"Twilight." A rough feminine voice spoke up, a hint of irration laced within the comment.
Twilight Sparkle's left ear flicked as she tried to maintain her concentration. Her eyes twitched back and forth between her closed eyelids. Her horn hummed and sparked as lines of code scrolled over the softly glowing green terminal that it was pressed against. Lines of violet code popped up occasionally on the screen.
"Twilight?" The voice asked again, ever-so-slightly more urgent.
"Leave her be, Do. She'll get us in before anybody else comes knocking." A gruff masculine voice spoke up to counter the first. This was followed by grinding cruntch. "We'll be just fine." The addition was muffled by a noticable full mouth chewing on stone.
There was the clopping clank of hooves on metal. "Spike, we got the info on this Tomb from one of Ahuizotl's grunts. We just managed get here first. He can't be that far behind us." The first voice countered, sounding more impatient. "If this place is so special, then I just wanna get inside this damn Vault, grab a couple good looking Embryos, maybe some datapads or guns, and then fuck off before we have any confrontations. I do not want to get in a firefight again."
Twilight's right ear flicked. There was a slight twitched in her closed eyes.
"When we do ge' stuck 'in, Ah've go' enough roun's wiff Sasha an' Sheila 'ere ta 'old off anybody." A deep, gravelly voice chuckled, accompanied by a pair of loud, ratching clicks. "Poor babes 'aven't 'ad a good figh' in ages."
"Well there's not going to be a fight." The female retorted in clear irritation.
"Ye' sure 'bout tha'?" Came a gravelly chuckle.
Twilight's jaw clenched along with her eyelids.
"I won't argue with you Shred." The female groaned.
"That is it!" Twilight snapped, whirling away from the terminal. Her violet eyes glared at her companions.
Wearing a tan vest, a brown bandolier, a holster at her waist, and metal shoes on her forehooves, Daring Do the pegasus, stopped her pacing in front of the large metal Vault Door. Her magenta eyes looked tense, her monochromatic mane of shades of grey was a mess under her pith helmet, and her tan coat wasn't much better.
Though he was a teenager, the tall, lanky, purple and green dragon, Spike looked a bit too relaxed. He leaned against a metal wall and chewed on a ruby. Probably pulled from the sack slung over his shoulder. Though, it was more likely that it had been fished out of one of the many pockets of his long coat.
And speaking of fish. Shred, the massive, steel gray-skinned, white under-bellyed, black-eyed, built-like-a-brick-shithouse, Shark Carnid sat on what had to once have been a counter of a guard post. Dual bandliers of ammo crisscrossed his scarred up chest. His worn and holey pants seemed to barely contain his tree-trunk legs. The same went for his black boots. A pair of huge, seemingly cobbled together, LMGs hung ast his waist like they were pistols. An excited, yet goofy grin twisted his maw of sharp teeth.
"Ohp, look wha' ya did. Ya go' 'er mad." Shred barked a gravelly laugh.
"All. Of. You. Shut it! I'm nearly done, so I'd like to finish in peace." Twilght wiped her brow with a hoof, levitated a water bottle out of the saddlebags around her barrel, took a couple gulps, and replaced the bottle in her bags. With that, she turned back to the terminal on the wall.
There were a few moments of blissful silence.
Then...
"That's what she said." Spike giggled.
"HA! Nice!" Shred barked, bumping his massive fist against the smaller dragon's.
"Are you KIDDING ME?" Twilight's horn flared with light and she whirled around a second time. Unfortunately as she did, her horn fried the terminal.
"Twi, you broke the-" Spike began only for the Vault door to hiss. "Oh hey the door's open. Yay."
"Look what you made me do!" Twilight fumed as cold air vented from the edgescof the door. "I wanted to be able to lock it again! But no! You had to break my concentration!"
"It's all good Twilight." Daring trotted up and patted the other mare's shoulder. "Now we can just sack the best stuff first."
Twilight fumed as both Spike and Shred got up and walked towards the door.
"Mako, i's cold!" Shred shugged like a quaking mountain.
"Then you can stay out here you big baby. I'm sure Twilight and Spike can lift the heavy stuff out to you." Daring short a smirk at the shark.
Shred frowned and grumbled as he turned and stomped back to his seat. Which creaked as set his bulk back onto it.
