LV-426 was a graveyard.
No, that's not the right word. Graveyard implies bodies, corpses, the buried or unburied dead. That wasn't the case.
It might've actually been better. Easier to process if there had been bodies, damage, some blatantly overt sign of a struggle. But the place was...peaceful. As peaceful as anywhere currently under the largest sand storm in recorded history could be, at any rate. Six and eight wheeled heavy cargo wagons parked in a neat little row, some of the larger standing shoulder high at the wheel hub, massive, imposing transports used to move the tons of supplies a setup like this consumed so ravenously. A wall of grit roaring and sheeting against them in a horizontal blitz.
We'd seen the wall of dust from miles off. It stretched from horizon to horizon before us, and reached in whorls and spinning eddies of mustard yellow and pale brown several thousand feet into the air. Moving almost like a living thing, thousands of tons of fine grit must've been airborne, abrading and polishing smooth anything it touched. Sanding wood smooth, polishing metal to a mirror sheen. Flaying unprotected skin as surely and swiftly as any blade.
We were spared the worst of its effects. Solstice, in yet another display of laudable foresight, had recommended changing out our standard guard issue armor for layers of long, loose fitting robes, cleverly designed to keep the worst of the sand out, and yet breathable enough not to bake us. She had similarly advised trading in the heavy steel of our ceremonial helms for tight fitting shielded sun/sand goggles. She'd taken the time to read the patrol reports from the last several Guard contingents to head this way, some of those reports being several centuries old. She done this on her own, a decision I can say without too much shame hadn't even occurred to me. Her diligence was a testament to her ability and wisdom.
Once it had become apparent that there was no external signs of life, the squad split up into pairs and swept into town, using the billowing sand to mask their approach as they fanned out to preform a detailed search. The ear pieces, which Solstice had dubbed communication, or com links, buzzed and clicked in our ears, occasionally letting loose unsettling moans and drawn out warbles of unnatural noise.
According to her, this interference was probably caused by the storm. Knowing the cause of the ululating howls, pops and hisses didn't make them any less disconcerting, or make the hair on the back of my neck stand up any less whenever one of the more voluminous shrieks came forth. Still, they provided an effective means of coordination, as the traditional shouted orders or hoof gestures weren't exactly applicable in this situation.
Tradition dictated that I, as the senior field officer, waited at the edge of town with my primary NCO, until we received an all clear from the search pairs. Less then a week into my promotion, and already it rankled. I wanted nothing more then to BE one of those search pairs, the concept of 'Lead from Behind', was anathema to me, smacking of command failure and general incompetent cowardice. Still, this was back when I still respected the, 'Proud, Ceremonial Traditions', so I compromised by setting up shop in the center of town, in the lee of the well assembly as the rest of the area was swept.
Say what you will about the general lack of professionalism of some of the miscreants I had command of, but this, at least, they executed with skill and aplomb. With little more then faint, muttered words and directions, they had fanned out. From my position in the center of the small cluster of buildings, I occasionally glimpsed their dark shapes moving spectrally through the airborne grit, barely there silhouettes just visible beyond the striated brown and yellow wall, the sounds of their movement drowned out by the ceaseless howl of the roaring wind that tugged and buffeted against us.
"Sir, we ---- met up at the ma-- ----ance."
A warbling howl distorted this report, to the extent that even now, I'm not entirely certain who it was that called it in. The hissing, shrieking tumult robbing it of any identification. The voice sounded drained and dried, as if even it had been robbed by the moisture stealing sand.
Me and Dusk Shield turned to each other and nodded, even at such a close distance we were little more then heavily swaddled, blurry shapes to one another. The urge to be out of the wind hastened our hoof falls, the anticipation of an end to the roar and the opportunity to shake out at least a bit of the several pounds of grit now working its way into every crease, crack and crevice, as well as the neigh mystical chance at something cool to drink urging us on perhaps a little quicker then decorum dictated.
Any such hopes were quickly dispelled.
