but before she could turn, a large weight dropped onto her back, slamming her down onto the deck. A foreign hoof pinned the barrel of her rifle to the steel floor. Another pushed her head into the years-old stains, grinding her muzzle in them. Rainy grunted and arched her back while her wings flared, but her attacker was surprisingly strong, resisting her attempts to buck them off like a bronco. She tried to summon more strength from deep within herself… but found her body wasn’t responding to her. Exhaustion and fatigue were making her sluggish and weak; a full 24 hours of fighting had finally caught up with her.

“Don’t shoot, Agrippa! You might hit Rainy!” she heard Aerion call out. Then, a few seconds later, she heard the thud of wood on flesh, followed by a yelp of pain, and the weight was lifted off her.

Rainy yanked her muzzle off the disgusting floor and gasped for clean air, taking a second to recover before looking around. Above her, Aerion loomed, grasping her baseball bat tightly as she stood over a frail, blood-soaked creature. It whimpered pathetically and curled up underneath the row of seats, covering its face with a hoof as it tried its best to hide in plain sight. Its hooves weren’t able to cover its horn, however. Rather, its lack of horn. The appendage was shattered at the base, and its stringy mane wasn’t able to cover it completely, remaining a constant reminder of what had happened to it.

“You…” Rainy murmured to herself.

“You?” Aerion asked in confusion, but her eyes never left the cowering unicorn.

“I’ve met this pony before. She attacked me when I first arrived in the city,” Rainy explained.

“And now she’s attacking us again. We should finish her off before she has a chance to do it a third time,” Aerion snarled coldly.

The unicorn whined in response. “P-Please… don’t kill…”

“It’s because she’s terrified, Aerion. Just look at her,” Agrippa said. “She’s no threat to anyone.”

Agrippa stepped forward and crouched down to better look at the unicorn underneath the seats. She slowly reached out with a hoof, as if trying to calm and tame a wild animal, but the unicorn flinched and scooted further away from her reach.

“Your horn…” Agrippa trailed off with a whimper of pity as she caught sight of it.

“On the train platform back at the Maneway Station,” Rainy interjected. “Self-inflicted.”

“N-No!...” the unicorn adamantly rebuffed her, pointing a hoof down at the other end of the train car. “Them...!”

“Them?” Agrippa asked. “Who’s them? Are they still here?”

The unicorn didn’t answer, instead shrinking into as small of a ball as she could manage before rocking back and forth, whispering to herself.

“Watch her, you two,” Rainy said. “I’m gonna make sure whatever it is she’s referring to isn’t still around.”

Rainy rose back to her hooves and leveled her gun once again, swiftly advancing on the other end of the maneway carriage. The closer she got, the brighter the lights became; they must be inside the station by this point. That meant platforms, stairways, walls, plenty of places for enemies to conduct an ambush. She needed to be careful.

She crouched down and peered through the small, dirty window in the sliding door. The narrow confines of the maneway tunnel expanded open to accommodate the boarding platforms, but it was hardly spacious; the low ceilings and tight walls made Rainy feel claustrophobic. She’d take open air instead any day.

After seeing no signs of life, Rainy pulled the door open and dropped back down onto the tracks. Once her hooves were back on the ground, she noticed the dried blood that was staining the wooden railroad ties and the ground beneath. It started as a few droplets at the maneway train, then turned into splashes, then puddles, as she got closer and closer to the station. Then, she walked into the open area, and the sight took her breath away in a horrified gasp.

It was a massacre. The station had been converted into a settlement of sorts, with wooden structures put up on top of the platforms to hold supplies and sleeping bags. There were sleeping areas, communal areas, and places for cooking, eating, and playing. The maneway tunnel had become a hidden town for survivors looking to hide from the chaos on the streets above. However, all the residents were slaughtered, and their blood coated the ground so much that it made the whole area glow an eerie red.

Their bodies were strewn across the platforms and tracks without any attempt to make their demise dignified. There was no mercy, no pity, no respect; they were butchered. Some died with makeshift weapons in their hooves in an attempt to fight back, while others lay cowering in the corner in terror, trying desperately to delay the inevitable. The scene nearly made Rainy lose the little food left in her stomach, and she dry-heaved before she could compose herself.

