The rest of the return journey was relatively uneventful, the night was clear after his work and he marvelled at the vast array of stars which lit up the night. Unconsciously he fussed with the bag which held the Black heart of the dead star lay, quiet and pulsing, waiting for him to light it up with the power which would make it sing once again.

Before then in a grassy hummock near the edge of the forest, the first two of the Jaeger’s pulled up a section of the turf and revealed a long dark underground tunnel, just big enough to march three abreast down this specific section of his network. Pausing temporarily, he let out a small spell, and the local magical field reacted, causing crystalline lamps imbedded into the walls to shine out in pale ice blue light. 

After about ten minutes march the silence of the place was broken by the sounds of grinding metal, hammering, and gear movements, the sounds of immense industry beneath the earth, almost completely unnoticed from those above. The tunnel widened, and before them became more intricate, branching and ornate, within minutes they were passing more and more Drones processing materials, both dead flesh and inanimate metal on long rail lines before pushing them into the industrial sector to be worked upon.

Scalpel once again paused and looked behind him at the arrayed convoy of his soldiers critically, before his eyes fell upon Steel Hammer and fixed him with an unsmiling gaze. “Take him to a processing cell; I’ll deal with him later. Oh…” he eyed the pack which Steel Hammer still held with him, “Search him first, confiscate anything which might allow him to escape and return my property to the library, these imbeciles have already made a mess of this situation, any reward which is above sparing their lives would be obscenely generous.”

Dismissing a four member section of the Jaeger squad to go with the pony, he continued further into his small industrial fortress, passing by the flaming forges and industries of his children, observing as the crafted his future under a drumbeat of hammers. He couldn’t stay, and neither could his outpost, even if the Inquisition hadn’t been alerted to his presence they would undoubtedly investigate the disappearance of their agents soon enough.

It was time to move.

Signalling to Lambda and Tsan he paused on a section of a bridge going across a smaller industrial section of the massive underground construct. “Send an order through the ranks, begin the disassembly of the entire base, anything which can be taken, the library, the forges, the resources, take it. By tomorrow I expect the main features of this base to be disassembled and prepared for movement, along with the entire work and defence teams. After we have set up base in our new location we can bring the rest of the facilities machinery and materials with us.”

The two machine ponies nodded, but looked slightly perturbed, “Where shall we go Lord Father? Do you have a location in mind?”

Scalpel nodded, “I do, but I’ll have to give it further consideration in my study, I think it will be suitable to our situation however. Prepare a mass transport circle with the unicorn horn grindings in Sector B2’s Warehouse, We’ll need to leave here fast…” His eyes flickered side to side suspiciously “I also believe our old friend is watching us, further activities here may endanger both the project and my life. As tempting as Amaretto’s offer is, with this betrayal I am not willing to risk further dealings with unknown sources, cut him loose.”

The two ponies nodded in affirmation, before Tsan asked, “what about the other Scholar father?”

Scalpels brow furrowed slightly, “I gave my word on Dr Lens’ safety, not his. Have him processed into a containment sphere. That will serve as an adequate message for the Scholars on the price of failure.”

“As you will father.” Both ponies saluted and bowed, before turning for different sections of the facility to oversee their various duties. 

“As for all of you” Scalpel addressed the Jaeger unit, “You performed excellently, I am proud of your efficiency in the field. Follow me to the Inner Sanctum and deposit the bodies in my personal Lab space, I’ll need them in the work that I’ll be doing tonight. After which return to your posts and assist with the disassembly of the facility, I expect you to be in the Sector B2 Warehouse tomorrow.” 

***

Several looted corpses later, he appeared to be somewhat closer to the truth of the situation than he had been an hour ago. As far as he could tell, the main goals of this group of Inquisitors mainly settled on providing backup to one of their agents, and for the capture of Dr Lens solely with all others to be completely expendable.

 The main essence of their orders seemed to be in code, but Scalpel’s brother had been in the Inquisition, and he himself had been privy to many of their secrets, so it proved unchallenging to decode. Most of it was the usual spy work, updates on location, observations, times and dates of meetings ect, but through it he had been able to conclude a few certain details. 

