The Long Road Home

by Nightwatcher

Chapter 4 : Dancing With A Wolf

Luna simply sat, staring not at her sister, not at the wall behind her, Lunas’ eyes held a emptyness never see by Celestia. She simply sat there, the empty look on her face for well over an hour, the only sound breaking the silence was Lunas’ shallow breathing and the near inaudible hum of the ship.

Celestia, fearful that her sister would crumble away, finally spoke up, “Luna...... Please say something....... Anything.”

Luna’s head snapped to her sister as if she had been struck, her eyes blinking slowly, “I...... I don’t know what to say..... I know I should be doing …...something. I should be crying.... screaming..... anything, but I just feel.......”

Celestia moved to Lunas’ side and nuzzled her sister lovingly,” I know sister, I felt the same way, but it’ll pass. We’ll get through this, and whatever else comes, together.”

Luna looked at her sister, “What about Nightmare? I can feel her, scratching it the back of my mind.”

Celestia drew back slightly, her eyes holding a steely determination, “We beat it once, we can do it again.”

Her sister didn’t answer, she only leaned into Celestia. After they shared the embrace for a while Luna leaned away, “This Human..... James was he?” Celestia nodded in confirmation.“Can I meet him?”

Celestia looked surprised, “Are you sure.... completely?”

Luna nodded.

Celestia looked at the ceiling, “Ember?”, She asked to the air.

“I’ll send for him, but he’ll have an escort.”

Luna looked at her sister, “Ember? Who’s that?”

“It...She is an ‘AI’, at least that’s what the Humans call her, the same thing as Vigil. She told me to think of her as a ‘mind without a body’.” Celestia answered.

“How...?” Luna questioned.

“I do not know sister, these Humans are... intelligent, so much more then we will ever be. I’ve yet to grasp the simplest of things they have shown me.”

After a short wait the rooms nano-door activated, putting Luna off, only for Celestia to raise a hoof to silence her for the time being.

Luna’s eyes shot open with a mix of surprise and fear, her joints locking up as a massive, dull-green armor clad, Human walked through the gel like door. It was the same armor from her dreams, a large rectangular device cradled in its arms, its foot falls thudding through her bones as it moved halfway across the distance separating them. It stopped and simply looked at her, the odd white lines on its helmet burning into her. The same runes on the left part of its chest, the only difference being that they were two vertical lines separated by a single horizontal one.

Then walking around the massive horror was a much shorter Human, only as tall as Celestia, the Human had graying blond hair and a short grey stubble on his chin. He shot a look at the other Human, and the massive beast moved back to the far wall.

The Human, James she assumed, walked up to her hand held out a hand, “Luna, It’s good you’re finally awake.” An odd double voice, one she could understand overlapping one she could not greeting her. Luna for her part looked at the Humans hand for a moment before placing her hoof in his palm to which he wrapped his fingers around her hoof and gave it a shake before letting go.

“I’m glad to be awake as well.” She said, eyeing the massive Human.

“Trouble sleeping?” James asked.

Luna passed a glance at her sister, she nodded, “My dreams have been.... troubled. To say the least.”

A alien expression crossed his face, “Chrysalis has experienced similar problems, I’ll see what I can get you too help, if you’ld like.”

“Thank you, James.” Luna said, thankful that her sister that told her earlier that the the Changeling was alive and well aboard this vessel. Still, it was quite a bombshell.

“If that’s all? I’ll have to bid you two farewell for now, give you time to get your bearings.” Celestia and Luna nodded, “Good, Ember can assist you should you need anything.”

James turned and left the massive Human following him out only for Luna to stop him with her gaze,”Ma’am?”

“What does that rune on your chest signify?” She asked, hoping that it would help her decipher her dream.

The massive Human tapped his chest, Luna tilting her head in confusion as the finger hit some kind of water-like film a centimeter off the armor, “It’s a form of identification, they’re numbers. The first is a squad number, the second is the position in said squad. My Identifier is One dash One, that means I’m in squad one, and I’m the commanding officer for the squad. Of course that’s a extremely simplified version, this is only used for fast identification in a firefight if our electronic systems are down, though now their little more than a emblem as our electronics are impossible to knock out unless we’re killed.”

“In my dream there was a Human in armor such as yours and this rune was on it,” Luna pantomimed out the circle on top of a circle, dash, then the vertical line, “What does it mean?”

The Human stilled for a moment, “Eight dash One...... Not much on him that I can get too. All I can see is that he was confirmed KIA, Killed In Action, on Eden at the time of the fall. He was part of a special operations team extracting VIPs, but who or whatever his squad was protecting I can’t see, I don’t have the proper clearance.”

“Oh.... Thank you.” Luna said with a slight nod.

The Human simply nodded back and walked out of the room, leaving Celestia and Luna to their own thoughts.

:~:

Chrysalis trailed up behind a fully armored John as came out of the medical room, fully knowing that he knew she was their.

“How’d she take it?” She asked.

“Better than I expected.” He responded without turning.

“‘Better than I expected’, what do you mean by that?” She asked, slightly perplexed.

He answered by shifting his weapon in his arms, surprising the Changeling.

“You really would, you really would kill her, just like that? Because she’s sick?” She asked.

“Yes.” He said without stopping or any hesitation.

She followed John for a while longer in silence before speaking again, “How do you do it? How do you take a life so..... easily?”

The Human stopped, she could hear and see John’s grip tighten around his weapon, before continuing forward, “I’ve been doing it for a..... very long time, Chrysalis.”

“How long?” She asked.

“Since I was a child.”

“What!?”

“I was conscripted into the UEG military when I was thirteen, HLF killed my parents, so as per standards I was conscripted. Not involuntarily, I was asked if I wanted prevent that happening to anyone else, after a month of thinking it over I said yes.” John responded.

“But you were so.... young.”

“You might think that, but we got through our ‘childhood’ stages of life fast compared to our ancestors. We are educated for eight years, then vocationally trained for another five..... Well not really ‘educated’ in the traditional way, everything we ‘need’ to know is downloaded over the first eight years directly to our minds as to remove any learning curve, then we go into a vocation and additional information is added in. We may be in our teens, could even be considered children by older standards, but we have the minds and bodies of adults. Mine is a special case though, and many still hold to the older ‘natural’ way of raising children.” John clarified.

“What is it like, being a soldier? Do you regret it?” She asked.

“It gets hard sometimes, the HLF, and the UEG, are capable of some........ horrid things, but all-in-all, I’m......content with how everything played out, except for this obviously.” John suddenly stopped for a moment.

“Yes Captain?” He said, Chrysalis, being used to this, waited patiently, knowing not to interrupt.

“What do you mean?” He asked, sounding perplexed.

“What! How long?!” He said below his breath, turning away from Chrysalis. “What’s it doing?...... IFF?..... Did Ember confirm?...... What do you mean ‘superseded’, she was the Chairmans’ AI!........Yes Sir, I’ll be there in a moment.”

“John.... is something wrong?” Chrysalis asked.

“No....nothing.” He said.

“You're lying.” She shot back immediately.

“That’s all you’re getting.” He said, stopping at a nano-door to a circular room. “This is my stop, you should head back to your room.”

Chrysalis brushed passed John, “I don’t like being lied to.”

“Sorry, this is a need to know thing Chrysalis.”

“I don’t need to know something that could be relevant to the continuation of my Changelings?” She said, a hint of venom in her voice.

He didn’t grace her with an answer and he simply walked through the nano-door.

Comments

[dawn_rising]

IT ALIVE!!! HAHAHA!

[Griffomo13]

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRR

[ArtyTheReader]

1986117 My guess is a rogue AI. Good Chapter!