//------------------------------// // 120 - Push Your Luck // Story: Lateral Movement // by Alzrius //------------------------------// As they emerged from the warehouse, Lex had already begun calculating the parameters of their rescue effort. A quick glance upward showed that the sun was high in the sky, not quite having reached its zenith yet. Which means that we have roughly eight hours until it sets. The fact that the elemental bleeds had struck during the beginning of summer was one of the few aspects of the disaster that was fortuitous, he knew. The ponies of Vanhoover would have been in even worse shape if they’d been forced to endure freezing temperatures on top of everything else they’d suffered. That, and the ghouls prowling the city would have had even more hours of darkness in which to freely stalk the streets. “What are we waiting for?! Let’s go!” Frowning as Cozy’s pleading interrupted his thoughts, Lex glanced over at Fencer. Sure enough, she wasn’t moving, instead standing off to the side and giving him a hateful look. The sight made Lex grit his teeth, not because he cared about her anger, but because she was deliberately being as uncooperative as she could without openly rebelling. “Get moving,” he hissed at her. “Now!” She lingered for a half-second in another display of petty defiance before she turned and started walking down the waterfront, going no faster than a leisurely stroll. “Faster!” Lex ordered. “Unless you never want to use magic again!” Again her only response was a dark look, but she broke into a trot. Cozy immediately moved after her, but Lex paused just long enough to take Severance from his back and toss it into the air, where it floated lazily. “Stay close to me,” he ordered it curtly before he followed the mares, the weapon trailing after him. As much as Lex hated to admit it, Sonata hadn’t been wrong to insist that he take Severance with him. Although he’d closed the elemental bleed, and the ghouls weren’t much of a threat, having the sapient scythe with him would be invaluable if another unexpected situation arose. Minutes passed as they made their way along the docks, Fencer leading them. Several times Lex noticed Cozy glancing at him, pursing her lips before looking away. He ignored her as best he could, but after the fifth such instance his patience snapped. “What?” he growled at her. Cozy flinched, wavering before gulping and plunging ahead. Whispering, she glanced at Fencer before returning her gaze to him. “Did you-, no, obviously it was you, but…her horn…” “It’s her punishment for trying to bargain with the information on your husband’s whereabouts,” he replied darkly. Even without remembering what Sonata had told him, the fact that Fencer had been unwilling to convey potentially life-saving information – or lead them to Pillowcase’s last known location, for that matter – unless she got something for it upset Lex deeply. It wasn’t just that it flew in the face of his moral values; rather, he’d seen what it was like when attitudes such as Fencer’s were commonplace among the populace, and he had no intention of letting Equestrian society degrade to such a degree on his watch. His home would NOT become another Everglow. Not if he had anything to say about it. “When we arrive at our destination, I want you to stay close to me.” Lex didn’t look at Cozy as he spoke, but he could see her frown of confusion out of his periphery. She gave a tentative nod, however, and that was good enough. Although he’d taken away Fencer’s ability to use magic and stripped her naked, Lex still considered her to be dangerous, or at least dangerous enough to potentially pose a threat to somepony like Cozy. Combined with the dangers that were still lurking in this city, and with Cozy’s worry for her husband likely eroding her sense of caution, Lex knew that he’d need to watch over her. They continued to march in silence, and after what Lex judged to be about forty-five minutes they reached the end of the wharf, where Fencer came to a stop. Pointing at the second-to-last warehouse, she nodded toward it. “There. That’s the one.” “Pillow!” Cozy started to rush towards the building, but stopped as Lex telekinetically tugged on her necklace, yanking her back. So much for her staying close to him! “What did I tell you before?” he snarled. “But Pillow-” “Will not be helped if you do something stupid while trying to find him! Now stay there and shut up!” Ignoring Cozy’s tearful look and Fencer’s smirk, Lex turned back to regard the warehouse. At a glance, there was nothing to set it aside from any of the others like it that lined the wharf. For a moment he considered circling the building to see if maybe there was anything notable on the other sides, but the prospects of that seemed minimal. Turning to shadow and observing it from above might have been worthwhile, but that would have meant leaving Cozy alone with Fencer, and Lex had no intention of letting that particular scenario come to pass. Slowly, Lex moved towards the building, hearing the other two keep pace with him. Although he couldn’t imagine why there would be any, he still adjusted his circlet as he looked at the doors in the magical spectrum. Giving a perfunctory nod as he found no magic whatsoever – and seeing no lock – he stood ten feet back from them before telekinetically yanking them open, ready to react in case there was some sort of trap or monster ready to leap out in response to their intrusion. But no traps activated, nor was there any sort of monster lying in wait. Instead, the doors opened smoothly, revealing the building’s dusky interior. In doing so, Lex saw that unlike the exterior, the inside of the building was very different from where they’d made their shelter; whereas their warehouse was relatively empty, having little more than shelves, this one was full of crates. They were stacked on top of each other almost to the ceiling, and were set in haphazard clusters rather than orderly rows. Lex glanced back at Fencer. “You go first.” Fencer gave him a sour look, then glanced at the open doors, obviously not keen on heading inside. “It’s pretty dark in there. I won’t be able to see.” She wasn’t wrong. Although the open doors