BEDLAM Minus One

Seemingly, the Storm King hadn't taken our repeated and active sabotage lying down. No, he'd taken it and left it on his kitchen counter before promptly forgetting about it.

I pinched the bridge of my nose and grumbled. "Explain it to me again, Verko," I asked, leaning on my knees in my chair across his desk. I idly scanned the room as Verko shrugged, adjusting his tie and twitching his ratty whiskers.

"His guy who came to demand more of those flyin' machines said the big lug thinks they're just breaking down," he said, drumming his claws on the arm of his seat. "Like I told you a little bit back, Ignatius don't put much thought into these things. If it works it works, and if it don't, just trash it." Ignoring the anxious tone he'd had since I walked in, I grunted and all but threw myself into the back of my chair, throwing my hands up in exasperation.

"We've spent the last two months hunting down and nailing his automated supply lines and you're telling me he isn't even considering sabotage?" I folded my arms and one leg over the other and huffed. "How in God's name did this guy conquer half of the Southlands?" Verko sharply cleared his throat.

"Air superiority mainly," he replied, pulling one of the lower drawers on his desk open. "Plus, the rest of the world ain't all too stable." As he dug through his drawer, I carefully pulled a small gemstone machine from my pocket and tucked it in the leaves of the small plant on his desk. It was effectively just a small camera that would send whatever it saw and heard to another device I had hidden in a little crevice a quarter mile away from Klugetown. The second device could actually hold whatever was sent like a computer file that could be viewed later. We'd whipped up the design in between sabotaging the Storm King's operation, and as Verko was pretty involved in said operation, we felt we could get a lot of mileage out of keeping direct tabs on him for once.

His newly developed antsy demeanor notwithstanding.

After another few moments, he quietly exclaimed and pulled out a rough, leather-bound stack of papers and held it out to me. "Here, give this a read sometime," he demanded. Taking it from him, I checked the first page but he spoke up again before I could really read it. "Hey, speaking of conquering and logistics and supply chains, keeping up my supply of those swell potions is nice and all, but you ever gonna share where you and that little pony friend of yours are holed up?" Keeping my attention on the page, I raised an eyebrow. To him, it would seem like I was intrigued by what I'd read. In truth, I was intrigued by the sudden relief in his voice that came with his question.

"No," I curtly replied, leafing through a few more pages before standing and making for the door. "Good talk as always, Verko. See you soon." He muttered something in response, but I paid him no mind.

The armored dark purple hornless unicorn carefully paced Verko's office, her eyes slowly scanning the walls and shelves around her as she moved. "Were you able to discern his hideout's location?" She suddenly demanded. Verko made a noise somewhere between a squeak and a chitter.

"Nah, the guy's being real stingy with it," he choked. A palpable silence followed his response, during which the unicorn paused and slowly fixed him with an even stare. Verko twitched and adjusted his tie. The unicorn stared at him for a few moments more before her eyes suddenly snapped down at his desk. She tilted her head slightly and a small smile broke across her features.

"Well, I suppose that's to be expected, even for someone he used to think of as an ally," she said coolly as she approached the desk, her eyes fixed on it. Verko choked and stammered.

"'Used to'? What, you think he's on to me?" He gasped. The unicorn arrived at the desk and carefully knocked aside the plant I'd hidden my camera in before rolling the device onto the center of Verko's desk. I smirked at the recording as she studied the camera closely while Verko tensed up.

"It would seem so," the unicorn declared before bringing her hoof down and the recording cut off.

Once we were both comfortable on the breakroom sofa, Jury grumbled at the video of Iggy's hornless unicorn while I continued to read the book Verko'd given me. One of the little drones staffing the room hovered over and carefully lowered a cup of hot tea to her that she hastily snatched with her magic.

"That sneaky, no good- OUH!" She nickered angrily and curled up on my leg. She looked up and tilted her head to get a better look at my book. "What's that?"

"Rough census Verko gathered, I guess," I replied, turning back a few pages to double-check a few comments. "The opening pages kind of suggest he and his criminal buddies wanted a solid idea of supply and demand for weapons, narcotics, all that good stuff and he started to figure out which countries were worse off as a result of their findings." I flipped forward again and furrowed my brow.

"So he compiled what they found in this. Not sure how true most of it is, though," I said with a quiet hum. Certainly, if what was in this book was true, it not only explained how the Storm King had managed to trash most of the world already, but it also painted a very unhappy picture for most creatures outside of Equestria.

Despite everything, when I read about the rampant slavery, poverty, hunger, and extreme prejudices that were handed out like candy at a carnival in some of the areas even just near Klugetown, I found myself feeling blessed to have landed in Equestria, despite how awful things had turned out.

And that feeling rapidly evolved into a deep-seated, thoroughly veiled, multifaceted anger that only grew and matured the more I read and the more my own situation seemed to shrink in comparison.

