TCB: Changeling Experiments

They had tried their best to move the vehicle but it was no use, wheels were stuck so hard and the mud was too slippery to move on it.

"Alright, one more time, three two one, now!" Stephen, Cheng and Sasha were pushing the vehicle from all sides while Olivia was pressing on the gas to move it. "Come... on!" No, it wasn't moving. Olivia stopped pressing as everyone stopped pushing. Stephen waited for a moment to have some breath, then punched the metal surface. "Just move God damn it!" He then leaned on the back of the vehicle and started breathing slow and heavily. Everyone was waiting for his order but it didn't come.

Sasha was the one who spoke first "So, what now?" he asked unsurely about how Colonel would respond "It's getting dark..."

Stephen lifted his head to face his teammates. Sasha was right, it was getting dark, they needed a shelter and they still couldn't get the vehicle moving. "We will try out later, for now we need somewhere to spend the night." He then stood up and headed to driver seat "Olivia what is the condition of the armored?"

Olivia was from US just like Stephen, a middle aged woman, a soldier, a mechanic. She lifted her head with a flaslight in her hand and turned to Stephen. "Well, systems are working perfectly fine, it has nothing do with inside. Can't say the same about those I'm afriad" she pointed at wheels of the vehicle.

"Do you think we can stay inside it?" asked Stephen.

Olivia glanced at the wheels, mud and turned back to Stephen "I don't suggest that, we may drive it worse than now by putting more pressure."

"We should look for a shelter." Stephen turned to others "We will split, and look for somewhere to spend the night. A village, a house, somewhere safe enough to stay a while." He reached to his backbag and took out four transmitters "Take these, if one of us find a place, we will inform eachother. Understood?"

Everyone took the transmitters from Stephen "Yes sir!"

"Just in case, keep your weapons with you." he said as everyone headed to different directions.

-30 Minutes Later-

Forest, just the Goddamn forest and nothing more. 'There has to be a civilisation somewhere around here!' Stephen thought himself, he was walking for almost half an hour now but he can't see anything except long, moist trees around him. He continued to walk further without any idea where he was. What else could he do at the moment? He wasn't even aware where he was heading, he was lost in thoughts again his memories...

Three years ago, life in Florida was continuing normally, people were enjoying their lives, some of them going to their jobs, kids and teens going to school... And there were the ponification camps working. Everyday tons of people were getting converted like it was nothing unusual. Most of them were going to so called Equestria but of course there were the ones who prefered staying in their homes too. Stephen, personally didn't care about them much: Their lives, their decisions after all but of course not everyone were thinking the same way. There were people who hated this conversion process, like an anti-conversion group. They were called the Human Liberation Front, HLF for short. A terrorist group, formed by people who think the ponification is dangerous and will become a trouble in the future for humanity. World has seen them as a community formed by paranoiac people and didn't take them serious at first but their attack on the Atlanta Bureau, in State of Georgia, changed this situation. Thousands of humans and ponies died that day and government started to search for the person who is in charge of this attack. HLF was silenced, not completely but significantly. Their actions were weakened and became less dangerous. Well of course, every coin has two sides, if there was an anti-pony community, then there was an anti-human group either: PHL. PHL was a Equestrian terrorist group who believed conversion was the only way to cure humanity and Earth. And as everybody can guess their actions were formed by their ideals: Members of the PHL were converting people without their consent and ruining innocent humans' lives. Princess Celestia, ruler of Equestria actually declared this group guilty and forbade any kind of action similar to PHL's at first.

That was until that day. People were running away, screaming for help, some of them were crushing under another, children were crying, car alarms were ringing insanely. Stephen thought it HLF at first. He took cover behind a wall to observe what was going on. A few pegasus' flew past the crowd rapidly. 'Wait... Pegasi?' As they passed, a few glass bottles of purple liquid fell on the ground, some of them hit a man just in front of him, which fell down while running away. The man's body was covered with the liquid, he turned to Stephen and stretched out his hand to him "Help me!" Just as he did, his fingers started bend backwards, then forwards again, repeating the movement for a few seconds. Stephen watched the man's body transform, seeing every bone of his body bend, break and reshape inside with a great pain. Same thing was happening to everyone who contacted with the liquid in front of him.

