Starfall

by Ghosted Note

Prologue - Baptism of Fire

Starfall
Prologue: Baptism of Fire

Earth has historically been a chaotic place, marred by calamities both natural and created by its dominant inhabitants, the humans, as they try to work out their place in the universe. Despite the various strengths of this species, their ingenuity, determination in the face of adversity, capacity for true compassion in the face of horror, and all of the others, they haven't quite managed to ascend past the flaws that keep them from unifying as a species, habitually striking at each other, mostly out of one sort of fear or another. It is no small irony that in human history, one of the most effective unifying forces has been fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of death, fear of losing that which was held dear, all of these tended to be very effective methods of bringing together the masses against a common perceived enemy. This was one such time.

When magic resurfaced on earth, lying dormant after some distant catastrophe rendered its ley-lines inert, chaos ensued. It did not come as a trickle, but as an explosion, and a few ordinary people suddenly found themselves with power they did not understand, nor could they control, and it was no small amount. Fighting erupted almost overnight as some sought to use the newly ascended mages, seeing benefit to either themselves, their governments and societies, or humanity as a whole, while others sought to eradicate them, seeing the terrifying power, the lack of control, and the lack of moral restraint some mages had as they abused their power to subjugate the world around them. It culminated in the United Nations issuing a declaration that all magic users must be registered and regulated, with harsh punishments for those who did not comply, up to and including summary execution.

While this act did help to reduce some of the chaos, many mages felt persecuted, and sought to break away from the society that had begun to treat them as criminals for circumstances beyond their control. The most accomplished magic users in the land banded together to raise an island out of the Atlantic Ocean, and thus the nation of Avalon came to be, a refuge for those who wished to escape the conflicts surrounding magic. Of course, this display of power did not go unnoticed, and the ability to raise an island sparked the question of how difficult it would be to push land back under the sea, and in unifying fear once again, chaos became outright war as the mages struggled to defend their new haven against the encroaching forces and the mages who had submitted to them...

-----

The High Chancellor smirked triumphantly at the surprised looks on the faces of the U.N. soldiers around her and the four other mages with her. "Greetings gentlemen. Shall you surrender now, or must this get messy?" she said smugly, idly twirling a string of flame around her fingers. Without a word, the soldiers began to lay down their arms as the group began to walk briskly through the bunker until they finally reached the room they sought. Within it was an unsurprisingly well-furnished room, complete with expensive-looking paintings, a lush crimson carpet, a well-stocked bookcase, and all of the other trappings that came in the office of a person who was important on the international level. The room was occupied only by a single well-dressed man in a sharp suit, smoking a cigar. This was Jeremy Foxglove, a resident of Britain responsible for forming and commanding the U.N.-sanctioned team whose real name, like most data on them, was classified, though they were more colloquially known as the Witch Hunters by many a mage.

As the team entered, Foxglove opened a small case and turned it around to present its contents. "Cigar?" he asked in a polite tone.

The mages weren't amused, and their leader stepped forward with a hand of flame outstretched. "You are coming with us to answer for your crimes against our kind. Will you surrender peacefully, or will we have to take you by force? We don't need all of you intact, we just need you to be able to stand...or sit... trial."

The High Chancellor wasn't surprised when the arrogant fool's first response was to laugh, but what he said next caught her off guard and chilled her to the bone. "Well, I suppose you got me. Bravo. We knew that the body doubles wouldn't do a damn thing against your scrying, even if we could make your vision a little bit murkier with our own assets. You'd only come for the real thing, and with a target so juicy, you'd send your best. So, congratulations, you got me. Care to see what you've won? Or should I say, what your friends back at Avalon have won?"

The reaction was instantaneous. Two of the mages vanished and Foxglove found himself unceremoniously flung and pinned to the wall by a third, the cigar falling from his mouth to smolder on the floor. The High Chancellor stepped forward and placed a hand on his throat. "What. Did. You. Do?"

Foxglove shrugged as best as he could in his position. "Well, bullets certainly weren't working. Even the least of your folks could block them. That's why we favor explosives so much down here. More raw force and more surface area to shield. Of course, Avalon had far too many skilled mages to just waltz a bomber or two in and level the place. So, a few of ours managing to worm our way into citizenship with Avalon, and we were ready to take out those responsible for keeping the shields on Avalon functional. Some of you are a little beyond our means of just killing, especially when you're in your home turf, so the easiest solution was to draw you out. You didn't have many military minds in your camp to back up that raw power, do you?"

"You're speaking in past tense," one of the two mages behind the leader commented warily.

"That's because, as your other two friends have likely found out by now, we smuggled in a little surprise while you were gone. With the threat you pose, we decided to take the nuclear option, quite literally. This fight's over. Your kind won't ever threaten humanity again."