Now, in order to portray this correctly, I'll need to explain a bit about these habitats. Fully enclosed, self sufficient hexagons twenty feet wide across the mouth, and a good six or seven times as long. They were modular, each carved from a single, glassy smooth chunk of basalt. Chosen specifically because apparently basalt is magically inert. Completely non responsive to even the most powerful of spike heads. The complex consisted of more then a dozen of these, stacked two high and elevated off the desert floor by a combination of a bit of natural stone and a complex grid of supporting girder work. There was a single entrance, the door facing out towards the well, sheds, and parked wagons.
The door was circular, flat bottomed and built to withstand anything, natural or not that could be thrown at them. They were double beveled, inside and out, and roughly two feet thick through the center. Id heard it said that even if something managed to crush the entire unit, a dragon, for example, the door would be unscathed. Now, I can't speak to the accuracy of that bit of hyperbole, but they were massive, buttressed with reinforced steel and inscribed with archaic runes that were supposedly capable of absorbing any magical energy not deflected by the null black crystal.
The door, all three and a half tons of it, had been knocked clean off its mountings and left lying fifteen feet into the main hallway. The center had been buckled almost to the point of being smashed clean through by a series of half a dozen or so impacts that had hit with force enough to imprint each individual blow into the supposedly impermeable surface. It'd be three months or so before we'd encounter what had caused this damage, but that's a story for another day.
As we stepped in, the wind howling mournfully across the mouth of the main hall, we trudged though drifts of wind blown sand, fine grit that had made it's way inside during the days since this place had been breached. The flows and ebbs of sand looked for all the world like waves frozen in mid swell, the drifts softening all the edges and corners, lending the place a sort of organic feel, as though we were walking through a natural cave...or strolling into somethings digestive tract.
Through the drifts of blown sand, channels had been carved by Duke and Priestess, the two point ponies. Massive and heavily armored, they were the only two in full armor, in full Dreadnaught plate no less. Now, keep in mind, this was before the rise of Discord, the Changeling assault, or even the return of Princess Luna. For close to a thousand years, the Royal Guard had been little more then ceremonial decoration, the closest we'd come to conflict this century being the occasional border spat with the Gryphon Kingdoms, or dealing with the odd resurgence of disgruntled wildlife.
The Tactical Dreadnaught Plate, however, was from a different time. Massive, crenelated like a fortress wall and about as mobile, it was built for the sole purpose of conflict so terrible and all consuming that, at that point, we couldn't even imagine it. The secrets of its construction had been lost over the intervening centuries, and now the few remaining intact suits were handed down from generation to generation, only entrusted to those rare few who showed themselves worthy of its peerless antiquity.
I'd heard, through the random unverifiable appeal of barracks chatter, that the suit currently worn by Duke had, a stretch of centuries before, been pounded flat into the ground under the claw of a rampaging dragon. From which the wearer promptly pulled himself clear of the crater and went on his way. Now, I can't vouch one way or the other about that particular yarn, but following two of those suits in, striding through the furrows they carved as they took up seemingly the entire passage, advancing shoulder to shoulder in perfect tandem, their massive double headed stave's swinging to bear against each wailing murmur or trickle of falling sand, I had to wonder...
My musings were interrupted by the wailing feedback crackle as a comm line opened up. The interference was still bad, but no where near the spontaneous ear bleed inducing bad that it had been outside.
"Sir, we've found...something."
That incredibly useful call in was from the pretty boy who was overly fond of mane dye.
"'Something' is a rather nebulous and vague bit of terminology, Private, try actually describing it."
"I uh...cant. I don't know what it is, but it is...something."
As we worked our way farther into the facility, towards the centrally located medical suite, the constant, scouring rush of the wind slowly faded, the only sign of the turmoil outside the occasional whispering moan which still came to us, accompanied by the rattling and banging metal of the ventilation system. It's distress obvious by the thin, but constant vertical streams of sand that trickled from every third or so of the air ducts we passed under.
