“The 900th Division doesn’t exist.”

“I’m telling you it does, it does. It’s just... Invisible.”

“Neun null... neun, Tikhiy S... S... Soldat Klinok, Awaken... Operative.”

The darkness faded, light growing to fill my vision, but something was different, the light was faded, I did not need to strain to prevent squinting.

The lid of the pod slid open, or at least it tried to. The mechanism ground to a halt before the pod was halfway open. My mind struggled against the fog of my stasis sleep as I reached out to the pod lid, straining to lift it up. I felt weak, barely able to get the lid any further. I pressed myself to the gap, squeezing my head through and twisting the rest of my body after it. I hit the floor with a thud, struggling to rise to my hooves.

It seemed like an age had passed, but slowly I was stood on my own four hooves. The light was indeed dimmer than I recalled, the walls faded but the door was still there, still shut. Shuffling my way across the room I pressed on the door and it, by some miracle, slid open.

“Sweet Luna,” I breathed, then almost repeated it in a sharper tone. The room beyond was in some ways worse off that the stasis room. The locker had fallen over, cracking the floor, while one of the lightbars in the ceiling now hung down from one end, dark and dead. Dust hung in the air.

My barding had spilled out of the locker, looking a little worse for ware with a layer of dust settling in the creases, but the beret was still tucked away inside, a little fresher looking. I pulled on the barding, which felt a little looser than usual, and perched the beret on my head, tucking my horn in behind the protective plate. The familiar uniform helped to calm me, focus me, start to feel more normal.

I noticed that the door was slightly ajar, slid along its track by maybe a hoofswidth, and that the room beyond was also dim. I set my shoulder to the door and heaved with my reduced strength, the door squealing in protest as it slid along unwilling tracks.

The third room was in tatters. Only one light was still working, the rest dead and blackened, with the dim illumination showing the cracked floor and missing ceiling tiles. The monitor was shattered and parts of the wall panels we peeling away. What had happened here? Had we been attacked? The Zebras had megaspell enhanced balefire bombs, maybe the facility had been bombed?

No. Do not Speculate. It is not important. It is not the mission... What was the mission?

I turned to the screen, dark, dead and shattered.

“FT-909-SBS Razor Wind.” I stated. Only then did I realise that I had not had to give my response to the voice. It had not addressed me since I awoke.

The panel below the screen was peeling away, the panel that contained my equipment. I tried to get in with my hooves, then my teeth, but could not get a purchase. I frowned then reached out with telekinesis to envelope the drawer and pulled back, the drawer following with a pained squeal but only opening a third of the way. I was able to retrieve my knife and with a bit of finesse I also retrieved the pistol. An Ironshod Firearms IF11-1S Operator with a suppressor, customised sights and a light tongue trigger. There was a magazine of ammo in the pistol itself, but I could not reach any extra ammunition. Storing my weapons in my barding I stared back up at the smashed screen.

What now?

I do not recall how long I sat before the broken screen, but it must have taken a while for my mind to even consider proceeding without a mission. Again, something tickled the back of my mind, like the hint of a memory long since lost. We had not always slept between missions, I was convinced there was a time where we had time outside stasis, where we would talk with other operatives, and base staff, and the project leads.

Project? What project?

No. Do not remember. It is not important. It is not the mission. I need a mission.

Don’t I?

Do you?

I frowned, I had to do something. Sitting in front of a broken screen would achieve nothing, I may as well be back in stasis. In the field, I could choose my approach, assess the situation and form a response. I could set my own mission. Right?

The mission... I needed to get out of the base, assess the situation. Locate the other Special Operations Unit bases and rendezvous with the other operatives. That sounded correct. With that decision I felt my limbs unlock and pushed myself up to my hooves, able to move with purpose over to the elevator door. Another heavy door that fought moving, but this time it may have been a blessing as I glimpsed the open elevator shaft behind the door. Not great.

Looking up and down the shaft I could not see anything in the gloom so, lacking any other light source, I pulled the beret from my head, tucked it under a band on my shoulder and lit up my horn. Green was never the best magic colour for illumination, but it showed me enough to spot the elevator car below the door, and the cracks of light from other busted doors above. I had an idea, not a great one but a serviceable one. Struggling with the door I managed to open it enough to squeeze through and wrap my forelegs around the cables connected to the elevator. Looking up, I could see the counterweight in the gloom above me and the light coming from the door at the top of the shaft.

