December 24th, 2022

Location: Lhasa, Tibet

Sergeant Greg "Blackout" Baker

Gear: Heckler & Koch G28 Rifle with suppressor and night vision attachments, Beretta M9, Combat Knife, Night Vision Goggles, Guile Suit, Communication Headset, 15 magazines of 20 rounds of ammo for the G28, 15 magazines of 15 rounds for the M9, Binoculars, Satellite Phone, Lock picks, Field Medical Kit, 40 Ft of climbing rope, 2 climbing axes, climbing gear, solar charger, water purifying chemicals, 5 days of standard rations, 7 days of emergency rations, lighter, blanket, 3 days worth of fresh water (if rationing).

Mission: Eliminate General Zhao Wei on his task to suppress the new Tibetan Freedom Movement.

Local Time 1800

"Why does this god forsaken general have to be so damn paranoid." I mutter. I have been on this guy for 8 days now, and it is starting to piss me off. An simple task command said, be done in 3 days they said, be back in the states in time for Christmas they said. Bull shit. This guy is so god damn paranoid it makes conspiracy theorists look sane. Never steps out side of his residence for more than an hour, and when he does he goes right into an armored vehicle while surrounded by body guards. And just when i think i have him, I notice something off about how he presents himself, he seems scared, and it looks like the bodyguards are forcing him to be outside. A body double. I have to hold my shot those extra few moments to make sure I'm not shooting his double. When I ask command about a body double, they reply with no Intel about him. Must be a new security measure he put in place.

"At this point, I'm fucking willing to take any opening i can to kill this bastard and go home." I mutter as i look down my scope. As paranoid as this guy is, from what command has told me, his wife is coming to pay him a visit within the hour, and when ever she is around, he always personally opens the car door for his wife to take her inside while his body guards get her luggage. This will probably be the best chance i get to kill him and go home. That is if command hasn't sent me bad intel. I lay in wait in my sniper perch on the mountain side, making sure that I will have a clean shot when it is time kill him. The only good thing about having to wait this long to kill General Zhao is that i have better knowledge of the paths the patrols take than command did. While my extraction won't be without exactly clean, it is as good as it is going to get.

Local Time 2359

I swear to god, when i get back I'm going to beat the shit out of who ever keeps giving me this intel. Six fucking hours and no sight of his wife, or her escort. She will be there within the hour my ass. What kind of sadistic fuck gets off of getting my hopes up only to see them slowly chipped away minute by minute. I'm to start by punching him in the gut, then strangling them like Bart Fucking Simpson. I think to myself as I watch my watch hit midnight.

"Merry fucking Christmas. Give me the god damn chance to shoot this prick and go home." I mutter as i take a bite out of a chocolate bar. Then, i notice a pair of headlights approaching the Generals residence.

"About fucking time." I say as I get into position.

Looking down my scope, i watch as the car approaches and goes though the security gate the the generals residence. 5 minutes later the car is clear to go though. I watch as the car pulls up to the front of the house, while i take aim at the front door. I wait. And wait. And wait. Finally the door opens up, I watch as the Generals body guards exit the building first flanking both sides of the door, as i wait for the grand prick himself to appear. Finally, dressed in his uniform he walks out to the waiting car I wait to check his posture, appearance, and how he is carrying himself before i take the shot. I have to make sure this is the general an not that fucking body double. Just when I am sure that it is him, I notice him look back into the house. The general is still inside. As i look into the house though the open doorway I see him standing at the bottom of the staircase in a robe. Parted just so as to expose his chest.

"Fucking prick." I say as I aim and take 2 shots at him. A moment passes. Then another. And another. Finally both shots hit him center mass. He falls to the ground face first as his body guards rush to his side. I'm tempted to take another shot aimed at his head for good measure, But i decide against it. No need to waste any more time on this prick.

I grab my gear and slowly crawl backwards making sure to grab the bullet casing to make my escape. I don't think they will be able to easily find me considering it is the middle of the night, and even if they do find t where i was shooting from, it will take them at least half an hour to get to this spot. Making my way south towards Bhutan, i am careful to avoid the roads and away from open sky.

"Command, come in, this is Blackout do you read? Over." I say into my head set.

"This is Command. We read you Blackout, what is your situation? Over."

"Target neutralized, heading towards extraction point now."

"Confirm, team will be at the extraction point in 4 hours."

"Roger that Command, Blackout out." I say into my headset as i make my way towards the extraction point.