Duke stopped for a moment, his massive glaive bisecting one of those vertical streams, fascinated by the way the sand flowed and ran over the oiled metal, running like granulated water. He shook himself out of it, and moved on, with me a few steps in his wake.
"Something", as vaguely annoying as that particular description was, in this case, turned out to be an apt one. What he'd found was unlike anything encountered in over eight centuries of recorded history. It was basically equine in shape, maybe a little smaller then a full grown adult. Its body was covered in a chitinous shell, a resin exoskeleton that was originally a glossy back and green. Clean bore holes of various sizes went clean through the legs and the dagger shaped horn jutting from its forehead. Scaled, insectile wings, or what was left of them at any rate, sprouted from under protective casings on its back. An entire half of its body had been deformed and cracked, ran into globs and streaks where it's exoskeleton had melted and reformed. The buckled and scorched wall and floor panels nearby implied some sort of explosive had been the cause.
"What the hell is this...Solstice, you ever seen anything like this?"
I leaned down over the corpse, inspecting it carefully. I shied away from any physical contact, as, at this point, I hadn't the slightest idea what we were dealing with. That wouldn't last long.
"No. Never even heard of anything matching this description...we might be dealing with a first contact scenario here, sir."
The wonder and excitement in her voice was plain, this kind of situation, being the first to make contact with a whole new species, I knew that the chance for something like this, some world alteringly massive discovery was a big part of the reason she'd enlisted. She met my eyes, the darkness of hers gleaming in the dim light, a huge smile barely restrained.
"Behemoth, this is huge, this may be the first new species discovered in over a century, and if they're intelligent...by Celestia, this could change our entire world!"
Little did I know at the time just how prophetic that statement would turn out to be, and at the time, I'd be lying if I said I didn't share in her enthusiasm, the hairs on the back of my neck standing up at the thought of such a monumental discovery. Still, as the officer, I had to force myself to keep the situation in perspective.
"Maybe, but whatever they are, they've made contact by disappearing several dozen Equestrian citizens, lets keep that in mind. Lets keep moving, we haven't cleared the facility-"
I was cut off by the distinctive fizz-crack of offensive magic being discharged and the sizzling thud of its impact from around the next corner. This is back when I was younger, and a little faster on my hooves, so I was up and half way around that corner before the bawling, air vibrating bass measure roar of Duke reverberated through out the structure.
"CONTACT! CONTACT OUTSIDE THE MED LAB!!"
As I came up on them, moving at the high speed run-hop-flight maneuver that looked ridiculous but ate distance in record time, I saw the tectonic forms of Duke and Priestess, shoulder to shoulder, their heavy glaives down and leveled, pointing at a small, pitch black square opening low in the wall. A two foot square ventilation duct that had been pried open, its bent cover laid a few feet away, having been there long enough to have a hearty coating of the ever present sand.
The sand was cratered and turned to bubbled glass in several spots from the impact of magic, the ozone stink of which wasn't fading in the still air, and a sizzling, blackened spot in the wall marked where another blast had hit, a solid foot or so clear of the opening in question.
"Report."
I took a moment to appraise the situation, long enough for Solstice and the rookie to arrive, then snapped my wing blades back closed with a practiced muscle twitch.
"I came into this corridor sir, and something attacked me. It was massive, a huge dark shape, bigger then Duke, I barely escaped with my life!! I scared it off, and it retreated into this vent!!"
"Duke, did you see what he described?"
Duke was as calm and steady as ever, the sonorous, booming bass of his voice that was such a boon to the Royal Guard choir, came forth as sedately as a rolling tide.
"No, sir. I was in the lab, the corridor was empty and magic had been discharged before I arrived."
His response was what I expected. I looked to the unicorn responsible for the new perforations, the stallion the squad had affectionately come to refer to as 'Twitchy'. That particular nomenclature made perfect sense in the depressingly common situations such as this one. It was Solstice, with her traditional lack of respect for blatant stupidity, that was the first to speak, beating me to the punch by a fraction of a second.
"Whoa whoa whoa, hang on juuuust a second, how big did you say this thing was?"