Stepping out I gripped the cables with my hind legs and gritted my teeth. ‘Luna protect and guide me’ I thought, ‘Celestia light my path’. I was not sure this was a good idea, but with little other choice, I just had to have faith.

No. Faith was not important. Only the mission is important.

That’s really annoying.

What? That thought didn’t seem right. The coda was important, I had been taught it to keep focus, to keep my mind on the mission. Hadn’t I? I struggled to remember, to reach into the void of my memories. It was the project leads, they had taught it to me, I thought, to help me when I was new to the unit, to stop me getting distracted.

I shook my head, getting distracted was a danger right now.

I looked up at the counterweight again, then down at the cables below me, gripping tight and focusing. A glow surrounded my horn as I summoned up my spell, encircling the cables below me with the magic and firing it off. The cables squealed as the blade of air snapped into them, biting a slice from the braided steel. The cables in my hooves quivered and there was an ominous rumble from above, accompanied by a sprinkling of dust. I cast the spell again, biting further into the cables, dropping more dust on my head, coughing as it tickled my throat. One last time I cast the spell, invisible blades cutting into the steel, reverberating up the cable.

The cable creaked and squealed, the counterweight rumbling until there was an almost comical ‘ping’ sound as the steel gave way. Holding on with all four limbs helped with not having them torn out of my sockets as the cable broke and the counterweight plunged down the side of the shaft. I was hauled up, eyes pressed closed and legs gripped tightly to the steel, willing the cable to stay straight and not whip out and smear me across the wall. There was a crash below as the elevator smashed into the bottom of the shaft, throwing up a wave of stale air and dust. I felt my mane whipping around in the blast as the counterweight encountered the remains of the elevator. With a resounding crunch the counterweight stopped its fall and I found myself bounced as the cable stopped its climb. Cracking open my eyes I found my head was just above the threshold of the door at the top of the shaft, the hanger access.

Loosening my grip on the cable I raised one aching leg up the cable, hooking a fetlock around again before repeating the process with the other foreleg. Locked on once again I heaved with my forelegs, sliding my hindlegs up towards my barrel before gripping back on. I inched my way up the cable, trying to get further up the door before attempting entry. I tried to swing closer to the door, to try and get a hoof in the crack, but even at the apex of my swing I could barely scratch the door. Letting the cable slow I focused on the door with my magic, gripping it with telekinesis, a pressure building in my skull. It seemed like the weakness I had been feeling since I awoke was limiting my magic reserves, and telekinesis was never my strong suit, especially compared to some of the other operatives.

That I could not remember well.

How long was I in stasis? Was my memory usually this hazy? I didn’t usually try to remember previous missions, or experiences, or ponies while I was on a mission. I just... Focused on the mission. What had happened to me?

No. It’s not important, it’s not the mission.

It is important

Yes, it is important. However I’m still hanging in the middle of an elevator shaft. I shook my head, trying to focus, grabbing the door with telekinesis again and straining my horn to shove the door aside. It moved in fits and starts as I grit my teeth and magically shoved the door along its track. Holding the door open I began to swing again, gaining momentum as I oscillated between the door and the rear of the shaft, judging when I had enough momentum. I let go, flinging myself across the gap and through the open door, scrabbling with my hooves to get purchase on the floor. I pulled my hindquarters through the door and released my magic, though the door did not slide back nearly as fast as I feared.

I lay on the floor for a few moments, panting slightly as I tried to control my breathing. Looking around from my prone position I saw that the hanger was in as poor shape as the rest of the facility. There were great patches of darkness where lights had failed and the floor undulated like a giant had gripped one corner and flicked it like a bedsheet. The air seemed stale, with a hint of earth. Pushing myself to my hooves I trotted trough the hanger, aiming for the large shutter doors that led outside. I passed a number of vertibucks, most of them were shattered husks but one looked mostly intact. Coming to the doors I could see where the earthy smell was coming from, on the far right side the shutters had burst open and a deluge of dirt had slid in, the shutters buckled in other spots all along the width of the hanger.