Foxglove dropped to the floor unceremoniously as the High Chancellor fell to her knees. "You...you just murdered thousands of civilians, people who didn't have a part in the conflict and just wanted to get away... And you're here now, telling us about it like you're life's not on the line. What sort of sick creature are you?" Her hollow voice rang through the air as her companions stood in shock.

The response she got was another infuriating chuckle. "You remember D.C.? Or how about how half of Australia's now a wasteland? What about all of the frozen corpses strewn about Russia? A few of you decide we're beneath you, and MILLIONS die. I couldn't give a damn about a few thousand time bombs exploding a bit early. That's a pretty good cause to die for in my book."

Several seconds of silence passed before she got back on her feet, and turned to her two companions, speaking in a dead voice. "Go, try to find any survivors. He's right. It's all over." She turned back to Foxglove, her gaze passing right through him and settling on some unknown point that seemed a thousand miles away. "You said you don't mind dying for your beliefs?"

He nodded, and she surrendered to the wave of hurt and anger that she had barely been containing before her last companions had teleported away. "Damn right."

"Good."

-----
2 Weeks Later
-----

The smell of burning flesh was so strong she could taste it. The screams of the dying had been drowned out by the constant thud of distant impacts long ago, the tell-tale beat of her last war-drum as the meteors fell from the heavens and impacted across the land, rendering the land as broken and ruined as the island that had once housed all of her friends, family, and anyone she had ever cared about. As she surveyed her empire of rubble, flame, and corpses, she knew that there was nothing worth saving. The magic flowed through her once more, surrounding her, supplanting her sense of self as she kept channeling the power as though she hoped it would override everything else within her. In the distance, they almost looked like falling stars.

-----
1 Year After
-----

As the two scavengers fled into the distance, their words echoed in her mind. 'Get away from us!', 'Leave us alone, please!' She vaguely registered their meanings, and something in her broken mind clicked into place. She had to get away. The fire inside had eaten her away, it seemed, and the vague urge to survive kicked in as her mind decided it was finally time to crawl and scrabble its way against what had been consuming it. At this point she couldn't stop channeling the magic if she tried, and the air around her sizzled and shimmered with power. She had gotten her wish, and it was all she could do to process anything besides the sheer power that had been gradually ripping away at her sanity, and more recently, her body, as the magic she held within her became too much for her frail human body to handle. Parts of her skin had started to burn away, leaving lesions and sores that leaked blood and wispy blue streams of raw magical power, and she had lost the use of her eyes months ago as they burned away, leaving her to see with nothing but the same power that was both sustaining her and killing her. She had to get away. This thought became internalized, and upon this foundation was the lean-to of her mind reestablished, memories being recalled and vaguely connected as she began her task.

Being immersed within her own magic for so long had its benefits, despite all things, and she could just as easily see the threads of space and time like her eyes could pick out the weave of a fabric before they had become the black pits they were now. She didn't know exactly what she was looking for, but she searched anyway, operating on some base, primal instinct as she cast her consciousness into the nether to try and find some place where the magic might have a harder time eroding what was left.

She couldn't tell how much time had passed, nor was she entirely sure what time was anymore, but something within her pulled her towards a small ripple in the fabric of reality. She dipped the toe of her consciousness into it, and found it inviting, but something held her back as she pushed and pulled and struggled to immerse herself within this strange place. She had to have it though. Every time she touched it, it was like a balm to her very soul, a refuge from the fire. She needed to find a way in! Like an animal desperately fleeing its predator her mind raced, a thousand fractured thoughts rising up like roots to break her stride until finally she felt a snag and understood. She had to leave behind these frayed and torn clothes, else the thorns within would forever catch upon them and keep her from escaping into this bliss. With a final cry that leaked out of her mind and through her mouth, she ripped herself from her own rapidly combusting body and escaped into the void.

------

Princess Luna watched silently from her balcony. Her unsurpassed mastery over the night sky made it into a canvas for her to paint upon, and now her subjects at last had started to look upon her work in awe and admiration, as the brilliant sparkle of starlight and the cool glow of the moon reached out across the land. She was content, a feeling unknown to her before she had returned from her banishment. Never before had life been so good to her, nor had she ever known so many friends, like Twi- She paused her reflections, a frown marring a face that many would claim to be an example of the epitome of Equestrian beauty. Nopony would know it wasn't hers, but she knew the moment she saw a shooting star make its way across the sky that it wasn't hers, and that it was significant. As the star impacted in the White Tail Woods to the southwest of Canterlot, she was already out of the room, intent on waking her sister and getting to the bottom of this matter. The things that appeared in the dark of the night were often dangerous, and she was their warden, ever vigilant to keep her subjects safe as they slumbered. She would not ever fail them those subjects again.

Author's Note:

So yeah, gonna try and get back into the swing of things. Wish me luck. Need to find a new proofreader as well.