The Inquisition had infiltrated the Scholar organisation in order to coerce Prof. Prancer into assisting them with the capture of a certain Silver Sweeper, one of the Alicorns which had descended along with Thea onto the earth. Most likely their goal had been similar to his, to use Alicorn material in order to power an Ascension by their leader Twilight Sparkle. He almost chuckled at that, bemused at the thought of her enraged expression at the mission’s utter catastrophic failure. 

“I don’t think so Miss Sparkle…”

As he raked through the document, an immense buzzing and whirring was taking place behind him by the actions of certain advanced Drone Models. Suddenly immense clumping steel feet marched towards his position at a nearby desk and halted. 

“Lord Father” metallic voice called, and Scalpel turned to give the Medical Drone a look of interest. The design was far in advance to the primitive models he had made for the assembly line, instead these creations had been specifically built for advanced medical duties, including the processing of new lieutenants. Much like their primitive cousins, half of the front of their faces had been carved in and replaced with numerous lens and machine eyes made of crystal and steel, leaving one banal looking eye which glowed with purple fire, however their bodies had been the most radically redesigned.

 A huge metallic pack covered most of their middle and back, covered in claw handed arms, scalpels, and various tools of their duties. Other aspects included four flexible pseudo arms which could be used to inject fluids or move and carve up flesh with some claw like grasping tools. Other tools had less specific purposes, including saws, knives and cleavers for more brutal duties, but the majority tended towards more technical purposes. Their hooves, much like the armoured lieutenants, had grasping digits, and the back hooves, stabilisers in order to assist them in a two hooves gait. 

Overall however, they looked like titanic mechanical mosquitoes, coated with viscera and only covered by heavy leather aprons for their operations. They were like something out of a nightmare.

He signalled for the creature to speak after a moments silence, whilst they were not as single minded as the average Worker Drone, they sometimes lacked imitative, and were below the intellectual grounds of his lieutenants. Where they did do well however, was in building his more complex designs, once taught, they never forgot.

“We have analysed the liquid you discovered on the person of the leading agent, as well as blood samples from the subject. All results indicate she has been injected with a highly potent form of the Inquisitors “Truth Serum”, which can render subjects pliable to the whims of the Inquisition, and force out truth where extensive torture might once have been necessary. This however can be countered by mindblocking the information, a self taught practice utilised both by yourself and undoubtedly the Scholars. This type however, seems to dissolve such defences and leave the mind completely vulnerable to Inquisitorial action.”

Scalpel nodded, rubbing his chin with an idle hoof, his usual frown settled across his face, “Interesting… use the sample to discover the exact components of the drug, then begin synthesis of it, we may have need of it in future. As for the moment…” He rose from his chair, and walked towards the prone Dr Lens, stopping before her prostrate position on one the dissection tables, not far from where dozens of other corpses were being processed on their own tables by Scalpels hoofpicked squad of Medical Drones.

He took a good look at her, he admired her fine features, delicate and alluring, her dark blue hair had become undone and now cascaded across her face in waves. He could see how so many might fall for her purely for beauties sake. But he saw through the thin line of beauty and saw the true perfection, her mind, her bright and wonderful mind which had so much to offer to this world, and the tightly protected innocence which it held in his eyes.

For a moment he almost considered casting aside his worries and fear and welcoming her back unharmed…

 for a moment he considered that they might be more than this, that he might not need to do this… 

For a moment he looked down at those lips and wished he could taste them on his own.

He could not deny he had become enamoured with this mare… but she had failed him… 

And now he needed to know the full extent of the rot within her organisation. 

His face, so often hard and unforgiving collapsed under its own rigid weight, turning sorrowful and confused. For a moment he was no longer the Doctor, the callous monster which history would name him as, but a lost, solitary and lonely creature, consumed by shadow and desperate for any small compassion out of a world of so much hatred and cruelty.

He raised a hoof and slowly stroked a rogue lock of hair of out her vision, and his horn lit up with a spell.

“Forgive me Lens…” a small droplet of water fell upon her cheek, and then another.

“Forgive me…”

“I must know.”