I was entombed in the base.

We must have been attacked, but how would they know where we were, Special Operations Unit bunkers were supposed to be secret. An infiltrator perhaps? But how? Recruitment was supposed to be stringent, and with the project’s ties to the Ministry of Morale... Wait. What project? And the Ministry? Questions were leading me back to the hole in my mind again. I didn’t even remember being recruited. I didn’t remember what I even did before I was an operative.

No. Plumbing the depths of my hazy memory was not the mission. The mission was to get out of the base. Remembering could come later.

Better.

Yes, better. Wait. What? Never mind, get out of the base.

Walking back across the hanger I glanced at the crushed vertibucks and noticed a glimpse of white poking out from the wreckage. Trotting over I stared at the object for a moment before realising what it was. A bone. Clear of flesh and sticking out through the smashed canopy of the vertibuck. Glancing in through the hole I could see more bones, including the array that made up a pegasus’ wing and a lone skull staring out at me.

Again I wondered how long I had been in stasis for a dead pegasus to have been reduced to lonely bones. Though not that lonely I realised as I looked about the hanger, noting where debris had fallen and spotting some bones peeking out from some of the piles. I looked back at the pegasus in the vertibuck, noticing the spread of the bones, seeing how the pegasus had died trying to stretch their way out of the canopy, but their rear legs had been pinned by the crushed roof of the vehicle. Their hoof was on the floor by the vertibuck and I felt a compulsion to reunite it with its owner, placing it gently in the cockpit.

I gave a sigh and looked around the hanger searching for some kind of alternate exit, I didn’t think I could get back down the elevator shaft. Looking along the back wall I saw a few more elevator doors, one of which was an empty frame as if to taunt me. Frowning at the piece of architecture I pressed on and found a door more like the ones between the line of rooms I passed through. Sliding this back I saw a short hallway that led to a flight of stairs descending back down into the base. With a resigned sigh I pulled my beret from the shoulder clasp and set it back atop my head, drawing some sense of stability from the familiar accessory, then walked down the stairs.

Flickering lights guided my steps as I traipsed down the stairs, spiralling into the depths of the base. After about seven flights there was a landing with an open doorway, though the stairs continued down into the darkness. Stepping through the doorway I praised Luna for giving me a break as, attached to the wall was a map. Given it was stuck to the wall with ductape, though one corner had come loose, it must have been an unofficial addition, especially as it was likely a security risk. In the end, frustration must have won out over security as some pony got lost for the umpteenth time.

I took some time to study the map, the base was a series of rings spreading out as it went deeper into the earth with the hanger layer being the smallest. There was a layer that was made up of five corridors radiating out like spokes of a wagon’s wheel connecting up to a circular corridor enclosing them. The map labelled these as ‘Operative Storage’. That felt... Strange, like I was being treated as a piece of equipment. I also never realised there was a connecting corridor linking the stasis rooms, and that the base only held five rooms for operatives, meaning that the full unit could not be deployed from this one base. I frowned, there was the hole in my memories again, I knew that there were nine operatives, including me, but I couldn’t name them. Turning my attention back to the map I saw there was an emergency exit route out through an administration area. I peeled remaining corners from the wall, noting some kind of circular logo in one corner, and resolved to take the map with me to guide my progress.

I was on the mechanic’s level, designed to maintain equipment and fabricate parts. As opposed to the maintenance level, which was the deepest part of the base and held generators, water pumps and air cycling systems. From where I was, the barracks was below me, then the administration & operations level. Below that was ‘Operative Storage’ and that sat on top of a single large room labelled ‘Megaspell Framework Chamber’. So, I had two levels to descend.

My initial plan was to run straight to the emergency exit, bypassing any distractions. Once I reached the Admin & Operations level I made a bee line for the labelled exit, trotting down the main corridor and around a few corners before I reached the door marked with ‘Exit’ in glowing green letters. The door was slightly ajar and there was a skeleton slumped beside the door, a horn on the skull showed it belonged to a unicorn. There was a small hole in one temple, and a larger one nearer the back of the skull, with a discarded pistol on the floor a testament to the skeleton’s last act. It was only then I noticed the faded rusty-brown stain on the wall, surrounding a dent.

