“… Then we check in with the Mayor of Stalliongrad and make sure our permits are in order. Then we see what documentation we can look at and go over it. Then --”
“Come on, Egghead,” Rainbow Dash groaned from where she lay sprawled on one of the couches in the train car, “Only you could make exploring a Pre-Princesses ruin boring!”
“Temper, girls,” Revan jumped in before Twilight could voice the annoyed reply that was showing on her face, “We’re almost to Stalliongrad, so let’s remember that we’re all friends, okay?”
“Sorry, Twilight.”
“Sorry, Rainbow.”
“Better,” the twi’lek nodded approvingly at the two ponies, “Now, how about explaining why you brought me along on this little adventure, Twi’? I know that keeping RD away from a chance to play ‘Daring Do’ would take chains and a gag, but why’d you invite me?”
“Oh, that’s simple,” Twilight replied as she brushed a bit of her mane out of her face, “You’ve told us about your prior experiences dealing with ancient tombs and underground ruins, so you were a logical choice. And, well, we’ve barely seen you for the last few weeks …”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” Revan apologized, as a quick burst of shame heated her face, “Working on this school and trying to train the Princesses in the Force is really eating up my time, I didn’t mean to ignore you girls.”
Rainbow flapped over to casually hoof the Jedi in the shoulder, “Hey, ponies get wrapped up in things, we’re cool.”
Revan bobbed her head in thanks for the mares’ understanding, then quickly changed the subject, “Do you really think you found something that everyone else missed, Twi’?”
“Not missed,” Twilight corrected, her face aglow with the joy of academic discovery, “But lacked the necessary information to find. While I have every confidence in the expertise of the archeologists who investigated Asphodel, they did not have access to the Crystal Empire’s archives, and I’m ninety-eight percent certain that there is a lower level that has been concealed from ponykind since Discord’s reign.”
Rainbow and Revan exchanged smiles at the unicorn’s enthusiasm, but the Jedi felt a moment of caution was in order, “You do realize that when folk go and hide away part of an underground complex, they usually have a reason for it? And long empty caves tend to acquire residents?”
“Of course they had a reason, that’s what I’m hoping we’ll discover,” Twilight tilted her head slightly as she gave her friend a confused glance, “As for monsters or aggressive animals, the Stalliongrad gendarmerie sends patrols through Asphodel specifically to make sure nothing dangerous moves into the complex.”
A long blast of the train’s whistle warned the three friends that they were approaching their stop, and sent them for their bags.
________________________________________
The bitter cold of Stalliongrad in late autumn left the twi’lek and two ponies chilled to the bone and deeply grateful for the blazing fireplace as they stood in Mayor Visionary Forge’s office. “All of your permits seem to be in order, Emissary Tvilight,” the red earth pony stallion rumbled through his massive mustache, “Is there anything else my office can be doing to assist you?”
“Thank you, Mayor,” the unicorn replied pleasantly, although her ears had flattened some at being addressed as “Emissary”, “Could you please provide us with copies of any maps, notes or schedules you might have for Asphodel? It would help us narrow our search area.”
Visionary stroked his mustache in thought for a moment, then nodded, “Da, I can be doing that. It vould be best if you finished your vork quickly, however, veatherpatrol will be bringing in first snows next veek. There is an empty office just down hall, my secretary, Dusk Crown, vill bring papers to you there.”
________________________________________
“Bored,” grumbled Rainbow as the other two poured over the documents Dusk Crown had provided, “Bored, bored, boredy mcbored.”
Unimpressed, Twilight pushed a small stack of papers over to the pegasus, “Just look for any patterns, Rainbow,” seeing Revan’s raised brow, she leaned over and whispered, “Trust me, Rainbow is actually really good at this.”
The quite rustling of papers and scratching of pens filled the room for a time, when Rainbow jerked up from her slouch, “Uh, fillies?”
“What’s up, RD?”
“I found that pattern Twi’ wanted,” Rainbow frowned down at her papers, “I’m just not sure what it means.”
“Show us,” Twilight urged as she and Revan moved around the table to join the pegasus.
“Well, I was looking at these patrol schedules, and I noticed that they all leave one part of the ruin uncovered,” Rainbow pulled over a map and pointed to an isolated, unremarkable chamber deep within Asphodel, “Right here, see?”
“I’ll be buggered,” the Jedi breathed, before flashing a wide grin at the weatherpony and clapping her on the shoulder, “You found it RD!”
