The Black Squirrel Brigade

Once you see it,

The mystery,

How can you not be drawn into it?

Does it not dwell on you,

Or can you not see it?

Chowing down on some warm vegetable soup was one of the perks of being stationed at an air base. The air crews, who were constantly going up for missions, needed something to keep their bellies warm once they returned, plus it was a big moral boost for them.

The Crystalville air base was among three other air bases that sat at the front lines of the Equestrian northern front. A new air base was constructed north of Hope Hollow since the Changelings got bogged down, while the Twilight Mountain Pass was constructed after the invasion of Olenia, while the Crystalville airbase was constructed right at the start of the war. The last air base is in Marechester, which has been around since airplanes were integrated into the military.

While all four are still in service, the Marechester air base was the smallest of all due to being downsized since the frontlines crept directly onto it. Because it was now an easy target for the Changelings, only the most hardy planes could take off and land at it, which are the old Hurricane models.

While Crystalville air base didn’t sit directly on the front lines, it did have to worry about Hedgewards and the fighting that was taking place there. Once the city was lost, it would put the Crystalville air base, as well as the Crystal Empire’s air base that just sat north of the border, both in danger of being hit by more than just air raids.

Because of the heightened risk the airbase was under, security was up tight. Patrols happened along the entire perimeter of the base by infantry, while at least two spitfires were constantly circling around. Don’t worry, there were flight plans so the two spitfires never interfered with the constant stream aircraft going and leaving from the base.

That’s one of the things that was enjoyable though, the constant buzz of the air base, Captain Sparkle loved it, it allowed him to work with ease, the perfect white noise.

The two SMILE agents seemed to be, ok? While in Chicoltgo, they were fine, but it was quiet when they were there. There hadn’t been constant fighting while they were in the city, at least nothing major they could hear. The two were from SMILE, not the military, so what they probably expected to encounter during their jobs didn’t prepare them for this, or maybe it did. The agents seemed to work slower when the sounds of the base increased, but any emotion or reaction of any form was entirely suppressed, which must have come from their SMILE training.

Captain Sparkle was currently going over the transcripts that were typed up from the interviews they conducted a few days ago and writing down notes for anything that stuck out. He had already gone through four entire transcripts and a dozen after action reports from the 22nd. He had a cup of hot chocolate and an empty bowl of vegetable soup. He was on his third cup of hot chocolate.

Agent Mythic was busy going through more after-action reports and going over all reports given by NCO’s and officers from the 22nd who had spoken or complained about the black stripes. Mythic was also in charge of filling Sparkle’s hot chocolate.

Agent Watermark was going through the past two weeks of various documents and schedules, from train departures and arrivals, intel on troop movements from the Changeling side and their own, to even all documented planes that have arrived and left.

Amongst all of them as well, whenever they needed a break from their current task, was the military censor's notes. Anything the censors had to black out or take notes on from messages soldiers wanted to send back home or elsewhere, were all laid out before them.

It was their second night of working on the air base since coming back from Chicoltgo. They were trying to figure out anything regarding the black stripes with what limited information there was. They were scraping through everything possible that might give them any information.

The biggest thing they learned was the black stripes had come from Whinnyapolis, or from that direction. It wasn’t concrete, but the first reports of their location came once they arrived in Crystalville, coming from the east, which is where Whinnyapolis was.

As Sparkle turned the page of one of the reports he was looking over, the buzz of Halifax's started up as they prepared for a bombing mission.

While Lancasters were a newer, and more abundant plane, only Halifax's had been assigned to the Crystalville air base due to its proximity to the front lines while Lancasters flew out of nearly every other air base, along with Halifax's.

Just as the final Halifax took off and a new one didn’t replace it, Mythic spoke up, letting his horn take a moment to relax from moving documents around, “So what planes were those just now?”

“Halifax's,” Sparkle answered. He didn’t even bother looking away from his documents.

“Aren’t those old?”

“They can still carry bombs,” Sparkle flipped through yet another page without looking up.

