Blindsided

If anything notable happened during the day, Lazuli wasn’t aware of it. She spent most of the day at the base, only going home when Cirrus did, and the two of them spent the night relaxing at home. Lazuli mostly lounged on the sofa with her head in Cirrus’ lap while they watched TV, though Cirrus was only half paying attention between the news and the book she cradled just above Lazuli’s head, occasionally booping her on the nose with it if she started to drift off. Eventually there came a time where drifting off made sense, though, so she didn’t wake her after that.

The next day it was the same thing. Lazuli went to the military base to get a proper briefing on what she was going to be doing in Manehatten, in which she expectedly got minimal information and most of her questions were answered with shrugs from Steel. It had become commonplace that her mission briefings gave her little information, because she was the operative they turned to for deployments that had small amounts of intel. It wasn’t that she minded – she just would have liked to be properly informed on anything besides the location or the target, and sometimes both, if she was lucky.

That night, it was the same as the night before. Lazuli laid with the back of her head against Cirrus’ thigh, staring up at the ceiling with a blank expression while Cirrus watched the news.

“So you’re going to Manehatten too, hm?” Cirrus spoke up, prompting Lazuli to shift her gaze from the ceiling to Cirrus’ face.

“Huh? What do you mean, too?” Lazuli asked, shifting so she sat up more, draping her body over her wife’s lap.

“I’m going there for a business trip in two days, remember?” Lazuli recalled something of the sort. Cirrus worked as a seamstress – a damn good one, Lazuli always maintained, and she owned her own boutique in Canterlot. It was a far cry from Canterlot Carousel in terms of business, but Lazuli liked to think it was far better in quality. She also begrudgingly accepted that her wife usually made more money than her each month.

“…Right…yeah, I remember that.”

Cirrus bonked Lazuli on the head with her book. “You forgot.”

“I didn’t, uh…something something clothes, right?”

“You’re such a jerk.” Cirrus giggled, making it clear she thought the opposite, shimmying so she sank lower into the couch cushions. “We might as well go together, right?”

“No!” Lazuli suddenly sat up, staring right into Cirrus’ eyes, which looked a mixture of confused and scared. “…I…I mean…it’s uh…my mission is tomorrow, and you’ve probably got uh…reservations and all, or…your hotel booking and stuff-“

“Shush, it’s fine! I can bump my hotel room back a day, it’s fine. Besides, we never go places together.”

“I uh…” Lazuli’s mind tried to think up an excuse that didn’t blatantly say ‘I don’t want you to be caught up in my job in case something goes wrong and they connect you to me’, but she couldn’t. “We’ll be there at the same time, it’ll be fine. I can debrief over the phone and stay in Manehatten a few days longer than my mission takes, we can hang out.”

“Feels like you don’t want to travel with me.” Cirrus made a mock pouty face, and Lazuli stuck her tongue out in response.

“You know that’s not what it is. This is time sensitive, I gotta get there faster than the train takes.” That was a lie.

“Hmph…fine. But I’m holding you to the other thing. We’re gonna go sightseeing!”

“I haven’t been to Manehatten properly in years, I’d love to.” Lazuli kissed Cirrus on the cheek, then laid her head back down. “Besides, I wanna see what important work you’re doing there anyway. But…um…you’ll keep me posted on where you are, right? And- uh, and not open the door for strangers?”

“Geez, I’m not a foal, Laz. But I bet you’ll love what I’m working on!” Cirrus squealed giddily. “I’m testing out this new fabric, it’s woven in with six different kind of gems, and it really makes the whole thing…”

Lazuli laid there for almost an hour listening to her wife talk about clothes – and she did listen. She loved hearing when she was this excited about something, even if Lazuli didn’t understand half of the things she was talking about. Eventually though, sleep overtook the two of them, and they fell asleep on the couch again.

Lazuli was suddenly very glad for the heat-retention in her suit when she made her way up into the clouds near Manehatten. It was cold, despite being near the end of spring, with water droplets sprinkling her face and sticking to her fur. The suit protected her cold-blooded body from the temperatures for the most part, but eventually she gave up on trying to be completely undetected and dipped below the cloud layer to fly down into the city. It was nighttime, since she preferred to operate when it was dark.

“You know every five minutes, somepony is assaulted or murdered in this city?” Steel’s voice came through her earpiece, interrupting her somewhat relaxing flight.

“Gee, thanks for that comforting tidbit, Steel.” Lazuli grumbled.

“Just saying. This place isn’t so nice when you get out of the tourist areas.”

“I know that, Steel. But given I’m going into a warehouse that’s apparently a criminal hideout, I wasn’t exactly expecting to take a nap in the guest room.”

“I dunno. Just making conversation.”

“You don’t have to be monitoring me all the time. How long have I been doing this?”

“Two years.”