“Great job, Rainbow,” Twilight agreed as she affectionately shoulder bumped the pegasus, “If somepony is going to all this effort to surreptitiously maneuver the gendarmerie patrols away from that room, than that is where we’ll start looking for the door to the lower level!”
________________________________________
Blearily trying to rub the sleep out of her eyes, Twilight sat down at the small table her friends had claimed and gave the waitress her breakfast order along with a groggy smile and a massive yawn.
“Serves you right,” Rainbow teased the unicorn, “You could have just given that secretary pony back the papers, but no, you had to stay up talking to him when we’re hoping to make an early start.”
“I know, I’m sorry,” Twilight’s apology was interrupted by another yawn, “It’s just Dusk Crown was so interested in my theories and research, and I got carried away.”
“Don’t worry about it, Twi’,” Revan replied as she casually swiped a piece of peppery haysausage off of Rainbow’s plate, drawing an indignant “Hey!” from the pegasus, “Finding someone who has both the wits and the education to really follow what you’re talking about is bound to sidetrack you a little.”
Rainbow frowned across the table at the Jedi, “Did you just call us dumb?”
“Only in comparison to Twilight.”
“Oh, well that’s okay, then,” Rainbow shrugged in agreement, then leaned protectively over her breakfast and mock growled at Revan as she jabbed her fork at the Jedi’s plate, while the twi’lek smirked in response and raised her own fork in turn.
“You two are as bad as the Crusaders,” Twilight sighed as she watched her friends’ clowning for a few moments, before she prudently moved her own plate away from the field of battle.
________________________________________
“So what’s the intel on this place, anyway?” Revan asked as the trio made their way deeper into Asphodel’s tunnels, the glow emanating from Twilight’s horn lighting their way.
“The current theory is that Asphodel started out as a mine and storehouse, although we don’t know who built it, as it predates Stalliongrad’s construction by several centuries,” Twilight explained happily, “During Discord’s reign, portions of the complex were converted by different groups of refugees to serve as living spaces and shelters from the rampant pandemonium outside. Unfortunately a chaos storm buried the entrance and reshaped the immediate surroundings, sealing it away until it was rediscovered eight years ago by Jubilee Dasher and Diamond Snow.”
“Mines and stores, huh? What where they digging for?”
“Gold, iron, copper and gems, mostly,” the unicorn replied, “Although there were a few mana crystal deposits, as well.”
“I dunno, Twi’, seems like a lot of tunnels just for some mines and a few storage rooms,” Rainbow remarked as she looked around at the shadowed, echoing galleries that stretched on and on.
“Some of the tunnels and chambers where dug by the refugees,” Twilight admitted, “But Asphodel is still one of the largest mines in Equestria, even if it is mostly exhausted now. Ah, here we are,” the unicorn smiled as she led her friends into an empty chamber that looked the same as all the others that they had passed, “Now we can begin searching for the concealed door,” she continued, rubbing her hooves together eagerly.
“Wait a second,” Revan requested as she rummaged in the pouches on her belt. Pulling out a pair of small tubes, she slapped them forcefully against her other hand, causing them to begin radiating a green light, “Here, RD,” she added as she held out one of the glowing tubes for the pegasus.
For the next two hours the only sound was an occasional murmured query or remark as the twi’lek and the two ponies scoured the small chamber from end to end, before they finally gathered back in the center of the room to compare their findings. “So we’re pretty certain that the northern portion of the eastern wall is the door,” Twilight summarized, “And the two catches to open it are over here,” she waved a hoof at the north wall.
“Makes sense,” Revan observed, “If you have multiple catches that have to be worked at the same time, you don’t have to worry about someone coming along and triggering it by accident like in all those campy holoshows.”
“Well what are we waiting for?” Rainbow asked as she eagerly trotted over to one of the hidden catches, while her friends quickly followed after, pausing only to pull a small glowstone lantern from Twilight’s saddlebags to replace the dying glow sticks.
Reaching out their hooves and nodding their heads in a quiet count, Rainbow and Twilight each pushed on part of the wall, their hooves sinking almost an inch into the stone. Without a sound a section of the back wall slid backwards and then moved off to the side, leaving a tunnel deeper into the earth exposed.
Eagerly slipping through the doorway, the three friends found a lever just beyond that sent the stone slab ghosting back into place on silent counterweights when pulled. “Someone is definitely using this passage,” Revan said as she crouched down to examine the tunnel floor, “The tracks for the secret door have been cleared.”
“Oiled too,” Rainbow added as she and Twilight wrinkled their noses at the faint odor.