“I mean what year did they come out? They’ve always been the bomber shown on recruitment posters,” Mythic said.

Sparkle finally looked up from his documents and gave an eye to Mythic, “1007? 8? Why? Is this paperwork making you want to enlist?”

Mythic laughed, “No, I was just curious. The posters are just everywhere in Whinnyapolis, plus we’re ineligible to join once we join SMILE.”

“Really?”

“Mhmm, I don’t know the specific reason though. Since the war, a few members have tried joining and were denied,” Mythic looked at Watermark and grabbed his attention, “Do you know why?”

Watermark looked up and shook his head, “I don’t either.”

Mythic looked back at Sparkle and shrugged, “Probably just so we still have agents. The workload for the entire agency has increased tenfold twenty times over since Olenia was taken over.”

Sparkle nodded off while his eyes fell back towards his papers. He reached for his hot chocolate and noticed it was empty so he floated it upwards to grab Mythic’s attention just before he looked back down himself. “Another fill?”

Mythic took control of the mug with his telekinesis after placing down his documents again, “On me.”

As Mythic left the room, Sparkle focused on the documents again.

“We never got around to directly asking Cable what made him raise the alarm the night prior to the assault since he ended up getting killed, but it turned out the alarm was nothing. All we know from what rumors spread through the trench is that he thought he saw something, something about red eyes that made him think there were Changeling infiltrators, but nopony else saw anything once the flares and tracers went out.”

Sparkle was going over the transcript of a pony they interviewed. There was a lot that each pony said, so it was hard to remember everything that was said, but when Sparkle read this part of the transcript, something clicked in his mind.

It wasn’t rare for one of the three to rummage through the documents looking for something, so when Sparkle started doing it, Watermark paid him no mind.

After sorting through the organization they had set up for themselves, Sparkle finally found Gust's transcripts.

After flipping through the pages of it, he finally landed on one of the earlier pages and read through it.

“And all of a sudden Rain comes running back to tell us we’re under attack, just in time for the machine guns to go off. We all run into the trench with our guns and…”

Sparkle skimmed a few lines of the transcript until he got to the part he was looking for.

“It turned out somepony started screaming about the enemy after seeing something over the top of the trenches. It wasn’t confirmed by them or anypony, but they screamed about it anyways.”

After reading that part, Sparkle stuck a pencil in that part of the transcript and flipped to the back of it and skimmed over the lines until he reached the part he wanted.

“Moonshadow said the Changeling said something about surrendering and ghosts.”

Sparkle then flipped between the two spots in Gust’s transcripts and the other one that started this lead, reading each part a few times before he started to write down some notes. He wrote down the transcripts' identification numbers and what folders they were a part of, wrote down very short versions of what was said between the three parts and then put the documents away.

Keeping the workspace clean was vital to getting any work done, so once Gust’s documents were put away, he stood up and went for the cabinet that his office had.

The three were using his office in one of the buildings on the base to do their work. The whole building was under its own security given the amount of intel and information that was within it. Neither Sparkle or the agents could get into some rooms.

The cabinet that Sparkle went for had a few boxes inside it, which in turn each had more documents and various other items. One of the things inside one was a journal that had been recovered from some Changelings. When Sparkle found it, he brought it back to his desk.

Looking at the notes he had taken, Sparkle began flipping through the journal.

The entire journal was written in Changeling though, but ever since the war slowed to its crawl, Sparkle had been learning Changeling when possible. It became a requirement for officers to learn after the Changelings invaded in 1002, but it hasn’t been enforced since 1007.

Watermark also knew Changeling, but Mythic didn’t. What Mythic did know was Herzlandish.

Herzlandish and Changeling were very similar languages to one another, at least to an extent. If someone knew Herzlandish or Changeling, they could easily learn the other language, but if you only knew one, you were limited to basic conversations with the other language. The moment it became complex is when the understanding of the other fell apart. This is why the Changelings and the Griffonia Empire had military cooperation with one another.