“So why don’t you just trust me?”

“Because as far as I know, you’ve only been succeeding because I’ve been supervising.”

Lazuli snorted heavily through her nostrils. “Dick.”

“Language.”

Lazuli banked to the side, thin trails of mist forming from her wingtips as she glided down towards the visibly darker, much less friendly looking area of Bronclyn. Her flight path brought her down a block away from the site she was meant to investigate, and she landed on top of a building that had a view of the warehouse. “Going quiet now.” She said firmly. “If you wanna keep listening to me breathing, go ahead.” She hopped down from the building, her wings hardly making a sound as they unfurled again and carried her down to the street below.

The streets of Bronclyn were usually the friendliest, from what Lazuli had seen, but the outer regions of it were much less so. Broken glass and garbage littered the sidewalks, the street lights flickered and buzzed, and ponies sitting in alleyways looked especially threatening. This was the kind of neighbourhood that Applewood liked to recreate for all of their crime movies and thrillers, and she had to admit that it fit the bill pretty accurately. Luckily, though, she only had a short distance to walk and didn’t run into any trouble.

The warehouse looked dark from the outside, but Lazuli’s ears told her there was activity within. It was faint, mostly the occasional clanking of metal against metal, or the hiss of machinery moving, but there was definitely something. It helped that the warehouse was in the middle of what probably used to be an urban neighbourhood, so there were no walls or fences to keep her out. She circled around the back, regardless.

As she neared the corner to the back yard, she was glad she had the instinct to stop. Pressing herself up against the wall and crouching low, she could hear voices off to the side.

“If you’d been less of a bitch about it maybe she would’ve replaced your leg instead of your eye, genius.” A male voice said.

“Well how would you react if she just came outta nowhere asking what part you want roboticized- robotifi- whatever.” Another voice, also male, growled in annoyance.

“I said I wanted my leg, simple.”

“Well she probably told you in advance!”

“Guess she just didn’t like you.”

“Fuck off.”

The conversation seemed to drop off from there, replaced with the occasional sound of hooves against concrete. Lazuli finally peeked her head around the corner to see what she was looking at properly.

Immediately, she was surprised by the species of the creatures guarding the back entrance. Both were zebras, evidenced by their grey fur and darker coloured stripes. One of them had a mohawk, the other sporting more of a pony-like mane style with his hair combed down to both sides from the middle.

Lazuli’s focus wasn’t on their hair, though, but rather their abnormal physiology. The zebra sporting the mohawk was the first one she heard speak, she imagined, since his left foreleg was made entirely out of metal. Compared to his other leg it seemed slightly slimmer, but when he moved forward it acted just like a regular hoof would, albeit with a bit more whirring and clicking.

The second stallion’s cybernetics weren’t visible until he turned his head. His right eye was entirely gone, along with a good deal of the left side of his face, and his eye had been replaced with a prosthetic one that looked just like a glowing blue light for Lazuli. She realized, perhaps too late, that the eye was fixated right on her, and ducked back behind the wall.

“Hey.” The one with the robotic eye nudged his partner, pointing to the wall Lazuli hid behind. “You see that?”

“You’re the one with the fancy eye, genius. Why don’t you tell me?”

“Something moved.”

“Probably a hobo.”

“Well they ain’t making a home here…” Lazuli heard the sound of his hooves clopping against the concrete as he approached. From what she saw neither of them were armed, but she needed to move fast, she knew.

As he reached the corner, Lazuli lashed out. There was no reason, in her mind, to kill him – instead she whipped around the corner and slammed her tail into the side of his head devoid of metal. While her tail was unarmoured, years of combat training had its muscles hardened to the point that being struck by it felt like being smashed in the face by the wall next to him, which unfortunately became a side-effect of her strike as his head crashed into the building and he crumpled.

By the time he had dropped to the floor, the other zebra was alerted. He staggered slightly, obviously not expecting there to be anyone of note there, and lifted his metal hoof. “Hey! The fuck are you doing?!”

Lazuli didn’t respond. Instead she ran forward, kicking herself off the wall and launching herself at him. It was only when the bottom of his robotic leg slid open and revealed an opening accompanied by the click of a shell being loaded into a chamber that she realized it was a mistake to throw herself at him.

She barely managed to use one wing to bank to the side in mid-air as the shotgun blast whizzed past her ear, deafening her in the process. She landed in front of the zebra, swinging forward with her tail, but he reached up and caught it with his metal hoof using a set of claws that were previously retracted into the appendage. “Hybrid bitch!” He yelled, swinging Lazuli to the side and slamming her face-first into the stone wall.