allowed some sunlight to creep inside, the near-total lack of windows meant that the gloom had retreated only a little. But as far as Lex was concerned, that was a bonus. No light of her own would keep her reliant on them. “Then you had better not go very far.” Scowling, Fencer slowly walked into the warehouse. Only after she’d entered the building did Lex go after her, Cozy keeping pace with him. As they crossed the threshold, she chanted her light spell, and a moment later the holy symbol on her necklace flared with radiance. For his part, Lex silently called upon his dark magic to enhance his vision, allowing him to see through the darkness without a light source. It wouldn’t be necessary so long as Cozy could keep making light, but it was always better to have redundancies in place. “Now,” Lex looked at Fencer, “take us to whe-” “PILLOW!” yelled Cozy, standing on her back legs and putting her hooves by her mouth. “PILLOW, WHERE ARE YOU?!” Lex was silent, not because he was listening for an answer but because he was momentarily stunned by Cozy’s overwhelming stupidity. It was only when she tried to call out again that he shook it off. “You idiot! Stop!” “But if he’s in here-” “If he’s still in here after several days, rather than having kept searching for the shelter like you told him in your note, then he’s quite clearly not in any condition to respond!” Lex hadn’t wanted to share any of the grim details about exactly what had happened when Pillowcase had the misfortune to encounter Fencer and her group, but Cozy had reached the point where her inability to think rationally about their situation was endangering them. If there were any ghouls or other creatures lurking in here that had somehow missed the doors opening, then they were definitely aware of their presence now. “I know that you’re worried about him, but you need to think before you act if you don’t want to make things worse!” “What…what do you mean ‘not in any condition to respond’?” Cozy’s voice was muted, a look of controlled fear spreading across her face. “Why wouldn’t he be able to respond? He…” She trailed off as the gears started to turn in her head, finally able to see past her worry and wonder how it was that Pillowcase could have been so close and still not found them. “He’s hurt,” she croaked, her fearful look changing to one of horrified realization. “He’s hurt and you know about it, because…” she turned to look at Fencer, “because she told you.” “Calm down,” ordered Lex. “We’re going to find him. We just-” Cozy didn’t seem to hear him, marching towards Fencer. “You did it.” Her voice was almost a whisper, as though dazed. “I can’t believe I didn’t…he’s hurt because you hurt him. That’s why you didn’t want to talk about it before.” She didn’t hesitate, walking up to Fencer until she was nose-to-nose with the other mare. “You did this.” “Cozy! Step away from her right now!” Lex telekinetically grabbed Severance, and started after her, intent on separating the two mares. I should never have brought Cozy along! But he had barely taken two steps before Fencer, who up until now had been impassive, suddenly gave Cozy a thin, mirthless smile. “I did,” she admitted. “And I’m not sorry.” Cozy’s eyes had just enough time to widen before Fencer suddenly surged forward, barreling into Cozy and bull rushing her backwards into a stack of crates. The two mares collided heavily with the wooden boxes, and Lex heard both of them grunt from the force of the impact, along with the scrape of wood across the stone floor, and instantly realized what was about to happen. Cozy, stunned from the impact, collapsed, her vision darkening as she struggled to process the sudden turn of events. A moment later her wits returned…letting her see the crates tumbling directly towards her, faster than she could possibly hope to avoid. A scream tore its way from her throat as she closed her eyes and raised her hooves in front of her face, knowing that wouldn’t do any good but unable to help herself. A second later she heard a heavy splintering and braced herself for the unimaginable pain that she was sure would accompany being crushed to death. Pillow! …but the pain didn’t arrive, and after a long moment Cozy opened her eyes. There was debris all over the place, with broken wood and…pencils, of all things, scattered everywhere. But for several feet immediately around her the floor was completely clear, as though the crates and their contents had somehow managed to miss her entirely when they’d fallen. But that can’t be. I saw them falling right towards me. It was almost as though something had interposed itself between them and her. “Are you alright?!” Lex’s voice cut through her confusion, and she looked over to see him making his way through the wreckage towards her. He reached the edge of the debris-free zone around her and spoke a word she didn’t recognize, and for a moment she saw a dome-shaped flicker around her before it disappeared, letting him come closer. A force field, she realized numbly. He created a force field around me. “Cozy, are you injured?!” he demanded as he reached her, and the urgency in his voice brought her back to herself. “N-no. I don’t think so.” Shakily, she climbed to her hooves, looking over herself just to be sure. When she didn’t spot anything, she finally nodded. “I’m okay.” It was starting to sink in that he’d saved her life, after Fencer had…had… “Fencer!” she yelped as she remembered the pony that had just tried to kill her. She spun around, but the other mare was nowhere to be seen. “Where did she go?” Reflexively, she looked towards the open doors. But Lex, seeing where she was looking, shook his head. “She didn’t go that way. She managed to grab your necklace and head deeper into the warehouse before I cast that spell.” “My necklace?” Cozy raised a hoof to her neck, feeling that he was right. “But why?” “Because,” answered Lex grimly, “she needed the light.” “No, I mean, why did she head inside instead of running away? She knows we're going to look for…” Her eyes widened as the answer came to her. “Oh no!” Lex nodded, already having come to the same conclusion. “Fencer’s not trying to escape. She’s trying to get to Pillowcase before we do.”