Chapter 14:
Extraction

“I’m not expecting to find anything really. There’s nothing out here,” I huffed, slightly annoyed. “Just sit here for two days and count it as some free hazard pay.”

“Guess that’s not too bad really…” I along with my fellow soldier fell quiet again, the dream I’d been having ever since dropping into this world repeating itself once again. The forest around our observation post went deathly quiet as the smothering black mist rolled into the dugout again once again…

“What are you doing?” I heard something say in a screechy language, almost as if a bird was speaking.

Wait, shouldn’t I have woken up by now?

“A betrayal for a betrayal, that’s the price you pay.” another voice answered, the black fog had wisps of green fire going through it. My head hurt again as I felt the pressure build as it had done before. The sound of a blade being drawn and a wet splotch were the last thing I heard.

I gasped air in and shot up, still being in the room in Gilda’s house I’d fallen asleep in. The sun had sunk towards the horizon as I had slept through the day in preparation of tonight. We’d been laying low for four days, waiting for more griffins to be about on the street so I could scout out the road to the castle with Gallus.

Rainbow had remained in Gilda’s house, staying on the first floor during the day so she wouldn’t be spotted through the windows. The fact that she’d been able to keep herself contained within the house had been an absolute blessing.

“So you’re up then, I was about to wake you if you weren’t,” Gilda said from the open door frame, I twitched as I hadn’t heard her approach.

“Thanks, shouldn’t be late to start my own party,” I answered, getting my gear and strapping it on.

“We’re getting ready downstairs as well, we got some food ready for you before we head out,” Gilda informed me, staying in the door opening to look at me as I got all the stuff ready I’d deemed necessary before going to sleep. “You really don’t get it, do you?”

I looked back at the other griffin with a raised eyebrow. “Get what?”

“Why Dash is here. You don’t even smell it,” Gilda repeated, amazement on her face as she couldn’t believe whatever she was hearing.

“Smell?” I asked in confusion, Gilda smacked her face with a claw.

“Seriously, who raised you? Can’t have been griffins and this pretty much confirms it wasn’t the ponies either,” Gilda bluntly stated. “Like seriously, I’ve lived in Cloudsdale and it was one of the things I found out very early.”

“Can you please get to the point,” I groaned, not in the mood to beat around the bush.

“Fine. Rainbow Dash wants to rut you.”

I nearly dropped my rifle hearing that. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me just fine,” Gilda said with a roll of her eyes. “I can smell it off her and we’re lucky that no griffin else around here probably knows how a horny pony smells because we’d have gotten unpleasant visitors otherwise.”

“It would have been nice to know that earlier,” I pointed out, going through some inner turmoil.

Damnit Rainbow, what the hell am I going to do about you now… you really aren’t gonna make anything easy on me, are you?

“We’d be screwed if anygrif did anyway. I’m downstairs eating if you need me.” Gilda turned around and walked down the stairs. I silently muttered some curses as I got everything strapped in and followed her down. The four of us there eating in silence as it would be our last night in the city regardless of what would happen.

Gilda, Gallus, and Rainbow would head out directly to an agreed extraction point while I would break into the castle and find the Lunar guards inside. Gallus and I had gone over everything he knew about the layout of the castle so many times that I could recite all his knowledge from memory. Princess Luna had also sent over the layout plans of the castle which they had in the Canterlot archives.

All this was done without knowledge of it leaking to Princess Celestia of course.

I checked my watch as no more preparation would make me more ready for the task ahead. Princess Luna had assured me she’d make the night as dark as possible to help with the operation… whatever that was supposed to mean I did not know, but I would find out very soon as the last sliver of the sun sunk below the horizon. I turned to watch the location where the moon was supposed to rise but to my surprise, it did not appear immediately.

Wait, what? She can’t have made the moon disappear, can she?

Being entranced by the fact the moon didn’t show up as it had since I first stepped foot in this world, I noticed another detail about the skies.

The stars.

They’re not there.

It was almost as if I could feel the temperature drop several degrees as something finally came up from under the horizon, a dim but blood-red moon slowly rose into place in the sky.

Subtle. Very subtle.

Though this might just tip the bastards off...

“Whoa… never thought I’d ever see this happen,” Rainbow spoke up, looking up at the sky.

“What?” I asked as Rainbow peaked past me at the sky outside.

“A blood moon. It’s supposed to mean Equestria is at war,” she answered in awe.

I looked back at the faint, red, glowing sphere in the sky. “That’s one hell of a way to inform everyone on the planet.”

“Yeah,” Rainbow agreed as we stepped away from the window and loaded her up with all the gear I wasn’t taking into the castle with me. What I did have on me was my rifle, pistol, combat knife, lots of ammo, a long rope, and the sword I’d gotten from Luna.

“Everything is in place, you all remember the drill right?” I asked them.

“I’ll drag their butts over there, don’t you worry about them,” Gilda said, satisfying me as I pulled my cloak around me so all my gear would be hidden on the way to the castle.