“Yadadadada…” Sparkle began muttering to himself as he went through the journal.

He had gone through the journal the day prior after the base received it from the 22nd. The commanders of the 22nd already looked through the contents and didn’t find anything of value in it so it was sent to the air base. It was going to then wait for further transportation to Whinnyapolis for either storage or destruction, or that was until Sparkle requested it.

Most of the contents of it went over the journey whatever bug had it as they invaded Equestria. Since the journal came from Chicoltgo, either it was lost, or the owner was killed.

“Ich schreibe das so schnell, wie meine Flügel summen können, aber gerade kam ein Trupp angerannt und schrie etwas über den unsichtbaren Tod. Anscheinend trugen sie die roten Augen eines Drachen.”

Sparkle finally found the passage that he was looking for. It was at the very back. A quick look at the date, which he must have forgotten, told him even more. The date was the night before the 22nd attacked Chicoltgo.

Upon seeing that, Sparkle looked back at the last bit of text and began reading over it again.

“... this as quickly as my … can buzz, but a … just … by screaming something about … Apparently they wore the red eyes …”

Sparkle translated the passage into Equestrian in his head, but he wasn’t able to understand most of it, but there was only one thing that did stick out, the red eyes.

“Captain, your chocolate,” Mythic said after coming back into the room. He floated the mug by, which now had steam rising from it. It was fresh hot chocolate!

“Cloudy, can you read this passage for me? The last part?” Sparkle asked Watermark, Cloudy was their real name.

Sparkle had floated the journal over to Mythic and held it in front of him. Watermark looked up from their work to find the journal near their face. It wasn’t like he could refuse though, since he was the only one who was fluent in Changeling.

“Writing this as quickly as my wings can buzz, but a squad just came running by screaming something about invisible death. Apparently, they wore the red eyes of a dragon,” Watermark then looked past the journal at Sparkle, “That one?”

“Mhmm!” Sparkle mumbled out as he began downing the fresh mug of hot chocolate Mythic had floated over.

“Is there something important about it?” Watermark asked.

Sparkle put the mug down, “I think so,” Without answering anything else, Sparkle brought the journal back over to himself so he could look at the writing again. After looking at it, he began writing down on his notes the proper translation that Watermark said.

After Sparkle began looking between his notes and the journal a few times, Watermark went back to his work as he realized Sparkle had gotten focused again. Sparkle would speak up once he gathered his thoughts.

“Do we know where exactly this journal came from?” Sparkle asked after holding the journal up for the other two to see.

Of course it was a long shot to ask, it was a random journal.

“Which bin did it come from?” Mythic asked.

“1013-2 Bin three,” Sparkle answered.

“That’s the one with some other books?”

“Mhmm,” Sparkle answered with the mug in his mouth again.

“You would have to go ask the quartermaster’s lieutenant. He’s the one who I got that stuff from,” Mythic answered.

“Where’s he at?”

“Storage depot three I believe. Or two. They’re right next to each other.”

Once Sparkle had that information, he downed the rest of the hot chocolate and placed the mug back on the table. He gathered the journal and his notes up again, “You two can finish up your current documents and you’ll be good for the rest of the night. I’ll come back to organize my stuff later.”

“Taking a swing for that lieutenant?” Mythic asked.

“Yep, I want to catch them, or whoever is running the depot tonight, for what information I can. General August will be here tomorrow and I’ll be giving her the report of everything we have so far, so I want to make sure we have something solid,” Sparkle said.

“When will we catch you then?”

“August is arriving after noon and will be staying for about eight hours. I'll be doing the report about an hour before she leaves, so show up here at 0700.”

“So, we have another full day to basically work?”

“We can take a small break around the time she arrives. I think the mess is serving filling food because of the visit.”

Mythic broke a smile at that information. He and Watermark had been eating military food since they arrived at the air base when meeting up with Sparkle, but this would be the first time since arriving that they were going to have a proper meal.

“So, we're just finishing our current notes?” Watermark asked.