However, as Rainy slowly made her way through the station, she noticed something odd about the corpses: they were all earth ponies. Not one unicorn or pegasus was among the slaughtered. Manehattan’s population was mostly earth ponies, yes, but they had been a rare sight in Rainy’s time here. Agrippa and Aerion told her that the earth ponies’ passive magic flow made them extra susceptible to contracting the virus, so she assumed that most of them had already died off. Were these earth ponies naturally immune? Or were they infected, and killed before the virus could overwhelm them instead?

Rainy reached the back of the station, and she received her answer to where all the unicorns and pegasi were. Against the back wall were two bloody piles of body parts: one full of horns, one full of wings. They had been methodically sawed off and tossed into the corner to rot.

What the hell happened here?

The snowstorm had subsided, and the sun was shining through cracks in the clouds above. Perfect weather for a supply drop.

Lightning Dust stood atop the roof of the Madisoat Mare Garden as the wind from the helicopter’s rotors threatened to blow her off her hooves, but she forced herself to remain upright. She couldn’t afford to look weak in front of her new squadmates. She had plans to be the de facto leader of the Shadowbolts in this city, and she needed the respect of her fellow agents to make that happen. And that started with appearing strong and taking control.

The helicopter gently touched down on the roof’s landing pad, and its blades began to slow, allowing Lightning to approach without being blown away. Two ponies leaped out and began to haul boxes of food, water, and supplies onto the helipad, but they weren’t the ones she was focused on. Instead, she watched as four other ponies with SPARC watches clambered out of the cargo bay and took in the Manehattan sights for the first time.

The first one off was a pink and green unicorn, with headphones dangling around her neck blasting music loud enough that Lightning could hear it over the whirring of the helicopter. She wore saddlebags overtop her Shadowbolt jumpsuit, and they were filled to the brim; with what, she did not know.

“Agent Lemon Zest, at your service! Ready to rock this bitch,” she said, with a couple headbangs to emphasize the point. “You must be Lightning.”

Lightning snorted. “I am. Welcome to Manehattan. Hope you enjoyed your smooth ride over, because that was thanks to me.”

“I’m pretty sure we have the pilot to thank for that,” Lemon responded. “What did you do?”

Lightning rolled her eyes. “I destroyed the spellcaster that was stopping you from flying into the city in the first place. You’re welcome.”

“Aw, that was sooooo sweet of you!” the second agent’s sing-songy voice interrupted before her voice suddenly turned icy cold. “It’s too bad nopony cares!”

Lightning looked over at the newcomer. She was a yellow and pink pegasus, and she wore custom-modified flight goggles over her eyes that provided extra rangefinding abilities and magnification. A hefty markspony rifle was strapped to her back.

“Ah. Sour Sweet,” Lightning said. “Good to see you again. I see your attitude hasn’t improved.”

“It has been a while since boot camp, hasn’t it?” Sour said, her voice sickly sweet. “Those were some great times. Fond memories… if I block you out of them!”

“Lighten up, Sour. We’re squadmates now, remember?” Lemon said before Lightning could come up with another retort. “We need to work together on this. And that means we need to get along!”

The third agent stepped off the helicopter, a purple and silver unicorn with medic bags strapped to her sides. “I don’t understand why we have to be teammates anyway. Aren’t Shadowbolts supposed to work independently?”

“Usually that would be the case, but command has deemed this situation too dangerous to allow us to freelance this,” Lightning responded.

“I feel like a damn Wonderbolt now,” the third agent groaned. “I’m Agent Sugarcoat.”

“Agent Lightning. Who’s your fourth?”

The three new agents all turned around to watch the last agent climb out of the helicopter. He was the only stallion of the group, so he easily towered over all of them, and he had wings… only, they weren’t pegasi wings. They were dark, leathery bat wings that nearly blended in with the dark colors of his Shadowbolt jumpsuit. He sported two fangs too long to fit in his mouth, so they poked out past his lower lips and glinted in the sunlight. His pupils were slits, and his ears were tufted. A thestral.

“Gridlock. A pleasure,” he said in a thick batpony accent as he adjusted the large LMG strapped to his side, the ammo belt draped around his neck.