Frowning at the remains I pushed open the door and suddenly found myself sympathising with the corpse. Behind the door was a pile of dirt, where the escape route had collapsed, sealing the base.

I sat back on my haunches, staring at the mound of earth that filled the shaft, feeling numb. Had I awakened only to die down here? I suddenly felt some kinship with the skeleton in the corridor. I couldn’t say how much time I spent just sitting and staring. My mind had ground to a halt, just trying to process the situation and I didn’t notice that I had actually moved back out into the corridor. When I noticed that it wasn’t much longer before I realised I was cradling the skeleton’s gun in my hooves.

Was this my plan? Join this unicorn in death? It would be quicker than waiting for the air to run out, or to starve to death. It was not death in battle, or a peaceful retirement but it would be a way out.

Is that the mission?

No. It was not the mission. The mission was to get out of here. I needed more information. What had happened here? How do I get out?

The Admin level might hold some answers on at least one of those questions, so an exploration of the offices was in order. Half the floor consisted of blocks of cubicles, all fairly identical with desks and chairs and terminals broken up only with scatterings of personality now faded and peeling. A poster here, a figurine there, one had a stapler attached to the desk with heavy duty bolts and the word ‘MINE’ engraved on the top. Most terminals were locked, but I didn’t think there would be any illuminating information in the analyst and administration cubicles. The other half of the floor was an open room dominated by a bank of shattered screens with a few banks of equally dead terminals. I backed out of the operations room and turned to face the bank of offices, my last chance for answers.

‘Base Commander Mint-Ripple Fudge’ was the nameplate on the first door, which itself was ajar. Peeking my head inside I could see a skeleton collapsed on the desk, a second sprawled on the floor, their skull sprawled a little further afield. The terminal had several holes in the back of it, a dead end in more ways than one.

The next office declared it’s occupant to be ‘Project Lead: Dr Erinnerung Muse’ which sparked some recognition, but nothing definite.

Is that even a pony name?

There was a hole in the door that looked almost like a beast had taken a bite from the side, with a skeleton strewn across the floor before the door. Said floor was stained rust brown with dried blood. Looking into the office I could see the remains of a jury-rigged contraption, a sawed-off shotgun in a clamp with a dented metal device in the doorjamb testament to how the trap had been triggered. There were no other bodies in the office, and the back wall was lit with the green glow from the desk terminal.

Tap. Tap. Tap. I may not have magic computer skills, I was not 905 after all, but I knew the basic workaround to get into a terminals BIOS root and try and pick out a password from junk. Two tries, find some little bugs that could reset the counter or clear incorrect answers, try again, back all the way out, go back in. Repeat. It only took the two cycles, thankfully. The password was ‘Medical’ for some reason.

Inside was a number of after action reports, some notes on theoretical magic, megaspell framework equations, a folder labelled ‘FT Review’, some messages and some audio recordings. I opened the folder out of idle curiosity, seeing a selection of files sorted by operative, selecting one of the ‘909’ files.

‘909 has stabilised well, which makes it a greater shame that they had to be included in the mass failure-reset. I think the adjustments made to the framework have been a success, even on a subject that was, if I am honest, hurriedly selected.’

That... Wasn’t particularly illuminating. And I suspected the rest of the reports would be similarly useful. I parsed down to the audio recordings and selected the first one in the list, pressing the enter key to play it.

“Enter,” came an accented voice, followed by the sound of a door opening and somepony trotting through, “yes?”

A second voice sounded, “I vanted to speak to you, to velcome you to zeh project. You haf come a strange route to zeh Ministry off Arcane Scienze.”

“’Zat’ is the worst Stalliongradi accent I have ever heard Mr?” the first speaker, a mare I thought, responded, her own voice holding some inflections of an accent,

A deep chuckle came from the other party, a stallion by the sound of it, “It comes and goes, I thought you might appreciate a welcome from someone as enamoured with their own culture as you were.” The voice now spoke in a much more normal Canterlot Standard accent, though some hints of rough Stalliongradi could still be found under the surface, “After all dorogoy, you keep your name, Erinnerung. Its Horstrian, correct?”

“Yes, it means ‘Rememberence’. And you are?”