As they looked around the tunnel, Twilight began to bounce in place while an excited smile threatened to swallow her muzzle, “We did it, we did it, we did it! We found a lost site of the ancient world! Just like Professor Do!” the unicorn and pegasus grabbed each other in a joyful hug, too caught up in the moment to care about how they looked as they celebrated.
“Congratulations, girls,” the Jedi added, as she threw an arm around each mare’s neck, “But don’t forget that someone is using these tunnels and trying to be stealthy about it, so let’s be careful, okay?”
The two ponies having calmed down, the trio headed down the slopping tunnel deeper into the complex, with Rainbow carrying the lantern as she slowly flew alongside her land bound friends.
As the little band passed empty chamber after empty chamber, many with their stone doors hanging open, Rainbow began to grumble irritably around the lantern handle in her mouth. “I know, Rainbow,” Twilight sighed, “It looks like looters have already plunder this portion of Asphodel. If we’re lucky, they haven’t stolen everything, and we might even be able to gain some idea of who they are so that we can alert the authorit--”
The librarian’s words were cutoff with a surprised yelp as the wall and floor opened up and three diamond dogs lunged out to seize her and drag the mare back into their tunnel! Revan latched onto Twilight and was drug along with her, while Rainbow charged the tunnel only to find her way blocked by a shield of green magic as the tunnel filled in behind the diamond dogs and her friends.
Dropping the lantern, Rainbow angrily kicked the newly sealed tunnel, “Give me back my friends, you buckheads!” When a few more kicks did nothing more than hurt her hoof, Rainbow scooped up the lantern and flew down the tunnel, determined to find her companions and the plotheaded nags who had just made the massive mistake of foalnapping them.
________________________________________
As she plunged down the steep incline Revan smashed into Twilight, the impact tore the unicorn from her captor’s paws and sent them both tumbling out into the room below. Rolling to her feet, the Jedi whipped out her blaster and lightsaber, the blade’s iridescent glow illuminated the chamber to reveal a motley collection of diamond dogs, scruffy looking ponies, gryphons and … changelings?
“W-what is going on?” Twilight stuttered in confusion as she scrambled to her hooves, her legs still wobbly from her tumble.
Revan moved to stand guard over the disoriented unicorn as she glared balefully out at the surrounding mob, “Looks like an abduction.”
“Right you are, lass,” a golden-headed gryphon nodded in agreement, then pointed his claw at the pair, “Get the unicorn!”
Two of the changelings ignited their horns as a dark brown earth pony mare dropped with a wet cough, drilled through her chest by Revan’s first shot, while a diamond dog yelped and grabbed his shoulder as he was hit by a second blaster bolt. Then the press of bodies was too thick for the Jedi to take more than the occasional snap shot as she concentrated on her saber work.
Pressed from all side, Revan constantly spun and twisted as she weaved through the mob, warding off the unicorns’ and changelings’ magic bolts and guarding herself and Twilight from their attacks as she fended away the throng, leaving severed limbs and broken bodies in her wake, while the librarian raised shields of her own and unleashed blast after blast of magenta magic that slammed their attackers back into walls or sent them sprawling with its concussive force.
One of the diamond dogs slipped around Twilight’s shield and reached out to scoop up the unicorn, only to have his cry of triumph cut short as Revan leapt back and swept his head from his shoulders.
‘All too easy,’ the Jedi thought as she rampaged through the enemy ranks, leaving two more lying on the cavern floor, ‘Twi’ and I’ll tear through this lot like a bunch of cheap clankers, and then we’ll go find Rainbow.’ She tossed a quick glance at the pair of changelings, their horns still ablaze with green magic, that had held back from the melee so far, before turning to plunge back into the fray, an unpleasant laugh burbling from her lips.
“Revan!” Twilight shouted, her frantic cry echoing through the chamber as the clatter of hooves heralded the arrival of another eight changelings. Whipping around, the twi’lek saw the unicorn desperately trying to hold off the swarm that threatened to overwhelm her, ‘When did … Why did I separate from Twi’?’ Revan saw one of the changelings give her an ugly smirk, ‘The bastards where in my mind!’ The changeling barked an order and Revan’s opponents pulled away, leaving the Jedi exposed and cutoff from Twilight.
No longer constrained by the risk of hitting their fellows, the reinforced changelings brought their numbers to bear, with half of them blasting the twi’lek directly, while the rest turned their magic against the chamber ceiling. Twilight’s pained cry of “Revan!” was swallowed by the rumble of the falling stones as the roof came crashing down and buried the Jedi.
Damn! That was intense!