The vault door fully opened. Chill fog rolled out of an unlit room. Suddenly there was a crackle of static. With a few clicks, ceiling lights bathed the room in white light. Vents on the walls and ceiling were exuding the chill fog. The room was dominated by a massive cylindrical glass container, easily big enough to hold something of Shred's size or larger. The glass was frosted over and the murky green liquid inside made it impossible to determine what lay within. Atop the cylinder, was a metal pillar that went up to the ceiling.
The entire room buzzed with a deep hum.
"That's it?!" Daring cried out, her mouth agape. "A single Embryo?! Fuck!"
"If it's important enough to have it's own vault..." Twilight commented, stepping into the Vault proper.
"Then it should be worth something." Daring's look of anger morphed into a grin.
"Look Twi, a console." Spike lazily pointed towards the terminal sitting right in front of the Embryo.
"Thank you Spike." Twilight smiled and nodded at her assistant.
"While you try to figure out what this is and how to get it out of here, I'm going to set up some kind of barricade in case Ahuizotl and his goons decide to show up." Daring trotted off towards Shred.
"That mare is a bit paranod." Spike commented.
"Little bit." Twilight shrugged as she trotted over to the terminal. On closing her eyes, lighting her horn and touching it, she yelped. She jumped away like she'd been shocked.
"Twi!" Spike snapped racing over to her.
"I'm fine." Twilight shook herself. "I just wasn't expecting to go in and see warning labels as the first thing."
"That's bad, right?" Spike frowned.
"Let's find out!" She grinned, squaring her shoulders and resetting herself. She closed her eyes and touched the terminal again. "... Well this can't be good."
"What?" Spike asked, kneeling next to her. "What are you seeing, talk me through it." He encouraged.
"There's no security. Nothing." Twilight frowned. "Not sure if that's bad..... Then again getting in here was a bitch to begin with..." She bit her lip. "And this is helpful... There are chunks of text here that appear... Redacted."
"How big a score is this?" Spike looked more worried than hopeful.
"I don't think this is a score, Spike..." Twilight said slowly. "Project: Meltdown.... XK-Class... Spike, I think we should leave." She pulled away from the terminal. "This is bad..." A small pad was levitated out of her saddlebags. "I do want all of the information though. Maybe it's just heavily encrypted. I can't tell from just file skimming." She pulled out a cable and hooked her pad to the terminal. "Maybe we can come back later and-"
"Daring Do! I think you have something of mine!" A voice boomed from outside the Vault, causing the pair to jump.
They turned around to see a large group of heavily-armed ponies and one angry, blue demi-god.
"Oh no...." Twilight moaned.
"Come on!" Spike hissed, half-dragging her behind the Embryo, Twilight still keeping a magical death grip on her pad.
"Like Hell it is!" They heard Daring shout back.
There was a pair of loud ratcheting clicks. "Wha's up?! 'Oo wan's some!" Shred roared.
"Dammit you two." Twilight grimaced, looking at her pad. Most of the data was hers, however it also had a direct connection to the terminal itself.
A thought crossed her mind...
"Too dangerous." She mumbled aloud.
"Twi, stay here, I'm moving up to support." Spike said, getting up and fishing through his bag.
"Be careful." Twilight nodded as she peaked out from her hiding place.
Shred was standing in the middle of the door way, both gins aimed at the mass of ponies. Daring was just onside the doorway, peaking around the corner herself. Her Tactile Hoof Boots had popped their fingers out and she stood on her hind legs, revolver in hoof. Spike was behind the living wall of Shred, fiddling with a couple things she couldn't identify from her vantage point.
"I might have known that you'd be here. That prize is mine." Ahuizotl called out.
"Well, we got here first. So you can kinda fuck off!" Daring called back.
It would be long before bullets started flying.
Twilight had a choice. Wait for the fighting to start, which would probably lead to all their deaths based on numbers alone.
Or.....
No. She couldn't lose her friends.
She bit her lip, lifted the pad, and ignited her magic.
Immediatelty, the white lights in the Vault went red as an alarm started blaring. The lights in the corridor switched to yellow emergency lighting. All the fog faded away as all the vents around the room sealed themselves.
"Twilight? The fuck did you do?" Daring yelled.
"I made a choice." Twilight yelled back. "Now, back up! I've got a feeling this thing is dangerous."
A hissing sound suddenly made her jump. She snapped her head up. The frost on the glass was gone. The liquid inside appeared to be boiling. Hot steam was venting from the pillar that the Embryo was attatched to.