"Okie-dokey," Jury suddenly replied, snapping me out of my mental spiral. "Uhm, so what're we gonna do about the Storm King?" I closed the book and hummed in thought.

"Well," I began, leaning my head back and considering the paneled ceiling and wallpaper we'd installed. As she'd handled most of the interior design, said paper was covered in little silver hearts with gears in them. "His little attack unicorn doesn't know where we are, so we probably still have stealth on our side."

"But she's still hunting for us," Jury retorted, standing up to look me in the eyes. "That's going to make collecting stuff kinda hard, won't it?" I nodded in response.

"Right. And without knowing where she is, we're going to be constantly looking over our shoulders," I groused, folding my arms. "And Verko's compromised, but that's hardly a shock." One of the drones hovered a cup of coffee to me but I waved it away. As we sat in thought, the door slid open and an animunculus foreman marched in, delivering a written report to Jury. She studied it for a moment before handing it to me.

Hey, hey! They found a new and big vein of silver in the lowest level of the facility. And us without a fence to sell it to. Hm.

"Maybe we should go back to Equestria?" Jury peeped, drawing a narrow-eyed frown from me.

"No, not yet," I replied, sharply. With a grunt, I snapped to my feet and adjusted my belt. "I think we're going to have to make a stand." Jury squeaked in response as I strode for the door, pushing passed the golem that was waiting for further orders. I heard Jury's hooves hit the ground as she trotted after me but then she paused.

"Aw, shoot! Right, just come with us!" I heard her say over the fans ventilating the whole complex. A few seconds later, I was joined as I marched down the well-lit, smooth-tiled hall by a set of hooves and the mechanical feet of our golem. "You- You mean like fight the Storm King?"

"I think so. We've got a surplus of armed animunculi, don't we?" I asked as we arrived at an intersection. I continued leading us to our command center as Jury stammered and squeaked.

"Y-yeah, but," she murmured. Waiting for her to complete her response, we stepped onto the walkway over the cavern where most of our quarrying was done. Arriving at the lift, I sent the foreman back to the lower levels and then turned to Jury once we were alone.

"But?" I demanded over the echoing din of the drills and picks hammering far below us. She looked through the guard rail at the cavern below as well as the teams of golems scaling the rockface.

"They've got all those airships, you know?" She finally replied. I hummed and gripped the rail, considering the space below us as well.

"Very true," I said before smirking and raising an eyebrow at her. "We'll just have to steal a few, won't we?"

The moonlight bathed the wasteland in a cool azure hue which contrasted sharply with the yellow search lights atop the numerous watchtowers surrounding our target.

We'd spied this particular site out during one of our sabotage runs. One of the Storm King's slave camps and a deep quarry filled with prisoners and guarded by the tall, bulky yeti-like 'Storm Beasts' that filled his army's ranks. It was a simple camp, mainly just a deep pit with barracks to one side and surrounded by fencing with towers lining the perimeter.
Raw rock and what-have-you was hauled up and loaded onto airships before being flown away. Only one ship stopped at a time like the one actively landing as we prepared to attack, but it was still a springboard for further antagonization.

And so, once Jury finished ensuring our small army of golems was ready to march, and hopped back in the "Bedlam Buggy" as she insisted on calling our tank-like machine, I stood up in my seat and raised my gloved hand.

Inputting a sequence, I then yelled. "ALL UNITS! CHARGE!" Sweeping my arm forward, the army rumbled to life and hurled across the valley. Jury switched seats with me and we both flipped on our shields before she set the buggy rolling after the horde from a safe distance back. Drawing my blasting talisman with one hand, I adjusted my glasses with the other to zoom in and focus on the scene ahead.

The ship had landed and the crew had disembarked to begin loading. Once the alarm was raised it would take them time to get the vessel airborne again, and that was time we could-

"What's that?" Jury suddenly asked. Blinking, I zoomed out and recoiled as the searchlights whipped around and lit up the horde ahead of us. The light took on a blue hue like the moon's and appeared to be crackling.

"Hit the brakes," I huffed. As Jury complied we sat and watched the golems that had been illuminated begin to spark and crackle, before finally, a deafening boom split the air. Jury squeaked and covered her mouth with her hooves as the fore-most line was blasted apart by lightning shot from the towers. The lightning continued to shower the field as the alarm echoed across the valley, and as a result, the rest of our small attack force was quickly swallowed up by the lightning as well.

"Fascinating," I hummed before reclining with a sigh. "And also why we let the golems go first." Jury whimpered and I reached over to jostle her gently.

"Get us home. The standard designs clearly aren't good enough for this clown," I grumbled. By the time the lights had rolled over the rest of the field, searching for any stragglers, we were already gone and my mind was already at work.

If nothing else, dealing with Iggy was certainly going to keep my mind busy for a little while.