7180219 Well, fancy meeting y' here, ol' Seb!
I wonder why would Revan aim for forelimbs? Attacking creatures wield no lightsabers, cutting off forelimbs has little "stopping power", and she seems to have little interest in either torturing her opponents or keeping them alive/minimizing damage done to them.
7881669 Actually, that's because forelimbs are what most of the attackers are using for weapons, there for this is the simplest way to disarm them ( yes, that's a horrible pun, I know).
Secondly, while Revan's normal fighting style involves a lot of agility and finesse, it is not elegant. Over the years, Revan has learned a very brutal fighting style that boils down to "hack them apart until they stop moving".
Thirdly, that's just the way I wrote the fight
7882173
Sorry, I haven't made my point clear above.
She doesn't need to disarm anybody when just cutting them in half is faster and easier --- not elegant but effective (under assumptions that they have no way to block lightsaber, and she doesn't need them alive). Examples from the movies are jedi fights with regular battle droids and Vader killing separatists leaders.
Ironically, it your own text both cases of targeting forelimbs get Revan in trouble: width diamond dog it makes Revan waste time for second decapitating blow (here she gets away with it) and with gryphon it leads to her eventual defeat.
7884353 Hmmm ... yeah, in hindsight, just a straight decapitation of the diamond dog would have worked just as well ...
As for the gryphoness ... in my defense, even if Revan had impaled or decapitated her (or tried to bisect her, even) all of that mass and momentum would still have been there, so Revan would still have been knocked away from Twilight.
And, well, what I had in my head required Revan to lose that particular fight, so ... Deus Ex Machnia for the bad guys?
7884905
She could evade, jump over, use force push...
Probably this puzzle has a solution, and it could be found if we write down all constraints explicitly:
A. Revan should loose but stay alive. Bad guys should not found the body, but believe she is dead, and capture Twilight.
B. Bad guys are not supermen, i.e. maybe experienced combatants, but not even close to Revan, not archmages, reasonably smart, reasonably brave.
C. Trick bad guys used should not be useful in the second fight.
D. Trick should be simple enough for bad guys to come up during the fight.
E. Revan is a great surprise for bad guys --- they have no prior knowledge of her capabilities.
Looks like A practically guarantees ceiling collapsing as final part. Assuming B we may safely say that key part of the trick should be something Revan has no prior experience dealing with --- not melee attacks (their weapons are much worse then lightsaber, mercenaries would run away after first few bodies cut into pieces), not magic blasts (little difference from blaster), probably not something having close Force-based equivalent. That leaves out spells and magic abilities, but probably not ones that are often used in fights between equestrians (or Revan would knew about them from Twilight or royal guards, or Twilight would just used counter-action). B and C and D rule out all really creative ways of using magic. So, a few ideas:
1. Use bright flash of light to blind Revan (blinds own troops too, unicorns could probably recognize each other magic and close eyes, trick works one time).
2. Some mind-base changeling magic attacks based on Revan's fear of dark side (equestrians know little about changeling magic).
3. Throw with telekinesis bunch or relatively small rock at Revan so she could not deflect them all (unicorns usually use shield, in second fight Revan can heal faster than receive damage).
4. Pegasus tornado with rubble inside.
5. Transfigure oxygen inside cave into nitrogen (useless not in caves, probably too advanced).
...
7887642 First, please don't take this as a criticism, but you seem really interested in getting around the whole limb-loping thing ...
Second, would you mind going back to your post and spoiler-tagging any references to mercenaries, Revan surviving the fight or to what happens in the second fight? I don't want to ruin anything for future readers who may follow the comments.
Now, let's get to work
Concern A) Letting the gryphoness get close enough for a decapitating shot to be viable would mean letting her get almost to Revan, resulting in a ridiculously small amount of time in which to evade/deflect/etc. the resulting corpse. Revan is damn good at what she does (and I have her old character sheet to prove it ), but would there realistically be enough time for her to react? (Realistically as in the readers are unlikely to call "BS" on it.)
Concern B) Destroying the poor gryphoness' moment of glory (Truthfully, I'm willing to just give her a brave death in battle or possible even erase that portion of the fight entirely if we can come up with a better alternative ...)
Maybe yes, maybe no. In both history and fiction it depends on the personalities of the mercs involved. There have been some who would actually stick to their guns even harder than national troops, whether from blood lust, pride, or honor. These mercs seem to be pretty dedicated to their contract.
Has possibilities, especially if Revan gets hit by multiple flashes at once ... It's probably a standard tactic for unicorn guardponies, but it is definitely viable ...
