Rise

RISE

CHAPTER 13: HE HOLDS THE KEY TO REDEMPTION

"Three... hours... of this shit, all because you missed your shot..."

"Wait, shut up, I see something."

God knows how many times this has happened by now, but I felt myself feeling not much better than a pile of shit. I lost conciousness, but after an amount of time I had came to. Kept my eyes closed, though. Need rest. Yes, rest, I would enjoy that. But on a bed or something, not rock. What happened? I tried to recall the events prior to knocking right the fuck out and almost dying, but nothing came. I remembered being on a train, going to Ponyville probably, but not much else. I fell, I think. But off the train? Or off the mountain?

"Hey, that looks like him! Get the rocks off!"

I heard someone speak from next to me. Sounded male, but, oddly enough, not exactly what I'd say would be from a pony. It sounded American. Somehow, I could tell a difference. Huh, maybe it's a real human. She might've been a real human...

Within just seconds of hearing the person talk, I felt a heavy weight come off my chest. As in the literal form, mind you. The rocks or whatever that was on top of me came off, and I finally opened my eyes, to see who or what happened. Surely enough, my predictions were true.

"Wh- hey, buddy, uh... you okay?"

"Why is he alive!? He should be dead! Not alive!"

Two bipedal creatures stood above me, not ponies. Humans, of course. From where I was, I couldn't really see them, but definitely human. Can't tell if yet another trap. I stood up, putting my hand on a nearby rock for support, and looked around. Huh, now that I'm up, starting to feel much better. Already healing. Taking a moment to see my surroundings, I noticed I was at the foot of a huge ass lake. Behind me, was-- oh, wow, that explains that. Dozens of mountains were up and above. I could barely see the tracks the train must've been on. It was long gone now, though. Did I actually fall off the mountain!? I didn't feel wet or anything, I couldn't have fell in the lake. And I had rocks on top of me. Perhaps when I fell on the ground, some rocks decided to follow. Which should be more reason for me to not be alive right now. What the hell?

Anyway, to my left was basically a large field, few trees here and there, and Ponyville in the distance. Looked beautiful though. Roses, dandelions, apple trees, and of course the tall grass, all put together to make an amazing sight. Now on my right, was pretty much what I expected. The clean, yes clean, water of the lake was pretty much the entire direction. And I could just almost see the shadow of spirals going into the air. Canterlot. But, my vision of that far was obstructed, by weather. Yep, still raining. Right in the middle of a storm, as usual. Goddamn, I need a jacket. It's cold. I don't like cold. Hmm... wait, aren't there two people in front of me?

"Yes, hello, I am alive. Hell if I know why. You guys kn-- holy shit. You're..."

Finally looking at them, I noticed something. These guys were goddamn U.S Marines! They had the uniform and everything! Some sort of weapon was on their back, didn't really look like anything familiar, but shit, these are Marines! They wore a blue-and-cyan camoflague. Heavy armor, large vest, padded everything, etc. The U.S flag was on their shoulders, and two different patches were on their arms. One had a yellow bar, and the other was the same, but silver. I recognized these as Second and First Liuetenant ranks. The one with the silver patch, First Liuetenant, stepped forward and spoke.

"Hello, sir. Name's Richard. First Liuetenant, Alpha Company, of the U.S Marines. You seem to be doing okay for yourself, considering you just fell off a train, then off a mountain." He smiled, and offered his hand. I, of course, gave him my hand and shook it. The one with the yellow patch did the same, offering his hand.

"Yeah. Er, name's Nick. Second Liuetenant, Alpha Company, U.S Marines. Are you alright?" He was a tad nervous, I noticed. He had the same weapon on his back. Again, couldn't see what.

"Uh huh. Don't know why I'm alive, but yeah, here I am. And here you guys are-- you know what the fuck is going on?"

"Well, yes, we do. You aren't gonna like it, though." Richard responded.

"Let's hear it, then!"

"You know about the wars that have been going on?"

"Well, sort of. I don't remember much. I know it was something about nuclear warfare going on, though."

"Yeah... that's tied to this. If you want to understand, you want me to tell you about the wars?"

"I guess? Are you even allowed to tell me about it?"

"I'm not gonna tell you every single detail, buddy. But, it wouldn't matter anyway."

"...Alright, so, lay it on me I guess."

* Richard *

So, it all started on the 18th of November, 2043. You probably remember, news was buzzing about it for weeks. The U.S.A was threatened. Bomb threats, again. They kept mostly anonymous about it at the time, but made it known they could hit bombs whenever they wanted. It was no doubt a terrorist group. A large one. The group had hacked TV networks, to put videos of terrorist attacks, threatening, the... usual things. Again, you probably know this. According to the end of these videos, they called themselves the 'Cloak'. They had a logo of sorts. Three people, standing next to each other, wearing red cloaks. Always would be in the videos.

