Book Three: Uncertain Days
Chapter Seven
On Eqqus, the enemy had attempted the same blindside maneuver on Canterlot that they were pulling in New York. Even as the Royal Guard was engaging the Orc and Changeling forces west of Manehatten, a pair of massive airships appeared, seemingly from nowhere, and opened fire on the capitol city. The carnage was terrible. But not as bad as it might have been...
Two days before, while discussing the possibility of a sneak attack on Canterlot and how to handle it, while Luna and Celestia had traveled to Earth to retreive the weapon General Morton had requisitioned, several high ranking ponies had begun the evacuation. It was done carefully, quietly, to avoid drawing any possible attention. By the time the attack came, the city and castle were empty.
"Princess?" Morton asked as he watched through his field glasses. They were observing from a hill side several miles to the south.
"Indeed General. Whenever you are ready." Celestia replied.
"Code is go." Morton spoke into a handheld radio. "Repeat: Code is Go."
In the skies above, the crews commanding the airships were beginning to realize something was wrong. There should have been defenders; pegasai, cannon fire, the Princesses themselves. But there was nothing. No signs of civilians fleeing in terror either. Something was very wrong. And then they heard the roar. Faint, at first, and far away, but approaching rapidly from the far side of the castle.
By the time they saw, it was too late. General Morton's weapon. An A10 Thunderbolt. If the ship's crews had reacted faster, if they had realized what they were facing, they might have saved themselves. As it was, explosive shells, enchanted further with explosive spells, tore into both ships at forty two hundred rounds per minute. The airships were falling from the sky in seconds as the warplane roared away and began to bank, turning back in case another pass was needed.
"Impressive." Luna said.
"Thank you." Morton held the radio to his mouth. "Good work. Stay sharp in case more of them show."
"Copy that General."
It was an important part of the Princesses expectations that when the first wave of the enemy's sneak attack failed another would come. But the minutes stretched into an hour, then two, and there was nothing. Then, word came from the troops fighting west of Manehatten, that the enemy there was pulling back, even though they had still been advancing slowly.
"Yes." Luna said, noting the expression on Morton's face, "It's too easy."
"Much too easy." Morton agreed.
"What are you two saying?" Celestia asked.
Luna answered, "I think... I think we did take them by surprise here, with Morton's warplane. They really did think they would have us on the back hoof with the attack on Canterlot, and we dealt them a blow they were not prepared for. But for the assault on Manehatten to be abandoned when it was working..."
"Yeah, I doubt one A10 would have scared off an entire army that big." Morton agreed.
"Then they've already adapted their plans to compensate?" Celestia suggested. "A foe that can alter plans so quickly will be hard to meet."
"We should delay the return to Canterlot." Luna said. "And move the Manehatten defenders closer to the city itself. If our enemy can indeed simply appear anywhere as they did here..."
Celestia shook her head wearily. "I'll send the orders."
XXXXX
Evening came, and with it Pinkie's 'Cheer Everyone Up' Party. It was more needed than ever, with the news of the attacks on New York and Canterlot. Octavia played softly, and while there was a significant crowd and the tables were filled, no one was dancing. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised." Pinkie whispered. Her mane was deflated. "I'm down too after all."
"We all are Pinkie." Applejack said, and everyone else at the table nodded or mumbled their agreement.
"At least people did come though." Pinkie decided. Her mane poofed slightly, and she bounced away to socialize with another table.
"And that's Pinkie for you." Twilight chuckled. "Nothing keeps her down for long."
"Eenope."
Pinkie bounded up to a table where Trixie, Durban, and Gillas the Elf were seated, along with Macintosh and Bethany. "Everything good?" She asked.
"We are well." Gillas answered. "But thank you."
Trixie scoffed. "'Well' he says. Will you look at these two?" She motioned to the couple, both of whom looked ill at ease.
"Aye." Durban agreed, barely concealing laughter.
"Yeah Mac! Just do it!" Pinkie cheered.
"Am I missing something?" Gillas asked, confused.
Pinkie looked him in the eyes and answered, flat out in front of everyone, "Mac's ready to propose and has the ring and was going to do it tonight and they both know it and the nervousness is killing them so they're sitting there shaking like leaves."
Pinkie!!" Applejack shouted from the next table.
"You're welcome." Pinkie said to Macintosh, and stood back, eyes huge.
"She ain't wrong Beth." Mac said, producing the ring. "Will y'all..."
"Do you have to ask!?" Beth exclaimed, and they embraced to the cheers of all the nearby tables...
XXXXX
Meanwhile, Tess was standing against the wall on the opposite side of the gymnasium. A slight grin tugged at her lip when she heard the cheer and knew what it had to mean, but she was too distracted to pay it much heed. Distracted by her work with the code Krel and the Doctor had extracted from the Mordor nanites. Seven hundred thousand lines of code had seemed daunting, but most of it was concerned with the core operating system and drivers for the moving parts. Only a small fraction dealt with what she was trying to determine, namely, just exactly what the things were supposed to be looking for.
Tess knew that the devices were made to seek out a magic field with a particular resonance. That they would then burrow into the rock until they found it. Rock solid and molten both, the nanites were heat resistant enough to function in lava for at least a short time. Based on the code, they would burrow until they reached the signature, which apparently was expected to be in the form of individual atoms, gather those atoms, and return them to the surface for collection.
