Rescue Process (7) (Patreon)

Thomas crouched low in the shelter. Dogs were coming now, their heavy claws scraping in the darkness. From their bipedal stance, each one towered over ponies, their bodies muscular and strong. They wore iron breastplates and carried spears as long as a pony’s whole body.

Through the slave camp, the native prisoners scattered at random, preparing for the next day of labor the same as they’d prepared for every other. They waited for their princesses to come and save them from captivity—maybe they would, if they waited long enough.

Learning a new body was one thing—but captivity in a desolate underground mine was more than he could accept. His life waited in another world, waiting for him to take it back. For himself, and Lin.

His winged friend wasn’t up front of course. Without magic or physical strength, she would be part of the support group, ready to help anyone who took an injury, or relay messages. 

Right now, that meant helping to keep the ponies who didn’t want to fight away from the door. The natives stared, faces full of fear that somehow made it to their scent. 

Glad that isn’t me. Thomas didn’t even know how long he’d been captive in the mine. Weeks? Months? Every day of deprivation and labor blurred together. Today would be the last.

The door rattled, clicked, then swung open. Several dogs walked in, led by the smaller leader animal they’d come to know. The one who decided when someone didn’t work hard enough to get food, or when someone should starve because they were too sick to get up. Duke

“Line up! If you think because the alpha is away that you won’t be working, you’re wrong! Maybe not eating—let’s see.” He gestured, and the two guards that came with him stalked away from the gate, banging their spears onto their breastplates. A few tore down shelters, turning over cots and blankets they thought might hold resting ponies. 

There were none inside, because that was the plan. They couldn’t let the dogs lock them inside, or their escape would end before it even began.

“Now!” Shauna’s voice echoed from the back, sharp and loud. All at once, every magical light in the tunnel burst into brilliant white, blinding and uncomfortable. “Open fire!”

Duke wore no armor, relying on the imposing guards to enforce his orders. There was nothing to keep the half-dozen arrows from piercing him like clay.

The animal gurgled and fell onto the floor before Thomas’s eyes. His own crossbow remained ready, unfired.

“Shields!” Shauna yelled. “Now!”

They moved—a half-dozen earth ponies, each one wearing misshapen chunks of metal formed into crude shields in front of them. Or maybe battering rams, because that’s how they used them. They charged in from both sides, knocking over the guards and blocking the door in the same motion.

Ponies screamed and squealed, retreating into the cave. Natives, terrified of what was taking place around them. But Thomas couldn’t run, no matter how afraid he felt. This was it.

Shauna stepped out into the light, pointing both wings at the guards. “Spears down, now! Or you’re dead!”

The dogs acted like they didn’t even hear her. One smacked out at random with a meaty paw, flinging a pony through the air and into the cavern wall. Another charged at somepony else, abandoning his weapon entirely for his vicious jaws.

At Lincoln, dragging a colt Thomas didn’t know away from the fight. 

Thomas dropped the crossbow to the ground. His instinct required no such aid. They were going to kill his friends! He wasn’t a fleeing animal, retreating through the plains. Thomas was human. If they had to fight monsters three times their size, if they had to hunt their food until it died of exhaustion, they would.

If they had to die for a common cause, or kill for one, they would.

His horn flashed bright blue, so bright it briefly overpowered the crystal lights. The guard lifted off the ground, smashing sideways into the wall as though thrown there by a giant arm. Thomas felt that force in his mind, imagining a contest between this vicious, toothy canine and an oncoming semi.

The dog crushed flat against the wall, metal bending and stone cracking at the impact. Thomas wobbled, then dropped to one knee. When the dog fell, it was barely even identifiable as organic anymore.

The other dropped his spear, whimpering in sudden terror and covering his head.

“Forward!” Shauna advanced beside the struggling Duke still gasping for breath. She turned towards the room, then crushed his skull with a single, decisive strike.

“Liberty or death!” 

He tried to echo that cry—but only bile came to his throat. 

Thomas had hunted before. But no deer could try to talk to you. None had ever kept him in slavery before, either.

His head suddenly throbbed, and steam rose from his horn like a firearm in icy weather.

Armored “earth ponies” moved past him, uniting into a block. They stood still while other ponies attached their new spears to their makeshift armor like pikes.

The press of bodies washed around Thomas like a stone in a river. All that mattered was Lincoln, approaching through the cavern with her pack of medical supplies. She touched his shoulder with one hoof, her whisper somehow clear despite the volume of the violence all around them.

“That was you?”

He nodded once. “You okay?”

“I wouldn’t be.” She pressed up close, close enough that he felt her racing heartbeat in her chest. That was more like the ponies—or a hummingbird, fluttering rapidly. “Think you saved my life.”

“Thomas?” Something touched his other shoulder, heaving him into a standing position. “Got any magic left?”

He stood, still on shaking limbs. “Think so. You still need me, Shauna?”

She laughed, though it sounded forced and uncomfortable. “We still have to get to the surface! If you can fight—with the others.” She eyed the deep red stain on the wall, shuddering visibly. “Didn’t know magic could do that. Guess we don’t have to worry about a gate after all. Just rip the damn thing off.”

He shrugged. “Not exactly sure I could... do that again.” 