So now, they said if the President didn't comply with their orders, "hell would be unleashed". Things like pressing something on a computer, to save a man from execution, were just the beginning of what they asked. Sending the Cloak files, like our own intel. But the President did it so they didn't drop the bombs. He did it for the U.S.A. So we could live happy.

This went on for over a month. And with it, the threats, the orders became more insane. Once, the President had to go to an area of the Cloak, to shoot a man. It was a large warehouse, but all that was in it was a table, a man tied to a chair, and a gun. The President, however, complied. Except, once he pulled back the trigger, nothing happened other than the bang of the weapon. It shot a blank. Wasn't loaded with real rounds. The man was freed, and the President was taken back to the White House, all within the same day. If he left without shooting, or didn't go to the warehouse at all, well, they already had a nuke aimed and ready to go.

Eventually, in January, the storms started. The Cloak stopped the messages. Of course, they wouldn't be seen anyways, after cable stopped working. As it progressively got worse, missions got harder. Our first thought was to get deployed somewhere and search for the Cloak, but they were sneaky bastards. Not even us could get a fix on their location. And so, some squads were deployed to just do a city-wide search of, well, everywhere. Everywhere we could. Marines into the States, Canadian Army into the North, S.A.S into Britian, to find this damn terrorist group. Wasn't really simply city-wide searches, more of an actual world-wide search. They were number one on the most wanted list.

Then, almost the whole year passed, when in September the Canadian Army found something. Yet another warehouse. It was huge, painted black, and had covered windows. Right outside of Vancouver. They informed us about it, said it looked suspicious. And thus, plans were created to infiltrate the building and see what's up. Spanned across five different squads. Alpha, and Echo Company of the Marines, Bravo, Charlie of the Canadian Army, and Delta of the S.A.S. And they were right, it was definitely a Cloak building. They had a WMD ready for detonation in there and everything. Sometime in October we went in, and... fuck, I don't even know what happened next.

One moment Alpha's in humvees outside, Echo in the warehouse, everyone else at backup positions, and the next we seen the warehouse blown to bits. Just the warehouse. The nuke didn't go off. Except, once we got off our asses and took a look at the place, the nuke wasn't there. Or anyone that was in the area. But here's the weird part-- it left a cloud of smoke. Not just any cloud, but a rainbow cloud of smoke. So of course, we walked in... and ended up here. I woke up here. I don't know how. Look, there's more, but we gotta go. C'mon.

* Jason *

"So, the nuke sorta detonated, everyone disappeared, then you walked into the warehouse, and now you're here?"

"Um, yeah, I guess."

"And the fucking Cloak was in the warehouse."

"A lot of them."

"..."

You know those times when you make a realization, or at least think something very plausible and you're just like "Fuck everything"? This is one of those times. The Cloak, man. He's right, the Cloak's a terrorist group. They actually did something a while back, they set some fires or something. But y'know, on important buildings. Like banks and such. It sucked. They sucked. So, when everyone disappears from a rainbow explosion from the Cloak, and these two guys are here now, you start thinking things. This place is probably the worst to be in right now.

"Look, I know what you're thinking. That's exactly why we're moving out, now. Come with me."

I sighed, but went along with them anyway. They started walking, and I went alongside them. But, instead of going to Ponyville, we went to the right, where there was an odd-looking forest there. Real... odd. And I could've sworn I heard Nick whisper to Richard something along the lines of "We got him."

***

"Sarge, Sarge! Look!" Johnson hurried to Sarge with the binoculars, and almost threw them right in his face from pure adrenaline.

"Private! What the fuck is getting you so hyped up!?"

"Over there! Oh my god, I-I can't really see it, but I think it's Alpha, they, they got this guy with them, and... they're going IN to the forest we just left, sir."

"Alpha? You mean, the rest of the squad?" Sarge set the binoculars to full zoom and looked where Johnson was pointing.

"Well, there's only two of them, but they're definitely Alpha. I think it's One and Two."

"Shit, that is them! They're heading right to that damned forest! Johnson, get on the radio with them, now!"

"Hey, everything alright out here?" Echo-One walked out the door to meet a shocked Sarge and Johnson of his fellow Alpha squad.

"Alpha-One and Two are taking some kid into that forest over there... I don't know if you've been in it yet, but it's pretty much literally hell. To go in it is signing a death wish. And they look oddly happy about it, too?"

"Lemme see those... h-holy shit, were they that grey last time?"

"Grey? I don't know. Can't see with this rain, I'm surprised we even found out that was Alpha-One and Two. I have a bad feeling about this..."

***

"Oh, marvelous! Would you look at that. They're finally bringing the other human in. It's about time, wouldn't you say, hmm?"

"Yeah. We'll be able to use him real good."

"Agreed. Especially considering he holds an Element."

"H-He's an ELEMENT!? But there's only six!"

"Twilight, Twilight, Twilight. Do you really think the Elements of Harmony are the only Elements?"

END ACT 1: RISE

"People often say that this or that person has not yet found himself.  But the self is not something one finds, it is something one creates."  ~Thomas Szasz, "Personal Conduct," The Second Sin, 1973