Twitchy, completely misreading here incredulity, grinned and nodded enthusiastically, pointing to the motionless steel boulder of Duke in silent confirmation.
"Yeah, that's what I thought you said...ok, let me see if I can help you with this..."
"Solstice-"
Having a decent idea what was coming, I was ready to step in and see if I could cut off the savage verbal beating looming on the horizon. A restraining hoof across my shoulder distracted me from continuing.
"Now, hang on a minute, sir, I think we should hear her out."
The look of barely restrained mirth on Dusk Shields face convinced me to withhold my objections. After-all, this did promise to be more then a wee bit amusing.
"Okay Twitchy-"
"Don't call me that, I hate that-"
"Shut up. Now, look at Duke."
Begrudgingly, his enthusiasm wearing off in record time, he complied.
"Good. Now, to the vent. Excellent. Now, back to Duke. The vent. Now, do you see the problem with what you're saying here?"
He continued, looking back and forth between the ponderous mountain of pony flesh and the dark opening Duke would be hard pressed to fit his head, much less the rest of himself into.
"Yeah...but...what're you saying, Solstice, that I made it up? That I...I..."
"That you're a undisciplined, panicky, rookie idiot? No, I'd never say something like that...I'm thinking it really, REALLY loudly, but I'd never come right out and say it..."
"Solstice..."
The warning tone in my voice was enough to pull her attention back around to me.
"See if you can't be a little more...political, eh?"
"Political, yes sir...lets see..."
She cleared her throat, turning back to the now blushed with anger stallion near on twice her size.
"Ok, political. Your obvious lack of self control and well documented penchant for exaggeration calls into doubt the validity of your claims in regards to this situation, as do the laws of physics, which, although they can be vindictive bitches, preclude significant aspects of the incident as you report it."
Silence met her verbose display, first interrupted by the creak of metal as Duke's triple XL head turned to look at me, and the desperate attempts by Dusk Shield to keep his composure. Given the nature of the gurgling and squeaking noises issuing from him, I was worried the stress of containing his mirth might pop one of his various internal organs.
"How was that, sir?"
It was with considerable effort, that I managed to keep a smile off my face.
"That'll do, Corporal. Private."
Flushed beet red with embarrassment, Twitchy nonetheless snapped to a reasonable approximation of attention.
"Go guard the main entrance. Duke, go with him, make sure he doesn't blow any more superfluous holes in this already structurally compromised facility."
They both saluted and moved off. When I turned back, Solstice was already halfway through disrobing, layers of heavy cloth piling up at her hooves. Once she'd finished, she again met my gaze, and answered the silent question it presented.
"Someone's gonna have to go in there sir, makes sense that it'd be me."
"Now, hold on just a minute, as commander, it's my job to-"
"I can't let you go in there corporal, this is clearly a job for an NCO-"
Me and Dusk verbally tripped over each other voicing our objections, which, in traditional Solstice fashion, she completely ignored.
"Same issue as before, sirs, look at the hole, then yourselves. Neither of you are small enough to fit in there. I am. Besides,"
The look she gave me was a subtle recognition that she knew that my objection wasn't merely on the grounds of protocol...and that she appreciated my concern.
"-You are the commander, so even if you could fit in there, which you can't, we couldn't have you risk yourself."
With a sigh, I nodded my acquiescence, she was right, on both counts. An occurrence common enough that a lesser stallion would be infuriated by it.
"Alright, but be careful in there, the only other Guard small enough to get in there is Redshirt, and I'm sure you'd rather not owe your rescue to him."
A quiet, timid and jittery voice rang out from the back of the room, from the scrawny stallion half eclipsed by the form of Priestess, who hadn't moved as much as an inch through these entire proceedings.
"S-sir, I would be alright to...I mean, I could...probably..."
"Just a joke, kid. I'm sure you'd do fine, but anyways Solstice, be careful."
She smiled, and shot me the kind of wink that smacked of inter squad fraternization.
"Of course sir, I'll be back before you know it."