“Just your current page. I don’t expect you to still be here when I return. We have all day tomorrow to basically finish.” Sparkle answered.

With that, Sparkle took the journal and notebook and left the office for the other two and left for the supply depots.

Outside, the sun was just about to start setting, but the air base seemed unaffected by that. A bunch of Halifax's were taxing on the runway to gather up for takeoff. They were both waiting for the rest of the bombers to join them, but as well as waiting for the last bombers from a previous mission to return. They just waited for two more to land.

Sparkle could watch just fine from where he was, he was away from the main ongoings of taxing planes. He was on the side of the airport that housed many of the fighters, which were all grounded at this point due to the night. Only a few heavy fighters were spooling up to join with the new group of Halifax's.

The unlucky thing was Sparkle had to walk across the base to the depot now. The commander's car he had while in Chicoltgo belong to the 22nd so they needed it back once he and the agents finished with their work. Thankfully though, Sparkle was able to hitch a ride with a truck that was carrying some fighter pilots down to the main mess hall.

The pilots ignored Sparkle’s presence, but only because so many ponies got lifts around the base that it was like riding a bus in any city.

Once they arrived at the mess hall, all of the pilots hopped off and the truck driver asked Sparkle where he was going. Learning it was the supply depot, the driver agreed to take Sparkle there. There were of course a few pickups along the way there, most who hopped off before they arrived at the depot.

When Sparkle arrived, he gave a small thanks to the driver before he started searching for the correct building that Mythic said the lieutenant was in. Depot two and three were the ones he was looking for. They were quick to find given they were the first three in the rows, so he started searching for any pony working at them.

Between all the storage depots, there were ponies going about their jobs.They were sorting things or moving things around for whatever order or request that had come in. Sparkle spoke to a few ponies, who all ended up pointing him to depot three, which is where their lieutenant was.

After another short look, Sparkle was able to find the lieutenant by a pony who showed him where he was.

There was a small office room in the third depot where he sat. There were no guards at it so Sparkle was able to walk right in, not that anypony would prevent a captain from entering once they were verified.

Upon entering, the lieutenant that was sitting in the office stood up and saluted Sparkle upon seeing his rank. After telling the lieutenant to be at ease, they sat back down.

The lieutenant was an earth pony with goldish fur, their cutie mark was hidden by their uniform. They were writing on a spreadsheet for inventory purposes.

“Captain sir, what can I do for you today?” The lieutenant asked.

Sparkle took out the journal he had brought and put it on the table before taking out his notes so he could look at them.

“This journal came from your storage. A SMILE agent came in and requested specifically for the journals that came from the 22nd’s assault on Chicoltgo. I don’t know what information you need, but it came from 1013-2 Bin three. That’s what box it was in when we received it.”

The Lt took a quick look at the journal before moving it across his desk back towards Sparkle, “The SMILE agent? That Mythic guy?”

“Yes, with black fur.”

The Lt. gave a nod before he started rummaging through the piles of paperwork he had on his desk. After going through the disorganized mess, at least what seemed disorganized to Sparkle, the Lt. pulled out some papers. He looked over the papers really quickly before turning them around and handing them over to Sparkle.

“That’s the request form that was filled out by them. There’s some weird stuff with it since they’re not military but had the authorization, so the entire ‘RELEASE’ section you can ignore,” The Lt. then sat there as he waited for Sparkle to look at it, but after a moment, the Lt spoke up, “Is that what you need? You didn’t actually ask for anything.”

Sparkle took a look over the papers, scanning over them for a moment. The ‘RELEASE’ section of the paperwork had a bunch of signatures and stamps that in all honesty, looked out of place, so he ignored it as suggested.

“Hmm, this is just the paperwork for the request,” Sparkle looked up at the Lt. “Do you have any of the paperwork or documents that told you where the items came from?”

The Lt. took a look at the request forums again before putting it in a bin that said ‘unorganized’, “Oh, that information,” The stallion took a moment to think it over as he stared at all the papers around his desk. He started to rummage through the paper now.