Lightning tilted her head. “A thestral agent? I didn’t realize they allowed non-ponies into the Shadowbolts. What’s next, griffons?”

“I am a pony,” Gridlock responded. “And griffons don’t like Equestrians at the moment, so unlikely.”

“He was a last-minute addition to the team,” Lemon Zest said. “Doesn’t talk very much. But he listens to my music, so he’s cool in my book.”

“That’s because you don’t give him a choice,” Sugarcoat intoned bluntly. “You don’t give anyone a choice.”

“Well, someone has to keep the spirits up and the nerves calm. All you losers are always so cranky and worked up!” Lemon said.

“Maybe we’re all cranky all the time because you keep annoying us!” Sour growled.

Lightning stepped forward. “Alright, knock it off, all of you. You’re all bickering like foals when we’re supposed to be a team. I don’t want to hear any more of it.”

“I’m sorry, who put you in charge?” Sour asked snidely.

“Command did. I’m the acting field commander of all Division forces in the city, as a reward for single-hoofedly taking down the Freelancer spellcaster,” Lightning said as she stared down the other four ponies; none of them objected. “And I intend to do things right this time. I assume you’ve all received the intel briefings before you came over?”

All of the agents nodded.

“Then you know the seriousness of the threats we face. The First Wave agents were weak and selfish, and now they’ve created a huge problem in this city. I won’t allow any more rogue Shadowbolts on my watch. We’re going to work together as a team, we’re going to stay in line, and we’re going to follow orders from Command. If you can’t do that, I’ll have you shipped off this island on the first helicopter out, and you can sit out the rest of this fight in a jail cell while the rest of us become Equestrian heroes. Got it?”

The other four nodded again, and Lightning stomped a hoof for emphasis. “They’ll remember our names for this, Agents. For good or ill. It’s up to you to make sure they speak of you in a good light.”

Just then, Lightning’s watch flashed bright orange, and her SPARC’s automated voice called out. “ALERT. INCOMING TRANSMISSION.”

“This is Captain Shining Armor, broadcasting on all known EUP frequencies,” a stallion’s panicked voice said through her commlink. “This is a distress call to any and all friendly forces in the city. Our situation is desperate. Is anyone out there?”

Lightning accepted the hail and synced the call with the rest of her squadmates so they could listen in. “Captain Armor, this is Agent Lightning Dust. I read you. Go ahead.”

“Agent? You’re with the Division? I didn’t realize there were any still left in the city. You’re not one of the bad ones, are you?”

“No sir. The second wave of agents has started making landfall in the city. We’ve taken back the Base of Operations at Grand Central, and supply runs have restarted.”

The stallion let out a relieved sigh. “That’s the first good news I’ve heard in weeks… but I need your help, Agent. Badly. We’re under attack by rioters at the EUP staging area. We’ve been reinforced by the EUP troops that managed to escape the Base’s destruction, but there are too many of them to hold back. We are protecting two VIPs who cannot be moved, so we cannot abandon this position. We need any help you can provide, or we will all be dead.”

“Don’t worry Captain, I’m on the way with a few friends. We’ll break the siege in no time.”

“Thank Celestia. Hurry, Agent. We don’t have much time.”

Lightning ended the call and gestured to the other agents. “You heard him. Let’s move, team! Let’s announce our arrival in a big way.”

They had tried to bring the injured unicorn with them, but she was delirious and inconsolable. No attempts by any of them to prod her into moving from the maneway station made her do anything but whimper and shrink away from their attempts at physical interaction. In the end, they had to leave her behind; Agrippa told them that moving her by force would only cause even more mental distress. There was nothing they could do.

The blood-soaked station was far behind them, but the images of the massacre lingered on Rainy’s mind. What could’ve done something so horrific? So cruel? Rioters were just opportunistic ponies trying to get ahead in the chaos. The Freelancers were cruel, but they didn’t strike Rainy as being that cruel. This was something new, something unfamiliar. Something horrifying. Rainy wondered what other secrets this city was hiding.

They finally reached the stop nearest Aerion’s condo, and the three mares made their way up to street level for the first time in hours. The sun was up now, and its rays were glittering on the freshly fallen snow covering the ground. However, the heavy gray clouds were still present up above, covering most of the blue sky and leaving everything feeling dull and lifeless; there weren’t any weatherponies to clear them away, after all.