Local Time: 0330

Almost there, just a little bit farther. I think to myself as i rappel down the side of a mountain towards a small dirt path that will take me to the extraction site. Soon, i will be on a heading home back to the states. I've had enough of Tibet to last a lifetime. I hit the rock face below me as i detach from the rope i had prepared earlier. Walking down the dirt path for a good 20 minutes i notice a blue light coming out of a cave on the side of the path. Odd... what could be glowing blue?

"Command, this is Blackout, do you copy?"

"We read you Blackout. What is the situation?"

"There is a weird blue light coming out of a cave on the local footpath. No idea what it is as I'm still a good 100 feet out. Should I investigate?"

"One moment please." Command replies as i wait squat on the side of the path. "The commander want's you to check it out, while maintaining radio contact."

"Copy that, moving towards the cave now." I say as I carefully move towards the cave. As I reach the entrance of the cave, i peer inside to check for hostiles. But it is empty, save for the source of the blue light coming from a pit about 60 ft inside.

"Command, I see a large pit inside the cave, with the light coming from something in the pit. Moving in now." I relay back to command as I make my way towards the pit. Testing the ground as i go towards the edge. Once at the edge of the pit, i peer down into it, inside the pit is what looks like water, but is glowing a bright electric blue. I relay this information back to command.

"Interesting. The commander wants you to get a sample of the liquid."

"Fine, but if i grow a third arm because of this I'm going to beat you with it." I reply back. Kneeling down, i grab an empty canteen of the stuff, and fill it with the strange liquid. As i go to stand up, the rock below me breaks off, and i fall into the liquid face first. Try to stand up, but i find no solid ground. I try to swim towards the surface, but no matter how hard I swim up, i seem to move farther away. It is like swimming in quick sand, in that the harder i struggle, the deeper i go. Eventually, my lungs start to burn as the oxygen in my lungs run out. I exhale the breath i was holding, and get a mouth full of the liquid. I can feel my self on the precipice of passing out, when i see a light. Out of desperation, I try swimming towards it. As my vision starts to fade, I reach the surface. I hold onto the side of the pit as i cough up what liquid was in my mouth and i gasp for air as i pull myself out. I roll onto my side as i take a few minutes to calm myself down as I regain my bearings.

Pulling myself a good 4 feet way from the pool of death, I sit up facing it. Immediately i notice it is no longer glowing, and now looks like normal water. Peering over the edge, it looks like it is no more than a 3 feet deep at first glance. I swear, if anyone finds out I almost drowned in 3 feet of water, I will be a laughing stock. Composing myself, I stand up and face out towards the cave entrance.

"Command, this is Blackout, sample collected." I say into my headset. I wait a moment. No reply. "Command this is Blackout, do you read me?" No reply. "Command this is Blackout, do you copy?" Nothing. I remove my headset to check to see it if was damaged from the water. Doing a quick check, everything seems to be working fine. I even test to see if my microphone is working, but nothing seems to be wrong. I turn my headset off, and on and try to reach Command. Still nothing. It was working in this cave just fine before, maybe it will work better outside.

I head out of the cave, and I try for another 5 minutes trying to reach command. Still getting no response, I pull out my satellite phone and try to call command. As pulled it out, displayed on the screen said not satellite in range. Which was odd, considering that the entire world has satellite coverage now. Something strange is going on, but I'm not sure what as of yet. Putting the phone away, I start following the path once again with the moonlight behind me. 30 minutes later and I should have arrived at the extraction point. But the path keeps going on. I try to radio command once again, but still get nothing. I close my eyes and look up into the air and sigh.

"Things are never easy on these ops are they?" I whisper. Opening my eyes, I look at the moon. Only... it is not the moon I know. The moon has what looks to be a shadow in the shape of a unicorn on it. Realizing this, I scan the sky for any recognizable constellation. But I see none.

"What the fuck. The fuck is going on. Where the hell is the sky I know? More importantly, where the fuck am I?" Don't panic, don't panic. Panicking leads to mistakes, and rash decisions. I must remain calm, and collected. I am in an unfamiliar environment, with an unfamiliar sky above me. You were trained for this. I must assess the situation. No communications, no navigational stars, possibly unknown wild life in the region, unknown civilizations possibly in the area, limited food, water, and ammunition. I need to survey the area, establish a base camp, in a dependable position with an access to fresh water, and a food source. Along with looking for signs of civilization, and making contact. Worse case scenario, I'm alone, in an unknown area, with limited supplies, and nothing to use as legal tender if I'm in an unknown world. Great.