“Good. Now Rainbow, stick with her. I don’t want to have to pull you out of that castle after you’ve done something stupid.”

“Yeah, I got it...” Dash mumbled, not sounding all too pleased.

“I’m not joking here Rainbow, you’ve yet to see me truly angry. Don’t push me there.” Taking a peek out of the door I found no patrols on the street. “We’re clear, see you three at sunrise.”

Slipping out the door, I merged with the shadows, sinking into alleyways that gave good cover as I made my way to the castle. I had to wait in cover a few times as patrols came by but in the extreme almost unnatural darkness they hadn’t even the chance to spot me.

Arriving at the castle itself I stuck close to the walls, walking along until I reached a drainage pipe close to the edge of one of the cliffs. It was too dark to really see what I was doing as I felt the iron bars blocking the way further. What made things harder was that out here I couldn’t use light yet as that might attract the wrong kind of attention.

Let’s see… the third bar from the cliffside should be the loose one.

Counting off the metal bars I quickly found the one that was loose and carefully pried it out, making sure I made no sound doing so. A small stream of water flowed through the pipe while echoes of talking griffons could faintly be heard echoing against the walls.

Right, now this pipe should be directly connected to the lower cellars...

Clicking on a small, red, headlight, I made my way down the small tunnel. If I had still been a human I might have had to crawl on my belly to get through the small space. On a few occasions, I had to turn off the light as patrols walked over grates above but eventually, I came to the one that led into a storage room according to the building plans I’d studied.

Slinging my rifle onto my back I reached out and pushed the metal grate that covered the hole above aside and squeezed myself through the hole, quickly clearing the room. The only things that filled it being barrels.

Perfect, the next part-

“Are you crazy?!”

I immediately grasped my combat knife and took position next to the door to the hallway.

“I thought I heard something in there.”

“You know what’s stored there. If you take that damn torch into that storage you’ll kill us both,” a second growled. “And besides, no-one’s down here other than those bats and they’re chained up.”

I heard some muffled grumbles and steps leading away from the door, the hallway on the other end staying quiet. The extra confirmation that my objectives were down here was nice too.

Wait, they couldn’t take fire in here…

Looking out at the barrels I checked if I could find one that I could open. Careful not to disturb the contents of one of the wooden containers I removed and set aside one of the lids and brushed a claw through the black powder that sat within.

Gunpowder.

Shaking the stuff off of my claws, I placed the lid back and filed away the particular bit of information in case it’d be useful later. Right now I had an objective to complete.

Waiting at the door and listening to make sure the hallway beyond was empty, I pushed the door open and stepped out of the storage room.

End of the hall, Stairway down to the dungeons.

With my rifle raised, I swiftly moved through the hallway and towards the door at the end of it. Just like the building plans had shown a stairway down revealed itself.

Knowing that the dungeon was at the bottom I silently snuck down, careful with my every step to reduce the amount of sound my movement made. There was no door at the bottom of the stairs, only a dark and long hallway with cells sitting on either side of it.

Right at the entrance, a griffin sat at a desk, a small candle lighting his table. It wasn’t bright enough to reveal me standing at the entrance but there was no way I would be able to pass him without getting seen.

“Hey, chicken!” someone called out from the darkness of the cells, gaining the griffin’s attention. I briefly swore that I could see the glint of eyes focussed on me through the metal bars.

“Quiet! Keep your poison to yourself,” He snarled, taking his candle and walking up to the cell to address the pony who’d shouted at him directly. “You know what happens if I have to come in there.”

The faint candlelight was enough for me to see the fangs in the batpony’s mouth as he grinned while I slowly snuck up to the other griffin.

“I wasn’t talking to you, dirtbag.”

The guard’s eyes went wide, finally turning his head around. Panicked flashed on his face as I closed the distance immediately, bringing down my combat knife and plunging it into his throat while holding his beak shut. The candle fell from his claws and winked out.

“Corporal Comet?” I asked as I dropped the limp body of the griffin onto the floor and turned on my headlight.

“The one and only. May I assume you are Specialist Grey?” The batpony’s eyes glowed red as I shone my flashlight in his direction. There were multiple batponies in this particular cell, their hooves chained to metal rings that were sunk into the foundations.

“You’d be correct in that. Is your full team here?” I asked, pulling the keys to the door off of the downed griffin.

“We’re… missing our sergeant. That bastard told us they’ve executed him.”

“They did. Forced the city to watch them do it,” I sighed as I entered the cell and removed the shackles. The five ponies looked like absolute crap, badly dressed wounds, blood and grime still clinging to their coats, and bags beneath their eyes.

“Well, shit… The body?”

“They took it away, I don’t know where it is.”

“Damn,” he cursed helping one of his subordinates to stand up. “You have an extraction?”

“Depends, can you fly?”

“No, our membranes have been cut. If we took off they’d tear and we’d plummet down,” the corporal answered as he followed me back to the stairs up.