In front of Rainy was Gramarecy Park, but it was hardly the symbol of life and prosperity all the stories had made it out to be. Through the tall fence that surrounded it, she could see that the plants and trees inside had all wilted and died, leaving it brown and lifeless. The snowfall had covered the whole park in a white dusting. Parts of it had been dug up to create deep ditches, which were filled with black bags in the shape of a pony’s body. Mass graves.

“Celestia’s magic isn’t working here anymore,” Rainy grumbled to herself as she winced and looked away.

“She’s infected. I don’t think her magic’s doing much work at all,” Aerion said in response as she trotted past. “It’s a wonder the sun still goes up and down when it needs to.”

No amount of death or sorrow seemed to faze Aerion in the slightest. Maybe her sarcastic twits were a coping mechanism; maybe she was a heartless sociopath. Rainy couldn’t quite figure her out. But Agrippa trusted her, and she had been helpful to this point, so Rainy still followed along. Besides, it’s not like she had the luxury of picking and choosing allies when she was infected and on the run.

Aerion led Rainy and Agrippa down the street to her condominium. In contrast to the newer, sleeker skyscrapers further uptown, the buildings here were old and made of orange brick. They were also smaller; still much taller than what Rainy was used to, but it helped give the neighborhood a cozier, more intimate vibe. Well, as cozy as a neighborhood can be in a dead city full of infection and death.

The condominium in question was only fifteen stories high. The lobby, though overturned and messy from the chaos of the original panic and evacuation, luckily didn’t show any signs of looting. With the elevators offline, the three ponies trotted up the stairs to the topmost floor, where Aerion unlocked the door to her condo and pushed her way inside.

The interior was small, but sleek and modern, in sharp contrast to the antiquated brick of the exterior. The whole place was painted a stark white with dull-colored furniture and appliances, and the only color came from the occasional piece of artwork displayed on the walls. The back wall was taken up by a large window which provided an amazing view of the park below and the buildings surrounding it, though the view was soured by the sad state of the park itself.

The place was a mess, but it wasn’t due to rioters or looters. MagiTech prototypes and other pieces of technology were scattered across the condo, covering every flat piece of furniture possible. Some of the designs were rudimentary and mundane, while others seemed beyond the realm of possibility. Aerion absently nudged a device out of the way with a hoof as she made her way into the living room.

“Welcome to my humble abode, mi casa su casa, yada yada yada,” Aerion rambled as she gestured around with a hoof. “It’s seen better days, but it’ll do. I’ve only got two beds, so someone’s gonna have to sleep on the couch. Unless you two are comfortable sharing.”

Agrippa and Rainy briefly made eye contact before they both looked away with a huff.

“Rainy can take the couch. She’s used to it at this point,” Agrippa said.

Rainy refused to rise to the bait, and an uneasy silence fell over the three instead.

Aerion raised her eyebrows. “...Ooooookay then. Sorry I brought it up.”

“It’s fine. I feel like I could sleep just about anywhere right now,” Rainy said with a yawn.

Agrippa nodded curtly and cantered away to the guest room to unload her saddlebags. Before Rainy could move as well, Aerion’s orange hoof pressed against her chest.

“I don’t want to keep you up too much longer, Agent Awesome, but we left the Base in such a hurry that we had to leave your virus scans behind. I’d love to get some updated ones before you crash,” Aerion said.

Rainy sighed. “Alright, as long as it doesn’t take too long.”

Aerion trotted off and returned a few seconds later with a small device grasped in a forehoof. It looked somewhat like a metal detector wand from a security checkpoint, but it had a small screen attached just above the handle. She waved it around to test it out, and Rainy could see that it was scanning the room around her, highlighting virus hotspots in red and orange.

“It won’t be as good as the big scanner back at the station, but it’ll have to do for now. Just hold still, Agent,” Aerion said.

Rainy had lots of experience standing at attention—working as a guardpony forced her to stay in one position for hours, after all—but the feeling of Aerion circling her body and waving the strange scanner inches from her fur almost made her shudder. When the wand passed over her wings, it made a high-pitched chirping noise, drawing Aerion’s attention.