“We’ll take the bastard’s keys.” She nudged them with a hoof, kicking them away from the fallen corpse of Duke. Blood stained the metal, dribbling across their surface. “You know the plan. We’ll be right behind you.”

They separated into two groups—those part of the fighting, and those following behind them. He left Lincoln, joining the others at the front. He could still hear Shauna as they made their steady way down the hall.

“Alright ponies! I know none of you wanted to do this—but we’re getting out! Let me tell you a thing about monsters! If you’re here when the alpha gets back, things won’t return to the way they were! They’re going to do awful, horrible things to you! Even if we lead rescue straight back here, it won’t be fast enough! Pick up all the supplies you can carry and come with us. You don’t have to fight, but if you stay...”

Her voice faded into the background. They were almost at the central mine, where a larger group of dogs waited to meet them.

“I’ve never seen a pony fight like that...” said Relic Rune, just beside him. Another unicorn, one of the few natives who had agreed to fight. Her eyes were wide and distant, and her crossbow hadn’t been fired. “How does she do that?”

“Shauna served two tours in the Middle East,” Adrien muttered. “Not sure what she did exactly, but she has stories.”

She wouldn’t be joining them for that part of the fight, though. Now more than ever, they had to move together, not allowing their weakest and sickest members to be left behind at the dogs’ mercy.

Winston took her place, barking commands from the front. “Locked the main gate!” he yelled back. “Cowards! You think that will stop us?” 

A few arrows flew through the opening just ahead, bouncing against pony shields.

“Fighting ponies will die!” someone said. “Alpha eat you!”

Thomas made his way to the front, holding the bloody keys in his magic. He stood beside the opening, entirely out of range of the dogs as he worked.

Shauna appeared at the back not long after, leading a herd of terrified ponies behind her. Many looked as afraid of their allies as the dogs through the opening, staying out of their reach. A few others had taken weapons of their own, makeshift clubs or spears from the collection the humans had made.

“Behind the shields!” she said. “Second rank, crossbows ready! Tactical?”

“I count twelve,” Lincoln said. Her voice might not be much larger than the other ponies, but Thomas heard it clearly anyway. Someone had to look out for her. “Not sure how many more are coming. Their barracks has more.”

“Right. Get ready, Thomas!” 

She made her way forward, pressing through the ranks until she was near the front. Through the gap, Thomas saw the central mining tunnel, twenty feet across and broken by minecart tracks. The dogs inside kept well back from the gate. Some held weapons ready, others crouched on all fours with hackles raised and jaws exposed.

“You bastards had no idea what you were doing trying to keep us here!” Shauna yelled. How she could keep her voice so confident while shouting at the top of her lungs—must be the military background. “Let’s make this very clear! Throw those weapons down and walk away! Any of you who fight are dead, you hear me? We are not taking prisoners today! Your alpha will find her prison is a tomb!”

She tossed something through the heavy metal bars. Thomas turned to look—then his guts nearly dropped out of his stomach. 

No wonder the ponies were so terrified of Shauna. 

She’d severed Duke’s broken, bloody head. It landed with a meaty thump on the floor, sightless eyes staring up at their captors.

“Liberty or death!” Winston shouted. He lacked the same insane conviction as their leader—but made up for it with magically-amplified volume. The cavern shook, dust tumbling through little cracks overhead.

“Liberty or death!”

Thomas turned the lock, then shoved on the gate with all his magical might. It banged open, screeching along dirty ground. Then they charged.

Thomas didn’t see the first conflict. By the time he made it out around the corner to join the fighting, there were fewer than half as many dogs still there.

Thomas moved through the middle. He had no crossbow anymore, but that was okay. What was the point of a weapon like that, when magic was so much more dangerous?

A few arrows came their way, and he turned them aside. Probably couldn’t do as well with a firearm—but arrows were slow. A little shove, and they went tumbling away from the group, scattered into the empty tunnel.

They advanced, inch by painful inch. Their enemy fought like animals, driven purely by fury or bloodlust. Once they closed, the huge dogs abandoned all training and just bit and clawed, forgetting their armor and leverage and everything else.

A few of their prisoners were former soldiers, like Shauna. But all fought with the same desperation—absolute confidence in the fate waiting for them if they failed.

The dogs, by contrast, could flee. Many did.

Those that didn’t, died—by Thomas’s hooves, or someone else’s. Soon the cavern had more bodies—eight dogs, and two ponies. Several more were injured, most with vicious bites or claw marks. As painful as those wounds looked, they probably wouldn’t be fatal.

Unless they got infected, of course.

The group made its bloody way to another gate, guarded only by a pair of dogs. One look at the bloodstained, armored ponies making their way up was enough for them to abandon their weapons and flee out the gate without a fight.

Thomas was among the first to step outside. Crisp mountain air swallowed him, sucking what little heat remained in his beleaguered body. His hooves crunched on fresh white snow as he stumbled forward.

He dropped to the ground, staring up at the feeble afternoon sun. Even at this altitude, the warmth on his skin was like the kiss of a familiar lover, almost forgotten.

“We made it.”

“Yeah,” said a familiar voice from nearby. Lincoln settled onto her haunches beside him. Her friend was covered with her own fresh coating of blood and grime—yet like him, she’d escaped relatively unscathed.

His only wounds were to his soul. “We’re free.”