"Okay, I can continue down this path hoping to find a good defensive position, or i can go back to that cave and hunker down until day time then move out." Thinking about this for a while, i decide to head back to the cave and hunker down for the rest of the night. As I sit there, i pull out one of my rations, and a canteen of water, and have a basic meal. Afterwards, I fill the canteen up with water from the water, and put a some drops of the water purifying solution into it. Hoping to make it drinkable by morning. Satisfied with current situation i lay down to get some rest.

Local Time: ???

Earth Time: December 25th, 1100

As i rouse from my sleep, I check my watch to see the time is 1100. Looking outside, I see the sun has risen. Before I leave the cave, quickly wash my face, put on my ghillie suit, and head out. Once outside, it is confirmed that I am not in Tibet anymore, as surrounding the mountain is a lush forest, along with the sound of birds in the distance. At least there are birds where ever I am. So making arrows should be feasible if should I make a bow to conserve ammo.

I start moving down the path, towards the base of this mountain range with my G28 ready just in case. It takes me a good 2 hours to get to the base of the mountain. Along the way I notice familiar dotting the path, daisies, daffodils, and clovers. Which was odd if it was an entirely different world, meaning there is a decent chance I am on an alternate version of Earth. And if that is the case, there is a good chance anything I was taught will apply here. I became much more positive about this when I reached the forest. Looking at the trees, they appeared to be oak trees.

Making my way though the forest, I look for any signs of civilization. 6 hours in, and nothing. Not even a tree that has been cut my intelligent means. Which I found to be strange. As this path looks to have been worn down by repeated travel, so there should be some kind of civilization near by, but I have yet to see anythings. After another 2 hours, I hear something, not the usual sounds of wildlife, but the sound of wheels. Quickly scanning the region, I move off the side of the road and hide in a bush a good 20 feet way from the path as I wait to see what comes by. As I waited, I kept my G28 ready just in case what ever came by was hostile. 3 minutes later, and the cart finally rolled by. As it passed by, what looked like 2 upright walking dogs were pulling a large cart with 2 more following behind it. This cart had a large cage build into it, and inside where what looked to be 8 dirt caked horses inside. But a few things caught my eye, the dogs were carrying what looked like muskets, the horses were bound, and gagged, one of them horses had wings while another had a horn, and one was really young.

Slavers, and it looks like both parties are intelligent. Otherwise why would the horses be like that? As I watch the cart go by, I ask myself, should I get involved in something that doesn't involve myself when all i need to do is survive right now. But as I am thinking about this, the young horse somehow got it's gag off and started to yell at the dogs.

"Let us go! We don't want to work in your stupid mines!" the little horse said. Why does that horse sound like a 8 year old girl? I thought to my self

"Quite Pony, you will work whether you like it or not. Now shut up before I make you shut up." said one of the larger dogs behind the cart. Ah, they are ponies not horses.

"No, I won't work in your stupid diamond mine, you can't make me!"

"I told you to shut up!" said the dog creature as it pulled out a sword on it's waist and jabbed the young horse with it.

The sword went a good inch in, and the young horse let our a scream, the kind of scream that makes any parent within 100 feet stop what their doing to help the child that just seriously hurt itself. Okay, fuck these dogs pricks, they are going to fucking die. I thought to myself as I took aim toward at the head of the dog that stabbed the kid.

"I said shut up! Other wise your tongue is next." said the prick dog. When the young pony didn't stop yelling in pain, he grabbed the pony by the neck and went for her mouth.

At this moment, I pulled the trigger, and the skull of this prick dog exploded forward, splashing the ponies in the cart with its blood and brains. Quickly changing targets, I hit the second dog in the rear center mass twice, followed by the same with the two in the front pulling the cart. Dropping all 4 within 10 seconds. It took a few moments, but at the ponies in the cage realize what just happened, the what i hope are adults were screaming into their gag, while the young pony started crying in addition to screaming. At this point, I 7 shells that hit the forest floor before standing up and walking towards the cart.

As i approached the cart, the ponies inside went quiet. I can only imagine what they thought i was, as they saw what must have looked like a 6"4' walking bush with a gun walking towards them. Especially right after their 4 captors were quickly dispatched within just a few seconds. As a approached what i can assume to be the mother or sister of the young pony that is still screaming moved in-front of her. What were the young horses called again? Oh right, Colt for male and Filly for female. At this point I noticed, that under the dirt, all these ponies seemed to be technicolor, odd. Did they get caught in a raid at a dye factory?

