Fallout Equestria: Chronicles of a Rad-ling

  Wispy had been working at the ministry of image for almost a year now, her internship almost over.  The job was all she had ever wanted, no matter how menial the task.  She got paid, and her boss wasn't a total tool either.

She had been working late nights since the pickup of propaganda poster orders.  She cleaned under the printers, and wiped off the press plates so they were prepared for the early-shift pony that would get the presses running again.

Tonight however, she was working extra late.

"You still here Wispy?" A voice awoke Wispy whom had been asleep, cuddling with the mop she had been using to clean under the printing presses.

"Wah-hah?" Wispy woke with a start, recognising her boss' voice.  She swept at the floor with the mop, trying to look as if she hadn't dosed off during work.

Black Cap opened the door to the printing room, "Wispy, have you been here all night?"

Wispy looked at her boss and nodded. Her eyelids drooped as her boss threw her left fore-hoof over his shoulder.  He trotted her from the printing room to the front office, and helped her put on her jacket.

"Now you go home and get some rest. I'll see you tomorrow." Black cap waved as Wispy left, leaving him alone in the largest ministry of image hub other than the one in Canterlot.

And he was not Black cap.

Horilous switched back to his usual changeling appearance as he collected his briefcase from behind the front desk where he had stashed it when he had arrived and taken on the appearance of the night-manager he had been posing as for years.

And tonight, he had more work to do.

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Horilous had four hours to complete everything he had to do tonight before the early-shift ponies got to work.  He unlatched his briefcase and examined the contents to insure the interface tool for the terminal in the day-manager's office was still intact.

He entered the office end of the building. His smell receptors registered old coffee and cigarette smoke, telling him he was close to the day-manager's office.

"Poor foal should quit smoking, I could find my way to her office even if the lights were off," he thought to himself.

The door to the day-manager's office was carelessly left unlocked.  Horilous entered the office and inserted the interface into the computer's spell matrix.  Now all he had to do was wait for the zebra interface to work its magic, and deliver it to the changeling operative waiting in the park east of the seaddle spire.

Horilous thought of his espionage as a job that needed to be done, he took no pleasure in his work.  He actually enjoyed his time spent working for the ministry of image.  But this was no culture exchange, this was war.

A war of which battles were fought behind the scenes as much as on the front lines.

The interface beeped twice, and horilous removed it from the terminal.  He moved to the filing cabinets next, switching out documents with forged copies.  Double the casualties here, reduce the troops trained there.  All the little things that make everything a little more hopeless.

Horilous kept the real documents, they would earn him extra at his next payment.  The zebras always paid well for such things, such as troop strength and hardware production.  The documents slid into the folder sitting in the open briefcase.

Horilous exited the building, and locked the outside door behind him.  He had resumed his magical disguise as Black cap, and began trotting towards the East Seaddle Park. The bit of flesh that always itched beneath his black carapace at these dark exchanges began to do its thing, which Horilous did his best to ignore.

Snow had began to fall in the cold Seaddle night, and the chill slowly crept through his exoskeleton.  If Horilous had a spine, a shiver would have shot down it.

Horilous entered the park, hugging the fence until he came to a rusted bench.  He sat, waiting in the chill for the changeling infiltrator to arrive.  Praying to the great hive queen that all of this espionage would soon be over and he could go home.

"Horsefly?" a invisible speaker questioned.

"Cheeselegs?" Horilous responded.

The changeling infiltrator ceased his illusion spell as he tossed a similar briefcase at Horilous' hooves.

"That will include your next mission and contingency plans."

"Contingency plans?" Horilous questioned. He tossed the briefcase full of documents and the interface to the other changeling.

The other changeling sighed, "The war escalates every day hive-brother.  If worst comes to worst, it would help to be prepared."

Horilous stared down at the briefcase he had received, "Yes, It would. Keep safe Cacoon."

"And you as well, hive-brother."  The infiltrator resumed his illusion, and disappeared into the night.

And Horilous sat on the rusty bench, looking at the briefcase he had received.

Black cap wrapped the scarf around his neck and grabbed his briefcase in his mouth. He took a quick stroll around the park, admiring the scenery of the wintry Seaddle night.  He exited the park, and made for home.

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The case had contained locked container labeled:

Contingency Plan

Do not open unless heavy threat of capture

The suitcase had also contained a box of cigarettes laced with some zebra drug he couldn't pronounce.  The drug was confirmed lethal in anything but minute doses in the mission briefing.  Horilous' nine chambered heart jumped to his throat as he read what he was supposed to use them for.

The zebras behind his operation had grown tired of sifting through her personal messages, mostly received from her drug addict sister, who was the notable head of the ministry of morale.  But this was an OP in the ministry of image, where the only thing her sister meant was more posters needing printing.

It was sad really, she had been his trainer when he got his internship at the ministry of image.  He had grown fond of the dark-maned manager.

And he had never had to kill anyone before. He was a changeling from the worker caste, not some trained, cold-blooded murder.

The bitter irony ripped at him.  He knew why she had started smoking. It was to relieve stress that her sister's drug problems caused her.  Even more ironic was that the cigarettes she smoked passed through her sister's ministry.

Horilous placed the cigarette box back into his briefcase, and latched it shut.

His apartment was in stark contrast with the world around it.  So many a technicolour home had been built in Seaddle, but Horilous' home was dark, warmer place.  His bed slightly, but he liked it that way.  It was a smell that reminded him of the hive queen and his true home.

Horilous locked his door, set his alarm, and finally plopped down on his bed and fell asleep.

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Black cap followed a procession of ponies dressed in black. Tissues patted tears away as the casket holding the corpse of the now deceased day-manager descended into the six foot hole that would be her resting place.  Black cap looked on as the family members began to shovel dirt in the hole covering her.

A tear attempted to escape his eye, he held it back.

The plan had worked without a hitch.  The drug lacing the cigarettes had done it, she had died within the week she had received the deadly box of smokes.

Of course this meant that he was now full time manager for the Seaddle branch of the Ministry of Image.  All that the zebras behind his operation had wanted.

But as a single pink carnation fell from the magical grip of a lavender mare in the crowd, he was not so sure of what his advancement had truly cost.

Black cap realised that the ponies that had attended the service had mostly left, besides a few stragglers.  He moved away from the grave-site and and made for the exit of the bleak cemetery that had been chosen.  He had a long way to walk if he was going to fill out the paperwork required to get his new pip-buck ordered and make his new job official.

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