I watched until she had slipped out of sight. I knew she was competent, and more then capable of taking care of herself, but...silently, I couldn't help but worry. Oh, the myriad and glorious joys of being the lord and master of all pessimism. I turned to Dusk to distract myself from my own dark imaginings and at least make a passing attempt at the whole leadership thing.
"Anything to report from the rest of the facility so far?"
"Not a thing, chief, and I mean that exactly how it sounds. There's nothing here. No sign of the crew, no sign of any more of those...whatever the hell they were. There were a few areas of blast damage and scorch marks, I'd say from the use of mining charges and defensive magic, but they're too worn down, too old to be read with any kind of certainty. "
"Blast damage...that implies that the colonists tried to put up a fight, at least. No bodies though?"
"No sir, not a one."
"Then we have exactly forty eight missing ponies here, and no sign of what might've happened to them, besides a single dessicated and heat ravaged corpse of a here too unknown species, which may or may not have anything to do with the disappearance, and some scorch marks, which may or may not be evidence of a fight."
"Yessir, that's about the gist of it."
A wave of uneasiness swept through me. I held my tongue, waiting to speak until the others who'd been drawn by the commotion had left, returning to their respective investigations. When me and the Sergeant were alone, I voiced my concerns.
"I don't like this, Dusk. I don't like this at all. Something is...wrong here. Very wrong. It feels...like we're standing at a crossroads. That we're playing witness to an event we can't comprehend...mark my words old friend, something dark is coming. Something the likes of which we've never seen."
I turned back to him, and for the first, and only time in our long association, I saw a look of trepidation flash across his weather beaten face. A look that was almost...fear.
"Hmph...yeah, I know what you mean, kid. This mission, the colonists, that damn...whatever the hell it is. I get the sinking suspicion we've been sent down a one way road, an those who sent us down it knew that from the get go."
"So...what do we do?"
He laughed, and when I turned back, the roguish, devil may care look I knew so well was back in his eyes.
"We do what we've always done, our damn jobs."
How simple and direct. How brashly brave that short sentence. If I'd known then what we were walking into, I'd have turned this whole patrol around, gone right back to Canterlot and resigned my commission. I'd have gone home, picked up the shattered remnants of my family, and disappeared to some place where the Equestrian Empire had never even been heard of...but this story is about what DID happen, not what could've. What I DID do, not what I should've.
Any further philosophic musings were preempted by a warbling crackle as a com line opened, and the accompanying distorted yet easily recognizable voice of Solstice.
"I've got something here, I'm coming out."
The tone in her voice is hard to describe. It was equal parts concern and excitement, with just a little anticipation thrown in for good measure. It was the tone she used when she'd unearthed some new, unexpected issue. When she'd found a new problem or encountered a new question that'd give her brilliant mind a bit of a work out. It was a fitting tone given the nature of her latest discovery.
Scurrying and scratching could be heard from within the dark duct as the good Sergeant and I rejoined Priestess, who hadn't so much as twitched from her post nearby during the intervening moments. Faintly, from within, I heard Solstices voice, speaking in low, reassuring tones.
"It's okay, it's alright, you don't have to be afraid. Come on, just a little farther..."
It was a little odd to hear her speak in that tone, it just didn't quite fit with the brash young mechanical genius I'd come to know. And love. I suppose even she had a protective, matriarchal quality.
She emerged first, covered in stains and blotches of the unidentifiable filth that accumulated over the years in crawl spaces and ventilation ducts, streaks of it trailing down the length of her frame and mussing her usually orderly mane. Somehow, she always did seem more beautiful smudged with a bit of grease.
The...creature, as we saw it then, which timidly came out in her wake, doing its best to cower behind her, was another matter all together. Jet black, a dull, sheen-less form void of light, it, or, he, as we'd soon discover, was visible only as a silhouette, as a crisp and clean carved equine outline. Imagine a shadow, moving on its own, where its hooves are tied to no living soul, and that will give you a faint idea of what we were looking at here.