As I reach the door at the back of the cart, I grab my knife, and reach into the cage with both hands. As i do so, the mother/sister of the filly recoils back, but I still grab her by the mane. She freezes up, as the knife approaches her, but instead of what she thought I might do, I cut the gag off of her after which I let go of her. Even with both the knife gone, she is still frozen with fear.

"You are safe now." I say as i start to work on the lock of the cage. The pony still seemed to be frozen with fear, for another 30 seconds before she found her voice again.

"W-w-who are you?" She asked with fear in her voice.

"Someone who thinks the only good slaver is a dead slaver." I say as I continue to work on this lock.

"W-what do you want?"

"Alcohol would be nice, but more importantly, I need to find shelter and food. Until I can find a way to get back home." The fuck is this lock, should have broken by now.

"I can provide shelter and food for you, it is the lease I can do for you saving us from those Diamond Dogs. Though my town of Hollow Shades is a good 2 days from here on hoof. It is a small town, but we should be able to help you. Though, we might need your help depending on how much damage was done by these dogs."

"Sounds good enough to me. Better than sleeping in a cave for days on end." I say as my lock picks breaks in the lock. "Stupid fucking lock. Gonna go Tomb Raider on this lock." I say as I go grab one of my climbing axes and jam the tip into the frame of the door. I move to the side, and pull. The metal groans as is is bent, but after a minute, the lock snaps and the door flies open hitting the side of the cage with a loud clang. "Alright, time to get you all free." I say as I start removing the bindings and gags from the ponies. They nervously thank me one by one, until they are all free. At which point, the pony I was talking to starts tending to the injured filly.

"So... uh... thanks again for saving us. Especially my little sister. My name is Rose Petal, and that is my little sister Aqua Lilly. What is your name?" she asks

I think to my self for a moment before responding, real name or call sign. "Call me Blackout." I say as i pull the hood of my ghille suit back.

"Good to meet you Blackout."

"So uh, what do you all do back in your town?" I ask

"Well, I'm one of the resident herbalist, I make healing balms with my little sister over there."

"What about the rest of the ponies with you?"

"Don't know. Never seen them before. They were probably either caught on the road, or from a different town."

"Interesting, is this a common occurrence?"

"No, not since the musket was invented around 30 years ago, with it disappearing almost entirely in the large cities with the program 50 to install electricity on a large scale.

So they do have electricity. But the combination of muskets and electricity is odd. Especially if the musket was only invented 30 years ago, and electricity on a large scale 30 years ago... I'm willing to guess that war is rare here. "Does your town Hollow Shades have electricity?"

"Yeah, but it is not used for much other than lighting up homes and some large machines. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, just wondering if it was anything like back home. I guess not. How is your sister's wound by the way?"

"It is not pretty, but i have managed to stop the bleeding, but what I really need is fresh water, bandages, and to stitch the wound close."

"I think I can help with those last bits." I say as i reach into my bag and pull out the basic medical kit, and a canteen of water, "Let me help."

"Thank you. Really, you have done so much already." she says as I start to clean the wound area. As I am cleaning the area, I notice that the color of the filly a pale blue, and she has a pearl white mane. Looking at her sister across from me, under the layer of dirt, she has a red coat, and a pink mane with a green stripe.

"So what is up with your colors, are they natural or do you dye them?" I ask as i am making sure the wound is clean before i stitch her up.

With a puff she says, "They are natural, why?"

"No reason. This might hurt little one. Try to endure it." I say as i thread the needle with thread, and start to sew the wound shut. She has a pained look on her face as I'm closing the wound, but I can tell she knows it will be better if she doesn't squirm. It takes a good 12 stitches, but the wound is closed to a satisfactory point. After which wrap the upper part of her leg with a bandage. "That should do it, the wound should stay closed long enough for us to reach your town if not longer."

"Thank you again. Can you help her onto my back?"

I nod as i lift the filly onto the back of her sister. She is heavier than she looks, she has to be a good 60 pounds, and the fact her sister doesn't even grunt with the added weight is a testament to her strength.

"Shall we head to Hollow Shades then?"

"Yeah, I'll lead the way."

Author's Note

Let me know what you think of the rewrite. Feedback is greatly appreciated. Next chapter we will arrive at Hollow Shades

Note: Town is 20000-100000 people, city is 100000-300000 people