"But what for?" Tess mumbled to herself for the thousandth time, "And what exactly is so special about that particular resonance?"
She looked to her left at the sound of a clatter and saw the Crusaders (All of them, original trio, new pony members, and even the honorary human, changeling, and goblin members,) coming out a door pushing a cart. The kids had begged Pinkie to let them assist when they learned about the party, so she had put them to work bussing tables. Tess watched as they fussed with the cart, the wheels of which were not cooperating with them.
"Why won't this thing move!?" Scootaloo exclaimed.
"It's these tiny little wheels." Apple Bloom answered. "They jam up if'n ya run over a dust mote."
"Well why do they make them so small then?" Nyma asked as she pushed along with Scootaloo and Micheal Phelps, getting nowhere.
"I'm guessin' they're cheap. More bits 'fer the makers." Bloom replied.
"Maybe you should stop pushing so hard until we find the problem." Sweetie Belle said.
"No way! I'm not letting this thing win!" Scootaloo argued.
Following Scootaloo's lead, the Crusaders gave another hard shove. The cart responded, rolling smoothly at last. For five feet. Then the wheels seized up hard again and the cart itself stopped on a dime, but the plates and glasses atop it did not. Seeing what was going to happen, everyone present, Tess included, dived to catch as many of the breakable items as they could. They managed to save most of it, but one plate fell to the wood gym floor and shattered.
"Thanks Miss Fairwind." Dinky said to Tess as the elf handed back the plate and glass she had caught.
"That's okay. I just wish I'd been able to grab that one too." They all looked down on the broken plate.
"Wow there's like a million pieces." Nyma said.
"Eeyup." Apple Bloom agreed. "Hay Sweetie Belle, I don't suppose there's a unicorn spell for fixin' it?"
"None that I know." Sweetie Belle answered.
"What about you Miss Tessindra? Any elf magic for mending broken things back together?" Apple Bloom looked up and saw that Tess was staring into the distance, eyes wide. "Tess?"
"Oh my god." The elf whispered, and bolted away into the crowd...
XXXXX
People had finally started dancing after the proposal. Twilight had accepted a dance offer from Midnight Steel. The stallion proved to be a skilled dance partner, and the pair were still chatting as they made their way through the crowds back towards the table Twilight was sharing with her friends. "So you and the Sheriff have been preparing for the possibility of an attack here?" Twilight asked.
Steel nodded. "Yeah. We've installed armory substations all over town with keys in the hands or hooves of every guard. And we've got Mister Gumbal making as many of those molatov bombs as he can... Though, for that matter, Bert wants to weaponize that lightning jar design he saw you make."
"That could be tricky. The enchantment wears off pretty fast, so they couldn't be stored long term in a primed and ready- Oh! Hello Tess!"
"Twilight, I need to speak with you right now." Tess said.
Seeing the worry in the young elf's eyes, Twilight excused herself from Steel and led the girl outside. "What's wrong?"
"I think I've figured it out. I think I know what they're doing with the nanites in Mordor. And it's worse than I ever imagined."
"Okay calm down... Tell me."
"So, it's like this... You know how, whenever an item is enchanted, it gains a unique magical resonance? And also how, if the enchantment is strong enough to be permanent, the resonance persists, in the shattered pieces, even if the object is destroyed?" At Twilight's nod of understanding, Tess continued, "So, Mordor... They're looking for a particular resonance, and they're doing it using nanites able to collect individual atoms... Twilight, I think they're after all the atoms the Ruling Ring was made from. I think they plan to reforge the thing once they have them all."
But... But that's... That's insane! Do you realize how hard it would be to find every single atom!? It's been ten thousand years! They'd be scattered all through the mountain's interior by now!" Twilight argued.
"Yes, even with the nanites it would probably take centuries." Tess agreed. "But then again, who knows how long they've been at it. If I remember right, one of the things we heard their leader say was that they were dumping the last shipment on the mountain..."
"She did say that." Twilight remembered. The mare's eyes were wide now, but she shook her head and said "But wait. Even if they did do this seemingly impossible thing and got the ring back, would it even work? It was tied to Sauron's life force after all. His presence gave it power, and in turn it maintained his presence. Surely..."
"Surely a reforged ring won't yank Sauron's soul back from the abyss after ten thousand years? I hope not. But what if it does? And even if it doesn't... Twilight, they've been working on this plan, devoting resources to it, for a very long time. And evil isn't necessarily stupid. They would have thought of these objections too, yet they went ahead, which means they're confident it will work in some way." Tess said.
"You're right." Twilight agreed. "We need to be worried."
"So what do we do?"
There's no sense in causing a panic. We'll let the dance play out, shouldn't be much more than an hour now. If you'll keep watch here and catch my friends when they come out, and also Aja and Krel, maybe see if one of them can get the Doctor, I'll teleport to Arcadia and get Blinky and the Trollhunters. Once we're all together, we'll go speak with Gandalf and the other wizards. Whatever Gandalf's plan is, it's supposed to ready no later than tomorrow morning anyway. Hopefully they'll finally tell us what's up." Twilight said.
"Okay, that's a good plan." Tess took several deep breaths, calming herself. "Let's do it.
"Okay. I'll be back soon." Twilight smiled and teleported away...