To say that myself and Dusk were a little startled would be an impressive feat of understatement, Priestess, however, reacted in a fashion completely belied by her imposing stature. In a series of motions that would've been impressively swift even for a mare not built like the result of a night of angry sex between a field bunker and a locomotive, she'd set aside her weapon, knelt down and un bolted and removed the thirty some odd pound helmet that so often was the only visage she presented. Her coat was the deep, shadowy green of a thick pine forest at dusk. Her face, set upon a tower of muscle and sinew as broad as some trees, was set in a look of gentle compassion that even her shaved head and brutish figure couldn't conceal. She spoke quietly, reassuringly, her voice flowing like a slow moving brook, even as rivulets formed by hours of sweat baking inside her helmet ran down her cheeks and neck. She made slow, ushering motions with a fore hoof, urging him to her chest.
"It's alright, little one, you're alright. Come here, no ones going to hurt you."
The dark figure, still cowering behind Solstice peeked out at this gentle coaxing. It was then that we saw the only bit of him that caught any light. Two dark, featureless pools, reflecting light with a wet sheen. The only parts of him not to seemingly drink in any and all luminescence, were his eyes. He moved slowly at first, then flew out from behind Solstice like a shot, careening into Priestess' armored chest with enough speed to send a slight, tectonic motion through her. She snuggled around him, wrapping him up protectively, still speaking in her low, reassuring tone.
"There you are, there you are. You're okay now, you're safe now..."
She looked up at myself and Dusk Shield, her eyes full of a kindness, a tenderness I'd not see again in any for more then half a decade. Her eyes sharpened a bit, changing slightly.
"Sirs...would you mind pointing those somewhere else."
Although phrased like one, this was anything but a question, and it was at this point, that the good Sergeant and I both noticed that our weapons had instictually tracked our new guest. The subtle shift to the look on Priestess' face let us know that she didn't quite approve, as well as giving us a silent guarantee that if we were foolish enough to move against the colt, she'd, regardless of rank, find new and remarkably unpleasant places to insert our respective weapons. As a silent agreement that we weren't exactly looking forward to being turned into large and oddly shaped popsicles, we lowered our blades.
- - -
Several hours and a monotonous string of negative reports later, I found myself alone in the office space that had once been reserved for the doctor of this frontier outpost. Now, like the rest of the place, it's only denizens were the ever present and everywhere dust, and piles and sheaf's of papers, yellowed and brittle from days or maybe weeks without a functioning climate control system.
The storm had blown itself out shortly after dusk, it's background roar fading so quickly our ears were left ringing by the sudden silence. Sitting there alone, my own breath seemed an obscene roar in the tomb like still that had descended. With ticks, pops, and metallic pings, the structure settled itself after the sustained assault it had survived. Now and again, a faintly heard hissing rush could be heard as one accumulated pocket of wind blown sand or another found its way to vertical freedom.
Stretching and sitting back, I winced as long sedentary muscles protested the sudden movement with a frankly impressive series of creaks and pops. I had just finished the after action report for the day, somewhat over dramatically named in this instance, as there was precious little action to report. If you happen to have a lust for bureaucrat-ese or are a rampaging masochist, you can access the full text of that report...assuming your clearance level is high enough. Last I checked, every last detail, report, and even mention of that mission was classified so highly secret, that there are maybe...a dozen folks in the Empire that have access to it. So good luck.
It'd been a hell of a day, so when Solstice walked through the door, my initial reaction was...well, suffice to say I was glad to see her. If anyone could ease the mental burden of the last twenty four hours, it'd be her. I'm not too proud to admit, but the fact that I knew she was examining the body we'd found, and that I also knew that task was likely to take another hour to ninety minutes, coupled with the fact that she'd staggered in side on and, in retrospect, slightly stumbling, didn't send up any red flags. Any of those things should've been enough to trigger warning bells in my head, but I was young, weary, and not exactly thinking with the appropriate segment of my anatomy when I rose to greet her, no doubt grinning like an idiot.