That man just screamed for help was not a human now, he was one of them, one of those ponies. Stephen stared at the unconscious body of him. The hand he tried to reach him with was nothing more than a hoof, his body was covered with a brown coat and there was a muzzle positioned under his eyes. "H-Holy shit..." Slowly, he reached to the former human in front of him to check if he is okay but then he heard flapping sounds nearby, pegasi were returning. Without hesitation, Stephen stood up and ran to the backstreet as fast as he could but fell on the muddy surface he was walking on, surrounded by long trees. He stood up again and looked around. He was very far away from the last place he was a moment ago. He was daydreaming about that horrible memory, that was why he couldn't make out how long it passed "Ugh, same shit everytime!" Yes this was not the first, in fact this was kind of a routine for him for a long time.

Stephen shaked of and rubbed his eyes to be onself again. He checked his stuff and looked around. Yup he was far far away from their vehicle. "Excellent Steve! You did it again!" He opened his arms to congratulate himself. Just as he took a step forward to the direction he came from, he felt something sticky beneath his boot, something like jelly. He glanced at his boots, their soles were covered with something. He streched out his two fingers and wiped the sticky thing on them to take a closer look. A jelly like, hyaloid, slimey matter with greenish blue color. "Eew what the fu-" before he finished his swear, a hissing sound came behind him. Stephen quickly aimed at the direction of the sound. He switched the mode from safety to semi-auto and scanned the scenery.

He didn't mind before but the trees in front of him were covered with that blue slime, same as on his boots. "The hell?" Stephen took a few steps forward, getting closer to the trees and bushes around them. A crackling came from the bushes. Stephen crouched, and reached out to the bush with his left hand while he held his rifle with his right. He slowly gripped the branch, just when he was about to lift it, his transmitter buzzed. "Colonel Cartwright, I found something. You gotta see this." It was Olivia talking. "Sir? Do you copy?"

Stephen let go of the branch with an annoyed sigh and he stood up, Stephen pressed the button on the device to answer "Clearly Lieutenant. Report your location."

"I'm in 327-North sir." Olivia reported

Stephen looked at the trees once again "Hold your position Lieutenant."

"Roger that." buzzed the radio.

Stephen switched the channel to notice others, still not taking his eyes off the trees just for a moment. "It's Colonel Cartwright speaking, every memeber is coming to the direction 327-North, I repeat, 327-North."

Radio buzzed again "Roger that."

Stephen pulled his finger from the button and turned around to go meet the team. But just as he stepped forward, he glanced back at the slime covered plants one more time. Then he took the road to the meeting point.

After a while the team was complete except Stephen and waiting for Olivia's report. Cheng was sitting, waiting for team's leader and Olivia was thinkering with her rifle by the time. Sasha, who is bored of this quite moment couldn't be patient "So what did you find Olivia?"

Olivia turned to Sasha with a serious expression "We have to wait for Colonel. I'll report when he's here."

Cheng stood up from where he was sitting and pointed towards the path behind the two. It was Stephen approching. From the look of his face, it was clear he was tired. After catching up with the rest of the team, he stopped where he was and looked at the curious faces in front of him. He made a move with his hand "Report Lieutenant."

Olivia saluted, turned back and pointed at the trees ahead. "Sir, I found an underground hideout about five meters away, I thought we chould search inside and see if we can use it."

Stephen stood silent for a minute, then turned to others "What about you? Have you found anywhere we can stay?"

"No sir." Sasha replied and Cheng just nodded negatively.

Stephen turned back at Olivia "Very well. Lead the way Lieutenant."

Olivia straightened up and turned back to the direction she pointed before. "This way."

Sasha and Cheng continued after Olivia, and after them Stephen was following. After a short while, they were arrived where Olivia led them. A rusty, metal, square shaped trapdoor was positioned at the center of the grassy ground around it. It reminded Stephen the old bunkers from World War II. Cheng ducked and took a closer look at the enterance, touched the rusty metal surface and turned back at Colonel, waiting for his decision.

Stephen scanned the area around them and with a final sigh, he gave the word "We're going in." After his command, every member of them climbed inside. At last, it was Stephen's turn, he put his foot on the metal bar of the ladder and slowly got inside being careful not to lose his balance and fall. Just he was about to get in completely, he lifted his head and stared back at the way they came from.

They were being stalked...