“That makes things more difficult but not outside of planning. Follow me.” with the five ponies in tow, I made my way back up but halted as I opened the door up top. A group of five griffins standing there, looking at us with surprise that faded nearly instantly.

“Fire!”

“Down!”

I jumped back, forcing the corporal down onto the ground as he was the most exposed alongside me. Five cracks of muskets could be heard as stone exploded above me and I felt one of the bullets hit my armour plate and another graze my right back leg.

“Charge!”

The five griffins, muskets lowered with bayonets attached ran forward. Though the pain in my leg was agonizing and my ribs felt like they’d just been kicked in by Rainbow Dash, I flicked the fire selector on my rifle to automatic and pulled the trigger. All of the hostile griffins in the hallway collapsed to the floor as I emptied my entire magazine.

“Everyone good?!” I called to the batponies behind me as I reloaded my rifle and opened my med pouch and got out my last pressure bandage and wrapped it around my bleeding leg. The bat ponies all laid down and had their ears covered, whining in agony. “For fuck- Get up! We’ve got to move!”

After pulling up the Lunar guards I stumbled down the long hall towards the storage room. Hobbling past the griffins and trying the door.

You’ve got to be kidding me.

I slammed my shoulder against the heavy wooden door to no avail. Stepping back I pointed my rifle and fired three shots through the door where the lock sat, slamming against it again but still not being able to get through it as the door stubbornly remained in place.

“Motherfucker. Alright, plan B, follow me!” Picking up a torch from the downed griffins while mentally bringing up the layout of the castle. I reminded myself of a second exit point a floor up. Placing the torch at the base of the door to the storage room, I got the ponies to follow me up through the castle. Running there was out of the question as none of my group was in shape for that and my leg was hurting too.

Shouts echoed all throughout the hallways now though as I’d truly poked the hornet’s nest. The only positive was that the griffins had yet organized well enough to stop us. The few of them we ran into were definitely not ready, getting mowed down before they could do anything.

They’re not going to like the next part...

Slipping into a side room I found the window I was looking for. There wasn’t a lot of anything in the means of furniture in the room as I looked around for someplace to tie my rope to. Meanwhile one of the batponies looked out of the window while I tied my rope to a wooden beam.

“Hey, not to complain but there’s really no way we’re not going to get seen if we go down here,” the mare pointed out.

“This was one of the ways out if you five could fly, not really optimal for how we’re doing things,” I answered, tossing the rope out the window and placing the beam in such a way that if you’d hang from the rope it wouldn’t slip. “Go on, make it quick, I want to get off this mountain.”

The five ponies rapidly followed each other down the rope, getting spotted by a few sentries as the nightguard mare had predicted. The moment the last of them reached the bottom of the rope I took my knife and cut the end off, letting it drop down so we could take it along.

Checking the air I found a small squad of griffins rapidly approaching the base of the walls where the batponies were waiting for me. Pulling the bipod hidden in my foregrip out, I took aim at the leading elements of their flight.

The three leading griffins immediately dropped from the sky making the others hesitate too as they dove down for cover from my fire. That gave me the time to leap from the window and ‘glide’ down to the ground, the way I slammed down was reminiscent of a superman landing.

“Where are we-” the corporal was interrupted by a dull thud that made the ground shake, a cloud of dust forcing itself out of the window we’d just jumped from.

“To the cliff!” I called out, pointing in the right direction. A few of the griffins that had seen us popped up between the battlements, one of them aiming a musket and firing at the batponies. The shot landed on the corporal before I could even respond, my shots impacting the stone around where the griffin had fired from.

“Corporal!” the female guard exclaimed, grabbing a hold of the downed pony and dragging him along as he gasped for air. My cover fire would keep their heads down a little longer but if too many griffins got up there we’d be royally screwed. Finding a large rock at the cliffside, all of us took cover behind a large enough boulder. I continued to pop shots at the wall but tried conserving my precious ammo.

“He’s having trouble breathing!” the guardsmare shouted, I pulled back for a moment and opened my medkit. I found the entry wound on the pony’s chest, feeling the back for an exit wound made me grimace at the hole.

“He needs medical, asap.” Opening my medkit, I pulled out the chest seals and prayed they’d close the wound well enough on the fur.

“No shit, where are we even going?!” she exclaimed as the corporal lost consciousness.

“Right here!” I swirled around and locked eyes with the newcomer who was dragging a chariot behind her.

“I TOLD YOU TO LEAVE!” I roared as I locked eyes with Rainbow Dash, making her flinch before turning back to the batponies. “Get him on that chariot!” Popping back out from behind the rock I fired a long salvo at the walls. The batponies used the straps in the chariot to secure their wounded comrade.

“Specialist! Get on!” the guardsmare called out, I immediately turned away from the wall and jumped on as well.

“Hold on tight! We’re gonna go fast!” Rainbow called out, pulling the chariot of the cliff and giving her wings a might flap. The wagon lurched forward, soaring off into the darkness.

Author's Note

Merry Christmas everyone!

For everyone who missed last week's blog, here's the art I posted in there:

*From chapter 1

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