"Hey there beautiful, wasn't expecting you so soo-"
My cheery greeting was cut short as she stepped into the pool of light cast by one of the few remaining functional overhead lights, and I finally got a good look at...her.
At first glance, it was Solstice, down to the twisted curl of sweat streaked mane on her cheek and the matted patches of her coat where it had been flattened by her armor. Then you saw the jagged, shimmering line of green essentially cutting her body in half. The segmented black carapace, the holed and jagged wings, the dull, multifaceted green eye, starkly contrasted with the storm cloud gray coat, long wings and deep, sheening black eye that occupied the other socket. 'She' appeared frozen in time, half the brilliant mare I'd known for most of the last decade, half...something else.
I was dumbfounded, struck stupid by the shock of such an unexpected visage. Then, with an almost serpentine hiss, it came at me. For something we'd been certain was dead just a few hours earlier, this thing moved like lightning. I didn't even have a chance to cry out before it'd hit me, the sheer force of its impact belied by it's comparatively diminutive frame. I'm not exactly a small fellow, and at the time of this event, was in my prime, fit and powerful as I ever was. Even so, this creature that I had almost a foot of height and a clear hundred pounds on, bowled me over the desk and onto the floor behind it.
Amidst the explosion of accumulated detritus that dominates the surface of your average medical practitioners desk, those items now raining down, clanking off the floor around me, I finally managed to recover enough to get a protective fore leg across this things neck, halting it's mouthful of translucent, needle like teeth a scant few inches from opening my throat.
It snapped and hissed, lunging at my face with buzzing and clicking sounds that were unmistakably insectile. It's form quaked and shuddered, the green line running down the center of its face, marking the boundary between mare and beast, jumped and twitched, like a damaged movie reel. With each lunging snap, thick ropes of inky black drool cascaded from it's maw, splashing against my neck and the side of my face.
It was at this point I may or may not have let loose with a series of descriptive expletives that'd make a sailor blush, and manage to leverage myself off the floor. Using every bit of my training and every ounce of my not inconsiderable strength, I managed to throw the bastard thing off me, sending it crashing back over the desk, the heavy oaken bulk of which went smashing over, adding it's own cacophony to the tumult. I stood quickly, unsteadily, casting around for something to use as a weapon.
It recovered quickly, scrambling back to its hooves and letting loose with a high pitched chittering roar, it came at me again, just as I raised the closest thing to a weapon I could find on such short notice, an ornate, engraved fountain pen. I squared myself, and set to take on this hideous monstrosity with nothing more then a gold leafed writing implement.
As it skittered and stood, pulling it's legs back under it's emaciated frame and coiling to launch itself at me a second time...it stopped.
Suddenly, as quick as a switch being flicked, the hissing, gurgling, clacking, ceased, and it froze, just short of unleashing a pounce that, in all honesty, probably would've been the end of me. It was strange, inexplicable that it would suddenly stop...until something under it's divided chin caught my attention as it reflected the light, gleaming brightly.
A little triangle of metal, a thin sheaf of brightness barely an inch in length had transfixed the creatures neck, just under it's chin. That subtle, almost fragile appearing visual cue became just a bit more pronounced as, with a jerk, it exited the side of the changelings neck, spraying the wall of this room with a viscous, stinking black fluid, more akin to crude oil then blood. It collapsed into a heap, and in its place, there in the doorway, back-lit by the bright lights of the surgical suite, was the true and genuine Solstice. Standing in profile, wing out and it's mounted blade steady and level with her unblinking eyes. It was a toss up what was sharper, the eyes or the blade.
It was an interesting moment as we stood there, eyes locked. Her masterfully crafted and peerlessly lethal blade...against my pen. The corner of her mouth pulled up into a smirk, and she stepped over to the limp form, taking no chances this time, she made sure it was truly dead, as with another quick slash she finished the task of removing it's head. She looked back to me from her task, that smirk still there, holding me transfixed. Her gaze fell to the pen, which had tracked with her as she moved across the office. That smirk grew into a full blown smile.
"No autographs, please."