Ooh, nasty. We know Chrysalis has direct mind control, and projective empathy wouldn't be an unreasonable combat trick for an emovore ... Maybe heighten Revan's overconfidence, blood lust, or even fear to get her to break ranks with Twilight? I can see it ...
It would have to be a lot of rocks to get past the standard Jedi/Sith auto-block talent ... Unfortunately, they are in an underground chamber rather than a natural cave, so loose rocks are in short supply.
Actually, it wouldn't even need rubble, just use the vortex to yank Revan into position for the changelings to gun her down ... The question is how many non-Rainbow Dashs would you need to physically move someone?
Wouldn't that screw them all over equally? And that is probably not something to do on the fly.
I appreciate your interest, but I think any major changes to this chapter should wait for my "The Story is Finished" final edits, but you definitely have me thinking about it now.
7887739
More like reducing number of WTF moments I hope.
Revan is not obligated to use only "cut and then evade" strategy --- cut after evading for example. She is even not obligated to cut the gryphoness at all. We can only guess what would be the best course of action for superhuman with magical fire-stick but there is pretty general argument that I missed last time and that should be added to constraints: in the universe where jumping at is an efficient strategy to defeat jedi probability of Revan surviving her previous adventures is infinitesimal. So my suggestion #1 goes to hell too.
Argument about running away is of course not decisive, but we should penalize a bit prior probabilities of universes where they don't run away.
Or, more generally, use some specific abilities of creatures that are little known about. Add one dragon to bad guys for example (dragons are likely to be resistant to lightsaber and blaster since they use volcano as bathtub). Limitation is: it should work only first time for some reason, i.e. be surprise or be defeatable by dark side.
Hmm, for some reason I thought that they are still in diamond dog tunnels.
I haven't required it to be powerful enough to move someone, but generalizing from "Hurricane Fluttershy" episode it actually is not so unreasonable: Rainbow Dash has 16.5 wingpowers and claims that physically fit pegasus should have at least 10. 800 wingpowers were enough to lift full pond that is (assuming ~20 meters in diameter and half-sphere shape) is more that 1000 tons of water. But tornado inside the cave ...
Suggestions #3 and #4 (although they are close to share #1's fate) fall under pattern "use something that works like a very big birdshot shotgun", so it hard to block with lightsaber but no problem for unicorn shield and inflicts not very great damage (to be countered with healing in the next fight). Maybe there is a spell that does exactly that instead of a single blast.
Casters would be close to the edge of nitrogen bubble and can hold breath (which give them a few minutes of useful consciousness instead of < 10 seconds). Also, drawing analogy from earth burrowing mammals, diamond dogs should be able to sense decreasing oxygen saturation and withstand it for a bit longer. But it is really bad idea for another reason: it something like this is possible during combat, then the best way to win every fight is to transfigure air into fluorine instead.
Another possible class of ideas: try to use Twilight to put them at disadvantage. Make her stuck at disadvantaging terrain? Or split them and make enemy's mage show Revan illusion of him cutting off a few not very important Twilight's parts and threatening to kill her unless... In that case it is must be made not so clear that bad guys need Twilight alive. Pretty cliche although. Entice Revan into methane pocket?
Full list of constraints look pretty limiting now, so I haven't been able to come up with any new amazingly clever ideas since.
7898178
Actually, a suicide rush can be a legitimate move, even against high power Jedi/swordsman/magic knights/etc., partially because it is such a stupid maneuver that it causes their instincts/training to trip over themselves (so to speak) and creates an opening that wouldn't normally be there.
Still, I can see what your getting at ...
Hmmm ... a teenage dragon would have possibilities (it would have to be a teen to fit in the tunnels, and ignoring for the moment the question of how Thornclaw and Dusk Crown got him to obey orders ...). Likely resistant to lightsabers and immune to blasters, as you said, and strong enough to dragonhandle Revan out into the open. Problematic for the second fight, though.
Currently (and baring someone getting a flash of inspiration) it's looking to me like the whole "projective empathy" route may be the best way to go. Pushing Revan's overconfidence and blood lust to unstable levels would get her to separate from Twilight, but would have no effect during the second fight (since she was operating in a Force rage and on a kill everything mentality at the time anyway).
Biggest problem I currently see is getting it written properly ... this is a fairly subtle situation to describe (especially during a melee), and ... well ... I'm rather weak at subtlety.
I'll start fiddling around a bit and see what I can come up with.
Bad guys look scarily competent like this. Cool!
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