“Mana Magusavich Spellwright. Welcome to Project Ramochnyy Soldat Remeberence.”

The mare’s voice was formal and steady, but carried an amused undertone, “Surely it is Project Rahmen Soldat? Or shall we compromise with Framework Trooper? And just call me Muse.”

“Maybe the Canterlot Standard will keep everyone happy. Have you met our OIA liasions yet? I think we’re crossing over three or four ministries with this little project.” The stallion, Mana, said with a couple of hoofsteps carrying him out to the door, “I’ll let you get settled in, then we can go over your ideas. The ones relevant to this project anyway. Auf wiedersehen Muse.”

“Do svidania Mana.” There was a sound of the office door swinging shut, “end recording and save, prepare to record next meeting.”

Some insight into the project leads at least. Interesting that both were members of cultures within equestria that held tight to some of their own culture rather then fully blend in. Still didn’t help me get out of here. My third roll of the die was the messages, and this time I picked the last one.

To: Erinnerung.Muse

From: Mana.Spellwright

Subject: Salted Earth

Muse, it’s all gone to Tartarus in an applecart.

There’s been some kind of strike on Roam, something separate from the back channels, a rogue operation maybe. Their response is already in the air, and it’s big. We’ve got maybe half an hour before the balefires burn out that list of targets. I had my selection of operatives working on launch sites, along with others, including the MOA, so there’ll be less bombs, but it’s not nearly enough.

We can’t risk the project falling into zebra hooves in a follow up push, and station 5 is right near the front. I’m enacting Salted Earth protocol on station 5, but I need you back here.

OIA has engaged some kind of hit list, we can’t be left hanging in the breeze, sil’ny stark right? Strong Together.

There’s a secret escape shaft. Get the key from my desk, taped to the inside of the bottom drawer then go to maintenance. Air pump 3 is a fake, behind the access panel is a way out. Meet me at station 1.

Sil'ny stark dologoy,

Be swift.

Mana Magusavich Spellwright

P. S. I know you hate that pipbuck, but it’ll be more useful on your leg than in your desk drawer.

This was what I was looking for. The mission was still on track, I was going to get out of here. Curiosity held me though, and I caught the handle of the desk drawer with my hoof, sliding it open. Sitting inside was a black cased leg mounted computer. A Pipbuck. One of stabletech’s miracles of technology. At some point, I was going to determine why I knew things, but not how I knew them.

It’s common knowledge. Though this one looks different.

I strapped the device to my leg and switched it on, watching the screen glow to life with a cool teal display. The same colour filled my vision as a compass resolved itself at the bottom of my peripheral vision. The screen displayed a little animated pony with the words ‘Pipbuck model Sigma – custom BIOS OIA-Framework 6.2’ which meant next to nothing to me. I was more interested in the text that scrolled by reading ‘welcome back Dr Muse’. Turned out there were files and recordings on the pipbuck too.

Pausing briefly back in the corridor I considered checking Project Lead Mana’s office, but as there was no sign of Project Lead Muse in her office, I reasoned she would have already claimed the key and made her escape, therefore there was little else that could be gleaned from the Stalliongradi pony’s office. Except maybe his regional pride. From the hallway I could see a large banner across the back wall of the office bearing the spread phoenix emblem of Stalliongrad.

Shaking my head, I returned to the stairwell and began to descend once again. Round and round I walked, the ‘tok, tok, tok, tok’ of my hooves on the steps the only sound. I started to drift away again, hypnotised by the unchanging environment and the steady beat of my hoof falls.

Where is everyone?

Dead I presumed. I had seen enough bodies around to get that. Some having died in the landslide of some sort that buried the base, some to unfortunate firearm related incidents.

That can’t be everyone, right.

I wasn’t sure, I had never seen that many other ponies around the base, just in the hanger.

Because you only went from stasis to hanger and back.

True. Or, not? I was sure I could remember being around the base, socialising with base personnel and other operatives. But, again, trying to latch on to those memories led to the hazy hole in my mind. For instance, I knew there was a commissary on the barracks level, while I could have got that from the map, I somehow just knew that the sparkle-cola machine in the far corner would stick almost every time, requiring a good hard buck if you wanted your bottle.