Twilight yelped and scrambled away from the Embryo as the glass started to crack, accidentally yanking her pad free from the cord. She ran into a crounched Shred, who had apparently moved back at Twilight's assistance. She was quickly yanked behind him by a pair of claws. Spike didn't even look at her, he was too focused on the spiderwebbing glass.
"Twilight what the fuck?!" Daring hissed at her.
Twilight winced. "I didn't want to lose you guys."
Before Daring could respond a deafening explosion rocked the Vault. Glass shards flew in all directions as liquids flooded the floor.
There was a tremendous thud. Twilight dared not look at what she'd unleashed.
A tense silence filled the room. Something exhaled a deep, growling breath.
"What are you doing?! Kill that thing!"
Ahuizotl's cry made Twilight's eyes widen.
The world erupted in gunfire.
Then-
A Roar.
Louder than anything she'd ever heard, it drowned out everything else. Shwe pressed her hooves to her flattened ears. She could feel the ground shake. Steady, heavy impacts of some unstoppable force. The shriek of tear metal penetraced the reverberating roar.
Twilight was glad she couldn't hear the screams.
The pounding faded away, as did the roaring.
She felt herself being shaken. Daring was nodding towards the door. Somewhar muted, Twilight heard, "we're leaving." Silently she nodded and Spike helped her up. Shred straightened and casually brushed the glass off of himself.
Twilight leaned against Spike, more than a little disoriented. The headed towards the door with Shred and Daring ahead of them.
"What did it look like?" Daring asked.
"Don' know. 'ad me eyes covered in case a' glass." Shred shrugged. "Look's like i' did a number on dem dough." Shred nodded down the hallway.
There were no bodies. Just burn marks, the occational meaty chunk, and a whole lot of blood. Twilight managed to keep her gorge down as she walked through the "mess." The path of destruction through the ancient facility was easy to follow. Massive claw marks were gouged into the metal walls, ceilings, and floors like they were made of paper.
As they walked, ears open for any noise, an eerie silence fell over the facility.
"Well... Look's like i' knew the way ou'." Shred commented.
"Think it's still here?" Spike asked, a hint of worry in his voice.
"We'll see when we get out. It might've just fucked off into the forest." Daring grumbled, rustling her wings. "At least, let's hope it did... We're not too far from the entrance."
"Speak a' the Leviathan..." Shred growled quietly as he froze, gesturing everyone to get behind him. Twilight peaked around him.
The entire wall that made the entrance to the facility had been pealed open like a tin can. Noonday sunlight shined into, slightly distorted from the smoke billowing from the wrecks of APCs that had no doubt come from Ahuizotl's personal army. Not far from the wrecks was something... Massive.
Even sitting, Twilight knew it would tower over her.
"Shit." Daring swore.
"Well tha's jus' dandy." Shred growling as he made a move to pull an LMG.
Daring stopped him. "No you don't! I'm pretty sure bullets just tick it off!"
"I could use something to distract it." Spike offered.
Twilight meanwhile wasn't listening the the arguement. She was staring at the Beast. It wasn't doing anything. Just... Sitting there, on the ground, looking up at the bright blue sky.
There was something about it. It seemed... Lost?
Twilight took a step out from behind Shred.
It was... Confused. Maybe scared? Twilight didn't know how shevknew but it felt... Right. She took a step. Then another. Until she was trotting out towards it.
"Twilight? Twilight! Daring snapped a hiss at her, but Twilight didn't stop.
It was huge, easily taller than Shred. Its skin, if you could call it that, was jet black. Heat seemed to radiate from it. Before she could analyze it further she noticed something. It was looking at her.
She froze.
It's massive head lowered. A pair of all black eyes with pupils like green flame stared at her.
It blinked.
She blinked.
Its maw opened. Hot breath like a blast furnace washed over her.
This was it. She was going to die.
Its lower mandible split, opening wide. A long snake-like tongue slithered out of it's gullet.
This was it.
It licked her face.
Twilight blinked.
Its tongue retracted and it huffed once, then started panting.
A loud chirping noise made her jump. The Beast's head cocked to the side, looking at her.
Twilight yelped and dug around in her bag until she found a metal disk. Brightening her horn, the disk lit up. An image of Princess Celestia appeared.
"Twilight, you haven't answered in hours. Are you okay? How did your job go?" The Princess rattled off, sounding much like a concerned mother.
"S-sorry P-Princess..." Twilight giggled weakly. "C-could you send someone to us? W-we've had a bit of a day..."