“Strange…” Aerion murmured. “Your wings are showing higher concentrations of the virus than before. I’ve never seen it multiply so quickly.”

“Well, I… did have to use them while I was taking down the spellcaster. Maybe that’s why,” Rainy said with a wince.

Aerion blinked. "You used your wings again? Are you crazy?"

"I was falling off a building, I didn't have much of a choice,” Rainy retorted, her eyes focusing on Aerion’s own tied-up wings. “Some of us don't have the luxury of choosing."

“Easy, Agent…” Aerion growled as she resumed her scanning. “If that’s the case, then I guess I don’t have to worry about the possibility of this being a more aggressive mutation to the virus. But you’ve really shifted the timeframe of your infection up. You’ve only got a day or so before it begins to spread from your wings to the rest of your body, which means Agrippa and I are pressed for time to get this cure research going.”

“What happens then? When it starts spreading?” Rainy asked.

“You start getting symptoms,” Aerion said as she waved the wand across her hindquarters. “Coughing, headache fever, sore throat, general weakness first. Then they start to get worse. You start finding it’s harder to move. Your hooves feel like they’re full of cement. Your joints start to lock up. Your color begins to fade. Your vision goes dim. You burn up from the inside, Agent, until you’re nothing more than a husk, a shell. Then your body collapses, and you expire. Nothing more than a faceless casualty in a mass grave.”

Rainy grimaced. “Does anyone survive?”

Aerion finished her scanning and moved to stare Rainy in the eyes. “85% of ponies who contract it succumb. Even if you do survive, the disease takes a massive toll on your body; some are left blind, others paralyzed, or without the ability to fly or cast magic anymore. The rest are the lucky buggers who are immune for some reason or another. The virus takes them over and they don’t feel a thing.”

“Well, maybe I’m immune. I haven’t noticed anything yet, after all.”

“That would be very convenient for all of us, but I guess we’ll find out in a day or so,” Aerion chuckled as she patted Rainy on the shoulder. “Get some rest, Agent. I’ll go see if I can get us some hot water.”

“Will do. Goodnight, Aerion.”

Rainy waited for Aerion to leave the room before visibly wilting. She could fall asleep standing up with how tired she was… but she needed to do one more thing first. She unslung her rifle and placed it atop the coffee table before slowly stripping her way out of her torn, scorched Shadowbolt jumpsuit. The black and purple uniform had started to stick and even melt into her white fur, and it took some effort to peel the material off of her. But finally, the last symbol of her affiliation to the Division was in a tattered pile on the floor.

She was a free mare. Free for the first time in a long time. But she was a free mare with a timer ominously ticking down over her head; she didn’t have the luxury of sitting back and doing nothing. For Rainy, the work was only just beginning. And she was determined to fight to the end until she emerged victorious, or it consumed her.

But for now, she needed to rest. And she was asleep as soon as her body hit the cushions.

Celestia was trapped.

She sat in a large box, with nothing to keep her comfortable or occupied. Two of the sides were glass; one faced the room she was kept in, while the other faced the neighboring box her sister resided in. The rest were hard steel, sealed to keep her isolated from the rest of the world. Air was pumped inside through a large filter that kept the environment as clean and pristine as possible.

Despite all these precautions, it was still too late for her. She was already infected; this setup was just to delay the onset and progress as much as possible while a cure was researched. The doctors told her that alicorn magic was stronger than normal pony magic, so she’d be able to resist it for longer, but she still felt weak and helpless. Each breath brought the risk of causing her to descend into a coughing fit, and her body was simultaneously fevered and chilled, never comfortable.

There was nothing more she wanted than to be out there helping restore order and hope… but the last time she tried had put her in this mess in the first place. Equestria no longer wanted to listen to her.

Luna and Celestia were hidden underneath the EUP staging ground, the most well-guarded place in the city. But despite her secluded location, Celestia couldn’t escape the constant explosions and gunfire that had been raging for hours now. Shining Armor had assured her that the situation was under control, but his face was rapidly descending into worry and panic that betrayed the true trouble they were in. Now he was up top directing the defense, leaving the two princesses all alone as the attackers closed in.