Lazuli was dazed, her vision swimming and her ears still ringing from the gunshot. She had to force herself to breathe after getting the wind knocked out of her by the impact, and as she started to pick herself up she narrowly avoided being struck in the face by the metal hoof careening towards her. It smashed into the wall next to her head, but the shock of it was enough to force Lazuli out of her daze. Grabbing hold of his hoof with her tail, wrapping it all the way up to his shoulder, she yanked him forward and slammed her head into his. Her forehead colliding with his muzzle earned a satisfying crunch as the cartilage in his nose was shattered, a loud howl of pain being cut off quickly by her yanking him down again, bringing both hind legs up beneath him and launching him into the air.

The zebra flew ten feet into the air before landing flat on his back, winding him completely. Lazuli, not wanting to take a chance, rolled herself up and steadied herself before knocking him out with a kick to the head. Once both of the guards were dispatched, she stood still and cocked an ear to listen.

The sound of machines working inside hadn’t stopped, and she didn’t hear anyone coming. Perhaps they somehow hadn’t heard the gunshot…or any of the commotion. Either that or they were just taking a while to come out. Either way, she knew she had to find a way in besides the back door, so she turned her head upwards.

The windows that spanned the entire length of the wall near the roof were the most obvious choice, and she imagined it wouldn’t be hard to get in. After making sure her head had stopped swimming, she spread her wings and launched into the air, hovering in front of the windows and peering inside.

The warehouse was one wide open space, filled with machines that apparently didn’t make enough exhaust to warrant an industrial sized chimney, which already made Lazuli suspicious given how much machinery was inside. A mixture of zebra and pony workers strolled around the warehouse floor maintaining the equipment, but most of it seemed to be automated. She noted the steel beams that ran from just below the windows across the whole roof, keeping it secure, and slowly began to push open the window so she could climb onto one.

“One of you fucked with the machines, don’t think I didn’t hear that bang.” A female voice reached Lazuli’s ears as she opened the window, sliding inside and gently settling herself on the beam that could barely hold both of her front and back hooves together.

“It was from outside, miss!” A much less commanding male voice said.

“Outside my ass, Mhina.” The female responded, but Lazuli didn’t want to risk peering over the edge to see who it was. “If I find out one of you dumb boot-lickers messed with one of my machines, I’ll rip off more than just your legs.” The voice continued with an angry lilt to her tone. “Now get back to work.” She demanded. The sound of three hooves on the floor and one metal one clanking against the concrete told Lazuli it was another one with cybernetic limbs – but as she peered over the edge, she realized it was more than just her.

Every pony and zebra she could see in the warehouse had some form of metal limb or implant. Some had more than one, but every one of them had at least one part of their body replaced with artificial versions. Legs seemed to be the most common. Lazuli briefly wondered if maybe this was some sort of underground cybernetics research facility and all of these workers had lost their limbs in one way or another, but based on the discussion she overheard outside and the attitude of the mare who she presumed to be the leader, this wasn’t a compassionate organization.

Lazuli reached up and tapped the side of her earpiece, speaking in a hushed whisper. “You’re recording this, right?”

“Yeah.” Steel’s voice responded almost immediately. “Just didn’t want to say anything. You okay? I heard you fighting.”

“I’m fine. No easy way to get any real information…” Lazuli mumbled. “Probably should have brought a camera.”

“Any office or anything?”

“Not that I can see.” Lazuli scanned the area, or what she could see anyway, and saw an office-like area overlooking the warehouse, almost directly across from her. “…Actually…there’s something. Hold on, I’m gonna check it out.” She started to shimmy forward, making sure to move slowly and methodically so that no one below could see her. Eventually she had her balance properly fixated, and started to walk along the beam using her tail as a balancing tool.

The Dracony shimmied to the other side of the beam, then hunched over when she reached the window, sitting there for a moment to listen for any sign of movement. Determining that the office was empty, she reached up and opened it.

It swung open easily, opening up to the interior of a nicely furnished and sizeable office area. On the opposite end of the room sat quite a few heavily stacked bookshelves. The desk was sitting against the wall to the left of the window, and the door to the office itself was on the right. She glanced behind her, then wiggled her way into the window and shut it behind herself.

Lazuli was surprised by how easy it had been, but she supposed even if this group were well-funded they wouldn’t put much into security of a run-down warehouse.

She sighed deeply as she shut the window, slowly looking around. The office was simple enough, though the view it had – overlooking the factory floor – made it seem like it was for a supervisor for sure. Stretching herself out, the Dracony began to head for the door…

Only for it to swing open. Lazuli’s immediate reaction was to leap into the air, grabbing onto a beam on the ceiling and hanging there. Dust tickled at her nose, but she forced herself not to sneeze as she looked down, swinging herself on top of the wooden beam.