Sparkle stood there with his notes while the Lt. looked through the papers. The sounds of the Halifax's from earlier started to roar loudly as they began taking off, a noise neither of the officers were bothered by.

After opening a drawer, the Lt. rummaged through it before finally taking a sheet of paper out and placing it on the desk to give it a look over.

The Lt. mumbled to themselves as they began skimming over the document until finally the Lt. tapped the paper with a hoof and turned it around for Sparkle, “22nd Everfree intelligence supplies, arrived four days ago for transportation to Whinnyapolis by train,” The Lt. then moved their hoof down the page and tapped at another spot, “It says for 1013-2 Bin three, that was intel gathered by the 22nd’s 6th company,” The Lt. then lifted his hoof and pushed the document over to Sparkle, “That’s all it says.”

Sparkle picked up the document with his magic and took a look at it. He glanced over the page from top to bottom for anything else before looking at the sections the Lt. tapped at.

After taking a glance over the document, Sparkle floated the document back over to the Lt. before taking his own notes and flipping through them. After a few moments, he came across the specific page he was looking for a read over it to himself.

“The 6th company helped sweep the eastern side of the city, clearing buildings and looting bodies.”

Sparkle closed his notes with a sigh and tucked his notes away.

The journal that made him come over here had no connection to Gust’s POW, or any changelings from that sector.

“Is everything alright sir?” The Lt. asked after taking the document back and sorting it back where it belonged.

Sparkle had grabbed the journal with his magic and brought it back over to himself before answering, “Yeah, just, it wasn’t anything useful is all.”

The Lt. gave a nod, “Well is there anything else I can help you with?”

Sparkle shook his head, “No, not right now. I’ll come back around tomorrow most likely for more details on things.”

“Ah, well my captain will be here tomorrow, for these depots. I’ll be gone towards the front later tonight.”

Sparkle gave another nod to his answer, “Well, regardless, thank you for the help lieutenant.”

“Sir,” The Lt. answered before he picked up the previous spreadsheet he was writing in.

After that, Sparkle left the office and the supply depots. As he began walking back to the building his own office was in, the sun had fully set.

The insides of hangers had their lights on, which beamed away their location, so their doors were being shut or the lights were turned off. Ponies carrying red lights popped up everywhere as they continued to go about their tasks.

Spotlight crews got into positions around the base, prepared to light up the sky in the event of any aerial attack by the Changelings.

The biggest change about it now being night, was you had to watch where you walked due to the vehicles driving around with dimmed headlights. Operation of the airbase didn’t stop at night, but it did become slower.

To help with any bombing missions the Changelings might have for the airbase, a bunch of lights making the outline of an airfield were set up a mile away from the actual one, which were run the entire night to make it a target instead of the real airfield.

At some point while returning to the building, one of the air base's firefighting trucks drove by, which was followed by a second behind it.

That wasn’t a good sign to see.

It didn’t prompt much action from Sparkle other than walking faster to maybe see where they were going.

As he got closer to his building, the scurry of ponies began catching Sparkle’s attention. He noticed that some were running towards the building’s location before a few more fire trucks whizzed by.

Well that really wasn’t good. The only important thing in this direction that would warrant that many fire trucks from the base was the intelligence building his office was in, that or a plane crashed down this way.

As he got closer, passing buildings and trotting now, he saw the glow of smoke rising above the wooded section that he had to go around. Just behind the woods was his building.

By the time Sparkle rounded the woods, three more fire trucks had arrived at the building. Half the building was on fire, which is why nearly half the base's fire trucks responded to it. Some were already attempting to put the fire out. The glow of orange lit up the area surrounding the building, which gave light to everypony to see.

There was no reason to approach any closer at this point though. Some of the entrances to the building already had water hoses dragged through them, which meant there were ponies inside fighting it from within.

Sparkle could only watch now, cursing under his mouth as other soldiers gathered around to watch.