I broke from my reverie when I nearly walked into a wall. I had reached the bottom of the stairwell and, still running on some kind of auto-pilot, turned again to continue descending. I rubbed the back of my head in embarrassment, not that there was anyone around to see me. Shaking off my daze I turned back to the corridor into the maintenance area and pulled the map from where it was tucked under a strap on my barding. I didn't want to wander a maze of pipes and cables blindly, so spread the map out on the floor, looking for the air pumps. Down the corridor, left, left, right, end of the hall, middle hatch. Got it. Map rolled back up and tucked away I marched my way to my destination. All about me was the hum of generators, though I could see a few parts where the lights had died, leaving dark black expanses deeper into the machine maze. I guess I was fortunate that these generators and air pumps were hardy enough to continue working without maintenance.

‘Air Pump 3: Maintenance Access’ was stamped on the hatch, with a simple handle at the side of the panel. I gripped it with my teeth and gave an experimental tug, rattling the panel in its frame. For a moment I was worried that it had been locked again and I was truly trapped in this tomb. But I tried turning my head and the handle twisted, popping the panel open with a click and letting it swing back out into the corridor. Behind the hatch was a large square of corrugated material, a filter. I frowned, Project Lead Mana had said this was a fake pump, so why did it look very real?

There was a small gleam at my hooves and I looked down to see a small key on the floor. Switching my gaze up to the filter I saw a small circular keyhole on the edge of the frame. Picking up the key in my hoof I manoeuvred it into my mouth and placed it into the lock.

You do insist on doing things the earth pony way, don’t you?

Conserve magic, deceive opponents, subterfuge. Why was I questioning this?

Giving the key a slight twist, I found half the filter panel swinging back out towards me. It hadn’t been locked, just pulled closed. I looked back at the access panel, not noticing any way to open it from the inside. Did I want to come back here? Possibly. It was the closest thing I had to a home, and besides I might need to return if I found nothing at Station 1, wherever that was. I left the access panel open, and the filter. I did shove the key into a pocket though, who knew, maybe it would work in other Stations.

Behind the filter door was a ladder. A long ladder. I was at the very bottom of the base and would have to climb this ladder to the surface. I let out a sigh, it couldn’t be easy.

No. No wishes, no grumbling. It’s not important, it’s not the mission.

I started to climb.

Once again, I was lost in the repetition. One leg at a time, forelocks over a rung, hindhooves onto another. Pull, push, swap, pull, push, swap.

I remembered something from before the war. A film about a special ops soldier left in the jungles of the zebra lands, forced to eat meat to survive. There was a strange focus on snakes in particular. Following the trail of a mad centurion he had to climb up to a clifftop base and, for some reason, the filmmakers insisted on a scene of the soldier, an earth pony, climbing a long ladder while the theme music played.

While I couldn’t remember said theme song, I could certainly empathise with the soldier’s climb.

It felt like I had been climbing for hours. With the atrophy I had clearly experienced in stasis it was hard going, and by the time the top of the ladder was in sight my limbs were burning with the effort, my chest was heaving as I tried to keep my breathing regular and I had slowed to a crawl, forcing each limb up one at a time. This was not an escape route for general use, this was for determined and desperate ponies. I finally came to the top of the ladder, inching up the last few rungs and sliding myself across the flat ground at the top. Panting, sweating and burning I simply lay on the ground for a while, a fine example of a highly trained operative. Catching my breath, I pushed myself to my hooves, wobbling only slightly as I walked away from the ladder. If I was coming back, I could only guess at how going back down would be.

There was a short hallway that curved to the right before ending a series of stairs up to a door in the ceiling. There were a pair of buttons beside the stairs, green with an upwards arrow and red with a downwards arrow. I hooved the green button and stepped back as some system gave a hiss and the ground rumbled overhead. The doors in the ceiling opened upwards and a surge of air pressed down on me. The smell was odd, woody yet slightly burnt and with a slightly rotten component, but it was fresh, not recirculated.

I walked up the stairs into the open air.

Mission completed.

Now what?

Author's Note

Thanks to kkat for creating this crazy mashup and letting others play around in it.
Thanks to Somber too, I may refernce things from Project Horizons and Homelands here and there.