“…S-Sister?…” Luna croaked.

Celestia glanced over to the identical cell next to her. Luna was no longer able to sit upright, so she lay on her side like a sleeping dog, barely able to lift her head up to stare blankly at her.

“Yes, Luna?” Celestial responded as sweetly as she could.

“You’re still there…” Luna muttered, as if it were possible for Celestia to walk away. “It’s getting harder and harder to see. Has Shining come back yet?”

“No, he hasn’t. No one has come by in a while.”

“Are they going to die?”

Celestia did her best to put on a brave face for her sister. “Shining Armor is one of the best captains I’ve ever had. If anyone can pull this off, it’s him.”

“Why are they doing this?” Luna whimpered. “Why did they attack us? Don’t they know we only want to help?”

Celestia paused, taking the time to find the right words. “Do you remember the night you came back from the moon? You said something to me then. Do you remember what it was?”

Luna frowned. “…It’s getting harder to remember anything, sister. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize,” Celestia said quickly. “You told me, ‘Ponies do strange things when they are scared.’ You said you knew that better than anyone. And you were right, Luna. Ponies are terrified. Just like you were, all those years ago. This virus is deadly, but fear… Fear is a mind virus of its own. And no amount of reassurances and promises can cure that when it becomes terminal. Remember that, and don’t be too quick to judge, sister.”

Her explanation seemed to placate Luna somewhat, and the night princess buried her muzzle in her hooves. “But how do we stop something like that? I don't think banishing everyone to the moon will work.”

“If I had the answer to that, we wouldn’t be here right now.” And she meant that in more ways than one.

Suddenly, a faint beeping noise caught Celestia’s attention. Her ears flicked and she turned to face it. Her isolation box muffled the softer sounds around her, so tracking its exact source was difficult, but it seemed to be coming from the wall closest to her. The tempo of the beeping grew faster and faster until it became a single, held-out tone. Then, the wall erupted.

Celestia’s beleaguered body was still able to flinch away at the sudden eruption of noise and fire, and several pieces of stone thumped against the viewing glass of her isolation box, nearly cracking it. She raised a hoof instinctively to shield her sensitive eyes from the billowing flame that emerged from the hole in the wall, which disappeared as quickly as it arrived. Through the breach stepped several rioters welding firearms, moving quickly and methodically. It was as if each of them subconsciously knew what to do, or were communicating non-verbally as they swept the room.

A large figure followed them inside, a stallion, seemingly unarmed. His eyes didn’t scan the room at all; his gaze was fixed firmly on the two sisters and didn’t look away.

“Well, well, well. What do we have here?” the stallion chuckled as he stepped in front of her viewing window. “Two royal princesses, alone and helpless. How convenient.”

Celestia straightened up to look as strong and intimidating as she could. “And who are you, my little pony?”

“Oh, me?” The stallion placed a hoof on his chest. “I’m no one. Just someone who’s grown a little too sick of the control your guards have on this city. So we’ve decided to throw you Equestrians out once and for all.”

“Why? We’re here to protect you ponies! We brought you food, water, and supplies, but your fighting has ruined all of it.”

“Protecting? No one’s protected me a day in my life! You’ve only pushed me around, attacked me, thrown me out just for being who I am… We all feel the same way. Now it’s our turn for revenge.”

“Revenge?” Celestia asked; maybe if she could get him talking, she could stall enough time for help to arrive.

The stallion rose to the bait. “We’re gonna finish off the rest of your little EUP coalition, and then we’re gonna take you and your sister captive. What will the rest of the country do to ensure your safe release? I figure just about anything. We’ll let you go… once we’re given this city all to ourselves. Though, looking at your sister, who knows if she’ll last that long?”

Celestia had been planning on playing coy and innocent with this rioter, but the threat to her sister made her throw all her caution to the wind. Her vision turned red as she leaped to her hooves, now towering over the stallion.

“Enough!” Celestia bellowed, her wings flaring open to look as tall and imposing as possible. “I am Celestia, rightful ruler and protector of Equestria. As your princess, I command you to stand down. We do not need to be enemies.”

“That’s the thing…” His eyes flashed green. “You’re not my princess. I serve the Queen.”