Mythic suddenly bumped into Sparkle from behind. “Captain! Watermark went to the depot for you!”

That’s all Mythic said to Sparkle before Sparkle spoke up himself, “What happened to the building?”

That was the question many ponies were asking at this point, unknown to them how the intelligence building could catch fire to this extent.

“It started in your office!” Mythic answered with a heavy breath. He had obviously come running form somewhere before he purposely bumped into Sparkle.

Sparkle looked confused at that answer, “Wait, what? How? When?”

“We were both leaving and were outside,” Mythic pointed in a direction towards the building, “When some ponies inside started screaming about a fire happening. A bunch started running out of the building with a bunch of boxes, documents, all that stuff, but then it accelerated to an ungodly speed!”

Sparkle looked at the building again before he looked between Mythic, the fire fighters and the other ponies all outside, “Did you get anything from the office?”

Mythic shook his head, “No, we had already finished up organizing everything so we left the rest of it there for you.”

As Sparkle began looking between everything more and more, all he realized he could do was just watch.

There were a few ponies still running in and out of the portion of building that wasn’t on fire or smoking like crazy, while some of the fire fighters were bringing loads of papers and documents out of other entrances that weren’t being used for the hoses. There were already high-ranking officers and military police watching the pile that was being formed and organized by some unfortunate low ranking officers.

“Was it a Changeling?” Sparkle had to ask.

“That should be impossible?” Mythic asked back.

After they were approached by some other soldiers, Sparkle and Mythic got into a conversation as they tried to figure out what happened.

In the meantime, the fire on the building was slowly being put out by the fire fighters who had prevented it from spreading any further.

Eventually Mythic said he was going to go search for Watermark at the supply depot after things had calmed down, while Sparkle was now left to the smoldering view.

As the beginning of the night only began, some nearby pony who had been watching the building, screaming out, “CHANGELING INFILTRATORS!”

Upon screaming that out, they were firing their pistol into the wooded area next to the building.

A bunch of ponies jumped to action, while some of the guards who were watching the documents took their rifles and began firing into the woods.

In the short midst of the gun fire, Sparkle looked into the woods where they were firing and saw the movement of the Changeling.

It was a single Changeling that moved quickly before it began taking off into the air, but there was one thing Sparkle saw that made him question if it really was a Changeling. Red beady eyes that looked in his direction momentarily before disappearing under the chaos.

Just as fast as the gunfire began, it stopped.

Only the guards had rifles, while it was other officers that carried pistols that were firing into the woods. The direction they were all firing in had nothing behind it besides any unlucky patrol that might have been in the back during the ordeal, thankfully though, there wasn’t.

Moments after the gunfire stopped, the sirens began.

Spotlights turned on and began shining up into the air while lights from patrols turned on as they began searching around for the Changelings. The base was now going into lockdown and a bunch of the spitfires that were grounded, but at the ready for defending the base, began their take off procedures.

At this point, all the ponies around the building began to scatter. The ones that were just watching the fire fled away for their bunkers and rally points, while the officers from the intelligence building began taking cover inside the smoking building, ready to defend it with their lives, well, the guards were. The officers only had pistols.

Given that Sparkle’s office was the one that caught fire, he just went for one of the fire trucks and hid behind it with some of the fire fighters as they tried to figure out if an attack was about to happen from the woods.

Once armed infantry arrived, they were able to get to better cover while they figured out what to do. Sparkle was busy making his way to the supply depot again, where he would hopefully find the agents. He was originally going to stay at the intelligence building while he waited for Mythic, and hopefully Watermark, but since the base was going under lockdown now, he wasn’t sure what would happen.

Through all of it though, there was only one thing that was left in Sparkles mind, the red eyes he thought he saw in the woods.

It made him open the Changeling journal he still carried, as well as his notes, both of which he went over so many times as he slowly tried to make a connection.

Red eyes and ghosts.

Whatever connection he could make, was only solidified later when no Changeling presence was found by base security.