“Idiots…” The voice of a mare reached her, and now it was much easier to see her. The voice matched what she heard on the warehouse floor, and the sight of her didn’t exactly surprise Lazuli, for some reason. The zebra walking into the office was clearly tough, with a messy mohawk that wasn’t nearly as cleanly cut as other zebras she had seen. Running down her neck and over one shoulder was a long braid of hair, presumably the excess that didn’t work into her mane style. She wore a combat vest, or at least some sort of reinforced vest, decorated with odd trinkets and tools. The most notable part about her was the shiny metal leg attached to her right shoulder – much like the stallion she met outside, except the claws embedded in it seemed not to be retracted. They scratched against the floor as she walked in, heading for the desk.

“I swear, I leave them alone for two seconds…” The zebra mumbled, strolling up to the desk and walking around it to sit down in the comfy looking chair behind it. She reached over to the desk, her clawed hoof gently picking up a cigarette from the pack nearby and lighting it with a flick of two of the claws, creating a spark before she lifted it to her lips. Lazuli cringed at the smell of smoke, but kept it to herself. “Won’t need to be here too much longer though.” As the zebra blew out a puff of smoke, Lazuli could see that there was a long scar across her left eye, running almost all the way to her cheek.

Lazuli was stuck. She wasn’t able to do much besides sit there on the beam, staying as still as possible and hoping the zebra didn’t look up. Thankfully Steel kept his mouth shut, and Lazuli was able to listen.

“What do you think?” The zebra turned her head off to the side, and Lazuli followed her gaze to the corner of the room, where she only now realized another zebra had entered through the office door. His steps had been silent, and he certainly looked…different. For one, he had wings, though based on them being made completely out of metal they were artificial.

“Your workers are adequate, Ayize.” The zebra said, and his voice sent a chill down Lazuli’s spine. It was cold, calculated…and sounded almost synthetic, like it was being spoken through autotune. “They just feel they can do anything when you aren’t present.”

“Fuckers.” The mare, who Lazuli presumed was Ayize, inhaled another lungful of smoke and breathed it out slowly. “Think I should hire more guards?”

“It would be logical.” The other zebra agreed. “Though you should be more discreet. I don’t think the police are too fond of me appearing to intimidate them every time you put up posters.”

“Can you blame me? I wanna be out there.” Ayize snickered, leaning back in her chair and shrugging. “Mmh…but yeah…” Having barely smoked half of the cigarette, she absently put it down on her desk and snuffed it out with a claw. “But I feel like we need to expand.”

“Expand, ma’am?”

“Get bigger. Do you not have a dictionary in that memory bank of yours?” Ayize tapped her head with her hoof.

Memory bank? Lazuli thought to herself, watching intently.

“Apologies. I just don’t know if that is wise, ma’am.”

“Why not?”

“I think it is best to keep a low profile until we’ve properly developed our public business, no?” The other zebra leaned back against the wall, standing on his hind legs and crossing his forelegs over his chest. “So that we have a proper cover for purchasing warehouses in better neighbourhoods.”

“Well I mean, I was thinking some backwoods place like Apploosa, but I guess you got a point…” Ayize snorted, picking up a pen in her hoof and idly twirling it in her grasp. “Besides, I already think there’s a mole down there somewhere.”

“A mole, ma’am? Who?”

“Dunno yet. Just feels like someone knows more than they should.” Ayize flicked the pen backwards, and it embedded itself in the drywall. “But let’s stop talking about business stuff. I was gonna get you an upgrade, right?”

“I believe you mentioned it, yes.”

“Let’s get going. No time like the present to go digging in a zebra’s noggin, right?” Ayize sat up, the chair creaking, before properly standing and walking out of the room. The second zebra paused in the doorway, his ears cocked as he looked over his shoulder and scanned the room suspiciously.

“I said let’s get going, Lead!” Ayize called from the hallway. The zebra glanced out the door, then grunted and shut it behind him.

Lazuli breathed a sigh of relief that she didn’t fully realize she had been holding in, before dropping down from the beam and landing with a soft thud on the ground. She was thankful for the soles of her suit’s hooves being padded, allowing her to make minimal noise when landing and walking.

She slipped behind the desk, quickly opening up drawers and folders to look for anything that might be important. She found a few schematics and inventory statements, but knowing that she couldn’t take too much without it seeming extremely suspicious, she quickly popped her earpiece out of her ear. Holding it carefully with her tail, she tapped a button on the side of it which opened up a tiny lens in the speaker, allowing her to take pictures – albeit not the highest quality – before placing the documents back. Lazuli clipped her earpiece back into her ear and opened up the window again, heading back across the beam.

Once she left the warehouse she spread her wings and flew off. Part of her felt bad for leaving the two unconscious stallions out there with no help, but every other part told her they deserved it, so she didn’t do anything to assist them when they would wake up. Instead, she told Steel that she had left the warehouse and would send the documents to him by computer – when she got to Cirrus’ hotel room, that is.